> See e.g. the early chapters of "Sapiens" (Yuval Harari).
This part of Harari's book have been debunked quite a few times already: his views of pre-agricultural are romanticized and doesn't match with the work of the specialists of this period. (While Harari is indeed an historian, he's a specialist of medieval times and has little authority on early-humans history).
Btw, I'm not even disagreing with you about agriculture, I just wanted to point out that quoting Harari on that has really little value.
Thanks, @littlestymar. To me, Harari's take seems more neutral than "romanticized". I share his skepticism of those who claim concrete knowledge of aspects of pre-literate human culture at which, logically, one can only guess or imagine. This might counter your point about his relative expertise / authority for that time period.
That said, I'm no historian, just a layperson who found Harari's work (so far -- I haven't yet finished "Sapiens") thought-provoking and interesting. In the relevant early chapters his perspective is refreshingly different from the norm -- in some ways comparable (for me) to Zinn's "A People's History of the US", in that it provides a PoV sufficiently removed from the standard narrative to serve as a reminder of how shallow and incomplete any one-sided version of events must be. The GP's citing of Pinker likely belongs in this camp, too: referencing an author whose ideas have merit (eg Pinker's computational theory in "How the Mind Works"), independent of their ultimate status as authoritative works.
This part of Harari's book have been debunked quite a few times already: his views of pre-agricultural are romanticized and doesn't match with the work of the specialists of this period. (While Harari is indeed an historian, he's a specialist of medieval times and has little authority on early-humans history).
Btw, I'm not even disagreing with you about agriculture, I just wanted to point out that quoting Harari on that has really little value.