this post was submitted on 24 Jun 2026
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On the other hand, why do you think we gave up the hunter/gatherer life style?
Cultivating grapes for wine and grain for beer was the origin of civilization!
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2501758-did-ancient-humans-start-farming-so-they-could-drink-more-beer/
I hate that alcohol, such an obvious health detriment, is so ingrained in culture that people don't even question it... Your link makes it worse!
Like the link points out, we were drinking before we had written language.
It's a matter of dealing with life on life's terms. The reality is that people like drinking. Sometimes people drink too much, and a few unlucky folks can't drink anything without risking death.
I ocne read a story about a Vietnam era war correspondent. He was a pacifist before going to cover combat and seeing combat up close made him hate war even more.
At one point a publisher asks him to contribute an article that 'deglamorizes war.'
He wrote back that deglamorizing war would be as easy as deglamorizing sex.
Let's fire up a peace pipe with tobacco then!
/j
Cool, let's. /nj
A ha ha ha Cheech & Chong?! That's an old memory 😁😁😁 loved it, but I don't even dare thinking how badly it could have aged 😬😁
I hate that existence, such an obvious health detriment, is so ingrained in culture that people don't even question it...
With one important difference: Wine was often diluted back then and beer was not as strong as it is today, so it was much less dangerous on the whole, and it was so weak that even children drank it instead of the terrible water of the time. Though they also drank water when it was good.
Less strong, but since they drank beer instead of water overall consumption was higher. Lots of people should still drink less though.
Yeah! It was seen as an everyday good feeling healthy thing back then and not just something to get wasted on, though that happened a lot too. I'd take the ancient mindset of moderation over today's alcohol addicted society anyday.
Not sure it was so much about good feeling. From what I read it was more about booze being less likely to grant you a plague debuff than water back in the days.
It's almost certainly both. It's not like alcohol is the only drug humans have used. Most do not have that justification, yet they're still used.
Thankfully we haven't progressed since then!
The oldest recipe we have found was a recipe for beer.
Good thing someone else did the work long ago, so I don't need to keep drinking it.
So you're telling me without alcohol I could have spent my life picking berries before I died of a toothache at 25? And instead I'm reading excel sheets and will die a prolonged death after years of chemo at 85?
Damn alcohol really is the cause of all my problems...
No one is forcing you to brush your teeth.
True, but its illegal for me to wander my neighborhood and pick berries from "private property"
Realistically, if you eat out of trash cans you'll have the same experience, and if you're quiet and neat, no one will report you.
Found the racoon
We prefer “opportunistic omnivore” but yes
The "dying at 25" thing is the result of a common misrepresentation of data. Infant mortality rates were significantly higher in the past, so the average gets thrown off. But, if you remove those data points (to reflect post-infancy mortality), you'd be living roughly the same amount of time.
Back when life expectancy was 45.
Popular misconception.
There were a lot of people who never made it out of childhood, which skews the average down.
But if you made it to adulthood, you had a pretty good chance of making it to 65 or so.
That's how averages work. Math.
That's also why averages aren't a good measure of a lot of things and are misleading.