Flesh and Blood (2021)(theanarchistlibrary.org)
theanarchistlibrary.org
Flesh and Blood (2021)
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/david-graeber-and-david-wengrow-flesh-and-blood
32 comments
You would like: Hars to be a God by Aleksei German, and the new Harvest (2024) movie
Looks like some excellent suggestions, thanks!
Enjoy. Will watch the Verhoeven too. Hope he gets to make his new one.
If you missed the citation at top: David Graeber wrote Dawn of Everything which is full of studies (largely of American natives), that contrast the political structures with the West at that time. This article is from one of those chapters.
If you found the idea of "theatrical" rules or "play kings" interesting, I highly recommend you give it a read, it's full of interesting stories that attempt to dethrone the idea of the inevitability of centralized authority and monopolization of violence, and the inevitability of agriculture.
If you found the idea of "theatrical" rules or "play kings" interesting, I highly recommend you give it a read, it's full of interesting stories that attempt to dethrone the idea of the inevitability of centralized authority and monopolization of violence, and the inevitability of agriculture.
Graeber's entire body of work is fantastic - there's a "mythology of progress" that's endemic to modern western culture, in which the current moment and way we live are the inevitable outcomes and apotheosis of human nature, that it's all natural and the way things simply must be. Graeber's books are an enjoyable, accessible dismantling of this mythology. "Debt: the first 5000 years" is an essential read, and both "The Utopia of Rules" and "Bullshit Jobs" are fantastic.
(If you're through Graeber's library and still looking for intellectual bricks to throw, James C Scott is a good chaser - "Seeing like a State" is a profoundly enlightening book, and "Against the Grain" is something of a diet "Dawn of Everything". I have heard great things about "The Art of Not Being Governed", but it's a bit denser than the other two and I haven't made my way though it yet.)
(If you're through Graeber's library and still looking for intellectual bricks to throw, James C Scott is a good chaser - "Seeing like a State" is a profoundly enlightening book, and "Against the Grain" is something of a diet "Dawn of Everything". I have heard great things about "The Art of Not Being Governed", but it's a bit denser than the other two and I haven't made my way though it yet.)
Yup, a must read. Made me wish I'd studied archeology as a pup.
That guy Harari in his best seller Sapiens compares humans to bonobos and chimps, without choice. A comparison rooted in modern day racism. Contrast this with anthropologists of today, like Levi-Strauss whose study of Nambikwara society found no fixed roles but seasonally adjusted politics and material economies, not some lockstep progression of discreet phases from gathering to hunting to farming as presumed by Turgot. Studies of Eskimo changing their names, swapping partners seasonally or of Lakhota buffalo police, or Cheyenne shifts from coercion to dispersion seasonally refute such a progression as does the enduring shift of Stonehenge druids away from grain farming to hazlenut gathering as primary food staple. Human social adaptability and innovation is nonlinear.
Migratory neolithic society was porous, people flowed in and out of various societal groups at different seasons, ranging across huge distances.
That guy Harari in his best seller Sapiens compares humans to bonobos and chimps, without choice. A comparison rooted in modern day racism. Contrast this with anthropologists of today, like Levi-Strauss whose study of Nambikwara society found no fixed roles but seasonally adjusted politics and material economies, not some lockstep progression of discreet phases from gathering to hunting to farming as presumed by Turgot. Studies of Eskimo changing their names, swapping partners seasonally or of Lakhota buffalo police, or Cheyenne shifts from coercion to dispersion seasonally refute such a progression as does the enduring shift of Stonehenge druids away from grain farming to hazlenut gathering as primary food staple. Human social adaptability and innovation is nonlinear.
Migratory neolithic society was porous, people flowed in and out of various societal groups at different seasons, ranging across huge distances.
The Davids (plural) who wrote the article, are also the authors of The Dawn of Everything.
His “Debt: The first 5,000 years” is excellent also
YC partner cofounder tlb also has recommended the book
Too bad this got insta-flagged, it's not exactly a political text.
Too bad this got insta-flagged, it's not exactly a political text.
> Private property first appeared as a concept in sacred contexts
I can't watch a couple of dogs fighting over a bone and believe that the concept of private property is a recent or human or even mammalian invention.
I can't watch a couple of dogs fighting over a bone and believe that the concept of private property is a recent or human or even mammalian invention.
One thing I learned from "the dawn of everything" is that societies have had diverse approaches to property over the millennia. And I've seen that it varies by country and region, even today.
Anecdote: My family went on a walking holiday in England. The entire country is crisscrossed by a network of walking paths. Many go through private farms. The same thing is rare, or even nonexistent, in the US. We were told that although we're allowed to use the land, there are certain stipulations, such as taking care not to damage the crops or disturb the livestock.
Here in the states, my family "owns" the land that our house is on, but with a variety of limitations.
Anecdote: My family went on a walking holiday in England. The entire country is crisscrossed by a network of walking paths. Many go through private farms. The same thing is rare, or even nonexistent, in the US. We were told that although we're allowed to use the land, there are certain stipulations, such as taking care not to damage the crops or disturb the livestock.
Here in the states, my family "owns" the land that our house is on, but with a variety of limitations.
I feel like this is an instance of "common senseism" for lack of a better term. You're not really engaging with the concepts presented (legally enshrined concepts of private property in a capitalist system) and dismissing it with some folksy sounding idea. Like others on the thread mentioned, you could pick a different arbitrary animal and come up with the complete opposite "conclusion"
One difference is that a single dog can't claim to own all the bones in the country.
[deleted]
This so very much.
But of course you could argue that dogs were badly influenced by humans .. but also most other wild animals know the concept of territory and fight over it.
But I think was meant with the quote is formalized property. Ownership tied to a piece of paper eventually - and this is indeed something different at some point.
But of course you could argue that dogs were badly influenced by humans .. but also most other wild animals know the concept of territory and fight over it.
But I think was meant with the quote is formalized property. Ownership tied to a piece of paper eventually - and this is indeed something different at some point.
It varies. Cats are more territorial than dogs for instance.
Surely it does. Also dogs, like wolves are pack animals. So not the single dog, but rather the pack has a territory.
(And dogs include humans as their pack).
Are you a dog?
What of the cooperation an ant colony?
People love finding examples that reinforce their biases
What of the cooperation an ant colony?
People love finding examples that reinforce their biases
You ever seen two ant colonies fight?
Moving the goal posts…it was proposed that two agents (dogs fighting over a bone) is proof of something I can only assume is the position of cooperation being “unnatural” when in fact it’s not.
This then moves the goal posts to the claim that multi-agent internally cooperative affinity groups can’t coexist. Dogs don’t fight if there are plenty of bones to go around. Plenty of ant groups coexist in the literature.
So, you’re most likely infected with the myth that there’s scarce resources.
This idea of the humans are inextricably and unambiguously violent or in a state where we must compete for scarce resources, is a trope that is both wrong and a threat to long term peace
This then moves the goal posts to the claim that multi-agent internally cooperative affinity groups can’t coexist. Dogs don’t fight if there are plenty of bones to go around. Plenty of ant groups coexist in the literature.
So, you’re most likely infected with the myth that there’s scarce resources.
This idea of the humans are inextricably and unambiguously violent or in a state where we must compete for scarce resources, is a trope that is both wrong and a threat to long term peace
"this is my cheeseburger"
is different from
"all 100 people in my village need a cheeseburger very badly; this piece of paper says that if any of them lay a finger on it, they get carted off to jail"
they're more referring to the latter
is different from
"all 100 people in my village need a cheeseburger very badly; this piece of paper says that if any of them lay a finger on it, they get carted off to jail"
they're more referring to the latter
Private property is a legal designation for the ownership of property by non-governmental legal entities.
I think maybe you're referring to personal property.
I think maybe you're referring to personal property.
Maybe the dogs should write their own history books.
from a quick glance at the text i think he means legally institutionalized private property or equivalent.
but he as an anthropologist has argued in other venues to revise historical origins of various concepts like currency and debt based on available evidence rather than academic myth.
which is an earliest known origins argument based on available archaeological evidence rather than true earliest origins or mythologized origins for propagandized explainability. Of course this isnt relevant to your dog point, but just to contextualize a reoccurring theme of Graeber.
but he as an anthropologist has argued in other venues to revise historical origins of various concepts like currency and debt based on available evidence rather than academic myth.
which is an earliest known origins argument based on available archaeological evidence rather than true earliest origins or mythologized origins for propagandized explainability. Of course this isnt relevant to your dog point, but just to contextualize a reoccurring theme of Graeber.
also worth noting they published papers together with wengrow being an archaeologist and taking that perspective. he is friendly on twitter if you want to talk to him...
[deleted]
Leftists (Graeber was an Anarchist) distinguish personal property from private property. Personal property are your personal effects. Your clothes, your car, your desk, your pen. Private property is the ownership of land and, later, industrial means of production. Things which have been historically used in an allegedly communal context, or worked on by communities of people, but their product is privatized for the person who provided the capital for the land or industrial tools.
I don't agree with this view of economics, but this is generally the line of thought among leftist thinkers
I don't agree with this view of economics, but this is generally the line of thought among leftist thinkers
At least in the book this link summarizes, it looks beyond anarchism and isn't written through that lens specifically
There's a new film out I just saw at TIFF by Tsangari who produced DOGTOOTH by Yorgos Lanthimos called HARVEST with Caleb Landry Jones, anyhow it's a telling of the early days of the Inclosure Act, an interesting period of transition, performed w anachronistic timelessness
There's a new film out I just saw at TIFF by Tsangari who produced DOGTOOTH by Yorgos Lanthimos called HARVEST with Caleb Landry Jones, anyhow it's a telling of the early days of the Inclosure Act, an interesting period of transition, performed w anachronistic timelessness
[deleted]
[1]: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089153/