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The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race - Jared Diamond 1999
(www.discovermagazine.com)
this post was submitted on 21 May 2026
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To be fair height is a pretty good proxy of nutritional adequacy in childhood. Being neighbors is important because the genetics will be similar.
Sure, it can be. But the fact it that they're STILL shorter with agriculture as the global standard kinda defeats the point
If the genetics create taller adults using the pre-agricultural diet, then that is a valid data point to keep track of, it isn't pointless. It's a indication the current diet isn't optimizing the genetic protentional
That's my point, though. We don't have predators to fight so size is no longer the advantage it used to be.
Our height is not what put us at the top of the food change. Our "genetic potential" is in our brains.
Height doesn't help us take down a diprotodon, it helps us win against the neighbouring tribe
Sure, but that, too, became a lot less important
Sure, but evolution is slow, we've only had farming and cities for 10k years, less in many places; hundreds of years for natives of America and Australia. We're still adapted to the tribal life hunting and gathering
It is possible our genetics have adapted to a shorter height, but 30,000 years is not much time for that and we have the record demonstrating the drop in height at the time of agriculture.
So, the question is if modern people from these regions take on a pre-agriculture diet, will the get taller? I think it's likely
Right, question is - what else is being stunted by the major change in diet? It might include brain function.
Maybe, but agriculture is a necessity to feed a population our size. We've hunted hundreds of species to extinction by eating them faster than they can reproduce
Agriculture wasn't the mistake. Population growth was.