On 11 May 2004 at 23:46, william wrote:
> If it's true that in paleolithic the population of the whole earth was
> about 15 million, there should have been little competition.
>
> William

I'm not sure this stands up logically -without the level of support we take for granted it seems
unlikely that humans would spread out the way we do now. I suppose if I want to support
this I will have to dig into material I haven't looked at in a long time... so I freely admit I am
just guessing about that, though in fact, I was intending to make a more or less  ironic joke
about human behavior.

The underlying idea was that people seem to be compelled to struggle over control of
resources even when there's plenty to go around, and if we think that maybe our species
hasn't changed a whole lot, well, that would imply conflict no matter *what* the population
size might have been. The reason I find this amusing is that the thought recurs in my
imagination every time there is a fresh outbreak of hostilities on this list.

There are plenty of people who believe in a peaceful golden age at the dawn of the human
era, and the struggle over interpretation of the available evidence is fierce. I've more or less
decided I am unlikely to ever know for certain, which has freed me to enjoy considering the
various theories without the stress of having to choose a side. Personally, I like Elaine
Morgan's Aquatic Ape premise for sheer chutzpah and interest - don't bother telling me how
scarce the evidence is, I already know that.

Molly