jean-claude,

> And hunter gatherers are unemployed all their life . The notion of work is
> an artificial one

It seems to me there is nothing artificial about the distinction between
running around in a loin cloth in the pursuit of food because one is forced
by hunger to do so, and sitting around on one's duff playing checkers with a
friend because it happens to suit one's fancy at the moment. One is work and
the other is play.

I think your real argument here is that paleos had a healthy attitude toward
work, which is not something I would contest. Paleolithic people may have
been happy hard-working folk but that is really beside the point.

I think the more general problem here is that while we all agree that
paleolithic people enjoyed what we would now consider a healthy diet, we
attribute that healthy diet to different causes. We are tempted to give our
paleo ancestors more credit than is due them.

You and others seem to want to ascribe some mystical wisdom to their
primitive way of life. As for me I do not suffer any delusion that our
primitive ancestors were strong and healthy as a result of any innate wisdom
they may have possessed. I do not ascribe any such special natural wisdom to
them or emulate them in any spiritual or emotional way. I resist the
temptation to deify my ancestors, especially those distant primitive
ancestors. I think they were for the most part savage unsophisticated brutes
who beat their women and killed their enemies for little reason.

Occasionally I even ponder the possibility that we would have descended from
strict vegetarians but for the fact that our violent omnivorous hominid
ancestors killed off whatever peaceful plant-eating tribes may have existed
in order to get more food and grub for themselves. Evolution is about
survival of the fittest, which does not often mean survival of the most pure
at heart.

-gts