On Thu, 24 Feb 2000, gordon wrote:

> Depending on when you start the clock, our primitive
> Cro-Magnon ancestors and their ancestors had something like 2,000,000 years
> to do something significant with all that free time. Two million years is a
> very long time and they have almost nothing to show for it. Their neolithic
> progeny accomplished more in 10 thousand years than they did in the 2
> million prior!

The great cultural Leap Forward began about 40,000 years ago,
well before the advent of agriculture.  I don't pretend to be
able to explain it, but it's clear that agriculture is not the
whole story.

Todd Moody