An unintentional takeaway from this attention is solidifying my belief that if you’re describing a new specific concept, you should make up a name too. For most purposes, this is for reasons like the ones described by Malcolm Ocean here (https://malcolmocean.com/2016/02/sparkly-pink-purple-ball-thing/). But also, sometimes, a New York Times bestseller will cite you, and you’ll only find out as you set up Google alerts.
(And then once you make a unique name, set up google alerts for it. The book just cites “eukaryote” rather than my name, and this post rather than the one on my blog. Which I guess goes to show you that you can put anything in a book.)
Anyways, I’m actually a little embarrassed because my data on human populations isn’t super accurate—they start at the year 50,000 BCE, when there were humans well before that. But those populations were small, probably not enough to significantly influence the result. I’m not a historian, and really don’t want to invest the effort needed for more accurate numbers, although if someone would like to, please go ahead.
But it also shows that people are interested in quantification. I’ve written a lot of posts that are me trying to find a set of numbers, and making lots and lots of assumptions along the way. But then you have some plausible numbers. It turns out that you can just do this, and don’t need a qualification in Counting Animals or whatever, just supply your reasoning and attach the appropriate caveats. There are no experts, but you can become the first one.
As an aside, in the intervening years, I’ve become more interested in the everyday life of the past—of all of the earlier chunks that made up so much of the funnel. I read an early 1800′s housekeeping book, “The Frugal Housewife”, which advises mothers to teach their children how to knit starting at age 4, and to keep all members of the family knitting in their downtime. And it’s horrifying, but maybe that’s what you have to do to keep your family warm in the northeast US winter. No downtime that isn’t productive. I’ve taken up knitting lately and enjoy it, but at the same time, I love that it’s a hobby and not a requirement. A lot of human experience must have been at the razor’s edge of survival, Darwin’s hounds nipping at our heels. I prefer 2020.
If you want a slight taste of everyday life at the midpoint of human experience, you might be interested in the Society for Creative Anachronism. It features swordfighting and court pagentry but also just a lot of everyday crafts—sewing, knitting, brewing, cooking. If you want to learn about medieval soapmaking or forging, they will help you find out.
Quick authorial review: This post has brought me the greatest joy from other sources referring to it, including Marginal Revolution (https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2018/10/funnel-human-experience.html) and the New York Times bestseller “The Uninhabitable Earth”. I was kind of hoping to supply a fact about the world that people could use in many different lights, and they have (see those and also like https://unherd.com/2018/10/why-are-woke-liberals-such-enemies-of-the-past/ )
An unintentional takeaway from this attention is solidifying my belief that if you’re describing a new specific concept, you should make up a name too. For most purposes, this is for reasons like the ones described by Malcolm Ocean here (https://malcolmocean.com/2016/02/sparkly-pink-purple-ball-thing/). But also, sometimes, a New York Times bestseller will cite you, and you’ll only find out as you set up Google alerts.
(And then once you make a unique name, set up google alerts for it. The book just cites “eukaryote” rather than my name, and this post rather than the one on my blog. Which I guess goes to show you that you can put anything in a book.)
Anyways, I’m actually a little embarrassed because my data on human populations isn’t super accurate—they start at the year 50,000 BCE, when there were humans well before that. But those populations were small, probably not enough to significantly influence the result. I’m not a historian, and really don’t want to invest the effort needed for more accurate numbers, although if someone would like to, please go ahead.
But it also shows that people are interested in quantification. I’ve written a lot of posts that are me trying to find a set of numbers, and making lots and lots of assumptions along the way. But then you have some plausible numbers. It turns out that you can just do this, and don’t need a qualification in Counting Animals or whatever, just supply your reasoning and attach the appropriate caveats. There are no experts, but you can become the first one.
As an aside, in the intervening years, I’ve become more interested in the everyday life of the past—of all of the earlier chunks that made up so much of the funnel. I read an early 1800′s housekeeping book, “The Frugal Housewife”, which advises mothers to teach their children how to knit starting at age 4, and to keep all members of the family knitting in their downtime. And it’s horrifying, but maybe that’s what you have to do to keep your family warm in the northeast US winter. No downtime that isn’t productive. I’ve taken up knitting lately and enjoy it, but at the same time, I love that it’s a hobby and not a requirement. A lot of human experience must have been at the razor’s edge of survival, Darwin’s hounds nipping at our heels. I prefer 2020.
If you want a slight taste of everyday life at the midpoint of human experience, you might be interested in the Society for Creative Anachronism. It features swordfighting and court pagentry but also just a lot of everyday crafts—sewing, knitting, brewing, cooking. If you want to learn about medieval soapmaking or forging, they will help you find out.