Agriculture & Civilization | Khan Academy (2024)

FAQs

Is agriculture better than hunting and gathering? ›

Flexi Says: Agriculture is considered better than hunting and gathering because it allows for a more reliable and controllable food supply. With agriculture, people can grow crops and raise animals in a specific area, which can be harvested when needed.

The oldest recorded civilization in the world is the Mesopotamia civilization. Overall, the 4 oldest civilizations of the world are Mesopotamia Civilization, Egyptian Civilization, Indus Valley Civilization, and Chinese Civilization. This article will briefly throw light on the oldest civilizations of the world.

Agriculture has been a crucial aspect of human civilization since the dawn of time. It has allowed us to domesticate plants and animals, and cultivate the land to produce the food we need to survive. Without agriculture, human life as we know it would not be possible.

With the beginnings of the Neolithic Revolution about 12,000 years ago, when agricultural practices were first developed, some groups abandoned hunter-gatherer practices to establish permanent settlements that could provide for much larger populations.

Changes in climate may have made it too cold or too dry to rely on wild food sources. Greater population density may have demanded more food than could be harvested from the wild, and farming provided more food per acre, even if it did require more time and energy.

The social scientist Luke Kemp analyzed dozens of civilizations, which he defined as "a society with agriculture, multiple cities, military dominance in its geographical region and a continuous political structure," from 3000 BC to 600 AD and calculated that the average life span of a civilization is close to 340 years ...

1. Egypt. Egypt is the oldest country in the world if we accept its founding as 3150 B.C.E. That's the estimated beginning of the reign of Narmer, the first king of the first dynasty of Egypt, and the end of the period considered predynastic or ancient Egypt.

A civilization is a complex human society that may have certain characteristics of cultural and technological development.

Another definition of History would be to count the start of a civilization with its earliest mentions. The '5000 years' claim traces the origins of Chinese civilization to the “three sovereigns and five emperors” and the mythical Xia dynasty that are mentioned in numerous classics of Chinese folklore (Gordon, 2010).

What civilization existed 1000 years ago? ›

Around 4000 B.C., the earliest phase of the Sumerian culture arose as the oldest civilization in the Mesopotamia region, in what is now mostly Iraq.

Many factors play into how much a farm worker is paid. The average farm worker family earns a total of $25,000 to $29,999 per year, which includes both farm labor and any other source of income. Less than ½ of farm workers have health insurance, and 20% of them live below the poverty line.

Without agriculture, there would be no government.

Finally, without the concept of agriculture, trade routes would've never been established, government would have never been invented, and the transition from paleolithic to neolithic would never happen. If agriculture wasn't discovered, people would not be settling.

Besides malnutrition, starvation, and epidemic diseases, farming helped bring another curse upon humanity: deep class divisions. Hunter-gatherers have little or no stored food, and no concentrated food sources, like an orchard or a herd of cows: they live off the wild plants and animals they obtain each day.

Hunting as a more sustainable option

Hunting meat is undoubtedly more sustainable than factory farming. There's none of the land and water pollution that comes with farming practices, and the meat is usually healthier too as the animals haven't been pumped with antibiotics and hormones.

Expert-Verified Answer

Previously, people lived by hunting and gathering their food. Farmers were able to produce a far greater quantity of food and, as a result, could have a greater number of children; nevertheless, the food had a lesser nutritious quality.

Hunting and gathering is actually a very efficient system that much of the time produces ample food. The main disadvantages are an inability to maintain surpluses against bad times or for supplying non-food producers (craftsmen, leaders, etc.)

Hunters can bring in more net new business, increasing the company's sales and taking business from competitors. So they may need to be compensated accordingly. For farmers, retaining customer might be the No. 1 priority and, as such, upselling might need to be compensated appropriately.