Although Jared Diamond makes some interesting and controversial points, I would look at the Neolithic Revolution as a necessary evil on the path towards a better future. Sure, the adoption of agriculture led to a temporary decline in living standards, but without it we are just smart animals. Agriculture isn't a mistake, it's a necessary foundation for civilization. Without the solid base of knowing where our next meal is coming from, we'd have stalled in our cultural development; we'd have got as far as music and dance, and maybe as far as firearms, but no further. We'd certainly never have managed to develop opera or construct the Taj Mahal or formulate and then solve the Poincaré Conjecture. We'd have primitive arts and no science, and we'd be too busy dealing with the day-to-day pressures of …show more content…
This increase in population has had many more benefits: more innovation, more culture, and more opportunities for more people to experience life on this planet. Fundamentally, the main argument is that they were healthier and happier, but the problem is that there were- and still are- too few of them to do anything exceptional. The Neolithic Revolution, despite the disadvantages that followed, was the best thing that happened in human history. The shift from hunting and gathering to agriculture was ultimately necessary to the rise of modern civilization by creating the foundation for the later process of industrialization and sustained economic growth. The advanced society we live in today would have never happened without the Neolithic Revolution. Hunter-gatherer populations were too few and far between. Farming supported larger populations, which produced greater ideas and technological advances, which support even larger populations and so