Different mechanisms shaped the transition to farming in Europe and the North American Woodland

The introduction and emergence of agriculture into Eastern North America (ENA) and Europe proceeded very differently in both subcontinents: it varied in timing, speed, and mechanism. Common to both regions, agricultural subsistence profited from the introduction of major staple crops which had been domesticated elsewhere; in both regions, the temperate climate and originally predominant forest vegetation provided an environmental context conducive to agriculture. To understand the different paths to agricultural subsistence, an integrated view of technological innovation, domestication and exchange of domesticates, migration and trade is required within the constraints imposed by the environmental context and geography. This study makes use of a numerical model of regional socio-technological evolution which builds on adaptation of important characteristics of prehistoric societies such as technology and subsistence diversity. With this Global Land Use and Technological Evolution Simulator (GLUES), regional transitions from foraging to agropastoralism, and associated land use and demographic changes are realistically hindcasted. I show that the model is capable of explaining the different timing, speed, and transition mechanisms: Europe received a large package of foreign domesticates and converted rapidly to agriculture, this fast transition can be best explained with demic and cultural diffusion followed by fast adoption by resident foragers. In contrast, ENA trajectories show a more gradual transition. Hunting-gathering and agropastoral life style coexisted for a long time and agriculture was adopted slowly into the existing subsistence scheme.Comment: Submitted to Archaeology, Ethnology and Anthropology of Eurasia, 9 pages, 6 figures, 1 tabl

Small world effect in an epidemiological model

A model for the spread of an infection is analyzed for different population structures. The interactions within the population are described by small world networks, ranging from ordered lattices to random graphs. For the more ordered systems, there is a fluctuating endemic state of low infection. At a finite value of the disorder of the network, we find a transition to self-sustained oscillations in the size of the infected subpopulation

Climate and society in long-term perspective: opportunities and pitfalls in the use of historical datasets

Recent advances in palaeoclimatology and the growing digital availability of large historical datasets on human activity have created new opportunities to investigate long-term interactions between climate and society. However, noncritical use of historical datasets can create pitfalls, resulting in misleading findings that may become entrenched as accepted knowledge. We demonstrate pitfalls in the content, use and interpretation of historical datasets in research into climate and society interaction through a systematic review of recent studies on the link between climate and (a) conflict incidence, (b) plague outbreaks and (c) agricultural productivity changes. We propose three sets of interventions to overcome these pitfalls, which involve a more critical and multidisciplinary collection and construction of historical datasets, increased specificity and transparency about uncertainty or biases, and replacing inductive with deductive approaches to causality. This will improve the validity and robustness of interpretations on the long-term relationship between climate and society

Evaluating the effectiveness of agricultural adaptation to climate change in preindustrial society

The effectiveness of agricultural adaptation determines the vulnerability of this sector to climate change, particularly during the preindustrial era. However, this effectiveness has rarely been quantitatively evaluated, specifically at a large spatial and long-term scale. The present study covers this case of preindustrial society in AD 1500–1800. Given the absence of technological innovations in this time frame, agricultural production was chiefly augmented by cultivating more land (land input) and increasing labor input per land unit (labor input). Accordingly, these two methods are quantitatively examined. Statistical results show that within the study scale, land input is a more effective approach of mitigating climatic impact than labor input. Nonetheless, these observations collectively improve Boserup's theory from the perspective of a large spatial and long-term scale.postprin

The Economic Archaeology of Roman Economic Performance

Recent years have witnessed a paradigm shift in the study of the Roman economy. Methodologically modern economic analysis is now far more acceptable than it once was, and archaeology has become the major source of empirical data for many questions. On the substantive side there is now a far clearer appreciation of the major changes that the Roman economy underwent, with substantial growth of population and aggregate production and even some improvements in standard of living, but followed by equally dramatic decline. This economic success was not limited to the imperial core, but also extended to the provinces

How Far Are We from the Quantum Theory of Gravity?

I give a pedagogical explanation of what it is about quantization that makes general relativity go from being a nearly perfect classical theory to a very problematic quantum one. I also explain why some quantization of gravity is unavoidable, why quantum field theories have divergences, why the divergences of quantum general relativity are worse than those of the other forces, what physicists think this means and what they might do with a consistent theory of quantum gravity if they had one. Finally, I discuss the quantum gravitational data that have recently become available from cosmology.Comment: 106 page review article solicited by Reports on Progress in Physic

State history and economic development: evidence from six millennia

The presence of a state is one of the most reliable historical predictors of social and economic development. In this article, we complete the coding of an extant indicator of state presence from 3500 BCE forward for almost all but the smallest countries of the world today. We outline a theoretical framework where accumulated state experience increases aggregate productivity in individual countries but where newer or relatively inexperienced states can reach a higher productivity maximum by learning from the experience of older states. The predicted pattern of comparative development is tested in an empirical analysis where we introduce our extended state history variable. Our key finding is that the current level of economic development across countries has a hump-shaped relationship with accumulated state history

Intelligence and Slave Export Intensity: A Cross-Country Empirical Assessment

The literature has not sufficiently engaged the emergence and expansion of the phenomenon of Slave export. This article contributes to the existing stream by examining the role of human capital or intelligence on slave exports. We postulate and justify a reasonable hypothesis that countries which were endowed with higher human capital levels were more likely to experience lower levels of slave exports probably due to relatively better abilities to organise, corporate, oversee and confront slave vendors. Our findings with alternative specifications involving varying conditioning information sets confirm the investigated hypothesis. The findings are also robust to the control of outliers