This post is partly in response to the "semester review" knowledge exchange.
In 501, we've been reading Myths of the Archaic State, by Norman Yoffee.
Yoffee talks about a lot of interesting things, and I will post a better summary once the semester is over. While reading last night, I saw a tidbit about optimal foraging. I'm preaching to the choir, but here it is:
"Rhys Jones (1978) studied a situation in which prehistoric Tasmaninas stopped eating fish after many hundreds of years in which fish were an important part of their diet. Whereas this decision makes no sense to some archaeologists, it shows for others that choices made by hunter-gatherers cannot be reduced to optimal strategies for exploiting the environment" (Yoffee 2005:162).
Sounds pretty good to me.
6 comments:
Watch it Mr. Woods. Your choir has a least one disadent. Actually, I think most of us would agree that optimal foraging is a good general principle. A GENERAL principle. That's the problem with a lot of the hardcore evolutionary guys is that they see many of these ideas as exact, never deviating laws. I mean, it makes sense that people usually go after food that requires the least work and produces the most bulk...right? Of course right. But do people always behave this way, of course not. Optimal foraging is a fine general principle. Any disagreement?
McGuire, Kelly R. and William R. Hildebrandt
2005 Re-thinking Great Basin Foragers: Prestige Hunting and Costly Signaling during the Middle Archaic Period. American Antiquity 70:695-712.
Not done with it yet, but OFT comes out smelling stinky.
Sorry Dave. It's just a cross you'll have to bear...champion of HBE. Hate the sin, love the sinner.
Communism is a fine general principle too.
Just joking with you Dave. I just thought Yoffee's was an interesting and simple summary of how some of us feel about certain aspects of OFT.
I forgot to mention that the italics in the quote were mine.
It seems that irrational actions and behaviors are always discounted in so many models. Even though religious and spiritual institutions are hard to infer (Hawke's Ladder), they still have some affect on behavior. I hate to be the bearer of "PO-MO" views (post-modernist), but Levi-Strauss has been whispering in my ear. The Soco lives on.
The jeans guy?
Granted. Obviously human action can not be boiled down to nothing more than a formula for logically obtaining food and trying to optimize your reproductive abilities, but...the general idea that people try to get the most with the least amount of effort makes sense. If I'm hungry and want a burger, will I drive to the BK two blocks away or the one one the other side of town? Sometimes I may drive to the other side of town cause I want a change of scenery, or cause a cute girl works there, or whatever. But the majority of the time I will go to the one two blocks away. Don't get me wrong, I think the strict evolutionists and optimal foragers have it wrong, human behavior is NOT the same as other animals and we do NOT always chose the most logically rewarding option, but as a general guiding principle it makes a lot of sense.
Jeans guy...nice.
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