Sublime

so any institutions that favor putting younger people in charge will be more dynamic. This would have sped up experimentation and innovation.

20. Sahlins (1972), p. 37. 21. http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2009/04/the-exchange-david-plotz.html.

That is to say, from the population of a city he can tell you with surprising precision not just how many petrol stations, miles of electrical cable and miles of roads it will have, but how many restaurants and universities and what level of wages.

beneficial role of freer markets, more open societies, and better governance in spurring economic growth.

while the behaviour patterns of archaic humans remained fixed for tens of thousands of years, Sapiens could transform their social structures, the nature of their interpersonal relations, their economic activities and a host of other behaviours within a decade or two.

Over two thousand years later, in 1966, the University of Chicago held a symposium on primitive hunter-gatherer societies.…

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Many anthropological and archaeological studies indicate that in simple agricultural societies with no political frameworks beyond village and tribe, human violence was responsible for about 15 per cent of deaths, including 25 per cent of male deaths.

predict even for a professional ecologist.

Our modern development pattern – a continental-scale social experiment – was established during a period of unprecedented abundance after World War II. We were not only the sole economic superpower that wasn’t devastated by war; the biggest players in the world were indebted to us. We held the global reserve currency, we had the greatest amount of