The dawn of everything - a new science of human history with David Wengrow

Science & Cocktails is proud to present an evening with archeology superstar David Wengrow, acclaimed writer of the book "The Dawn of Everything" on the history of inequality with the anthropologist David Graeber. David Wengrow will take you deep into the history of humanity that no one knows about. Was there an "original" form of human society? Why is our conventional understanding of human history wrong? Was there an Agricultural Revolution? Does living in cities make inequality inevitable? Is our present global order fixed in place by social evolution: are we stuck?
Our conventional understanding of human history is wrong. Our species did not spend 95 percent of its evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers. So what were we doing all that time? Agriculture and cities did not mean a plunge into hierarchy and domination. So where does inequality really come from? Drawing on findings from his best-selling book, The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity - co-authored with the late David Graeber - David Wengrow explains how archaeology and anthropology are providing startling new answers to these major questions, revealing a prehistoric world more varied and unexpected than we knew, and a future more open and free than we imagine.

David Wengrow is a professor of comparative archaeology at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London, and has been a visiting professor at New York University. He is the author of several books, including What Makes Civilization?. Wengrow conducts archaeological fieldwork in various parts of Africa and the Middle East. a recipient of the Antiquity Prize and has delivered the Rostovtzeff Lectures (New York University), the Jack Goody Lectures (Max Planck Institute) and the Biennial Henry Myers Lecture (Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain).

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[stonedzebra]

I love learning from David Wengrow he is one of my favorite people. Also RIP David Graeber, the world is a worse place without you.

[kirstencorby]

Having politicians be ritually mocked and beaten to impress on them the gravity of their position sounds like a damned good idea to me!

[johnhoward]

In Asia, for instance, nobody has ever heard of Hobbes or Rousseau. There was no Enlightenment in Asia comparable to the European Enlightenment. The dynasties took a different path. They gave the world a thousand inventions - opera, moveable type printing press, porcelain, gunpowder, noodles, tea, silk...

[travistownsend]

I randomly purchased their book on an impulse, so glad I did. It is the most interesting and paradigm-shifting book I have ever read.

[cornerstore_d]

A groundbreaking book that everyone should read, or at least read it and tell everyone you can. Our unique human trait is imagination and creativity, and every single person that has ever lived has exercised that skill

[jovillasboasescrivao]

Amazing. I am reading this book. I am from Brazil. This man is incredible. And so, I think, was David Graeber. Thank you so much.

[saintlybeginnings]

This guy makes enormous assumptions that he states as fact, though no such evidence exists to making up claims that are provably false.

At about 12mins w/ burial, he assumes 1) those items = wealth (if the items are abundant, it would not = wealth), 2) ignoring possible religious beliefs that would burry such items w/ all respected members of the tribe to have in the afterlife, 3) assumes there is no chief even though Inuit peoples do have Chiefs (the very festival he mentions is based upon a legend of the Chiefs daughter)

To 40:25- yes, there were older cities, (Jericho, for 1), w/ hierarchies. A satellite city doesn’t mean they didn’t have a Chief or leader. I’m also very curious how he know whether inequalities were present in these early cities/ villages/ tribes?

Tell Sabi Abyad had burnt buildings uncovered which could be from conflict (or natural causes or carelessness). There are 4 different sites that compose the area, some being quite large (a 5th mound can’t be excavated due to being a recent burial location), & records show that the people moved between these location every decade or 2- likely to not over use agricultural land.

It is quite possible that this area was a satellite location for an administrate center city..

Native American Tribes had Chiefs, as Hunter gatherers. They also had slaves. They had peace & open trade with some tribes & hostility w/ others (just as we see today)

[allenanderson]

I started at 15:30 because he summarizes the "wrong story" in a recap that saves time.
Not a bad idea to increase playback speed as well.

[johncurtis]

If the reader will allow these thoughts, I tend to see it like this. At the core of every human society sits the one thing upon which everything is built. It could be the ebb and flow of prehistoric social systems; it could be todays electronic and digital global world. At the core sits the one thing that drives the whole of it.

Knowledge.

Tested and validated sets of information that inform and aide the construction of the society of the time. Our society, all human gatherings, are constructed on this basis. All of it is curiosity driven and scientific in its nature, and interestingly enough it seems culture emerges out of the dynamic of that aggregating, accreting, knowledge.

You don't need cities for this. You don't even need civilizations as we are wont to define them these days. What you need are social networks that communicate that knowledge across regions and, more importantly, thru time.

This is the defining attribute for us primates. Our ability to create and use complex self-generating networks that go on to support our deepening social complexity over time. It has been so supportive that it has allowed us to separate from the natural rhythms of planetary life. At least, for a time.

I'm leaving aside how estranged we all are these days from the natural world, and what that might portend for us all. It could be bad. It could be good given our ability to recognize error and change.

In any case take that knowledge away and all you've got left is a primate little more than animal. Which never happens to us though there have been times when we've clearly lost vast amounts of very valuable knowledge. I presume this from just a glance at the likes of megalithic ruins that boggle our understanding.

Our ability to retain, store and transmit into the future, knowledge we consider of high value is one of the main attributes in what makes us Human. And none of it requires the inequalities of Kings, Emperors, slaves, police or any sort of top-down hierarchical system to affect. All it arises simply as a function of being intelligent social animals. It's a form of emergence.

Just some thoughts. This is a great presentation, and the book is even better.

John~
American Net'Zen

[andykaufman]

Another important fact is many of the elements we call Civilized, like the use of Bronze or later Iron, and the Wheel, or Wine are NOT created in places like Egypt or Sumeria. They literally are concepts foundational to what most people would call 'civilized' or civilization but were created in places outside of it by most people's conception, because those other places held a degree of civilization, but conceptually are defined as something else.

[terenigtopjian]

Finally, an evidence-based account of our collective history! Also happens to be a much more hopeful and inspiring history :)

[arturotorras]

In Australia, the Ancient people there, used to do agriculture and walking Hunting gathering

[megret]

The Native American rendezvous is a good example. Once a years in summer the various clan groups would gather to trade and compete. I observed what I came to call the “magic three.” Large, medium, small. Father, mother and child. The original holy trinity. Then up to the clan level. Next the tribe. Then the nation

[davefroman]

Make it eleven instances of domestification. We have now found evidence along the west cost of Canada that also shows the presence of maintained crops.

[louisesumrell]

All of human history is a struggle for power and control, as a mitigation of fears. It's that simple. The factor that allowed us to survive is compassion, love.
There's fear and there's love. The friction between humans over those two emotions is the underlying cause of human struggle.

[uhurachezidek]

I loved this! Such a fantastic orator. Everytime he took a sip, I'm like, yes you deserve it. Thanks!

[ivtch]

A wonderful insight. Amazing.
Yes I have been under the assumption that larger population centres were stratified and autocratic. The tendencies to power and greed in ascendance. It sounds like this is not true.
However, David needs to explain how thereafter most large societies ended up with a hierarchical structure.

[tomasjevne]

Just amazing! I loved your book, mr. Wengrow.

[gregolbert]

This is way better doubling the playback.
speed.

[johnnyjet.]

"Only a person with a pure soul can make a good soup". - Beethoven