How It Came to Be Other Resources

Core Readings

• Harvey, Joe. (1990). "Growth in Perspective." Rocky Mountain Institute Newsletter. p. 4, 7. Link

Harvey draws one-day analogy to 3.5 billion years of life on Earth and shows destructiveness of what humans have done and impossibility of continuing. 10 min.

• Wikipedia. "Evolution." Read introduction Link 5 min.
• Wikipedia. "Geological History of Earth." Read Introduction. Link
• Wikipedia. "Timeline of the Evolutionary History of Life." Read introduction. Link
• H. Sapiens Notes
• Diamond, Jared. "The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race." - Link 3 pp, 5 min.
• Shepard, Paul. (1998). "10,000 Years of Crisis." The Tender Carnivore and the Sacred Game. pp. 1-26. link 40 min.

Shepard portrays the shift to agriculture as a key element in decline of humanity and planet.

• Population Reference Bureau. "World Population Graph." Link
• Miller, G. Living in the Environment. "Kilocalories per Person per Day." Link
• Heilbroner, Robert. (1999). "The Economic Revolution." The Worldly Philosophers. pp. 18-41. Link (Also available at Stanford Libraries.) 25 min.

Heilbroner chronicles the emergence of mercantilism in Europe that marked the beginnings of a transformation from agrarian to industrial society, and from tradition-based social relationships to money-mediated society.

• Seavoy, Ronald. Famine in Peasant Societies. Link Read highlighted text and skim the rest. 30 min.

Seavoy argues that peasants prefer periodic famine to leisure. On the basis of examples drawn from diverse places and times he asserts that the only way to induce peasants to work hard enough to extract surplus from them is to deny them a "subsistence compromise," which he defines as working enough to feed everyone during normal years, and accepting that some will die during years of poor harvest.

• Ponting, Clive - "Creating the Third World." Green History of the World. Link 30 min.
• "Swing Riots. Wikipedia. Link 5 pp, 10 min.

Swing riots in early 19th century England resulted from enclosure, mechanization, burdensome mandatory tithe, and rent, and were instrumental in evolution of workhouses as means to control the poor.

Interest Readings

• Riversong, Robert. Summary of: Ponting, Clive. (2007). A New Green History of the World. Link 20pp.

Excellent, relatively lengthy summary of a book about human global history written from an ecological perspective.

• McAlpin, Michelle. Review of Seavoy, Ronald E. (1986). Famine in Peasant Societies. pp. 237-239. Link (5 min)

McAlpin recounts how Seavoy explains peasant commitment to leisure over security even to the point of accepting periodic famine, and why this commitment makes denial of the "subsistence compromise" essential to sever peasants from the land and enlist them in the commercial exchange economy.