Why did the great powers of Asia stagnate whilst Europe was rising? This question—often called the Great Divergence—is one of the most defining questions of modern history.
In this talk, I use the case of Britain and India to probe that divide. Did colonialism make Britain rich and India poor? Or was Britain’s rise already underway before conquest? And what does all this tell us about the everyday experiences of the people of on two sides of the divide?
This recording comes from the British Academy, where I was invited to speak at the launch of Bishnupriya Gupta’s An Economic History of India. I was honoured to give this talk on this exceptionally rich topic, speaking after some of the leading experts of India's history.
How did I do?
Share your thoughts in the comments or at OnHumans.Substack.com.
Enjoy!
DIG DEEPER
Read: See my article on the "Origins of Modern India". Complement with my "Origins of Modern China" from last fall.
Listen: Check out the two-part "What About India?" series from this February. Complement with the episode with Professor Tirthankar Roy this July.
SUPPORT THE SHOW
You can pledge your support at Patreon.com/OnHumans
KEYWORDS
Colonialism | Imperialism | British East India Company | European colonialism | History of Colonialism | Geographical Determinism | Environmental Determinism | Political History | Fiscal History | Great Divergence | Western Dominance | Early Modern History | Kenneth Pomerantz | Steven Broadberry
Climate. Weathers. History.
Here's an encore episode to wrap up the mini-series on these themes!
This episode on the puzzling origins of farming is one of my all-time favourites on the show. I thought it was a good time to put it out again.
You can also read my essay on the topic here.
Enjoy!
~
ORIGINAL SHOW NOTES
Agriculture changed everything. Traditionally, this “Neolithic Revolution” was celebrated for opening the gates of civilisation. Recently, it has been compared to the original sin. But whatever our take on agriculture, we should be puzzled by one thing: Why did our ancestors start to farm in the first place?
It's not like early farmers had improved lives. Quite the opposite, they worked harder and suffered from worse health. So why did so early farmers stick to it? And why did farming spread so far and wide?
Andrea Matranga thinks he has the answer.
An economic historian at the University of Torino, Matranga links agriculture to climate change. This is not a new idea — not as such. After all, agriculture developed in lockstep with the end of Ice Ages. For years, this vague link has formed my own pet-theory on the matter.
But I never paused to reflect on the obvious problem with it. There was never an “Ice Age” in Sudan. Why didn’t humans just farm there?
Matranga has the answer to this and many other puzzles. And surprisingly, his answer is linked to the movements of Jupiter. I will let him tell you why.
We begin this episode covering some previous theories on the origins of agriculture. Next, we dissect Matranga's theory and the evidence for it. Towards the end, we talk about the spread of farming — peaceful and violent — and note a neglected downside to the hunter-gatherer lifestyle. As always, we finish with my guest’s reflection on humanity.
LINKS
You can find my summary of Matranga's theory with links to academic articles at OnHumans.Substack.com.
Do you like On Humans? Join the group of patrons at Patreon.com/OnHumans!
MENTIONS
Names
V. Gordon Childe | Jared Diamond | Mo Yan | Alain Testart | Robert J. Braidwood | Milutin Milanković | Feng He | James Scott | Richard B. Lee | Irven Devore
Terms
Neolithic | Holocene | Pleistocene | Consumption smoothing | Malthusian limit | Milankovitch cycles
Ethnic groups
Natuffians | Pacific Northwestern hunter-gatherers
Keywords
Anthropology | Archaeology | Big History | Economic History | Agricultural Revolution | Neolithic Revolution | Homo Sapiens | Sapiens | Climate change | Paleoclimatology | Seasonality | Origins of Agriculture | Neolithic Revolution | Climate Change | Hunter-Gatherers | Human Civilization | Population Growth | Sedentary Lifestyle | Subsistence Farming | Evolutionary Adaptation | State Violence | Agricultural Coercion | Ancient DNA
Before they built empires, the Europeans built ports.
Across Africa and Asia, European sailors arrived as merchants. They traded and negotiated. They defended their interests—sometimes with cannon fire. But they were not trying to govern a foreign land.
Yet things changed.
Why?
Historian Tirthankar Roy has a bold new answer.
Roy is a professor at the London School of Economics, where he teaches a renowned course on the economic history of colonialism.
His most recent book isThe Origins of Colonialism. And in it, Roy explains that we cannot understand the origins of European Empires in Asia and Africa by simply zooming into the actions of Europeans. We must understand what happened to the elites of the lands being conquered. And more often than not, that had to do with the rains, rivers, and access to water.
In this episode, Roy explains how his theory sheds light on the rise of the British Empire in India. Along the way, we also sketch many broader ideas about the story of global colonialism, from Chinese ports to the conquest of Burma and from the water problems of Mumbai to the rubber plantations of Congo.
Enjoy!
This is part two of this summer’s mini-series on the way climate has shaped the human story. Curious to hear more? Head to last week’s episode on how an ancient climate change paved the way for the very origins of humanity!
Thoughts about Roy’s points? Or mine? Voice them at OnHumans.Substack.com! (Episode page uploaded within an hour of the episode drop.)
SUPPORT THE SHOW
You can pledge your support at Patreon.com/OnHumans
DIG DEEPER
Check out also the two-part "What About India?" series from this February!
KEYWORDS
Colonialism | Imperialism | British East India Company | European colonialism | Africa | Asia | India | China | History of Colonialism | Geographical Determinism | Environmental Determinism | Political History | Military History | Fiscal History | Great Divergence | Western Dominance | Early Modern History
On Humans is back from the break!
To mark the summer heat, here is a two-part series on how climate has shaped the human story. In next week's episodes, we will explore the role of water and weather in the origins of European colonialism. But today, we start by crawling deeper into the past: to the origins of humanity itself.
In this episode, Yale professor Jessica Thompson helps us navigate one of the most influential ideas in human evolution: that an ancient climate change pushed our ancestors out of the jungle, onto the savanna, and eventually toward big brains, meat-eating, and tool use.
This is a captivating story. It has been mentioned many times on the show. But do the details hold up?
What follows is a sweeping account of human origins, which nuances — but does not reject — the grand arc explored in The Origins of Humankind series. This is a story about a climate that has never remained steady. It serves as a poignant reminder of the weather's power to shape human destiny. But it’s also a story about human resilience and our capacity, from the very beginning, to defy the iron laws of ecology. Enjoy!
Thoughts about the episode? Share them at OnHumans.Substack.com. You'll also find a bunch of links to dig deeper.
SUPPORT THE SHOW
You can pledge your support at Patreon.com/OnHumans
MENTIONED SCHOLARS
Richard Wrangham (guest in summer 2023)
Sarah Blaffer Hrdy (guest in Spring 2024)
KEYWORDS
Human evolution | Human origins | Paleoanthropology | Human biology | Climate change | Miocene | Pleistocene | Brain evolution | Brain energetics | Deep history | Anthropology | Archaeology | Austrolopithecins | Genus homo | Bipedalism | Evolution of apes | Missing link | Tsetse flies |
Binary thinking is out of fashion. But what about biological sex?
Whatever we might say about diversity and fluidity, the ideas of “male” and “female” seem essential in biology. I’ve taught the subject. I’ve drawn bees and flowers, with arrows from anthers to ovaries. I’ve used the terms “dad cell” and “mother cell” while doing so. I don’t know how I could have done it any differently.
And maybe that’s just fine. Human sex cells are binary: sperm and egg. But here’s the twist: humans aren’t sex cells. Humans are animals. And animals aren’t so easily grouped. XY chromosomes don’t always produce a penis. And when we turn to hormones, brains, and behaviours, the picture gets even messier.
Or so argues Princeton Professor Agustín Fuentes, a leading expert on human biology. His new book, Sex Is a Spectrum, came out this week. It makes the case that biology no longer supports a sharp separation between male and female. Whether you agree with Fuentes or not, it’s an argument worth taking seriously.
We had a great conversation, ranging from hermaphroditic worms to sex-changing fish, and from gender stereotypes to intersex humans. At times, I pushed back. But I learned a lot throughout the conversation. I hope you do too.
Thoughts about Fuentes’s argument? Or my takes? Share them at onhumans.substack.com. You'll also find more links to dig deeper.
Support the show: patreon.com/onhumans
MENTIONS
Agustín Fuentes: Sex is a Spectrum; Creative Spark; Race, Monogamy, and Other Lies They Told You
Yuval Noah Harari: Sapiens, A Brief History of Humankind
Jared Diamond: Guns, Germs, and Steel
Steven Pinker: How the Mind Works
Sara Blaffer Hrdy: Father Time (see episode in April 2023)
KEYWORDS
Biological sex | gametes | chromosomes | intersex | hermaphrodite | sex determination | sexual dimorphism | sex-changing fish | clownfish biology | evolutionary biology | human evolution | Agustín Fuentes | anthropology of sex | reproductive biology | nonbinary biology | developmental biology | sex differences | male and female | sex in animals | sex in humans | genetics of sex | human biology | science of sex | sex vs gender | c. elegans sex | 5-alpha-reductase type 2 deficiency (5α-R2D) | PCOS (Polycystic Ovary Syndrome) |
And so it ends! In the final episode of The Origins of Humankind, we explore the aftermath of the story so far—the story of how one peculiar species, Homo sapiens, evolved, spread, and outlived its relatives.
Guiding us through this final chapter is Johannes Krause once again. Together, we uncover the emerging picture of the global spread of farming, pastoralism, and other key ingredients of modernity. Along the way, we explore some of the central questions of history—from the origins of inequality to the surprisingly pivotal role played by the peoples of the Eurasian steppe. (Yes, Mongols will make an appearance! But the story of the steppe goes much deeper...)
As always, we end with my guest’s reflections on humanity.
Enjoy!
LINKS
More material: OnHumans.Substack.com/Origins
Support the show: Patreon.com/OnHumans
Free lectures on human origins: CARTA
Krause's books: A Short History of Humanity; Hubris: The Rise and Fall of Humanity
ABOUT THE SERIES
The Origins of Humankind is produced by On Humans and UC San Diego's Centre for Academic Research and Training in Anthropogeny (CARTA). Other guests include Chris Stringer, Dean Falk, and Tim Coulson.
KEYWORDS
Anthropology | Biology | Human evolution | Human origins | Homo sapiens | Agriculture | Ancient DNA | Climate changes | Pleistocene | Holocene | Archaeology | Neolithic | Yamnaya | Bell Beakers | Proto Indo-Europeans | Ötzi Ice Man | Gunpowder Empires | Bantu-expansion | Austranesian expansion | Sami poeple | Y-chromosome bottleneck |
The time has come! This is where our story truly begins.
In Episode 4 of The Origins of Humankind, we finally turn the spotlight on Homo sapiens. Guiding us through this journey is Johannes Krause, director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology and a pioneer of one of the greatest scientific revolutions of our time: the science of ancient DNA.This ability to extract DNA from fossils has transformed our understanding of the human past—giving us tools to tell a genuinely global history of our species.
In this episode, we use the magic of ancient DNA to explore the world our species was born into: a weird, wild Ice Age planet teeming with other human species, from Flores Hobbits to Neanderthal Giants. We touch on big questions, such as:
We end at the dawn of the Holocene—the warm, wet period that would give rise to farming, cities, and everything we call “history.” That’s the story we’ll tackle in the final episode of The Origins of Humankind. Stay tuned. And enjoy this episode!
LINKS
More material: OnHumans.Substack.com/Origins
Support the show: Patreon.com/OnHumans
Free lectures on human origins: CARTA
Krause's books: A Short History of Humanity; Hubris: The Rise and Fall of Humanity
ABOUT THE SERIES
The Origins of Humankind is produced by On Humans and UC San Diego's Centre for Academic Research and Training in Anthropogeny (CARTA). Other guests include Chris Stringer, Dean Falk, and Tim Coulson.
KEYWORDS
Anthropology | Biology | Human evolution | Human origins | Homo Erectus | Australopithecines | Brain evolution | Paleoneurology | Hominins | DNA | Homo sapiens | Climate changes | Pleistocene | Cognitive evolution | Cognitive archaeology | Stone tools | Palaeolithic | Neanderthals | Homo floresiensis | Denisovans | Homo longi | Sima de los Huesos | Gravettian | Cannibalism | Aurignacian | Svante Pääbo |
Things are about to get personal... In episode 3 of The Origins of Humankind, we zoom into the birth and spread of humanity itself.
Our guide is the iconic Chris Stringer, one of the most influential paleoanthropologists alive. Together, we trace the origins of our genus and the emergence of Homo sapiens as the last surviving human species. While doing this, we meet many oddities, such as rhino hunting along the River Thames, but we also explore some of the biggest questions in human evolution:
As always, we finish with my guest's reflections on humanity.
MORE LINKS
More material: OnHumans.Substack.com/Origins
Support the show: Patreon.com/OnHumans
Free lectures on human origins: CARTA
Stringer's books: Lone Survivors; Our Human Story
WHAT'S NEXT
#4-5: The Story of Sapiens, in Two Parts
The series finishes with two episodes on the story of Homo sapiens, using the magic of ancient DNA to tell a genuinely global history of our species.
Key question: How did migrations shape the human story? Why are we the only humans left? And how did humans spread worldwide, first as hunters and gatherers, then as farmers and shepherds?
Your guide: Johannes Krause was the first scholar to discover a new species of humans by DNA alone. Co-author of Hubris, and A Short History of Humanity, he is now the Director of the Max Planck Institute of Evolutionary Anthropology.
When: March 16th & 23rd, 2025
KEYWORDS
Anthropology | Biology | Human evolution | Human origins | Homo Erectus | Australopithecines | Brain evolution | Paleoneurology | Hominins | Cave art | Homo sapiens | Climate changes | Pleistocene | Cognitive evolution | Cognitive archaeology | Stone tools | Palaeolithic | Neanderthals | Alloparenting | Expensive tissue -hypothesis | Radiator theory | Brain growth | Palaeoanthropology |
The story continues! In part 2 of the Origins of Humankind, we trace the first steps of our ancestors after they left the chimpanzee lineage.
To get humanity going, our ancestors had to wander through millions of years of what anthropologist Dean Falk has called the Botanic Age. It's a time shrouded in mist, yet it may hold the key to some of humanity’s most defining traits — from language and music to our clumsy toes and our large brains.
Our guide is Falk herself, a Distinguished Professor of Anthropology and the world's leading expert on human brain evolution. Together, we try to make sense of topics such as:
As always, we finish with the guest’s reflections on humanity.
MORE LINKS
WHAT'S NEXT
Origins of Humankind #3: What Is a Human?
The stage has been set. It is time for humanity to enter. But what is a human? What makes a skeleton fall into the Genus "Homo"? And why did this puzzling genus evolve?
Key questions: Why did humans evolve? And how do modern humans differ from Neanderthals or other extinct humans?
Our guide: Chris Stringer is an iconic figure in the field, best known for his groundbreaking work towards the widely accepted Out of Africa -theory of human evolution. His career at London’s Natural History Museum stretches across five decades.
When: April 9th, 2025
KEYWORDS
Anthropology | Primatology Human evolution | Human origins | Homo Erectus | Australopithecine | Australopithecus africanus | Brain evolution | Paleoneurology | Apes | Great apes | Chimpanzees | Bonobos | Gorillas | LSA | Cognitive evolution | Cognitive archaeology | Baby slings | Motherse | Parentese | Baby talk | Putting the baby down -hypothesis | Radiator theory
What does war do to the human psyche? It can traumatise. It can cause grief. It can normalise violence and make demons out of the enemy. But difficult times can also elevate our care and compassion. And while much of the new solidarity is focused on those on “our side”, the helping hand does not always stop at the border.
Or so argues anthropologist Greta Uehling, the author of Everyday War (2023). Building on over 150 interviews with Ukrainian civilians and ex-combatants, Uehling’s work brings depth and nuance to the topic - a topic often simplified by naive contrasts between peaceful care and brutal violence. Profoundly optimistic in ways, Uehling is still far from romanticising war. Rather, she paints a humane picture of people finding meaning from the challenges of violent conflict.
Dr Uehling sat down with Ilari to discuss various stories and lessons from Ukraine. As always, the episode finishes with Dr Uehling's own views on humanity.
Mentioned scholars
Yuval Noah Harari / Paul Ricoeur / Hans-Georg Gadamer
Names of the Ukrainian respondents have been altered to protect their identity
_________
SUPPORT THE SHOW
Please consider becoming a supporter of On Humans. Even small monthly donations can make a huge impact on the long-term sustainability of the program.
Visit: Patreon.com/OnHumans
Get in touch: ilari@onhumans.org
Welcome to the first episode of the Origins of Humankind!
In this sweeping first episode, we cover the entire planetary backstory of human existence – from the origins of life to the climate change that kickstarted human evolution. Our expert guide on this journey is Tim Coulson, the Head of Biology at the University of Oxford and the author of A Universal History of Us.
The episode explores questions such as:
As always, we finish with the guest’s reflections on humanity.
MORE LINKS
Get more material on the Origins of Humankind at OnHumans.Substack.com/Origins
Support the show: Patreon.com/OnHumans
Read more CARTA and find their free-for-all lectures here.
Get Tim Coulson's book here.
NEXT EPISODE
#2 An Unusual Ape (Tuesday 2nd of April)
In episode two, we follow the first steps on the human line, exploring how abandoning life in the trees paved the way for many of our human oddities.
Key questions: Why was upright posture so important? What did it do to parents and children? When did the brains of our ancestors start to show human oddities?
Your guide: Dean Falk, a leading expert on brain evolution at the University of Florida. She recently published a book titled A Botanic Age, looking at human evolution before the Stone Age.
Stay tuned. And subscribe to On Humans.
KEYWORDS
Evolution | Human evolution | Human origins | Origin of life | Emergence of life | Emergence of life | Abiogenesis | Natural history | History of life | Meteors | Organic chemistry | Vertebrate evolution | Tetrapods | Dinosaurs | Pleistocene | Predators | Early humans | Austrolopithecins | Lucy | Homo erectus | Homo ergaster | Homo sapiens | Megafauna extinction | Humanity | Carl Sagan | Ediacaran Garden | Cambrian Explosion | Mesozoic | Jurassic | Triassic | Cretaceous | The Great Oxigenation Event | Sauropsids | Synapsids |
Where do we come from? How did we get here? What kind of creature are we?
The science of human origins has made great progress in answering these timeless questions. From carbon isotopes to ancient DNA extraction, we now have unprecedented tools to explore our past. But with all this detail, it’s easy to miss the forest from the trees.
To fill this gap, On Humans has partnered with CARTA — a UC San Diego-based research unit on human origins. Together, we have designed a five-episode journey to dig deep into the new science of the origins of humankind.
Together, these episodes explore the emerging science of how we became the puzzling and wonderful creatures we are today.
The series begins tomorrow. Subscribe now free episode and written summaries at:
SERIES OVERVIEW
#1 The Big Picture
The series begins with a sweeping take on the history of life on Earth, from the origin of life to the rise of humans.
Key questions: What is life? Who were our ancestors during the dinosaurs? What led to the rise of primates? And what kind of a primate are we?
Your guide: Tim Coulson is the Head of the Department of Biology at the University of Oxford. He recently released a breathtaking overview of the history of life and the universe titled A Universal History of Us.
When: March 25th
#2 An Unusual Ape
In episode two, we follow the first steps on the human line, exploring how abandoning life in the trees paved the way for many of our human oddities.
Key questions: Why was upright posture so important? What did it do to parents and children? When did the brains of our ancestors start to show human oddities?
Your guide: Dean Falk, a leading expert on brain evolution at the University of Florida. She recently published a book titled A Botanic Age, looking at human evolution behind the Stone Age.
When: April 2nd
#3 What Is a Human?
The stage has been set. The third episode tackles human evolution head-on, focusing on the new scientific discoveries about the genus Homo.
Key questions: What is a human? Why did we evolve? And how do modern humans differ from Neanderthals or other extinct humans?
Your guide: Chris Stringer is an iconic figure in the field, best known for his groundbreaking work towards the widely accepted Out of Africa -theory of human evolution. His career at London’s Natural History Museum stretches across five decades.
When: April 9th
#4-5: The Story of Sapiens (In Two Parts)
The series finishes with two episodes on the story of Homo sapiens, using the magic of ancient DNA to tell a genuinely global history of our species.
Key question: How did migrations shape the human story? Why are we the only humans left? And how did humans spread worldwide, first as hunters and gatherers, then as farmers and shepherds?
Your guide: In 2010, Johannes Krause became the first person to discover a new species of humans by DNA alone. Co-author of Hubris, and A Short History of Humanity, he is the Director of the Max Planck Institute of Evolutionary Anthropology.
When: March 16th & 23rd
SUBSCRIBE
Onhumans.Substack.com/Origins
India’s history isn’t just the story of one nation—it’s the story of one-sixth of humanity. It’s also a lens for understanding how colonialism, democracy, and globalization shaped the modern world.
This mini-series offers a human-centred perspective on that remarkable story, focusing on how politics and trade impacted the lives of ordinary Indians.
In Part 1, we explored the decline of the Mughals and the long stretch of British rule. In Part 2, we turn to India's independent journey as the world’s largest democracy.
To guide us through this complex history, I’m joined again by Bishnupriya Gupta, a professor of economics and the author of the excellent Economic History of India.
In this episode, we discuss:
The legacy of British colonialism in independent India / Why India fell behind the economic miracle of East Asian countries like China / The successes and challenges of India’s democracy in shaping its economic future / What happened to inequality in India during independence?
As always, we finish with my guest’s reflections on humanity.
MENTIONS
Past episodes: What About China (with Yasheng Huang, #44-46)
Keywords: Independent India | British colonialism | British Raj | Indian nationalism | Indian industry | Economic inequality | Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru | Nehruvian period | National Congress | China miracle | Human capital formation | Literacy | Primary vs higher education | Poverty reduction |
LINKS
Read more at OnHumans.Substack.com.
You can also find On Humans on YouTube and BlueSky!
Feeling generous? Join the wonderful group of my patrons at Patreon.com/OnHumans, or get in touch for other ways to support!
Email: makela dot ilari at outlook dot com
Following the success of last year’s What About China -trilogy, I’m delighted to introduce a two-part series on the economic history of India. This series examines the origins of modern India by focusing on politics, poverty, and the experience of ordinary Indians from 1600 till today.
The first episode covers the decline of the Mughals and the hugely controversial rule of the British East India Company and, later, the British Crown.
One thing is clear: Most Indians lived in poverty when the British left. So, how much of Indian poverty was due to British policies? How much was shaped by deeper trends? And what should we make of those infamous railways?
To tackle these questions, I’m joined by Bishnupriya Gupta, a professor of economics at the University of Warwick and one of the world’s leading historians of the Indian economy. Her new book, An Economic History of India, provides a uniquely objective and data-driven exploration of India’s history, focusing on the well-being of ordinary people.
In this episode, we discuss:
Indian vs English living standards in 1600 / The impact of British colonialism on India’s economy / The Great Famines of Bengal / What both imperial apologists and Indian nationalists get wrong about the British rule.
In the end, Gupta also explains why Mahatma Gandhi's education might be a clue as to why India lagged behind East Asia in the 20th Century.
Enjoy — and stay tuned for Part II on the era of Independence!
MENTIONS
Books: An Economic History of India by Bishnupriya Gupta; The Great Divergence by Kenneth Pomerantz;
Other scholars: Stephen Broadberry | Prasannan Parthasarathy | Nico Voigtländer & Hans-Joachim Voth | Indrajit Ray | Oded Galor (see episodes #12 and #13)
On Humans episode: What About China (with Yasheng Huang, #44-46); Birth of Modern Prosperity (with Daron Acemoglu; Oded Galor, Brad DeLong; Branko Milanovic, after #40)
Keywords: Mughal India | British colonialism | British Rad | East India Company | Indian nationalism | Indian deindustrialisation | Cotton trade | Indian railways | Primary vs higher education | Great Bengali famines
LINKS
Read more at OnHumans.Substack.com.
You can also find On Humans on YouTube and BlueSky!
Feeling generous? Join the wonderful group of my patrons at Patreon.com/OnHumans, or get in touch for other ways to support!
Email: makela dot ilari at outlook dot com
Why are history books so full of men? Why have so many societies treated women as property?
In short, why is patriarchy so pervasive?
A casual thinker might find an easy answer from biology. Men tend to be bigger and stronger. Hence, they get to run the show. “Just look at chimpanzees!”
But this explanation has obvious problems. Indeed, female chimpanzees don’t have much power in their groups. But female bonobos do. And looking at humans, not all human societies are patriarchal — not nearly to the same extent.
We don’t need to look at modern Scandinavia to get inspiration for women’s empowerment. Quite the contrary, equality between the sexes might have been the norm throughout most of the human story. This might sound surprising given the rates of patriarchy across time and space. However, it is supported by a simple finding: gender equality is relatively common in existing hunter-gatherers. This stands in stark contrast to their agricultural neighbours.
This old finding became part of the scholarly conversation again in late 2024 when a new paper reported high levels of equality between husbands and wives amongst married hunter-gatherers. The levels of equality surprised the scholars themselves. But all this raises an interesting question: why is this? Why would hunting and gathering incline societies towards equality? Or vice versa, why would agriculture nudge societies towards male power? And what should we make of the many outliers from this pattern, like the matriarchal farmers of northeastern India?
To discuss these topics, I invited the lead author of the recent paper to the show.
Angarika Deb is a cognitive anthropologist, soon to earn her PhD from the Central European University. Despite her young career, she has produced tons of interesting articles on gender inequality around the world. A wide-ranging conversation was guaranteed.
LINKS
For links to academic articles and a summary of the conversation, head here (uploaded with a short delay after the episode).
Read more at OnHumans.Substack.com.
You can also find On Humans on YouTube and BlueSky!
Feeling generous? Join the wonderful group of my patrons at Patreon.com/OnHumans, or get in touch for other ways to support!
Email: makela dot ilari at outlook dot com
MENTIONS
Technical terms
Patrilocality | Matrilocality | Virilocatily | Y-chromosome bottleneck
Ethnic groups
Agta | BaYaka | !Kung | Mongols | Garo and Khasi | Inuit
Keywords
Patriarchy | Agriculture | Neolithic | Social evolution | Social complexity | Hunter-gatherers | Sexual division of labor | Human evolution | Anthropology | Archaeology | Evolutionary psychology | Sociology | Social science | Human science
“We are survival machines – robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes.” - Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene
In 1976, Richard Dawkins published one of the most iconic science books of all time. It has inspired a generation of science enthusiasts. But unsurprisingly, many readers disliked the idea of being but a “robot vehicle” or a “survival machine” for some tiny molecules — especially if these molecules are best served by repeated pregnancies or donations to a sperm bank.
Yet Dawkins was right on one thing: “however much we may deplore something, it does not stop being true.”
So what is true?
I have previously written about one claim in the Selfish Gene which is certainly not true. This is the claim that, if we accept the book's biological theories, then we humans must be “born selfish”. Even Dawkins has accepted that this was a "rogue" claim that readers should "mentally delete". You can hear more by heading to episode 20 of On Humans.
But what about the underlying science? Are selfish genes still the right way to think about the facts of evolution?
Not so, according to Eva Jablonka.
You might remember Jablonka from episode 36 on the evolution of consciousness. But before her work on consciousness, Jablonka was famous for her research on epigenetic inheritance -- literally, "inheritance beyond the gene". So what is epigenetic inheritance? What do we know about it scientifically? And does it matter philosophically?
I hope you enjoy this conversation.
LINKS
Get more links and references from my accompanying essay at OnHumans.Substack.com.
Support my work at Patreon.com/OnHumans
Each year, the World Happiness Report ranks countries based on their citizen's life satisfaction. My home country, Finland, tends to come at the top. Sure. But lessons can we draw from all this? Beyond patting Finns on the back, can we distil some more insights from the report?
I got to discuss this with Lara Aknin, co-editor of the World Happiness Report. In this previously unpublished clip, Aknin explains the major findings from the World Happiness Report and reveals the “single best predictor of happiness” across countries.
If you want to hear more about Aknin’s work, see episode 47.
Support the show
Keywords
Happiness | Life satisfaction | Economics | Social Science | World Happiness Report | Finland | Latin America | Nordic countries | Scandinavia | Welfare state | Well-being | Freedom | Equality | Generosity | Altruism
Many traditional societies accept polygyny (one man, many wives). Monogamy, too, is practised across the globe. But what about polyandry — one woman, many husbands? Is this a "dubious idea" as sometimes suggested by evolutionary theorists?
In this bonus clip, anthropologist Katie Starkweather offers interesting examples of formal and informal polyandry from around the world. She also brings nuance to theories about jealousy in men and women.
(This is a previously unpublished clip from my conversation with anthropologist Katie Starkweather, as published in episode 43.)
LINKS
Scholars mentioned
Donald Symons (author of Evolution of Human Sexuality), Sarah Blaffer Hrdy (author of Father Time, see episode 40), Brooke Scelza, Sean Prall
Articles mentioned
See the list and links here. This and other resources are available for free at OnHumans.Substack.com
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Monogamy | Polygamy | Polyandry | Mating | Pairbonding | Anthropology | Ethnography | Jealousy
Happy New Year 2025! To celebrate, here is an encore of what proved to be the most popular episode of 2024.
This rerun combines episodes 30 and 31 into one epic journey towards the frontiers of human understanding. My guest is Donald Hoffman. Our topics are consciousness, cosmos, and the meaning of life.
Enjoy!
Original show notes
Laws of physics govern the world. They explain the movements of planets, oceans, and cells in our bodies. But can they ever explain the feelings and meanings of our mental lives?
This problem, called the hard problem of consciousness, runs very deep. No satisfactory explanation exists. But many think that there must, in principle, be an explanation.
A minority of thinkers disagree. According to these thinkers, we will never be able to explain mind in terms of matter. We will, instead, explain matter in terms of mind. I explored this position in some detail in episode 17.
But hold on, you might say. Is this not contradicted by the success of natural sciences? How could a mind-first philosophy ever explain the success of particle physics? Or more generally, wouldn't any scientist laugh at the idea that mind is more fundamental than matter?
No — not all of them laugh. Some take it very seriously.
Donald Hoffman is one such scientist. Originally working with computer vision at MIT's famous Artificial Intelligence Lab, Hoffman started asking a simple question: What does it mean to "see" the world? His answer begins from a simple idea: perception simplifies the world – a lot. But what is the real world like? What is “there” before our perception simplifies the world? Nothing familiar, Hoffman claims. No matter. No objects. Not even a three-dimensional space. And no time. There is just consciousness.
This is a wild idea. But it is a surprisingly precise idea. It is so precise, in fact, that Hoffman’s team can derive basic findings in particle physics from their theory.
A fascinating conversation was guaranteed. I hope you enjoy it. If you do, consider becoming a supporter of On Humans on Patreon.com/OnHumans.
MENTIONS
Names: David Gross, Nima Arkani-Hamed, Edward Whitten, Nathan Seiberg, Andrew Strominger, Edwin Abbott, Nick Bostrom, Giulio Tononi, Keith Frankish, Daniel Dennett, Steven Pinker, Roger Penrose, Sean Carroll, Swapan Chattopadhyay
Terms (Physics and Maths): quantum fields, string theory, gluon, scattering amplitude, amplituhedron, decorated permutations, bosons, leptons, quarks, Planck scale, twistor theory, M-theory, multiverse, recurrent communicating classes, Cantor’s hierarchy (relating to different sizes of infinity... If this sounds weird, stay tuned for full episode on infinity. It will come out in a month or two.)
Terms (Philosophy and Psychology): Kant’s phenomena and noumena, integrated information theory, global workspace theory, orchestrated objective reduction theory, attention schema theory
Books: Case Against Reality by Hoffman, Enlightenment Now by Steven Pinker
Articles etc.: For links to articles, courses, and more, see https://onhumans.substack.com/p/links-for-episode-30
This was fun!
Last Wednesday saw the first-ever live recording of On Humans. The event was held at the London Business School, courtesy of the LBS's China Club. My guest was MIT Professor Yasheng Huang, familiar to regular listeners from the China trilogy published earlier this fall.
In this new episode, we keep tackling the origins of modern China. This time, we draw insights from Huang's two upcoming books: Revisiting the Needham Question and Statism With Chinese Characteristics. The conversation is structured around five themes: 1) the "Needham Question"; 2) Keju exams; 3) Scale; 4) Scope; and 5) The Eighties. Expect juicy insights to questions such as:
Towards the end of the conversation, Huang also shared his memories of working in China through the 1989 crackdown at Tiananmen Square.
Enjoy!
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Email: makela dot ilari at outlook dot com
