that some method or combination of methods is employed by each group. Infanticide is common, but far from universal. Since males are usually preferred to females, the practice may result in markedly displaced sex ratios in the population. Invalidicide is widespread, although some tribes treat the sick and injured with consideration and do not withhold customary medicines. Delayed marriage, late weaning, and wide spacing of children are among the most common methods of population control, and computer studies have shown that these alone can adequately stabilize a population (Skolnick & Cannings, 1972). Geronticide (killing of the aged) is also practiced in some tribes. In addition, warfare, raids, feuds, and similar activities often affect population size.
In general, there seems to be no model that has very wide application. Lee (1968) specifically investigated the situation of the aged among the Bushmen: “In a total population of 466, no fewer than 46 individuals (17 men and 29 women) were determined to be over 60 years of age, a proportion that compares favorably to the percentage of elderly in industrialized populations.”
It is evident, then, that the “nasty, brutish, and short” stereotype of the hunting–gathering life styles was a product of an egocentric sense of superiority and that all features of it are demolished by serious anthropological studies.
Conclusions
The ethnographic evidence indicates that people who do not farm do about everything that farmers do, but they do not work as hard. Gatherers clear or alter vegetation with fire, sow seeds, plant tubers, protect plants, own tracts of land, houses, slaves, or individual trees, celebrate first‐fruit ceremonies, pray for rain, and petition for increased yield and abundant harvest. They spin fibers, weave cloth, and make string, cord, baskets, canoes, shields, spears, bows and arrows, and ritual objects, recite poetry, play musical instruments, sing, chant, perform dances, and memorize legends. They harvest grass seeds, thresh, winnow, and grind them into flour. They do the same with seeds of legumes, chenopods, cucurbits, crucifers, composites, and palms. They dig roots and tubers. They detoxify poisonous plants for food and extract poisons to stun fish or kill game. They are familiar with a variety of drugs and medicinal plants. They understand the life cycles of plants, know the seasons of the year, and when and where the natural plant food resources can be harvested in greatest abundance with the least effort.
There is evidence that the diet of gathering peoples was better than that of cultivators, that starvation was rare, that their health status was generally superior, that there was a lower incidence of chronic disease (Lee & De‐Vore, 1968), and not nearly as many cavities in their teeth (Angel, 1984).
The question must be raised: Why farm? Why give up the 20‐hr work week and the fun of hunting to toil in the sun? Why work harder for food less nutritious and a supply more capricious? Why invite famine, plague, pestilence, and crowded living conditions? Why abandon the Golden Age and take up the burden?
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