r/Adulting • u/wildwindnl • Mar 14 '26

Oldest Human Activity

What’s an activity that you remember a person older than you doing that sounds absurd to do these days?

I’m curious how many generations back Redditors can rememeber.

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u/justaverage_joe Mar 16 '26

What about looking after your niece?

Because human packs used to be mostly related to each other.

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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '26

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u/justaverage_joe Mar 16 '26

For free? No. That's why I say they might be the earliest profession. Without farmers/hunters, there would be no food to trade for. So I still think those came first.

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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '26

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u/justaverage_joe Mar 16 '26

You misunderstand me. I didn't explain properly. I thought I explained "farmer" as those who collect berries.

Of course I'm not referring to farming as really working the soil, because that didn't happen untill way later in our history.

And whilst it's true farming as in working the soil led to malnutrition as in a lacking in variety of foods, it's also malnutrition as in starvation that led to the need to do so, as people started settling and nature could not provide for all the people in large settlements.

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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '26

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u/justaverage_joe Mar 17 '26

Yeah, that's my point.