Why Did Humans Wait 290,000 Years to Build a City?

Our species is about 300,000 years old. Our brains were as good as yours for tens of thousands of years. So why did the first towns only appear around 10,000 years ago, and why did everything explode after that? Hard hat on: Nate travels back to the Ice Age to meet Oog and find out what really held humans back. Mammoths, wild climate swings, the strange stone pillars of Göbekli Tepe, the wheat that tamed us, the first towns where people walked in through the roof, the first writing (it was mostly receipts) and the catch nobody tells you about farming. And there's a riddle: the answer is something you complain about almost every day. ⏱ Chapters 0:00 The puzzle 0:39 Same brain, different world 1:24 Life on the move 2:33 The Ice Age 3:37 11,700 years ago: everything changes 4:40 The first farmers 5:51 Surplus: the first towns 6:41 The snowball of ideas 7:36 The catch 8:26 The answer to the riddle 9:04 Your turn If you could bring Oog just one invention from today, what would it be? Tell me in the comments. 📚 Based on research including: • Hublin et al. (2017), New fossils from Jebel Irhoud, Morocco and the pan-African origin of Homo sapiens, Nature • Oktaviana et al. (2024), Narrative cave art in Indonesia by 51,200 years ago, Nature • Henrich (2004), Demography and cultural evolution: the Tasmanian case, American Antiquity • Dansgaard et al. (1993), Evidence for general instability of past climate from a 250-kyr ice-core record, Nature • Richerson, Boyd & Bettinger (2001), Was agriculture impossible during the Pleistocene but mandatory during the Holocene?, American Antiquity • Dietrich et al. (2012), The role of cult and feasting in the emergence of Neolithic communities: new evidence from Göbekli Tepe, Antiquity • Fuller (2007), Contrasting patterns in crop domestication and domestication rates, Annals of Botany • Larson et al. (2014), Current perspectives and the future of domestication studies, PNAS • Mummert et al. (2011), Stature and robusticity during the agricultural transition, Economics & Human Biology • Diamond (1987), The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race, Discover Illustrations are simplified and artistic. Dates are approximate, and some of these ideas (like the Tasmanian case and the feasting theory of Göbekli Tepe) are still debated by researchers. #ancienthumans #history #neolithic