agriculture

Actually, Jason Godesky is rather brilliant; his 30 Theses deserve a good look. He struggled mightily with defining horticulture and agriculture, did not quite get it right, but made a lot of good points. Can I do better? Or at least, can I come up with something that will enable us to communicate more clearly about these matters? With trepidation, I am giving it a shot. The purpose of this post is not to find the Right and Correct definition, but to untangle the definitional knots so that we can talk with one another and get somewhere.

In Agriculture: villain or boon companion, I argued that we sapiens have been cultivators since time immemorial, that a combination of foraging and cultivation is a sensible, durable way of life that has served us well, and that the “origin of agriculture” really is the intensification of cultivation that becomes visible in the archeological record.