Saturday, July 27

Entrepreneurship in our genes ?

Humans are considered the most average species in the evolutionary timeline and surprisingly are one of the most crucial species to ever dominate planet earth and the species that single-handedly dealt extinctions and destroyed ecosystems competing with nature itself

Just take sharks and whales for example these are majestic creatures evolving over hundreds of millions of years and dominate the sea,

Humans despite being so average have been able to dominate the whole ecosystem

Our mammal’s ancestors weren’t so fortunate since 200 million years ago mammals have been the underdogs of planet earth , an average species.

None of the revolutions in human history have been solely circumstantial or accidental

300,000 years ago human species called homo Erectus discovered fire and then later domesticated it. This was the most impactful entrepreneurial discovery in the history of mankind. Humans had a dependable source of energy, light, and warmth and an effective weapon against vicious lions and hyenas. Evidence supports humans used to torch jungles with fire and once the fire died down, stone age entrepreneurs harvested the remains, and this act made hunting easier. Fire helped human digestion, humans were able to eat rice and wheat due to fire and fire had a revolutionary impact on our anatomy. Since the advent of using fire for cooking humans, the intestines have decreased. intestines and brain are the two biggest energy consumers and fire’s help in digestion caused intestinal tracks to shorten and leave more energy to our brains.

This shows life helps entrepreneurial species the most and the advent of fire may have been an accident or a leap of curiosity but the domestication of fire and using it for cooking and other purposes was not. the fire was the first pivotal difference between humans and other animals

All animals rely on the merits of their body may it be muscles teeth or wings

Eagles, as an example, pick out thermal columns rising from the ground, unfold their massive wings, and let the air boost them upwards. but eagles cannot manipulate the vicinity of the columns, and their maximum sporting ability is exactly proportional to their wingspan.

when humans domesticated fire they received control of an obedient and endless force. In contrast to eagles, humans could choose when and where to ignite a flame, and that they could perform various duties with it.

The advent and domestication of fire was which led humans to evolve further

Around forty-four thousand years ago, the humans living in Indonesia developed the first seafaring societies. They learned how to build ships

They navigated and maneuvered the sea through the vessels they constructed and became long-distance fishermen

every different mammal that went to sea – seals, sea cows, dolphins – had to evolve for hundreds of thousands of years to develop specialised organs and a hydrodynamic body. The Sapiens in Indonesia, descendants of apes who lived on the African savannah, become Pacific seafarers without growing flippers and without having to look forward to their noses to migrate to the top of their heads as whales did. as a substitute, they constructed boats and learned how to steer them. And those skills enabled them to attain and settle in Australia.No other animals had ever moved into any such massive variety of radically different habitats so fast, everywhere using virtually the same genes.

This proves that the advent of early human entrepreneurial activity led to the revolutions that we know today these advances were made in the time called cognitive revolution and these advances are proof of that .

Around ten thousand years ago when humans began to dedicate almost all their time and effort to manipulate the lives of a few animal and plant species

From dawn to sundownpeople sowed seeds, watered vegetation, plucked weeds from the ground, and led sheep to pastures. This work, they thought, mightoffer them extra fruit, grain, and meat. It changed into a revolution within the way people lived – the Agricultural Revolution.

The transition to agriculture commencednear 9500–8500 BC within the hill of south Turkey, western Iran, and the Levant. It started out slowly and in a confined geographical region. Wheat and goats had been domesticated aroundapproximately 9000 BC; peas and lentils at 8000 BC; olive timberthrough 5000 BC; horses through 4000 BC; and grapevines in 3500 BC. Some animals and flowers, together with camels and cashew nuts, have been domesticated even later, however,through 3500 BC the primary wave of domestication had finished

Even today, with all our superior technologies, greater than ninetypercent of the calories that feed humanity comes from the handful of plants that our ancestors domesticated among 9500 and 3500 BC – wheat, rice, corn

Human advent to domesticate plants and animals offered nothing for individuals. Yet it did miracles on Homo sapiens as a species.

Cultivating wheat supplieda good deal of extramealsand increased food per territory and thereby enabled Homo sapiens to multiply exponentially.

Around 13,000 BC, the regionacross the oasis of Jericho, in Palestine, couldnourish at maximum one roaming band of approximately100exceptionallyhealthy humans

Around 8500 BC, while wild vegetationpaved the way to wheat fields, the oasis supported a massive cramped village of 1,000 humans,

The currency of evolution is neither hunger nor pain, it is copies of DNA helixes. Like the economicachievement of a business enterprise is measured through its market capitalisation, notthrough the happiness of its employees, and other stakeholders so the evolutionary achievement of a species is measured through the number of copies of its DNA. If no DNA copies remain, the species is extinct, simply as an organisationwithoutcash is declared bankrupt. If a species boasts many DNA copies, it is an achievement and the species flourishes. From this sort of perspective, 1,000 copies are constantlybetter than 100 copies. This is the essence of the Agricultural Revolution

It led way to humans multiplying and humans could do more than just hunt.

they could think, write history and devote their energy to more entrepreneurial activities instead of foragers who had to spend time searching for food.

The agriculture revolution wasn’t a mistake it was a deliberate attempt of humans to control life and have more food security in the future .

Life has changed dramatically in the past 4 decades since the advent of the internet. Alan Turing had made the first computer long ago to decode the Nazi enigma machine. Like most entrepreneurial activities one thing can be a mistake but the other things and the improvement of that is deliberate.

Peter Theil eloquently discusses this in his book. There are two types of entrepreneurship one is where there is a leap in technology where a new thing is invented and the other is where the existing technology is improved

The latter is never a mistake, the former could be an accident.

The true essence of the word entrepreneurship is solving problems and discussing our primitive homo sapiens’s enterprising nature is very significant

It proves that since six million years ago human’s enterprising nature and its ability to communicate in large numbers is the reason today we are on top of the animal hierarchy .

enterprising nature is in our genes .

(note that the above phrase is in a metaphorical sense, the science hasn’t found any entrepreneurial genomes)

Muhammad Abdullah

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