Would You Risk Death for Honey?

Today you can buy sugar with zero risk. But for most of human history, getting a mouthful required a calculation that could end your life. The earth guarded its sugar with venom and sheer heights, making a blind search a mathematical death sentence. You would burn more calories looking for a hive than the honey actually provided. To survive the math, we had to form a literal inter-species alliance with a wild bird. Where the evidence is thin, the video says so. Claims are flagged as known, likely, or uncertain. In this video: The calorie math of a blind search A literal inter-species alliance The specific acoustic call birds wait for Trading heavy tools for an aerial map When the map ends at the tree roots Sources: Ancient rock painting of honey hunting: Crane 1999, The World History of Beekeeping and Honey Hunting Honey in modern Hadza diets: Marlowe et al. 2014, Journal of Human Evolution Caloric contribution of wild sugar: Crittenden 2011, Food and Foodways Beeswax residue in early pottery shards: Roffet-Salque et al. 2015, Nature, doi:10.1038/nature15757 Confirmed mutualism with wild birds: Spottiswoode et al. 2016, Science Cuevas de la Araña cave art: Dams & Dams 1977, Nature Hunter gatherer reliance on honey: Marlowe, Berbesque, Wood, Crittenden & Porter 2014, Journal of Human Evolution Bird responses to specific human calls: Spottiswoode, K. Begg & C. Begg 2016, Science Observing the human bird alliance directly: Wood, Pontzer, Raichlen & Marlowe 2014, Evolution and Human Behavior More on this: ancient humans risking death for honey, how ancient humans handled risking death for honey, ancient humans explained, early humans, prehistory, human evolution, ancient humans.