By the way- I don't think you can assume ancient man was unhappy.
I don't think ancient people were unhappy in the modern sense of the word. Their lives were probably a lot more stressful and certainly extremely violent, but depression was probably nonexistent (a death sentence). I would argue that most modern people would consider their lifestyles undesirable.
I think people tend to look at pre-agrarian society with rose-colored glasses. Did people have better nutrition, in 10000 BC, if they were hunter-gatherers rather than farmers? Yes; that's not even debated. I don't know how much should be taken out of that. For example, there's the often made and almost certainly false claim that agriculture led to gender inequality. From a gender-equality perspective, I don't think that pre-agrarian society was the utopia some people make it out to be. Pre-monogamous societies pretty much invariably treated women as property, because access to women was the signal (and primary benefit) of a man's social status. "Alphas" had many wives, "gammas" had none and were sent off to war as soldiers (to either "take" wives or die). It was better to be a woman than a low-status man, but that doesn't mean gender equality was there. It's hard to have gender equality in that sort of morally debased culture. Monogamous marriage (which came much, much later than agriculture) was the very first wave of feminism.
Your description of human monogamy does not gel with my understanding. My understanding is that as far as monogamous relationships go, we've always been pretty much the way we are now. That is, we are a mostly monogamous species, but not completely. The benefits of social status that you describe still exist now; a middle class man cannot afford a mistress. But the elite in any society is relatively small compared to the size of the society, so most couples are mostly monogamous.
(I keep saying "mostly" because we, as a species, cheat. In "The Third Chimpanzee" Jared Diamond makes a compelling case that cheating is actually an evolutionary strategy, and that we shouldn't dismiss it as people faltering from the ideal marriage. That is, if many, many people do it across all cultures, it's probably in our genes.)
I agree with what you are saying. I think what has changed is that having a harem is no longer socially acceptable. People still cheat all the time, but the era when a high-status man can have 20 "wives", and in which a lot of low-status men (to be made soldiers) can't find any, has ended in the civilized world.
Humans are probably "naturally" polygamous and violent, and also willing to enter violence if it can increase sexual access. This is "good" for the "selfish" genes, but painful for the organism and outright bad for society, which is why societies steer toward mostly-monogamous arrangements as they mature.
I think that there still are very high status men in this world who get away with 20 "wives." Consider, for example, the royalty in Saudi Arabia. My point was it's rare now, and that it was equally rare then. Or do you have stats on it?
There certainly are such high status men. But compared to the world population, and considering they reign over only very small parts of the world, are they even statistically significant?
I don't think ancient people were unhappy in the modern sense of the word. Their lives were probably a lot more stressful and certainly extremely violent, but depression was probably nonexistent (a death sentence). I would argue that most modern people would consider their lifestyles undesirable.
I think people tend to look at pre-agrarian society with rose-colored glasses.
I agree with the rose-colored glasses. However, the post I replied to was hinting they believed it was obvious modern societies would win when compared based on happiness, and I thought it prudent to point out we can't assume that.
I think the highs and lows were a lot steeper in hunter-gatherer societies. The thrill for a 15-year-old hunter after his (or her) first big kill is probably unmatched by the smaller victory of a good SAT score or college admission... or anything we experience in our lives, for that matter. Merely surviving can give people a much stronger sense of purpose than most office jobs. On the other hand, the violent death rate was somewhere around 0.5% per year from conflict with other humans alone. Life expectancy for someone who survived childhood was probably in the mid-50s and some people definitely achieved what would be considered "old age" even today, but if you made it to 65, almost all of your childhood friends would be dead.
It's impossible to compare subjective experiences. I know that I wouldn't trade, but that's all I can really say.
I don't think ancient people were unhappy in the modern sense of the word. Their lives were probably a lot more stressful and certainly extremely violent, but depression was probably nonexistent (a death sentence). I would argue that most modern people would consider their lifestyles undesirable.
I think people tend to look at pre-agrarian society with rose-colored glasses. Did people have better nutrition, in 10000 BC, if they were hunter-gatherers rather than farmers? Yes; that's not even debated. I don't know how much should be taken out of that. For example, there's the often made and almost certainly false claim that agriculture led to gender inequality. From a gender-equality perspective, I don't think that pre-agrarian society was the utopia some people make it out to be. Pre-monogamous societies pretty much invariably treated women as property, because access to women was the signal (and primary benefit) of a man's social status. "Alphas" had many wives, "gammas" had none and were sent off to war as soldiers (to either "take" wives or die). It was better to be a woman than a low-status man, but that doesn't mean gender equality was there. It's hard to have gender equality in that sort of morally debased culture. Monogamous marriage (which came much, much later than agriculture) was the very first wave of feminism.