Was just wondering or trying to imagine how this very first came about. I imagine it was long ago when a native to the wild plant experimented and decided it was a good thing. Maybe some-one on here knows about this? Why did they find it good I wonder. Must have been a lot of other plants etc around but this one sure took off in all it’s forms. Maybe they were just bored or hungry and chewing some leaves and simply unwittingly became addicted or was there some kind of high or something medicinal that they realised? Then some-one must have thought, hey why don’t I role this tobacco leaf up and set fire to it and breath in the smoke. I wouldn’t have thought that an obvious thing to think of but for some reason it happened. Any ideas? Just did a search. Checking this out http://archive.tobacco.org/History/Tobacco\\_History.html very interesting "•c.1 BCE: Experts believe American inhabitants have begun finding ways to use tobacco, including smoking (in a number of variations), chewing and in probably hallucinogenic enemas (by the Peruvian Aguaruna aboriginals). " "•1493: Ramon Pane, a monk who accompanied Columbus on his second voyage, gave lengthy descriptions about the custom of taking snuff. He also described how the Indians inhaled smoke through a Y-shaped tube. Pane is usually credited with being the first man to introduce tobacco to Europe. "

How did people find out how to milk cows and why did they decide to drink it? It wonders me much more.

While the cow thing is funny and does provoke a little thought haha, i guess its because we saw the young drinking the milk, just like humans. i have wondered about stuff like this before though.

How did people find out how to milk cows and why did they decide to drink it? It wonders me much more.

Imitation is how early man figured out many things

I’ve always wondered about the first guy to eat an egg.

Read “Guns, Germs and Steel”. Excellent book. The writer discusses how people start doing stuff like this. Like wheat cultivation: people gather wilds seeds, then poop near their village or shelters or whatever. Some of the undigested seeds start to grow, which gives people ideas. Stuff like that.

I think they left the grains out in the rain and it became beer. Beer is a bit more enticing a reason to cultivate grains than bread, and is more likely to have been stumbled upon to begin with.

While the cow thing is funny and does provoke a little thought haha, i guess its because we saw the young drinking the milk, just like humans. i have wondered about stuff like this before though.

So why didn’t we take to drinking dog milk? We domesticated dogs long before we domesticated cows. Its most unnatural, and I take no milk products myself.

Not sure about dogs (or cows) but I know for sure that Giraff milk was to high to get at. They hadn’t invented the ladder then or things could all have been so different now. Lion milk. Well there were difficulties with that. I guess we will never really know about the very first beginnings of tobacco use. I still don’t think we really know fully what it or nicotine does and why it’s so popular. BTW see another e-cig ban in the news today. Wales of all places claiming vaping leads to smoking. Of course no eveidence for this, that I know of anyhow and I think it would be pretty stupid to go from vaping to smoking ( personally now prefer vaping along with snuff over smoking and I now switched to cotton self built wicks which has improved the vaping more) but then people do strange things although I really think they would just stay with vaping. I actually don’t think I would have ever started smoking if vaping had been available to begin with. The bottoom line seems to be just demonisation of nicotine It’s usually the other way around with vaping leading to smoking cessation for which there is massive and ever growing evidence but why be reasonable about anything? Still no issue about exhaust fumes of course either. I really believe that vaping and snuff are the healthy ways to have a nic habit and I’m really happy about that after all these years of tobacco history.

While the cow thing is funny and does provoke a little thought haha, i guess its because we saw the young drinking the milk, just like humans. i have wondered about stuff like this before though.

So why didn’t we take to drinking dog milk? We domesticated dogs long before we domesticated cows. Its most unnatural, and I take no milk products myself.

We probably did but it didn’t taste so good and the yield was too small to make it worth people’s time to milk them. The main reason we milk cows and goats is because they have huge udders filled with milk, most mammals don’t produce enough milk to get a decent amount of it. And if drinking milk is unnatural than why do women have boobies and why do we love to suck on them? How we figured out how to make fire is a far better question than how we figured out we can eat things we see other animals eating

We probably did but it didn’t taste so good and the yield was too small to make it worth people’s time to milk them. The main reason we milk cows and goats is because they have huge udders filled with milk, most mammals don’t produce enough milk to get a decent amount of it. And if drinking milk is unnatural than why do women have boobies and why do we love to suck on them?

ok, I won’t derail this thread any further so if you want to continue this tangent please PM me. Yes I know all this, but prehistoric cows had much smaller udders, the big ones came through selective breeding. Anyway, yes its natural for human babies to drink milk from their human mothers. Cross-species milking is just odd.

snuff was more than likely introduced by the shaman. Native americans may had called them the medicine man. He got his information from the spirit world. Most isolated tribes still have and rely on the shaman for direction in many matters. hunting, crops and medicine to name a few.

@jakartaBoy. I read Guns, Germs and Steel and found it very interesting. The “accidental” theory seems most likely to me. Like someone had some tobacco leaves that were dry and crumbly( a few thousand years ago), took them out, put in his palm and sniffed them to see if they were still fresh. Some of the crumbled dust particles went up his nose, a few minutes later he felt this wonderful clarity of thought, things looked brighter, and in his nose, a warm earthy scent drifted into his brain. Thats how I think snuff first “happened”. It was unintended, but it was pleasant, so he shared his new-found discovery with his tribe members. Zoom ahead to the present year and here we all are, discussing all aspects of that long passed “accident”

@mrmanos, it certainly expands on the points raised above about giraffe milk and lion meat, and why they’ve never been popular choices for domestication. I just read “Why Nations Fail”, which gives a fairly convincing critique explaining why GGS hypothesis doesn’t really stand up to close scrutiny. It would be great to see a debate between the two writers.

@jakartaBoy. I read Guns, Germs and Steel and found it very interesting. The “accidental” theory seems most likely to me. Like someone had some tobacco leaves that were dry and crumbly( a few thousand years ago), took them out, put in his palm and sniffed them to see if they were still fresh. Some of the crumbled dust particles went up his nose, a few minutes later he felt this wonderful clarity of thought, things looked brighter, and in his nose, a warm earthy scent drifted into his brain. Thats how I think snuff first “happened”. It was unintended, but it was pleasant, so he shared his new-found discovery with his tribe members. Zoom ahead to the present year and here we all are, discussing all aspects of that long passed “accident”

Even when I’m out for a roam I will often smell and sometimes taste leaves or berries or maybe a mushroom or whatever, but I do be careful and I never attempt to milk any wild animals. So could be Accidental Theory or purely trial and error. They were probably already chewing the leaves initially and then as you say smelt (insuflated) some dried old leaves maybe already knowing from previous experiments that this was another way to obtain effects from plants. Early chemists. I’m sure a lot of good knowledge of these things is lost now. I shouldn’t contiue the duality of this thread but ever see those african guys who bleed the cows and mix up a lovely blood milkshake. It’s amazing how those people live and the kids that go get tarantulas for a barbeque treat much like western kids buy sweets. Best thing I ever saw was I think on the Asian steps, Mongolia and they killed a goat, skinned it and turned the skin inside out, filled it with the goat meat, threw in a big hot stone form the fire and sewed the skin up and left it to cook. Apparently it was the tastiest meat the program maker had ever had in his life and he really did look like he was meaning that. They then went to sleep outdoors in minus 25celcius after they had buried a line of hot stones which they then slep on top of and which kept them warm all night. Brilliant.

http://www.biopsychiatry.com/tobacco/ This is great info. Seems just what I was looking for.

come on this can’t be right the snuff go’s up ones nose, and all the years I’ve been using it as a hemroid treatment no one has ever told me!!! but thinking about it I have had some funny looks over the years

I agree with Basement Shamen

How did people find out how to milk cows and why did they decide to drink it? It wonders me much more.

Now that is absolutely hilarious and yet so true!