Sure. In the book they decide to change "roles" for the day, The guy would take care of the toddler and the house work while the wife would take care of the fields. She simply did not have the physical ability to get enough of the work done by the time it would have needed to have been done for them to maintain their, at the time, farm. Essentially the reality of the physical differences between men and women came to the forefront when your life depends on the food you are planting and caring for today determines if you will survive the winter.
Men are stronger, - they have larger lung capacity than women, men can simply do "more work" than women in the same amount of time (physical). This isn't a mystery. If SOMEONE has to watch the kid and keep to the stove and the house - who should do it, the man, or the woman if the other job is to work in the fields?
There is also some interesting concepts of the equation of Calories burned to generate future calories to burn. If you are running at a deficit you are in trouble and may even be able to spot the trouble months out. But also taking into account during winter months you will be more sedentary so will not have to necessarily worry -as much - about daily calories available. Do you have a reserve? etc.
The perspective of food scarcity also puts into perspective how special "Feasts" were back in the day - Modern day has completely erased the importance of a feast back in the day because we have lost the perspective of how important food is and how difficult (without modern power) it is to develop/cultivate - Further - that's not accounting for famine or bad crops.
It's a really interesting book for this kind of practical data.
Sure. In the book they decide to change "roles" for the day, The guy would take care of the toddler and the house work while the wife would take care of the fields. She simply did not have the physical ability to get enough of the work done by the time it would have needed to have been done for them to maintain their, at the time, farm. Essentially the reality of the physical differences between men and women came to the forefront when your life depends on the food you are planting and caring for today determines if you will survive the winter.
Men are stronger, - they have larger lung capacity than women, men can simply do "more work" than women in the same amount of time (physical). This isn't a mystery. If SOMEONE has to watch the kid and keep to the stove and the house - who should do it, the man, or the woman if the other job is to work in the fields?
There is also some interesting concepts of the equation of Calories burned to generate future calories to burn. If you are running at a deficit you are in trouble and may even be able to spot the trouble months out. But also taking into account during winter months you will be more sedentary so will not have to necessarily worry -as much - about daily calories available. Do you have a reserve? etc.
The perspective of food scarcity also puts into perspective how special "Feasts" were back in the day - Modern day has completely erased the importance of a feast back in the day because we have lost the perspective of how important food is and how difficult (without modern power) it is to develop/cultivate - Further - that's not accounting for famine or bad crops.
It's a really interesting book for this kind of practical data.