I just had an hour drive and thought about this whole thread. Most won’t read this whole post….thats ok! It’s more for me.
This whole post is about corn.
There are two good thought experiments I’ve often heard and used dealing with these debates. First is the witch that comes and takes every single man made thing away from humans. She then tells every human if you as a people can make one iPhone I’ll give you everything back. Then she leaves.
Many have debated this question, but the consensus answer is it could never be done. Within a month 99.9% of humans would be dead (watch naked and afraid, and they are given fire starter, knife, and pot). The few left would spend generations just trying to survive, much like humans did for 100k years. People even a mile a way couldn’t communicate, no way to organize. iPhones take mines, factories, computers, electronics, mass communication. No one would be able to even write down what the witch wanted. Thousands of years later, if humans as a species survived, no one would even remember the witch or an iPhone and things would look totally different.
The second is if someone would pay ONE person 50 million dollars IF they could make one of the simplest things humans possess from start to finish….a pencil. The consensus is one person could not do it. You would have to cut a tree and process would down to a pencil. Drill a precise hole down the middle. That’s the easy part. Graphite has to be mined and processed, and takes machines and skill to make into a small tube. What about the tin cap that holds the eraser? Again mining, metallurgy, and forging to make a small precise cap. The rubber? Better be able to drill for oil and process it. And finally, yellow paint. Good luck making that.
I say all that to say that EVERYTHING we have and do was built on years and years and generations of other people and previous technological advancement. Even people that live “off the grid” use advanced tools, materials, and skills to live like they do. Hell homeless people have tents and clothing not available a generation ago.
Now to hunting. I was thinking of the things I use to hunt. My guess is everyone here has used some or all of these things, plus many more.
Clothing: the camo patterns are computer generated to fool a deers eyes. Goretex for water protection and breath ability. That goes for all synthetic fabrics. Insulation in our coveralls. Zippers. Buttons. Even our “traditional” wools are taken from sheep in Bangladesh, shipped to a factory, and machines weave them into tight patterns for our thermal underwear in a way not possible a generation ago.
Guns: modern rifling, machines with specs to make them shoot accurate and reliably. Same with bullet casings, primers, propellant. The bullets themselves are designed by engineers and tested in wind chambers and computers. The materials are created using AI and metallurgy techniques perfected by scientists. Crossbows, compound bows? Generations of tech infinitely better than what they used in midieval times. They can generate force no human could pull back and hold for a reliable shot with the mechanics of the pulleys. And hey, those were all made by machines and craftsmen that can almost guarantee the one you will buy shoots like the next one. Something like that impossible 1000 years ago. Only kings could have craftsmen make 500 years ago. Now I can buy one infinitely better than those used on the battlefields of England for 200 bucks at Cabellas.
Optics: the binos we use, designed over generations by master craftsmen. Took millennia to perfect. Now cut to fractions of a millimeter by machines. Same for rifle scopes. A 199 dollar bushnell would have been the most advanced optics on earth a hundred years back. Mounts on the rifles are reliable. Laser range finders? That is space age tech for 100 bucks. We use on the golf course or stand what was not invented in 1950, and was not available retail until 10-15 years ago.
Food plots: I could go on and on. Tractors, tillers, drills, bush hogs, pallet forks and front end loaders. Grain drills. Sprayers. Chemicals galore.
Seed: imagine if we had to only plant what we grew? No buying a strain scientists made to grow where it’s not supposed to, coated to defy weather patterns and droughts. Synthetic fertilizer? Back to being able to drill for oil and process it. Massive machines that dig rocks from the earth, process it, and let us buy it for 20 bucks at Walmart.
Cars: how do we get to our hunting spot two hours away? Men of Olden days would ride their horse fighting off natives for weeks to get to that honey hole. My wife is mad if I’m not home for dinner. What about the four wheeler we ride to the stand or use to spray?
Hunting stands: I think this might be the biggest tech we have created to help us fool prey. Nature doesn’t have death for large animals in trees. They don’t look up. So we all hunt from aluminum stands we build (ie put together) to outsmart evolution to get above deers nose and eyes. “Well I built my stand.” Where did the hammer and saw and nails come from? Hell even if you used a handsaw there are generations of tech to forge that metal into a cutting blade. Generations. And good luck making your own nails.
I’ve left out many many many things we use to help us kill deer that are way past cheating. But we take them for granted because we have alway had them, or don’t think about the advancements needed to obtain them. Just because grandpa used them doesn’t mean it’s any more fair or lack of technology that gives us an advantage over the deer.
Back to corn. So, no, I don’t think someone pouring corn on the ground to bring in deer is the THING that ruined hunting and made us harvesting a deer “not a fair chase.”
