 :::Reread the thread on Jared Diamond. We don't use him. You have failed to grasp that the objection is not to the fact that the late world ecological change rendered  all countries in the northern hemisphere more ertile, etc., but to the silliness of the phrasing ('fostered human development' sounds like a phrase straight out of a pop psychology book.)    :::Improved ecological conditions following the last ice age facilitated population growth and a flowering of culture. ref Mark Griffiths,  The Lotus Quest: In Search of the Sacred Flower,  Random House,  2011 pp.144-146   