What lifeform on Earth let you to believe that the default state of being was effortless comfort?
The default state of life is different in the frozen tundra vs the temperate rainforest. Some people live in areas where there is natural abundance of easily exploitable resources. Modernizing a bit, some people live in areas where the minimal acceptable standard of living can be supported on a few hours of work per week.
So in a way we do need something to help us "relax" in a world where we can't naturally.
That's not what ethnologists saw in most primitive people's they've examined...
I assumed protestant ethic came from all the non-anal families literally dying in an unforgiving and unfamiliar land.
What’s a non-anal family? Most families are non-anal if you consider how human reproduction works by I’m not sure that’s what you’re talking about :P
Your logic makes sense if the Earth were the same everywhere. It breaks down if you understand that New England is fundamentally different from England or Africa.
The fact that puritanism thrived says something about New England's natural state in the 1600s. It says nothing about humankind's natural state.
Really, the fact that it emerged so late in human history, and was dominant so briefly, in such an unusual place suggests it's somewhat unnatural at a species scale.
Most human good comes from this, too...
Now that's out of date. Between TV, video games, and the Web, there's now way too much ability to sit still in a room.
That should be the natural state of man, though, I'd extend it to meeting with friends, cooking, playing, etc -- that is, being "non-productive". It took a lot of advertising and protestant ethic working hand in hand through opposing ends to move the needle towards full on consumption and full on productivity.
"All human evil comes from a single cause, man's inability to sit still in a room." - Blaise Pascal