Part 2: 2nd Wave Civilizations in World History

My thoughts are all over the place. So many interesting things I read and skimmed through. From how the Persians mourn over a king's death, India with their caste system, Chinese and Roman empires more universal (thinking they are the center of everything) to Socrates being executed for being accused of corrupting the youth of Athens and the speculation of the Chacos' cannibalism during a drought period which abruptly ended the culture. So much information and so much happened in a short period of time if we are going to compare it to the Paleolithic era.

What caught my eye?

Persian Empire - other than being an impressive empire- no surprise - I have seen some movies like the Prince of Persia. How they mourn when the king died. Persians were expected to shave their hair in mourning and the mains of horses were cut short. But what is even more interesting is the fact that the king had ordered a high ranking nobleman to death because the person had interrupted the king while with his wife. WOW! Talk about walking on thin ice! It wouldn't matter what you did. If the king was in a bad mood you are in a no win situation. Better cross your fingers and hope the king will spare you.

Persian Empire seem to be more over the top, elaborate. They had the elaborate irrigation system going on but I wander if the Maya's irrigation system was as elaborate has the Persian's. They make a comment that the Mayan's had a sophisticated system but I am not clear as to what context compared to the Persian's. But comparing the Persian Empire to Classical/Greece. Greece was a smaller civilization where they were smelting metal (silver, lead and copper).

Greeks - not surprise - more internal conflicts and warfare but with all that drama they found a way to temporarily look away from their conflict to participate in the Olympics together. Despite their conflicts between the city-states, Greeks weren't really fighters. They expanded by settling in places not to conquest and create an empire. In addition, "the wealth and well-born men had the rights of full citizenship and then eventually the lower class and farmers were able to obtain rights. Then there was Solon who made a change. He pushed Athenian politics to democratic direction. Debt slavery was abolished, access to public office was opened to a wider group of men, and all citizen were allowed to take part in the Assembly" - stated in the text book. Amazing how this was already in development. A democratic belief. To add, Alexander promoted interracial couples. How did we manage to take a step backwards if people were already moving forward with citizenship rights and fairness and freedom of choice?

Chinese & Roman Empires - These empires seem to have a more universal attitude. Its all about them; they are the central piece of it all. China had a way of influencing people even if they were taken over. People would continue to practice how the Chinese did because it was more efficient in their eyes. It seemed that people in China had more chances in a political involvement than in a Roman empire because the roman empire expectation was that you had to be from a lineage; have the bloodline to rule. Chinese empire was good at getting people to assimilate to their way of doing things where it seemed like to me that the Roman empire was more by force. Because the Chinese empire were able to do this - other people adapted the Chinese way (influence - like I mentioned before) to get people to do what they want them to do. It was if they had better control over people.

Gupta & Mauryan Empires - small but efficient. These empires may have controlled less area but they were more efficient but unfortunately it appears that these empires were not long-lasting despite their impressive empires similar to the Roman and Chinese Empires.Gupta empire with the "free hospitals"; a flourished culture with the arts and sciences. Successful trade China. With Buddhist and Hindu culture rooting during this time the caste system was still defined. How did this caste system continue to develop even with the influence of Buddhism? India continued to comply with the caste system whereas the rest of the world was working towards social order.

Socrates - my dude who answers a question with a question. Who questioned assumptions and challenged ideas "about the importance of wealth and power in living well" - in the textbook). He was executed because he was accused of corrupting the youth. Basically, a person who was looked as a teacher that guided individuals to think for themselves and question anything was killed because people were afraid of change. Afraid of things not being in order the way they felt it should be. Not being able to change your mindset. There is nothing wrong with change but people till this day have a issue with change and sometimes are too scared to face it because of the unknown and uncertainty.

Africa & Americas - True or false, Africa's population size based on % of the total world is more than the Americas? True. Based on the text (from 400 B.C.E to 1000 C.E) , p.264 Africa ranges from 10-15% of world total versus Americas ranges from 5-7% of world total. The Americas consist of North/Central and South America. Africa held a lot of people in just one continent. AMAZING! The Americas (all 3 combined) are half of that. Why is that? Part of it could be because of the environmental piece that was stated in the text. Africa being more of a tropical setting in certain areas whereas Central/South America experienced earthquakes, droughts and floods. Over time these environmental experiences will cause a civilization to no longer exist.

Niger River (West Africa) - Cities without states. Everyone had their job they didn't need a state system to define their well being and how to establish a lifestyle. This was evidence that cities could flourish without having a state but basically having an understanding of what is needed to work together and stay alive. Cities without states along the Niger River to Mayan where they had leaders in their cities. This cause numerous internal conflicts and warfare between cities because there was no one ruler, a central leader. However, despite their issues, they managed to pull together the Mayan solar year which is more accurate than our calendar we use today. Why are we using our calendar and not the Mayan one?

Speaking of calendar, The Mound builders. It was said in the text that the some of the mounds were aligned with the moon which allowed the prediction of the lunar eclipse. Was this by accident? Just imagining we already had the brain power back then, what took us so long to get to the modern era? Going back in time, seeing how math and science played a big role along with politics and philosophy. With such brain power and yet the urge to control it all and conquer it still took me by surprise to read about the Chaco. Chaco highly skilled astronomers and became the dominant center for production of turquoise ornaments did something I would have never imagined. Following the trend of all the other cities and empires we read about. There was always some sort of internal conflict and some case of warfare whether it was hard core or a slap in the face. I wouldn't think this civilization would have encountered cannibalism. In the text, there speculation as to why this occurred and one of them being, there was a drought? Regardless what the cause was, this led the civilization to an abrupt end.

Terra Cotta Warriors - Fascinating. Amazing how our imagination is when we think of the afterlife. He was definitely going out going / going into the afterlife guns blazing. I did see some of the warriors when they came through San Francisco. Very impressive.
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Chaco Civilization:

Ch 1: First Peoples; First Farmers

Up to this point, I have read through the Prologue and Intro to Part 1 (First things First). I still can't shake the fact that we are able to date so far back. I mentioned this before but the capability to assume what happened in the past is questionable to me. All of this is subjective and how people interpret the information collected and provided.  I would have to say the cosmos portion of the reading was the most fascinating part for me. Comparing the this version and the reading insert we had in class... either way it is intriguing to base this information all on science and how we came about and not religion based. Anyway.. back to the people.. and agriculture.

In the text, I found particularly interesting about the aboriginal people in Australia. Despite the outside influences that came in with technology that the Aboriginal people still practiced  their ancient way of life. It appears that the Europeans had their hands in this influence, bringing in about 250 languages, wide variety of farming needs (bulbs, seeds, roots..etc) and hunting large/small animals.

I am starting to see a trend with the Europeans. World domination still comes to mind. From my world religion class to world history - there appears to be a common denominator.. the Europeans. They may have tried to go to China, Korea and Japan but it seems like they were unable to influence those countries their way.

I do have to mention how I am amazed that there are still communities (tribes) out there that continue to practice their ancient ways. I would not deserve this. I am assuming they are aware of technology but choose not to go down that road.

Lastly, I have to point out, in the text it stated that relationships between man and women were FAR more equal in the beginning than in later in society. Why is that? What changed for humans to think it is ok to treat women inferior? This has been question that goes through my mind every so often. After taking women's literature it made me question who decided women were not equal to man? If the paleolithic era was before religion into play, what was the driving force that changed the mindset for people?

The Big Picture - Turning Points in the Early Times of the World

I am still fascinated that we have been able to find early proof of humanlike creatures and how things may have been. I read over the definition of Paleolithic in the text book - "Paleolithic also referenced as "old stone age" refers more generally to a food, collecting or gathering and hunting way of life before agriculture allowed people to grow food or raise animals deliberately." Really?!? This has to be another WOW factor for my little brain. The thought of us evolving over time and someone brilliant or by accident decided to grow some food and raise some animals deliberately. It reminds me of the cartoons of some sort on how man discovered fire or the wheel. I love how we have evolved but what is in store for us as we move forward into the modern era. Google has been  coming up with things for our consciousness to live forever. Is that something we should strive or should we just leave alone what the cosmos have provided us?

Prologue - Before there was man

It is amazing to read what is thought of about the beginning of time. How it the earth started out as a spec of matter/gas. Then BAM... there is life in just seconds.. milli seconds? That is unheard of. I am still amazed as to how people come up with this conclusion and trying to wrap my head around such a complex theory of where we began. From science to religions, how do we come up with such theories? Looking at the history of the universe and trying to make a connection with religion seems to be a far reach to link. Based on what I have read, hinduism is the oldest religion about 5,000 years old and it has no true record of beginning or founder.. one could say that hinduism is a mystical/cosmic type religion. But where does it tie with the cosmic calendar and the beginning of humans? Based on the cosmic calendar, First humanlike creatures 2.7 million years ago, 1st agriculture 12,000 years ago, birth of Buddha/Greek civilization 2500 years ago, birth of Jesus 2000 years ago and then the Aztec and Inca empires 500 years ago.. there is no mention of hinduism on the cosmic calendar. I find that quite interesting...another thing that caught my eye was the differences between the cosmic calendar in years versus days. For instances, when dinosaurs were in existence either it was ~165 million years ago or 5 days in cosmic terms.

Again, it takes a lot for me to wrap my head around this. Even with a science degree I still question how things are decided and determined based on what.. based on experience, based on previous knowledge.. who wrote this stuff?

Then there was man... the defined era of humans - Paleolithic, Agricultural and Modern (Industrial). The best part is that the majority of our time on earth it is said it was spent mostly in the Paleolithic era.. crazy. modern era has NOTHING on paleolithic. --- I would have to say, it seemed like the good times.. because later.. there became man who decided to be more greedy and Europe appearing to be on the quest of world domination but yet China seemed to be untouched.