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There are isolated examples of early water and sewage canal systems, but none was a cause of civilization. The oldest is probably the Indus Valley (Harappans) by about 2000-3000 BCE.
But the claim I was objecting to is that plumbing made civilization possible. Sumerian cities date back to 3500 BCE and Egypt's by 3000 BCE. This is thousands of years before any sort of plumbing, nor was plumbing a precursor to urbanization in any other part of the world.
I wasn't sugesting that indoor plumbing caused civilization ,only that it might be a signifiacant event in history. I acutually heard a lecture by a histrian who holds that plumbing or removing waste from our immediate suroundings was more than an idle novelty, and it alone migh have been responsible for people to live in larger and larger groups.
I wasn't sugesting that indoor plumbing caused civilization ,only that it might be a signifiacant event in history. I acutually heard a lecture by a histrian who holds that plumbing or removing waste from our immediate suroundings was more than an idle novelty, and it alone migh have been responsible for people to live in larger and larger groups.
Oh ok, you had originally said that plumbing "allowed" people to "form cities." The formation of cities is the most central element to the rise of civilization.
But otherwise certainly water and sewage removal definitely allow for bigger cities.
Your argument makes no sense; it might in a society where a greater segment of the population were well-educated and could be cou ted upon to act in a completely empircal manner, guided by an enlightened self-interest, but we're a log way from that, and it will be a while before the rest of the world catches up to the First World.
As monotheism has itself evolved andd eveloped, the role of the individual conscience has expanded, the Catholic Couter-Reformation of the Sixteenth Century served the same purpose its Protestant predecessor.
Because most people are scared, one way or another; the development of an individual conscience enables most individuals to within reason, set their own limits and, while as Mark Twain observed "Every man, like the moon, has a dark side, which he never shows", most people behave reasonably.
But on the other hand, absence of recognition of a Deity leaves the state as the primary source of near-unlimited power. The French Jacobins, the Soviet Bolsheviks, and the Nazis all recognized this, and the results are written in blood.
Just pointing out the way the Catholic church and its children enforced their own power over individuals who didn't play the game right or not at all wis also written in blood. The Burning times, the wars between split offs, and so forth. A large monotheist entity is just as much a power in its time and in its time the Church was as soaked in blood as any other which wishes to keep what it has.
Just pointing out the way the Catholic church and its children enforced their own power over individuals who didn't play the game right or not at all wis also written in blood. The Burning times, the wars between split offs, and so forth. A large monotheist entity is just as much a power in its time and in its time the Church was as soaked in blood as any other which wishes to keep what it has.
don't forget the English church, they killed a lot of Catholics.
don't forget the English church, they killed a lot of Catholics.
This was all part of the same, as it was at heart a political dispute within the community. Henry wanted official blessing on divorce and made his own church to do it. But at the heart of it was his need for an heir. To this day there are ties with the Catholic church. It was different with Luther and other smaller split offs who wished to practice their way for personal reasons. But it is also encompassed in the larger picture of a monolithic power and what happens when it starts to falter. The splinters tend to react how they were used to.
With the British situation, there was a massive dose of politics involved as well which brought up a lot of old scores too. Any opportunity would be taken advantage of. The essense was the Catholic church was not a power because it was a church but a power which happened to be a church. Thus when its doctrine was questioned it also became political.
Somebody notices that fermented grain preserves fresh unpolluted water. That made growing grain a priority over just gathering grass seed.
Again, not an "event", but a series of probably thousands of independent discoveries over millennia,, stumbled upon fairly quickly by virtually every culture. I just culled this remark out of a search for some historical perspective:
Weston A. Price, a dentist who travelled the world, studying primitive cultures found that almost all of the traditional cultures had some form of lacto-fermentation as part of their food culture.
Almost any food can be preserved via lacto-fermentation. Looking at a short list of commonly prepared fermented foods from around the world shows how common fermentation is.
Have we considered that the single most significant event in all human history...has yet to happen?
Got to have fun with this one:
Political leaders telling the truth?
"Full Disclosure" regarding all those black ops "off budget" funds?
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