History

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari

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Cannot recommend this book enough, even though for us slow readers, it's quite the undertaking. However, for all the pains and troubles and time, it's fully worth it. 

Not only does Harari somehow manage to capture the entire scope of human history in an engaging and challenging sort of way, he also aptly and continually finds ways to challenge our current mindset and norms of life and living and understanding. He's brilliant! 

Sapiens is one of those must-read books that will linger in its readers mind long after it has been placed on the shelf, only to be passed around or reached for time and time again. If only just to refresh our memory. 

Here are a few highlights:

Most top predators of the planet are majestic creatures. Millions of years of dominion have filled them with self-confidence. Sapiens by contrast is more like a banana republic dictator. Having so recently been one of the underdogs of the savannah, we are full of fears and anxieties over our position, which makes us doubly cruel and dangerous. Many historical calamities, from deadly wars to ecological catastrophes, have resulted from this over-hasty jump (pg 12).

Rather than heralding a new era of easy living, the Agricultural Revolution left farmers with lives generally more difficult and less satisfying than those of foragers. Hunter-gatherers spent their time in more stimulating and varied ways, and were less in danger of starvation and disease. The Agricultural Revolution certainly enlarged the sum total of food at the disposal of humankind, but the extra food did not translate into e better diet or more leisure. Rather, it translated into population explosions and pampered elites. The average farmer worked harder than the average forager, and got a worse diet in return. The Agricultural Revolution was history’s biggest fraud (pg 79).

One of history’s few iron laws is that luxuries tend to become necessities and to spawn new obligations. Once people get used to a certain luxury, they take it for granted. Then they begin to count on it. Finally, they reach a point where they can’t live without it (pg 87).

Ted Kaczynski actually said something very similar in his Manifesto:

Another reason why technology is such a powerful social force is that, within the context of a given society, technological progress marches in only one direction; it can never be reversed. Once a technical innovation has been introduced, people usually become dependent on it, so that they can never again do without it, unless it is replaced by some still more advanced innovation. Not only do people become dependent as individuals on a new item of technology, but, even more, the system as a whole becomes dependent on it . . .Thus the system can move in only one direction, toward greater technologization. Technology repeatedly forces freedom to take a step back, but technology can never take a step back—short of the overthrow of the whole technological system.

Interesting. Might have to consider that a bit longer.

Back in the snail-mail era, people usually only wrote letters when they had something important to relate. Rather than writing the first thing that came into their heads, they considered carefully what they wanted to say and how to phrase it. They expected to receive a similarly considered answer. Most people wrote and received no more than a handful of letters a month and seldom felt compelled to reply immediately. Today I receive dozens of emails each day, all from people who expect a prompt reply. We thought we were saving time; instead we revved up the treadmill of life to ten times its former speed and made our days more anxious and agitated (pg 88).

How do you cause people to believe in an imagined order such as Christianity, democracy, or capitalism? First, you never admit that the order is imagined. You always insist that the order sustaining society is an objective reality created by the great gods or by the laws of nature. People are unequal, not because Hammurabi said so, but because Enlil and Marduk decreed it. People are equal, not because Thomas Jefferson said so, but because God created them that way. Free markets are the best economic system, not because Adam Smith said so, but because these are the immutable laws of nature (pg 113).

In order to establish such complex organizations, it’s necessary to convince many strangers to cooperate with one another . . . There is no way out of the imagined order. When we break down our prison walls and run toward freedom, we are in fact running into the more spacious exercise yard of a bigger prison (pg 118).

This next quote might be the most disturbing. Growing up in a Christian home and attending church most of my life, I've always heard of the persecution of Christians from the non-believing world. Not how much we've killed ourselves.

In the 300 years from the crucifixion of Christ to the conversion of Emperor Constantine, polytheistic Roman emperors initiated no more than four general persecutions of Christians. Local administrators and governors incited some anti-Christian violence of their own. Still, if we combine all the victims of all these persecutions, it turns out that in these three centuries, the polytheistic Romans killed no more than a few thousand Christians. In contrast, over the course of the next 1,500 years, Christians slaughtered Christians by the millions to defend slightly different interpretations of the religion of love and compassion . . . On 23 August 1572, French Catholics who stressed the importance of good deeds attached communities of French Protestants who highlighted God’s love for humankind. In this attack, the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre, between 5,000 and 10,000 Protestants were slaughtered in less than twenty-four hours. When the pope in Rome heard the news from France, he was so overcome by joy that he organized festive prayers to celebrate the occasion and commissioned Giorgio Vasari to decorate one of the Vatican’s room with a fresco of the massacre (the room is currently off-limits to visitors). More Christians were killed by fellow Christians in those twenty-four hours than by the polytheistic Roman Empire throughout its entire existence (pg 216).

There is poetic justice in the fact that a quarter of the world, and two of its seven continents, are named after a little-unknown Italian whose sole claim to fame is that he had the courage to say, “We don’t know” (pg 288).

Strange. That there might be a downside to curiosity. What are the ramifications/consequences of pursing understanding or insight? What (or who) are we killing off? What are we losing?

Just as the Atlantic slave trade did not stem from hatred towards Africans, so the modern animal industry is not motivated by animosity. Again, it is fueled by indifference. Most people who produce and consume eggs, milk and meat rarely stop to think about the fate of the chickens, cows or pigs whose flesh and emissions they are eating. Those who do think often argue that such animals are really little different from machines, devoid of sensations and emotions, incapable of suffering. Ironically, the same scientific disciplines which shape our milk machines and egg machines have lately demonstrated beyond reasonable doubt that mammals and birds have a complex sensory and emotional make-up. The not only feel physical pain, but can also suffer from emotional distress (pg 343).

Each year the US population spends more money on diets than the amount needed to feed all the hungry people in the rest of the world. Obesity is a double victory for consumerism. Instead of eating little, which will lead to economic contraction, people eat too much and then buy diet products – contributing to economic growth twice over (pg 349).

As long as my personal narrative is in line with the narratives of the people around me, I can convince myself that my life is meaningful, and find happiness in that conviction . . . commercials urge us to “Just Dot It!” Action films, stage dramas, soap operas, novels, and catchy pop songs indoctrinate us constantly,: “be true to yourself”, “Listen to yourself”, “Follow your heart”. Jean-Jacquess Rousseau states this view most classically: “What I feel to be good – is good. What I feel to be bad – is bad.”

People who have been raised from infancy on a diet of such slogans are prone to believe that happiness is a subjective feeling and that each individual best knows whether she is happy or miserable. Yet this view is unique to liberalism. Most religions and ideologies throughout history stated that there are objective yardsticks for goodness and beauty, and for how things ought to be. They were suspicious of the feelings and preferences of the ordinary person. At the entrance of the temple of Apollo at Delphi, pilgrims were greeted by the inscription: “Know thyself!” The implication was that the average person is ignorant of his true self, and is therefore likely to be ignorant of true happiness. Freud would probably (392, 393).

So much to chew on. So much to consider. Just as a good book should be. 

 

For more on . . .

Reading Log 2017  :  Reading Log 2018

Privileged America, your table is ready

This morning, after listening to the podcast "State vs Johnson," by Malcolm Gladwell I was uncomfortable. No, that's not right. I was angry - pissed even - because I just hate stories like these. It's about a colored man accused of raping a white woman during the Jim Crow era. He didn't do it, but that didn't matter. She said he did.

The podcast ended about seven minutes before the walk was over so I had time to try and digest it a bit. It was a bit like trying to swallow a much too large piece of apple. After forcing it down with a giant chin-to-chest gulp, it scraped all the way down, leaving my chest soar and bruised for the rest of the day. Suddenly, simple eating becomes a painful chore. 

Around noon, I grabbed a beer and tried to sort out my thoughts. I drank coffee instead.

A few nights earlier, I wasted too much time watching Louis C.K. videos because a good friend of mine, Eric Trauger, always talks about him, and for good reason: Louis C.K. is brilliant - in a hysterically difficult to watch sort of way - because, well, he nails us. Right on the head. And it's super uncomfortable.

Especially if you're privileged white. 

In "State vs Johnson," Gladwell points out the parallel between Johnson's case and that described in To Kill a Mockingbird. The only difference being, Johnson didn't have Atticus Finch. He had a drunk who didn't understand the constitution, or the rights of all men.

(As a side note, I absolutely, with all that I know and am, disagree with Gladwell's assessment of Atticus' motive of persuasion).

Soon after the podcast ended, one thought that came to mind was on the idea of rights. After the trial, where Johnson was unsurprisingly found guilty, a new lawyer, Vernon Jordan, stepped in to try and rectify the verdict on the basis of violated Amendment rights - the fourteenth specifically- which says that no state shall "deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws (via)." 

Johnson, a born citizen of the United States, had certain unalienable rights. But because of the color of his skin and because of the egregious actions he was assumed to have done, his rights were tossed aside, like crumbs on a picnic table. 

Suddenly, inherent rights, seam so fickle, so fragile, only as strong as the men and women who ensure them. 

The twin brother to rights is deserve, and in our American culture, we use them interchangeably. He or she deserves or has the right to do this or that, we feel the freedom to buy or do as we please because we deserve it, and please, feel the freedom to speak up and speak out because it is our First Amendment right, any high schooler knows that.

These ideas of complete independence and freedom are rooted in the declarations of our constitution, that all men are created equal and with the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. As Americans, we understand these truths, and we hold them to be self-evident.

But, what if they're not? What if we don't actually deserve anything? What if we, really, have absolutely no right to demand any rights at all?

What if, like Atticus Finch, all we really have is the weight of responsibility. 

None of us chose anything about our birth, we just showed up, involuntarily. Louis C.K. hits on this when he says, "If it were an option, I would re-up (on being white) every year." 

That's a pretty important "if" because it emphasis the point that none of us had a choice in anything about how we came into this world. Not who are parents are, their nationality, or ethnicity they are or decided to have sex with. We didn't decide any of it. We had not a single bit of input. Even after we were born, our opinions didn't count. If our parents lived on a farm, we lived on a farm. If they moved to the city, we went along - kicking and screaming or otherwise. From the beginning, we had no say, none, on some of the most deciding factors of life. 

We didn't even have a say if we wanted to be born at all.

However, overtime, we begin to expect, demand even, what we are so confident think we deserve. 

Yet, these men and women, without rights and without privilege, shaped the course of America.

We know America is what we make of it. That, "the Tuskegee Airman, and the Navajo Code Talkers, and the Japanese Americans who fought for this country even as their own liberty (a right or privilege) had been denied" taught and lived out for us a great lesson on what it means to be American, and what it means to be human.

"We are all called to do something. We are all called, to play a role," not simply sit about, demanding our rights and privileges, but to live a life of deep responsibility, like Sojourner Truth, Fannie Lou Hamer, and Atticus Finch

Many of those men and women who walked that bridge, including that southern baptist preacher who had a dream, didn't look to the Constitution for strength to stand up and do something, they looked to their responsibility, their role within the time, and they made something of it. They were men and women of integrity, not entitlement. And they, along with many others both past and present, are what have helped make America great. Not their rights. 

But we're not finished. In fact, if we look around, I think it's clear to say we are far from it.

May we, especially those of us born into undeserved privilege, live in a similar way and with like conviction and embrace the roles we are called to play - to make our homes, our communities, our country and our world great, not simply ourselves. To live, not with selfish and ambition, but with a sense of urgent responsibility, to use our gifts and talents and rights for the benefit of others, not merely ourselves. And to love. Good God may we learn to love and think of each others as more important than ourselves. 

Then, and only then, will We be great. 

 

For more on . . .

-N- Stuff  :  Humanity  :  History  :  The Misunderstood Black Panther Party

 

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Infographics say more than what they say.

Sometimes, I get lost in the world of infographics because they tend to take huge ideas or concepts or large chunks of time, and allow them to fit in my pocket - so I can carry them around much easier than a textbook or World Atlas.

These one's are pretty interesting, and a little disturbing. At least, the "History's Most Significant Journeys" one is because, apparently, outside of the 1965 Civil Rights walk, no non-white male made any sort of significant journey, anywhere in the world. 

Interesting. 

 

This one, too, seems to be a celebration of the white man's accomplishments. No doubt these men were responsible for the innovation of the world, but on whose backs did they stand upon? Whose labor completed their dreams? 

The title reads, "The People Behind the way we live." Was there no woman contributing to the way we live, behind the inventions? Or were they only consumers? Sitting quietly, distracted by the "internet society," just waiting for someone better, more educated, and more capable to invent something bigger and better?

 

Why are these books banned? Because they challenge authority - because they ask people, regular people, to think and consider something other than what they know or believe to be true. And, for the most part, beause they challenge the leadership and ideals of white men.

Huh.

Sometimes, I get lost in the world of infographics because they tend to take huge ideas or concepts or large chunks of time, and allow them to fit in my pocket - so I can carry them around much easier than a textbook or World Atlas.

Right now, my pockets are full of white men. 

And that's a problem. For several reasons.

 

For more on . . .

-N- Stuff  :  Maps that will change the way you see the world :  World Languages in simple infographics

 

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"All the Ladies Like Whiskers" : how an 11 year old helped Lincoln become president

"Having recently seen a picture of Abraham Lincoln and the man who would become his vice-president, Hannibal Hamlin, eleven-year-old Grace Bedell decided in the autumn of 1860 to write to the Republican candidate and future U.S. president with a a single suggestion that would surely win him the affections of the voting public. To her amazement, she met him in person a few months later, as he traveled victoriously to Washington, DC by train - and he had taken her advice."

The letter reads:

For those hard of seeing, here's some help:

Hon A B Lincoln
Dear Sir
My father has just home from the fair and brought home your picture and Mr. Hamlin's. I am a little girl only 11 years old, but want you should be President of the United States very much so I hope you won't think me very bold to write to such  great man as you are. Have you any little girls about as large as I am if so give them my love and tell her to write to me if you cannot answer this letter. I have got 4 brothers and part of them will vote for you any way and if you let your whiskers grow I will try and get the rest of them to vote for you you would look a great deal better for your face is to thin. All the ladies like whiskers and they would tease their husband to vote for you and then you would be President. My father is going to vote for you and if I was a man I would vote for you to but I will try and get every one to vote for you that I can I think that rail fence around your picture makes it look very pretty I have got a little baby sister she is nine weeks old and is just as cunning as can be. When you direct your letter direct to Grace Bedell Westfield Chautauqua County New York.
I must not write any more answer this letter right off Good bye.
Grace Bedell

 

Grace met President Lincoln soon after. "He climbed down and sat down with me on the edge of the station platform," Grace later recalled. 'Gracie,' he said, 'look at my whiskers. I have been growing them for you.' Then he kissed me. I never saw him again." (via).

"With great power comes great responsibility." I wonder if one of the many responsibilities of those in power is kindness, and not taking oneself to seriously.

 

 

For more on . . .

-N- Stuff  :  History  :  President : humble, meager, pathetic

 

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Russia's history is more complex than we know

In the past two days I've listened to two podcasts, somewhat unconsciously. That is, I unconsciously chose them, not unconsciously listened to them, because that would be reckless. 

Both podcasts, one from Stuff You Missed in History Class and the other from This American Life told stories with Russia as their focus. One podcast entitled, "The Other Mr. President" fit my ideas and understandings of Russia perfectly, and also injected a whole lot of steroids into my stereotypes of a scary, harsh country - Vladimir Putin's rise to power is a CRAZY STORY!!! 

The other injected life into their bigger picture. Entitled "Three Nuclear Close Calls" this podcast told of three different stories where Russian generals, single handedly, prevented all out war against the US and saved thousands of lives. And they did so in almost direct opposition to their superiors. These are even CRAZIER stories!!! 

There's a couple films about on one of the men, Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov. 

Here's the latest one.

A Brief History of Red

ARTSY EDITORIAL

BY ABIGAIL CAIN

FEB 13TH, 2017 10:23 PM

“Red,” writes historian Michel Pastoureau in Red: The History of a Color, “is the archetypal color, the first color humans mastered, fabricated, reproduced, and broke down into different shades.” As such, it dominated visual culture for centuries. With the advent of the Protestant Reformation, however, people began to view the shade as gaudy, even immoral, and its preeminence began to fade. Today, both blue and green surpass red as the West’s favorite colors. 

But the bold hue—whether crimson, vermilion, cardinal, or scarlet—still retains power. Red artworks fetch the highest prices at auction. Red is the color of revolution, of seduction. And its story is far from over. The scientists who last year announced the discovery of a new blue pigment are now hunting for a never-before-seen red. From some of humanity’s earliest cave paintings to Mark Rothko’s immersive abstract canvases, here is a brief history of red in art.

Red Ochre

Cave paintings at Cueva de los Manos, Argentina. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Cave paintings at Cueva de los Manos, Argentina. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Cave paintings at Altamira, Spain. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Cave paintings at Altamira, Spain. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Red has been part of our palette since the very beginning of human history. Ochre—a naturally occurring pigment that is the source of earthy shades of brown, orange, and yellow—is red when it is composed of hematite. Neanderthals were using red ochre as far back as 250,000 years ago, in a region that has since become the Netherlands. Some scientists believe that these early cultures applied the color to their bodies as decoration; others think it may have been used in more practical ways, perhaps as an adhesive or a method of softening animal hides. Later, during the Upper Paleolithic period, early artists began employing the pigment as paint. The dusky red bison dotting the cave walls of Altamira in Spain are some of the oldest, dated between 20,000 and 14,000 BC.

 

Cinnabar

Mural at Pompeii, Italy. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Mural at Pompeii, Italy. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

“Box with Camellias,” China, 13th Century. Image via The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

“Box with Camellias,” China, 13th Century. Image via The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

By the time pharaohs ruled Egypt, the number of reds used in artmaking had multiplied to include cinnabar, a natural mercuric sulfide that was also incredibly toxic. (The mercury mine in Almadén, Spain, where Rome later extracted its cinnabar, was basically a death sentence for workers.) Ancient Romans loved the brilliant red pigment, a preference reflected in its high prices during that time. Pliny the Younger wrote that cinnabar cost 15 times more than red ochre from Africa and was equal in price to the precious Egyptian blue. Gladiators who emerged victorious from the Colosseum might be smeared with the shiny red mineral and then paraded through the streets of Rome. Cinnabar is also prominently featured in the murals that grace the walls of upper-class villas in Pompeii.

Cinnabar later became synonymous with the carved lacquer produced in China beginning in the 12th century. These elaborately patterned luxury items, which could be anything from vases to incense holders, were typically colored with the powdery red pigment that gave them its name.

 

Minium

Albrecht Dürer, Virgin and child with St Anna, 1519.

Albrecht Dürer, Virgin and child with St Anna, 1519.

Like cinnabar, minium (also called “red lead”) is a highly poisonous material. Scholars consider it one of the first synthetic pigments, with Romans heating white lead to extreme temperatures to produce the paint. Its eye-popping orange shade showed up well against marble and gold, and it was often used for inscriptions. Later, medieval illustrators would employ the pigment in their illuminated manuscripts. But it was most popular with Mughal artists from India and Persia in the 17th and 18th centuries—so much so that their paintings became known as “miniatures,” after the minium that accented their works.

Vincent van Gogh was an avid user of red lead, a decision that has frustrated conservators centuries later. As it turns out, minium “whitens” under light, and many of the Dutch painter’s most famous works have seen their red accents fade over time.

 

Vermilion

This is where names start to get tricky. Ancient authors used the word “vermilion” to describe the pigment made from grinding up cinnabar. But vermilion also refers to the synthetic version of the color, invented in China thousands of years before it was brought to the West by Arab alchemists during the Middle Ages. This vermillion was used extensively by Renaissance painters, including Titian, who is renowned for his luxuriant reds. Although the pigment is normally an orangey-red, when exposed to sunlight it can darken to black.

Vermilion became increasingly popular beginning in the 16th century, and the industry for the pigment boomed—first in Venice, and later in the Netherlands and Germany. It appeared on shelves everywhere from hardware stores to apothecaries to paint shops. In the end, although it was pricier and less stable than minium, vermilion won out in a battle of the reds.

 

Carmine

Cochineal bugs were the third most valuable export from the New World in the 16th century, right behind gold and silver. These white, pellet-shaped insects didn’t look like much when attached to the pads of Mexico’s prickly pear cacti, but when dried and crushed they produced a vivid red hue that would take Europe by storm. Although originally a dye, cochineal was soon transformed into a paint called “carmine,” which took up residence in 15th- and 16th-century painters’ palettes—RembrandtAnthony van DyckRubens, and Vermeer among them.

It persisted into later centuries, with artists including J.M.W. Turner and Thomas Gainsborough incorporating the paint into their works. Although carmine produced a rich crimson glaze, often used on top of other reds like vermilion, it also had a tendency to fade in sunlight. The compositions of 18th-century portrait painter Joshua Reynolds fell victim to this phenomenon; his subjects look pale and ghostly today, more like marble sculptures than living beings.

 

Cadmium Red

It would be several centuries before the next major innovation in red pigment came along. In 1817, a German chemist uncovered a new element, cadmium, which became the foundation for new shades of yellow and orange paint. But it wasn’t until 1910 that cadmium red was available as a commercial product, offering an alternative to the traditional vermilion. Henri Matisse was the first major champion of the new pigment, trying in vain to get his friend Renoir to make the switch. Like most Impressionist painters, Renoir was loyal to his original palette. (Since the plein air technique favored by Impressionists privileged speed, it was helpful to know exactly how paints would mix together.) When Matisse loaned him a tube of cadmium red, the older painter responded, “It is very irksome to change,” and promptly returned the paint.

 

Lithol

Mark Rothko’s Panel One, Panel Two, and Panel Three (Harvard Mural Triptych), with restored colors using light from digital projectors. © 2014 Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Peter V…

Mark Rothko’s Panel OnePanel Two, and Panel Three (Harvard Mural Triptych), with restored colors using light from digital projectors. © 2014 Kate Rothko Prizel and Christopher Rothko/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Peter Vanderwarker, © President and Fellows of Harvard College.

In the late 1940s, Jackson Pollock started splattering commercial house paint across his canvases in huge, sweeping gestures. These iconic works offer a striking and high-profile example of artists’ increasing experimentation with materials throughout the mid-20th century. Rothko, too, dabbled with untested pigments in his work with various results. In 1962, he incorporated two brand-new organic reds into his palette for a series of murals at Harvard University. One of these pigments, Naphthol, had no ill effects. But Rothko’s other choice, Lithol, eventually doomed the works. Still in use today as a low-cost ink in the printing industry, Lithol red is highly sensitive to light. After several years hanging in the university’s penthouse dining room, Rothko’s deep reds and pinks had faded to light blue. By 1979, the paintings were so damaged that they had to be permanently removed.

 

—Abigail Cain