When Bronowski says that "man is a singular creature" and not merely a "figure in the landscape" he is saying that man is a unique creature among animals. He believes that man is the shaper of the landscape and that he explores the nature of the world. Bronowski believes that man's brain makes him adaptable to most environments. Bronowski says "humans can adapt, because of his imagination, his reason, his emotional subtlety, and toughness and it makes it possible for him not to accept the environmental change but to change it." One example that Bronowski uses is the Ice Age, many animals died out during the ice age and were stuck under the snow, while humans adapted to the Ice age and the humans survived. Bronowski believes that the humans are a shaper because of all the things they have done. One thing is they learned how to create and master the control of fire. Fire used to and still does kept warmth at night and they could have warm food, when before their food couldn't be warm because they didn't use fire to heat it. The humans' life expectancy was 20 years old and that is a long time for back then, and Bronowski says that 20 years old is an incredible age for this time. Animals usually don't live to be 20 human years, but they can be 20 in their calculated age.
Humans started to have forward thinking, and for example this would be cave paintings, and that is Bronowski's main topic for forward thinking. Cave paintings were done around 30,000 B.C, and animals never really had forward thinking. Bronowski says that animals have not developed forward thinking, but that is how human are distinguished from animals. Bronowski says that humans are more distinguished from animals, because we have imagination. Imagination lets us have thoughts in the future, and at this time animals didn't have imagination. A few examples Bronowski uses are when an athlete is pole vaulting over the bar and he has to imagine that he can vault over it. Bronowski says "The athlete's mind us fixed ahead of him, building up his skill; and he vaults in imagination into the future." He is saying that the athlete has to picture it or see jumping over the pole in his mind. He has to picture the bar, himself, and the pole to jump with. Then as he starts he must see the pole hit the ground, and himself flying over the bar and landing on the mat. So that is a specific example of how Bronowski says humans use imagination.
Humans also develop opposable thumbs, and animals don't have thumbs in general. Opposable thumbs let us be able to do more things, because our hands can move in directions that animals can't and ours now can. As of this time humans have evolved. For example: they're not as big and hairy like gorillas. Bronowski says that animals haven't made progress, and that humans keep making progress all of the time. Another thing Bronowski says is that 2 million years ago humans had 1.1 pound brains, but as of 1 million years ago humans had 3 pound brains and today we have a 3 pound brain. This is a great example of evolution, because in 1 million years humans brains got bigger and humans became smarter. Bronowski says that humans have been given imaginative gifts and animals haven't.
Examples that Bronowski says are " making plans, inventions, new discoveries, by putting different talents together; and his discoveries become more subtle and penetrating, as he learns to combine his talents in more complex and intimate ways." Animals don't make plans or invent things, because their brains aren't as functional as humans brains are. Bronowski says "among the multitude of animals which scamper, fly, burrow and swim around us, man is the only one who is not locked into his environment." He means that humans can get out of their environment if necessary, but animals can't get out of there if necessary. When Bronowski says "exaltation not fear," he means that we shouldn't do something out of fear. Animals for example have to run from their predator so they don't get eaten or killed. Humans really don't have to run from predators. Man has joy in life Bronowski says, and animals don't have much joy in life. An example is that humans can have fun like playing sports or play games, while animals can't really play many games, or have fun. Animals as I said before spend most of their time running for prey or running from their predators. Humans do not need to run from predators as often or ever like the animals have to.
Those are the features and qualities that make man unique and how Bronowski distinguishes humans and animals.
Bronowski says that we see changes in the humans' skulls, but that we see little or no change in animals' skulls. Bronowski says that "the head is more than a symbolic image of man; it is the seat of foresight and, in that respect, the spring which drives cultural evolution." The humans head has evolved a lot in the past 30 million years while the Topi antelope has not. Bronowski also says that humans would never be able to know that we were humans. They wouldn't be able to for many reasons and I will explain this by using many details. Bronowski also says that a Topi antelope from this back then could find a Topi antelope today, and I will explain this by using many details.
We see a lot of changes from the human skull and one is the teeth. Teeth from our ancient ancestors weren't level, and they also didn't have the same kind of K-9 teeth we have today. They used to be less sharp, and the teeth of our ancient ancestors were lower and higher in certain parts. The Topi antelope's teeth have not changed much, which we can notice since the beginning of time. So we would not be able to tell a difference with the teeth of the Topi antelopes.
We also see a change in the level of man's head. Our ancient ancestors' heads were tilted at a down angle, and our heads currently are level. We can make our heads move in many different directions that Topi antelopes can't now or back 30 million years ago. The Topi antelope that Bronowski showed in the film was severely twisted, and it is nothing like man's head. It had many differences and one was that it was slanted downwards; back then it couldn't sit its head up straight. Mans shape of the skull has changed, since the beginning of time, while the Topi antelopes hasn't changed. Mans has become a new shape since the beginning of time, and has a different spot and shape for the spinal cord. Topi antelopes still have the same basic shape of the skull, and their spinal cord is the same shape and is in the same spot. The reason we see so many differences is because an ancient human could spot a Topi antelope today, but not its own developed self. The antelope hasn't changed because has no need to adapt to a new environment. The Topi antelope has stayed in the same spot for millions of years, because it has it's living in an environment that hasn't changed. Those are the differences that we see in the human skull, but we see no significant changes in the Topi antelope's skull.
A lot of Topi antelopes died during the Ice Age, because they were trapped underneath of the snow. The Topi antelope's race survived, but it many died from being trapped. The humans have changed because they adapted with migration to other places in the world. Humans have adapted too many different areas and one is they adapted during the Ice Age. During the Ice Age humans migrated after the snow and not much of the human race was killed. The Garden of Eden used to be a fertile crescent but now a dry desert, and this shows how humans and the Earth have adapted throughout life. This shows that the Earth has adapted and that the humans have adapted with the Earth over time. Bronowski also says that animals, when they adapt, adapt much slower than humans. The Topi antelope's brains did not function like the humans did, they did not function to adapt until after they were trapped.
Another example that shows that humans have adapted is when the soil wasn't fertile in a certain place, they would get up and adapt to another place with fertile soil. An example is when humans were nomadic were in some fertile areas, but then they found the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. They settled in between them and the soil was very fertile, because the rivers would overflow and produce great soil. Animals don't move unless they really need to, but even then they weren't always able to move or they just didn't move. For example the Topi antelope's usually only move if there is a drought where they are settled, but sometimes then they just die of thirst. They do because their brains do not allow them to think into the future so they don't adapt as fast as humans do because, their brains do not think that they have to move so they stay and die.
A final example of how humans skulls changed were that their head is shaped different now than it was back then. Bronowski says that the human head was more circular four million years ago, but over time it has become more of an oval/circle. It is a mix of both, while the Topi antelope's head has stayed basically the same throughout time. That is how Bronowski describes the Topi antelopes skull four millions years ago and now, because the humans skull from four million years ago and now.
Bronowski says that man can't grow up on the move and with this he is talking about the nomads. Bronowski has many distinctions between nomadic life and village agriculture life. Bronowski says that with nomadic life there is no room for innovation, because you are always on the move. Bronowski says that village agriculture has room for innovation, because they don't move to a new spot every day. So they can expand on different things, and that means they can have skill specializations. Some examples of skill specializations are bricklayers, carpenters, and farmers. Specializations help the village agriculture, because certain people master certain things. You don't have to worry as much about having your family in danger. You don't because you're not hunting animals you are going somewhere to grow different crops. While Bronowski says in a nomadic agriculture there is no time to specialize, because you are always moving so you can't just stop to master a whole new thing.
Nomadic people just make one big circle over time, and village agriculture people just stay in one spot. Bronowski says that going in one big circle is like a waste of time, because you never accomplish anything life. One year goes by and you're back in the same space that you started, so Bronowski is saying that it is a waste of time. Bronowski says that staying in one place is better, because you can do anything you want to the land. One example is to keep the soil as fertile as you need, but when you're nomadic then you can't control many things because you always move. Bronowski says that farmers have an advantage with having a village agricultural life, and that is that they can use the overflowing rivers to make fertile soil. That is a big advantage in being a village agricultural citizen. Bronowski says that hunting cannot support a growing population, and that is a distinction that Bronowski makes. He says that, that is another advantage that village agriculture has over nomadic people.
Village agricultural people don't have to hunt, because they can farm which prevents them from having to hunt animals' every day. Bronowski said that if they started out with 50 goats, then they expected to lose at least 1/3 of them. Bronowski says that, that is a bad thing, and that in village life you can create more inventions. One invention in village life was the wheel, and Bronowski says that was a huge invention. The village agriculture people turned the wheel into a pulley, and that could water out of the ground, if they put a bucket on the pulley. Also village agriculture had created a plow for the farms, they would plow their fields and that we save a lot of time instead of it taking them way longer. Nomadic people didn't have enough time to create the things that the villages did.
Village life also domesticated animals, and they domesticated horses. Horses were used as weapons, because they would ride on them with their spears and bows and arrows, then they would shoot at you or just take all of your things. The horse was like a modern day tank; you could just attack villages or groups with them and wipe them out completely. Even today the horse can be a useful weapon, for example if you wanted to ride through somebody's yard and damage their house you could. Bronowski says that war is like stealing, you just ride through on your horse, and steal all of their crops and herds that they have. Nomadic life would just leave the elderly on the other side of the river, because they couldn't pass it, so they just left them there to die. The nomadic people never had a big population, it was around 20-30 people per group. Bronowski is saying that a civilization can't grow on the move, and village agriculture has sometimes over 1,000 people. So Bronowski is saying that village agriculture will always have more people, because they are settled and they have a better chance of having a steady amount of food. He says that a nomadic group can stop having a steady amount of food if they can't find food, because they have to hunt and you are never guaranteed that you will be able to find and slaughter something.
Bronowski says that nomadic people get smarter, because they finally start to follow herds, instead of killing an animal and trying to find another. The difference still is that hunting is still more risky than farming. With farming basically you just have to worry about if you will have rain, or if the river will overflow. With hunting you have to worry about being eaten, and there not being enough food for your entire group of people. You have to worry about if the women and children will get eaten while you are hunting for the food.
That is how Bronowski distinguishes nomadic and village agricultural life.
I believe that Bronowski talks about many ideas/concepts/insights in the segment, "The Grain in the Stone." One of the most important ideas/concepts/insights is when Bronowski says, "The most powerful drive in the ascent of man is his pleasure in his own skill." Man is supposed to love what he does, if done well, and then he should love to do it better. Bronowski states that you see it in science and this is when man carves and builds. You see the effort put into all of the edges in the building and all of the decorations inside of the building. Bronowski also says, "The monuments are supposed to commemorate the kings, religions, heroes, dogmas, but in the end of man they commemorate is the builder." An example that Bronowski uses is a great temple with its architecture inside of the building. Bronowski says that these temples express the civilizations identification to the other civilizations. The point that Bronowski is making is that the monuments speak for the dead and to the living people. Bronowski says that these monuments establish a sense of permanence in which the characteristics of the humans are viewed. Bronowski says "I could not end this essay without turning to my favorite monuments, built by a man who had no more scientific equipment than a Gothic mason." These are in Los Angeles and they were built by an Italian Simon Rodia, and at the age of forty two he decided to build, in his back garden, some humongous structures out of chicken wire, bits of railway tie, steel rods, cement, sea shells, bits of broken glass, and tile of course. Tile of course because he worked as a tile settler. Rodia took whatever he could find or the neighborhood children would bring him, he would use. It took Rodia thirty-three years to build them, and nobody would ever help him, because he didn't know what to do himself sometimes. They were finished in 1954 and he was seventy-five by then. He gave everything to the neighbor, and then simply walked out. This is a prime example of what Bronowski meant when he said, "The most powerful drive in the ascent of man is his pleasure in his own skill." Rodia had pleasure in what he did, but he also loved to do it.
A second very important idea, concept, or insight is the blood groups around back then. The Indian tribes of North and South America do not contain all of the same blood groups that were found in all of the populations elsewhere. The blood group was O back then in the Americas, but blood groups A and B consisted in other parts of the world. At this time there is no blood group B anywhere In the Americas as there is in many parts of the world. There is not much blood group A in the Americas, and the ancestry in the Americas didn't have blood group B. In North and South America it was basically all blood groups O, but some tribes had blood group A. The blood group A only had was about ten to fifteen percent of North American tribes. The evidence is that there is no blood group B anywhere in the Americas, but in many other parts of the world there was blood group B. In central and South America all of the original Indian population is blood group O, not like North America with O and A. Bronowski says "I can see no sensible way of interpreting that but to believe that a first migration of a small, related kinship group (all of blood group O) came into America, multiplied, and spread right to the South." Then there was a second migration, again small groups either containing only A or both A and O, and this followed them only as far as North America. That is how Bronowski describes how the blood groups came into the Americas.
A third idea, concept, or insight that is very important is how Bronowski says a city must live on a base. Bronowski says "A city must live on a base, a hinterland, of a rich agricultural surplus: and the visible base for the Inca civilization was the cultivation of terraces." He also says that now there are bare terraces just grass, but once the potato was cultivated here (it is a native product of Peru). Inca came to the climate like the coca, which is an intoxicating herb that only the Inca aristocracy was allowed to chew, from which we produce cocaine from. The Incas culture was a system of irrigation, and the Inca Empire made; it run through the terraces, through canals, and aqueducts. Incas had something like the Fertile Crescent and they controlled the water, and the Incas were able to build on the control of irrigation. Bronowski says that the Incas were in many ways like Mesopotamia, and that meant that they rested on the invisible base of communication. Three inventions made the network of authority: the roads, the bridges, and the messages towards it. These were very advanced inventions, because they can now send different messages to different parts of the civilization. Bronowski says that on the roads were no wheels and no supports under the bridges, and the messages were not in writing they were sent by many people over miles and miles. The Incas had a remarkably tight social structure and everybody had a place. They could be a peasant, craftsman, or soldier and worked for one man, the Supreme Inca. He was the head of the civil state, and also the religious incarnation of godhead. The Incas created a lot of different buildings, some are even around today. They had great architectural people and some buildings today are so remarkably built, that they can't figure out how they built them. That is why I consider the Incas to be one of the most important ideas in the segment, "The Grain in the Stone."
My final important idea, concept, or insight is how the Earth has lived threw everything. Bronowski says "And on the surface, the erosion of snow and rain and storm, of stream and ocean, of sun and wind, have carved out a natural architecture." The Earth has also lived through earthquakes, tornadoes, tsunamis, and hurricanes. As Bronowski said the Earth has lived through a lot of surface erosion, weather it is with snow, rain, or storms the Earth has survived. The Earth has lived through major natural disasters which now wipe out total cities, states, and sometimes countries. So how the Earth has survived these different things is astounding. Bronowski also says "Man has also become an architect of his environment, but he does not command forces as powerful as nature." What this means is man can control his village, unless nature starts to destroy it. Man can control the people and the buildings of his village or community, but once you put the natural disaster than man cannot control his village or community anymore. A specific example Bronowski uses is the Canyon de Chelly in Arizona. It is a secret valley and has been controlled by one Indian tribe after another almost without break for the past two thousand years (since the birth of Christ). This next example is how man mastered his environment and this is when the Tigris and Euphrates rivers over flowed. The villages used that storm as a advantage, because they created very fertile soil to grow crops. So that is how some civilizations use disasters as advantages at the end. Another reason that the statement, the Earth has survived through everything is important, is because it shows that even with erosion and humongous disasters the Earth has stayed basically the same through all of this. A final reason that this is an important idea, concept, or insight is because it just shows that so far whatever has been thrown at the Earth, it has survived and will survive for a lot longer. Those are the four most important ideas/concepts/insight in the segment "The Grain in the Stone" in my opinion.
ไม่มีความคิดเห็น:
แสดงความคิดเห็น