Winter 2024 Part 5

 

Human

The essence of human is complex and exciting to know about. We human beings are the most advanced species of life in world history. We have survived the Reagan administration, massive changes in our world technologically, and other events. We are the most widespread species of verbally talking human beings with highly complex language in the world. We have bipedalism, high intelligence, large brains (with cognitive skills that can develop complex societies, advanced civilization, and form abstract thought), and are highly social beings. We can form families, kinship networks, political states, and other forms of social interactions. Our values, social norms, languages, rituals, religions, cultures, and other ways of living have been very diverse. Human beings want to understand and influence phenomena which is why we can study and analyze subjects of science (being the first species to travel into Space including the Moon by our own inventions), technology, philosophy, mythology, religion, and other concepts of reality. The paradox of Homo sapiens sapiens is that we survived so much and lived in a such small period as compared to the time from the start of the Universe. The Universe started in ca. 13.5 billion years old, but humanity existed for thousands of years. Genes and the environment can influence human biological variation in the visible characteristics, physiology, disease susceptibility, body size, mental abilities, and life span. Any two human beings are at least 99 percent genetically similar. Most human beings are omnivorous or capable of eating a wide variety of plant and animal life. We can use fire and other forms of heat to prepare and cook food. 

The advanced prefrontal cortex of human beings causes us to be very intelligent. Likewise, humans are capable of doing good and evil as history and experience teach us. The many wars of the world, slavery, and other evils prove how many human beings made a conscious decision to do evil unjustly. The many activists standing up against injustice, those who build houses, those who use charities, and those who enrich the lives of their communities outline the goodness presented by tons of human beings as well.  We have to promote goodness in the Universe. We can have episodic memory, flexible facial expressions, self-awareness, theory of mind, introspection, private thought, imagination, volition, and form views of existence. With our language, art, and trade being part of human existence, we have a unique role in the Universe. The question is what is the future of us? Will we travel to the Moon (as NASA wants to do with the Artemis program by the end of 2024), Mars, or beyond (NASA's Europa Clipper spacecraft is set to explore Jupiter's moon to see what is going on there) or will we stay on Earth. Only God knows that answer. What we do know is that to survive in the near future, we have to devise solutions to our complex problems from climate change, health care disparities, institutional racism, sexism, xenophobia, and poverty. I am realistic about the future, but I have hope and optimism too. 

*The journey continues, and we will continue to explore, discover, love, teach, dream, live, pray, build, invest, and grow as human beings. 

Culture

Human culture is very diverse. Culture is about social behavior, institutions, and norms found in all human societies. Culture deals with knowledge, beliefs, the arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of individual people. Culture is diverse based on region or location. For example, the act of African American couples jumping a broom after being married is part of a specific culture just like when people celebrate the Chinese New Year with fireworks, songs, and dance. These diverse cultures are very normal and widespread globally. Across different cultures, there are unifying human characteristics like the love of family, friendship, cuisine, and other aspects of human existence. There have been cultural changes over millennia. For example, back in ancient Rome, people wore tunics. Today, most of the Western world and all other regions of the Earth have people wearing different styles of clothing from shirts, dresses, pants, and a myriad of hats. There is cultural diffusion. For example, the hip-hop culture came from New York City, and it has spread intentionally, maize is found in America and spreading globally, and the kente cloth from Africa is common among tons of people in the black African Diaspora. UNESCO tries to preserve culture and cultural heritage globally. Culture is studied by anthropologists and sociologists constantly in studies, books, and other forms of research. Culture is always unique. It can be found in art, music, dance, spirituality, technology, fashion, shelter, the military, etc. Some cultures can be passed down from generation to generation in written and oral traditions. For example, certain family stories, investments, and a toolbox can be passed down from parents to children. Also, it is important to note that Western culture is not the superior culture above every other culture. Many cultures in the Americas, Asia, Africa, Oceania, etc. have great value in the Universe not just Western culture. One part of culture is food culture. 

Many relatives make gumbo, turkey, and other cuisine to be part of family traditions, love family, debate issues, and show a sense of human togetherness. The environment, wars, colonialism, trade, and other events can influence culture in mighty ways. We have tons of languages spoken among the human family like English, Mandarin Chinese, Hindi, Spanish, Arabic, Bengali, French, Russian, Portuguese, Urdu, etc. Most people worship in the religions of Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Folk religions, Sikhism, and Judaism. Other human beings are unaffiliated, agnostic, and atheist. Language can be presented by humans in speech, written words, braille (for blind people), sign language, and symbols. There are about 6,000 languages in use today. The human arts are visual, literary, and performing. The Visual arts can be painting, sculpturing, film, fashion design, and architecture. Literary arts are about prose, poetry, and drama. The performing arts relate to theater, music (with artists like Coco Jones, H.E.R., Tinashe, Brandy Norwood, Monica, etc.), and dance. The arts can deal with games, food preparation, video games, and medicine. The arts can be political, entertaining, and show wisdom to people. Art is great, and listening to music and observing dance stimulates the orbitofrontal cortex and other pleasure-sensing areas of the brain. The technologies of paper, the printing press, gunpowder, compass, and other inventions were made in China. Today, we have electricity, penicillin, semiconductors, internal combustion engines, the Internet, air conditioning, and television spreading cultural excellence across the globe. 

Biology

There is no full understanding of human beings without understanding human biology, anatomy, and physiology. Most human beings have legs, a torso, arms, a neck, and a head. The whole adult human body has about 100 trillion cells. Most of the body systems in humans are the nervous, cardiovascular, digestive, endocrine, immune, integumentary, lymphatic, musculoskeletal, reproductive, respiratory, and urinary systems. The dental formula of humans is: 2.1.2.3/2.1.2.3. Humans have proportionately shorter palates and much smaller teeth than other primates. Humans have short, relatively flush canine teeth. Humans have characteristically crowded teeth, with gaps from lost teeth usually closing up quickly in young individuals. Humans are gradually losing their third molars, with some individuals having them congenitally absent. Human beings have an appendix, flexible shoulder joints, grasping fingers, and opposable thumbs. While humans have a density of hair follicles comparable to other apes, it is predominantly vellus hair, most of which is so short and wispy as to be practically invisible. Humans have about 2 million sweat glands spread over their entire bodies, many more than chimpanzees, whose sweat glands are scarce and are mainly located on the palm of the hand and on the soles of the feet. It is estimated that the worldwide average height for an adult human man is about 171 cm (5 ft 7 in), while the worldwide average height for adult human women is about 159 cm (5 ft 3 in). Shrinkage of stature may begin in middle age in some individuals but tends to be typical in the extremely aged. Throughout history, human populations have universally become taller, probably as a consequence of better nutrition, healthcare, and living conditions. The average mass of an adult human is 59 kg (130 lb.) for women and 77 kg (170 lb.) for men. Like many other conditions, body weight and body type are influenced by both genetic susceptibility and environment and vary greatly among individuals. Humans have a far faster and more accurate throw than other animals. Humans are also among the best long-distance runners in the animal kingdom, but slower over short distances. Humans' thinner body hair and more productive sweat glands help avoid heat exhaustion while running for long distances. 

Humans are a diploid and eukaryotic species. Each somatic cell has two sets of 23 chromosomes, each set received from one parent; gametes have only one set of chromosomes, which is a mixture of the two parental sets. Among the 23 pairs of chromosomes, there are 22 pairs of autosomes and one pair of sex chromosomes. Like other mammals, humans have an XY sex-determination system, so that women have the sex chromosomes XX and men have XY. Genes and environment influence human biological variation in visible characteristics, physiology, disease susceptibility, and mental abilities. The exact influence of genes and environment on certain traits is not well understood. While no humans – not even monozygotic twins – are genetically identical, two humans on average will have a genetic similarity of 99.5%-99.9%. This makes them more homogeneous than other great apes, including chimpanzees. This small variation in human DNA compared to many other species suggests a population bottleneck during the Late Pleistocene (around 100,000 years ago), in which the human population was reduced to a small number of breeding pairs.

The human genome was first sequenced in 2001 and by 2020 hundreds of thousands of genomes had been sequenced. In 2012 the International HapMap Project had compared the genomes of 1,184 individuals from 11 populations and identified 1.6 million single nucleotide polymorphisms. African populations harbor the highest number of private genetic variants. While many of the common variants found in populations outside of Africa are also found on the African continent, there are still large numbers that are private to these regions, especially Oceania and the Americas. By 2010 estimates, humans have approximately 22,000 genes. By comparing mitochondrial DNA, which is inherited only from the mother, geneticists have concluded that the last woman common ancestor whose genetic marker is found in all modern humans, the so-called mitochondrial Eve, must have lived around 90,000 to 200,000 years ago.

The Human Genome Project was one of the greatest scientific endeavors in human history. 

All humans experience an interesting life cycle. After fertilization, the average gestation period is 38 weeks. The embryo turns into a fetus. Some people have early labor, and some have a cesarean section if the child needs to be born earlier for medical reasons. High levels of infant mortality exist in developing countries corresponding to lower birth weight. Developed nations have infants being born in 7-9 pounds and 19-21 inches in height at birth. New medical technologies have made labor more successful, but problems do exist like maternal death and other complications. Mothers and fathers care for children, and culturally most parental care is done by the mother. Humans reach sexual maturity at 15 to 17 years old. The human life span exists from infancy, childhood, adolescence, adulthood, and old age. Among cultures, these times vary, but there is a rapid growth spurt among humans during adolescence. Human women undergo menopause and become infertile at around the age of 50. The life span of an individual depends on two major factors, genetics and lifestyle choices. For various reasons, including biological/genetic causes, women live on average about four years longer than men. As of 2018, the global average life expectancy at birth of a girl is estimated to be 74.9 years compared to 70.4 for a boy. There are significant geographical variations in human life expectancy, mostly correlated with economic development – for example, life expectancy at birth in Hong Kong is 87.6 years for girls and 81.8 for boys, while in the Central African Republic, it is 55.0 years for girls and 50.6 for boys. The developed world is generally aging, with the median age around 40 years. In the developing world, the median age is between 15 and 20 years. While one in five Europeans is 60 years of age or older, only one in twenty Africans is 60 years of age or older. In 2012, the United Nations estimated that there were 316,600 living centenarians (humans of age 100 or older) worldwide. 

Most humans are omnivorous eating both plant and animal material. Some are vegan and primarily carnivorous. In some cases, dietary restrictions in humans can lead to deficiency diseases; however, stable human groups have adapted to many dietary patterns through both genetic specialization and cultural conventions to use nutritionally balanced food sources. The human diet is prominently reflected in human culture and has led to the development of food science. In general, humans can survive for up to eight weeks without food, depending on stored body fat. Survival without water is usually limited to three or four days, with a maximum of one week. In 2020 it is estimated that 9 million humans die every year from causes directly or indirectly related to starvation. Childhood malnutrition is also common and contributes to the global burden of disease. There is biological variation in the human species – with traits such as blood type, genetic diseases, cranial features, facial features, organ systems, eye color, hair color and texture, height and build, and skin color varying across the globe. The typical height of an adult human is between 1.4 and 1.9 m (4 ft 7 in and 6 ft 3 in), although this varies significantly depending on sex, ethnic origin, and family bloodlines. Body size is partly determined by genes and is also significantly influenced by environmental factors such as diet, exercise, and sleep patterns. Populations can adapt. Many genes that allow adult humans to digest lactose have a long history of cattle domestication and are dependent on cow milk. Sickle cell anemia, which may provide increased resistance to malaria, is frequent in populations where malaria is endemic.

Populations that have for a very long time inhabited specific climates tend to have developed specific phenotypes that are beneficial for those environments – short stature and stocky build in cold regions, tall and lanky in hot regions, and with high lung capacities or other adaptations at high altitudes. Some populations have evolved highly unique adaptations to very specific environmental conditions, such as those advantageous to ocean-dwelling lifestyles and freediving in the Bajau. Hair color and skin color do depend on melanin. 

The greatest degree of genetic variation exists between men and women. While the nucleotide genetic variation of individuals of the same sex across global populations is no greater than 0.1%–0.5%, the genetic difference between men and women is between 1% and 2%. Men on average are 15% heavier and 15 cm (6 in) taller than women. On average, men have about 40–50% more upper body strength and 20–30% more lower body strength than women at the same weight, due to higher amounts of muscle and larger muscle fibers. Women generally have a higher body fat percentage than men. As there are chromosomal differences between women and men, some X and Y chromosome-related conditions and disorders only affect either men or women. After allowing for body weight and volume, the voice of men voice is usually an octave deeper than the woman's voice. Women have a longer life span in almost every population around the world. There are human beings who are intersexual people. 

Psychology

Human psychology is one of the most important issues about humanity. This subject is related to the human brain, the central nervous system, and the peripheral nervous system. In addition to controlling "lower", involuntary, or primarily autonomic activities such as respiration and digestion, it is also the locus of "higher" order functioning such as thought, reasoning, and abstraction. These cognitive processes constitute the mind, and, along with their behavioral consequences, are studied in the field of psychology. Since humans have a larger and more developed prefrontal cortex than other primates, that region of the brain deals with higher cognition. Humans are more intelligent than any other species on Earth. Humans may be the only beings with episodic memory and can have mental time travel to think about past events. Humans have a high degree of flexibility in their facial expressions. Humans can cry emotional tears that animals can't do. Humans can dream too with sensory images and sounds. Dreams happen by the pons and mostly happen during the REM phase of sleep. Humans can have 3 to 5 dreams per night. Dreamers are more likely to remember the dream if awakened during the REM phase. The events in dreams are generally outside the control of the dreamer, except in lucid dreaming, where the dreamer is self-aware. Dreams can at times make a creative thought occur or give a sense of inspiration. 

Human consciousness, at its simplest, is sentience or awareness of internal or external existence Consciousness, knowledge, cognition, the senses, and imagination all deal with psychology. Emotions are biological states associated with the nervous system. Moods such as pleasure, anger, creativity, etc. reflect on human behavior. Acting on the extreme or having uncontrolled emotions can lead to social disorder or crimes. Studies document how criminals may have a lower emotional intelligence than normal. For humans, sexuality involves biological, erotic, physical, emotional, social, or spiritual feelings and behaviors. Because it is a broad term, that has varied with historical contexts over time, it lacks a precise definition. The biological and physical aspects of sexuality largely concern the human reproductive functions, including the human sexual response cycle. Sexuality also affects and is affected by cultural, political, legal, philosophical, moral, ethical, and religious aspects of life. Most humans are heterosexual, and other humans are non-heterosexual (like gay, lesbian, bisexual, pansexual, polysexual, asexual, alloromantic, allosexual, androsexual, aromantic, autoromantic, autosexual, biromantic, bicurious, demiromantic, demisexual, gynesexual, skolioseuxal, spectrasexual, etc. Therefore, these realities exist among human beings). Human psychology has been studied by the experts for centuries and thousands of years. 

Society

Human society is very complex. It is structured by a system of organizations and institutions arising from interaction between human beings. Being highly social as human beings, we can develop large complex social groups. Society, in the modern age, can be divided into different groups based upon income, wealth, power, reputation, and other factors. Societies are social stratification and a degree of social realities. We have modern and traditional societies. Human groups can exist in many sizes like families, nations, and international organizations. Hunter-gatherer band societies were the first form of human social organization. Human societies deal with gender. Most societies are divided into men and women among adults. From thousands of years ago to today, some societies do have nonbinary structures and diverse gender identities that many people didn't know about until the 21st century. Some societies embrace a third gender, fourth, fifth, and gender non-conforming existence. Gender roles deal with norms, practices, dress, behavior, rights, duties, privileges, status, and power. On average, men have more rights and privileges than women in most societies both back in the day and today in near 2024. Biological sex is a reality of human existence. Gender is a social construct. That means that gender roles are not fixed and vary historically within a society. Early gender roles were diverse in early human history by the Upper Paleolithic age. 

In human society, human societies organize, recognize, and classify types of social relationships based on relations between parents, children, and other descendants (consanguinity), and relations via marriage (affinity). There is the fictive relationship of types applied to godparents or adoptive children. All societies have incest taboo as incest is disgusting obviously. Human ethnic groups represent a social category that identify people based on shared attributes like traditions, ancestry, language, history, society, culture, nation, religions, or social treatment. Ethnic group is different than race. For example, my ethnicity is African American because I have a shared culture and ancestry with black Americans. A black person from Brazil has an Afro-Brazilian ethnic group different from me, but we are of the same black race (of the black African Diaspora). 

As for governments, it is found that 47 percent of human live in some form of a democracy (I know some conservatives talk about Republics, but this is about all democracies that embrace a republican form of government or not), 17 percent live in a hybrid regime, and 37 percent of people live in an authoritarian regime. Many nations have international organizations and alliances. The United Nations is the largest international organization with 193 member states. War and terrorism are common today, but war casualty is less now than back 80 years ago or 600 years ago. Almost 200 million people died in the 20th century alone in wars and conflicts. Human trade and economics among humans have expanded for millennia. There were bartering systems long ago. Today, we have many economies like capitalism, socialism, communism, hybrid economies, etc. There are massive inequalities in the division of wealth among humans which is why people fight against income inequality to this very day. The eight richest humans are worth the same monetary value as the poorest half of all the human population. That is not something to praise and change ought to happen economically to make economic systems fair for all people. 

The History of Humanity

How did humans travel throughout the world? Human beings originated in Africa in ca. 300,000 years ago. We migrated out of the continent and some of us interbreed and replaced other populations of archaic humans. Human showing behavioral modernity came as early as 160,000 to 70,000 years ago. The out-of-Africa migration existed in two waves. The first one was around 130,000 to 100,000 years ago, and the second (Southern Dispersal) was around 70,000 to 50,000 years ago. H. sapiens proceeded to colonize all the continents and larger islands, arriving in Eurasia 125,000 years ago, Australia around 65,000 years ago, the Americas around 15,000 years ago, and remote islands such as Hawaii, Easter Island, Madagascar, and New Zealand in the years 300 to 1280 A.D. Human being developed life over many millennia and by ca. 100,000, people were using jewelry and ocher to put on our bodies. By 50,000 years ago, many of our ancestors showed characteristic behaviors like the burial of the dead, the use of projectile weapons, and seafaring. Later, people made syntactic language that improved how human beings communicated with each other. We saw artistic expression in cave paintings and sculptures made from ivory, stone, and bone. By the time of the Paleolithic era, human beings were hunter gatherers and mostly nomandic. 

Genomic research has shown that hybridization between substantially diverged lineages was common in human existence. DNA evidence suggests that several genes of Neanderthal origin are present among all non-sub-Saharan-African populations, and Neanderthals and other hominins, such as Denisovans, may have contributed up to 6% of their genome to present-day non-sub-Saharan-African humans. Human history is filled with massive developments. All human beings were hunter-gatherers until about 12,000 years ago. The end of the last major Ice Age was in ca. 12,000 years ago. This caused the warmth of the Earth in general. Human population growth expansion coincided with both the Quaternary extinction event and the extinction of the Neanderthals. Then, we have the Neolithic Revolution (the invention of agriculture) first took place in Southwest Asia and spread through large parts of the Old World over the following millennia. The Neolithic Revolution existed as early as 10,000 B.C. This was when people developed modern-day agriculture that changed how human beings lived forever. Many Neolithic societies worshiped ancestors, sacred place, or anthropomorphic deities. The Neolithic religious or civic site of Gobekli Tepe in Tukey is vast being dated to ca. 9,500 to 8,000 B.C. The revolution caused human beings to have cereal crop cultivation and animal domestication like wheat, barley, sheep, and goats as early as 8,500 B.C. in Mesopotamia. Rice has been domesticated in the Yangtze River Valley in ca. 8,000 B.C.  It also occurred independently in Mesoamerica (about 6,000 years ago), China, Papua New Guinea, and the Sahel and West Savanna regions of Africa. Later, we saw the access to food surplus that resulted in the creation of permanent human settlements. Then, there was the use of metal tools for the first time in history. From agriculture and the sedentary life, we saw the growth of early human civilizations. Early proto-cities appeared at Jericho and Catalhoyuk (in Turkey) in ca. 6,000 B.C. 

 

An urban revolution took place in the 4th millennium B.C. with the development of city-states, particularly Sumerian cities located in Mesopotamia. This era is called the Bronze Age when cities and civilization grew to the next level. It was in these cities that the earliest known form of writing, cuneiform script, appeared around 3000 B.C. Cuneiform writing began as a system of pictographs, whose pictorial representations eventually became simplified and more abstract. Cuneiform texts were written by using a blunt reed as a stylus to draw symbols upon clay tablets. Other major civilizations to develop around this time were Ancient Egypt (in 3,000 B.C.), the Yellow River Civilization (in 2,200 B.C.), and the Indus Valley Civilization (in 2500 B.C.). 

These societies developed a number of unifying characteristics, including a central government, a complex economy and social structure, systems for keeping records, and distinct cultures and religions. These cultures variously invented the wheel, mathematics, bronze-working, sailing boats, the potter's wheel, woven cloth, construction of monumental buildings, and writing. Polytheistic religions developed, centered on temples where priests and priestesses performed sacrificial rites. Writing facilitated the administration of cities, the expression of ideas, and the preservation of information. Writing may have independently developed in at least four ancient civilizations: Mesopotamia (3300 B.C.), Egypt (around 3250 B.C.), China (1200 B.C.), and lowland Mesoamerica (by 650 B.C.). Among the earliest surviving written religious scriptures are the Egyptian Pyramid Texts, the oldest of which date to between 2400 and 2300 B.C. 

They eventually traded with each other and invented technology such as wheels, plows, and sails. Astronomy and mathematics were also developed, and the Great Pyramid of Giza was built. There is evidence of a severe drought lasting about a hundred years that may have caused the decline of these civilizations, with new ones appearing in the aftermath. Babylonians came to dominate Mesopotamia while others, such as the Poverty Point culture, Minoans, and the Shang dynasty, rose to prominence in new areas. There were the Nubian and Nok civilizations in sub-Saharan Africa too. The transportation was used by waterways readily. Armies used horse based cavalry and chariots that allowed armies to move faster. Bronze production traveled in tin to Southwest Asia and as far as England (as the Phoenicians traded with the people of ancient Britain). The growth of cities grew into the forming of states and empires. Mesopotamia saw warring city states for centuries. In Egypt, by contrast, the initial division into Upper and Lower Egypt was followed by the unification of all the valley around 3100 B.C. Around 2600 BCE, the Indus Valley civilization built major cities at Harappa and Mohenjo-daro and developed a writing system of over 400 symbols, which remains undeciphered. China entered the Bronze Age by 2900 B.C. The Shang dynasty (1766–1045 BCE) was the first to use writing, inscribing the results of divination ceremonies on oracle bones – ox shoulder blades and turtle shells. In the 25th–21st centuries B.C., the empires of Akkad and the Neo-Sumerians arose in Mesopotamia. In Crete, the Minoan civilization emerged by 2000 B.C. and is regarded as the first civilization in Europe. Over the following millennia, civilizations developed across the world. By 1600 B.C., Mycenaean Greece began to develop. It flourished until the Late Bronze Age collapse that affected many Mediterranean civilizations between 1300 and 1000 B.C. In India, this era was the Vedic period (1750–600 B.C.), which laid the foundations of Hinduism and other cultural aspects of early Indian society, and ended in the 6th century B.C. The Vedas contain the earliest references to India's caste system, which divided society into four hereditary classes: priests, warriors, farmers and traders, and laborers. From around 550 B.C., many independent kingdoms and republics known as the Mahajanapadas were established across the subcontinent.

 

Speakers of the Bantu languages began expanding across Central and Southern Africa as early as 3000 B.C. Their expansion and encounters with other groups resulted in the spread of mixed farming and ironworking throughout sub-Saharan Africa, and produced societies such as the Nok culture in modern Nigeria by 500 B.C. The Lapita culture emerged in the Bismarck Archipelago near New Guinea around 1500 B.C. and colonized many uninhabited islands of Remote Oceania, reaching as far as Samoa by 700 B.C. In the Americas, the Norte Chico culture emerged in coastal Peru around 3100 B.C. The Norte Chico built public monumental architecture at the city of Caral, dated 2627–1977 B.C. The later Chavín polity is sometimes described as the first Andean state. It centered on the religious site at Chavín de Huantar, a place of pilgrimage and consumption of psychoactive substances. Other important Andean cultures include the Moche, whose ceramics depict many aspects of daily life, and the Nazca, who created animal-shaped designs in the desert called Nazca lines. The Olmecs of Mesoamerica developed by about 1200 B.C. and are known for the colossal stone heads that they carved from basalt.They also devised the Mesoamerican calendar that was used by later cultures such as the Maya and Teotihuacan. Societies in North America were primarily egalitarian hunter-gatherers, supplementing their diet with the plants of the Eastern Agricultural Complex. They came together, seemingly voluntarily, to build earthworks such as Watson Brake (4000 B.C.) and Poverty Point (3600 B.C.), both in Louisiana.

The Late Bronze Age collapse around 1200 B.C. resulted in the disappearance of several civilizations and the beginning of the Greek Dark Ages. During this period iron started replacing bronze, leading to the Iron Age. This period is also called the Axial Age where many philosophy and religious leaders rose up.  Chinese Confucianism, Indian Buddhism, and Jainism, and Jewish monotheism all developed during this period. Persian Zoroastrianism began earlier, perhaps around 1000 B.C., but was institutionalized by the Achaemenid Empire during the Axial Age. New philosophies took hold in Greece during the 5th century B.C., epitomized by thinkers such as Plato and Aristotle. This period from 500 B.C. to 500 A.D. saw new empires of unprecedented size develop. There were professional armies, unified ideologies, and advanced bureaucracies. Empires controlled millions of people. In the 5th century B.C., history started being recorded as a discipline, which provided a much clearer picture of life at the time. Between the 8th and 6th century B.C, Europe entered the classical antiquity age, a period when ancient Greece and ancient Rome flourished. Around this time other civilizations also came to prominence. The Maya civilization started to build cities and create complex calendars. In Africa, the Kingdom of Aksum overtook the declining Kingdom of Kush and facilitated trade between India and the Mediterranean. In West Asia, the Achaemenid Empire's system of centralized governance became the precursor to many later empires, while the Gupta Empire in India and the Han Dynasty in China have been described as golden ages in their respective regions. Several empires began in modern-day Greece. The Delian League, founded in 477 B.C., and the Athenian Empire (454–404 B.C.) were two such examples. Later, Alexander the Great of Macedon (356–323 B.C.) founded an empire extending from present-day Greece to India. The empire divided shortly after his death, but resulted in the spread of Greek culture throughout conquered regions, a process referred to as Hellenization. The Hellenistic period lasted from 323 to 31 B.C. In South Asia, Chandragupta Maurya founded the Maurya Empire (320–185 B.C.), which flourished under Ashoka the Great. From the 4th to 6th centuries A.D., the Gupta Empire oversaw the period referred to as ancient India's golden age. The ensuing stability contributed to heralding in an efflorescence of Hindu and Buddhist culture in the 4th and 5th centuries, as well as major advances in science and mathematics. In South India, three prominent Dravidian kingdoms emerged: the Cheras, Cholas, and Pandyas.

In Europe, the Roman Republic was founded in the 6th century B.C. and began expanding its territory in the 3rd century B.C. The Republic became an empire and by the time of Augustus (63 B.C.–14 A.D.), it had established dominion over most of the Mediterranean Sea. The empire would continue to grow, controlling much of the land from England to Mesopotamia, reaching its greatest extent under Trajan (died 117 A.D.). In the 4th century CE, the empire split into western and eastern regions, with (usually) separate emperors. The Western Roman Empire would fall, in 476 A.D., to German influence under Odoacer. In China, the Qin dynasty (221–206 B.C.), the first imperial dynasty of China, was followed by the Han dynasty (202 B.C.–220 A.D.). The Han dynasty was comparable in power and influence to the Roman Empire that lay at the other end of the Silk Road. As economic prosperity fueled their military expansion, the Han conquered parts of Mongolia, Central Asia, Manchuria, Korea, and northern Vietnam. As with other empires during the classical period, Han China advanced significantly in the areas of government, education, science, and technology. The Han invented cast iron and created finely wrought bronze figurines.

Following the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 A.D., Europe entered the Middle Ages. During this period, Christianity and the Church would provide centralized authority and education. The Eastern Roman Empire, now known as the Byzantine Empire, with its capital at Constantinople, would continue for another thousand years until the city was conquered by the Ottoman Empire in 1453. During most of its existence, the Byzantine Empire was one of the most powerful economic, cultural, and military forces in Europe, and Constantinople is generally considered to be the center of "Eastern Orthodox civilization.

In Africa, the Kingdom of Aksum, centered in present-day Ethiopia, established itself by the 1st century A.D. as a major trading empire, dominating its neighbors in South Arabia and Kush and controlling the Red Sea trade. It minted its own currency and carved enormous monolithic stelae to mark its emperors' graves. Successful regional empires were also established in the Americas, arising from cultures established as early as 2500 B.C In Mesoamerica, vast pre-Columbian societies were built, the most notable being the Zapotec civilization (700 B.C.–1521 A.D.), and the Maya civilization, which reached its highest state of development during the Mesoamerican classic period (c. 250–900 A.D.), but continued throughout the post-classic period. The great Maya city-states slowly rose in number and prominence, and Maya culture spread throughout the Yucatán and surrounding areas. The Maya developed a writing system and were the first to use the concept of zero in their mathematics. West of the Maya area, in central Mexico, the city of Teotihuacan grew based on its control of the obsidian trade. Its power peaked around 450 A.D., when its 125,000–150,000 inhabitants made it one of the world's largest cities.

In the Middle East, Islam became the prominent religion and expanded into North Africa. It led to an Islamic Golden Age, inspiring achievements in architecture, the revival of old advances in science and technology, and the formation of a distinct way of life. The Christian and Islamic worlds would eventually clash, with the Kingdom of England, the Kingdom of France, and the Holy Roman Empire declaring a series of holy wars to regain control of the Holy Land from Muslims.

In the Americas, complex Mississippian societies would arise starting around 800 A.D., while further south, the Aztecs and Incas would become the dominant powers. The Mongol Empire would conquer much of Eurasia in the 13th and 14th centuries. Over this same period, the Mali Empire in Africa grew to be the largest empire on the continent, stretching from Senegambia to Ivory Coast. Oceania would see the rise of the Tuʻi Tonga Empire which expanded across many islands in the South Pacific. 

The early modern period in Europe and the Near East (c. 1450–1800) began with the final defeat of the Byzantine Empire, and the rise of the Ottoman Empire. Meanwhile, Japan entered the Edo period, the Qing dynasty rose in China and the Mughal Empire ruled much of India. Europe underwent the Renaissance, starting in the 15th century, and the Age of Discovery began with the exploring and colonizing of new regions. This includes the British Empire expanding to become the world's largest empire and the colonization of the Americas. This expansion led to the Atlantic slave trade and the genocide of Native American peoples. This period also marked the Scientific Revolution, with great advances in mathematics, mechanics, astronomy, and physiology.

The late modern period (1800–present) saw the Technological and Industrial Revolution bring such discoveries as imaging technology, and major innovations in transport and energy development. The United States of America underwent great change, going from a small group of colonies to one of the global superpowers. The Napoleonic Wars raged through Europe in the early 1800s, Spain lost most of its colonies in the New World, while Europeans continued expansion into Africa – where European control went from 10% to almost 90% in less than 50 years – and Oceania. Technology saw factory growth, mass production, and mechanization to manufacture tons of goods faster while using less labor than previously required. This caused industrialization and workers fighting for better wages and better working conditions. This struggle for the workers to have economic justice continues to this very day in 2024. 

A tenuous balance of power among European nations collapsed in 1914 with the outbreak of the First World War, one of the deadliest conflicts in history. In the 1930s, a worldwide economic crisis led to the rise of authoritarian regimes and a Second World War, involving almost all of the world's countries. The Allied forces, led by President Franklin Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin, and other people defeated the Axis Powers (filled with Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, etc.). About 100 million human beings died in World War II being the bloodiest war in all of human history. Following the conclusion of the Second World War in 1945, the Cold War between the USSR and the United States saw a struggle for global influence, including a nuclear arms race and a space race. The United States developed to become the world's largest economy by the end of the 20th century. During the Second Industrial Revolution, a new set of technological advances including electrical power, the internal combustion engine, and assembly-line manufacturing increased productivity once again. Meanwhile, industrial pollution and environmental damage, present since the discovery of fire and the beginning of civilization, accelerated drastically. 

This time saw massive decolonization in Africa, Asia, and the Americas where black people and other people of color fought for their own independence movements. The European empires lost territories globally. The current Information Age sees the world becoming increasingly globalized and interconnected. Humans are one of the most adaptable species, despite having a low or narrow tolerance for many of the earth's extreme environments. Through advanced tools, humans have been able to extend their tolerance to a wide variety of temperatures, humidity, and altitudes. As a result, humans are a cosmopolitan species found in almost all regions of the world, including tropical rainforest, arid desert, extremely cold arctic regions, and heavily polluted cities. 

Cold War preparations to deter or to fight a third world war accelerated advances in technologies that, though conceptualized before World War II, had been implemented for that war's exigencies, such as jet aircraft, rocketry, and computers. In the decades after World War II, these advances led to jet travel; artificial satellites with innumerable applications, including GPS; and the Internet, which in the 1990s began to gain traction as a form of communication. These inventions have revolutionized the movement of people, ideas, and information.

 

The second half of the 20th century also saw groundbreaking scientific and technological developments such as the discovery of the structure of DNA and DNA sequencing, the worldwide eradication of smallpox, the Green Revolution in agriculture, the discovery of plate tectonics, the moon landings, crewed and uncrewed exploration of space, solar-power and wind-power technologies, and foundational discoveries in physics phenomena ranging from the smallest entities (particle physics) to the greatest entity (physical cosmology). These technical innovations had far-reaching effects. The world's population quadrupled to six billion during the 20th century, while world economic output increased by a factor of 20. In 1820, 75% of humanity lived on less than one dollar a day, while in 2001 only about 20% did. At the same time, economic inequality increased both within individual countries and between rich and poor countries. 

The early 21st century was marked by growing economic globalization and integration, which brought benefits but also risk to interlinked economies, as exemplified by the Great Recession of the late 2000s and early 2010s. Communications expanded, with smartphones and social media becoming ubiquitous worldwide by the mid 2010s. By the early 2020s, artificial intelligence systems improved to the point of outperforming humans at many circumscribed tasks. In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic substantially disrupted global trading and caused recessions in the global economy. There has been reported 6,988,666 (updated 2 January 2024) confirmed COVID-induced deaths worldwide. Concerns grew as existential threats from environmental degradation and global warming became increasingly evident, while mitigation efforts, including a shift to sustainable energy, made gradual progress. Most humans (61%) live in Asia; the remainder live in the Americas (14%), Africa (14%), Europe (11%), and Oceania (0.5%). 

Great Contributions of Humanity

*Human beings have been inventors and discoverers for thousands of years. There are tons of contributions of human beings. I picked these seven contributions because they changed the game, they are monumental in their impact in the Universe, and these contributions still inspire us in the year 2024.

1. One of the greatest accomplishments of human history was the creation of the Great Pyramids in ancient Egypt. The Great Pyramid of Giza served as a tomb of the pharaoh Khufu, who ruled during the Fourth Dynasty of the Old Kingdom. It was built in ca. 2570 B.C. over the course of 27 years. Its architect is presumed to be Hemiunu. This structure prove that ancient human beings were very intelligent people who understood not only architecture but high levels of science including mathematics like trigonometry, algebra, etc. Initially standing at 146.6 meters (481 feet), the Great Pyramid was the world's tallest human-made structure for more than 3,800 years. Over time, most of the smooth white limestone casing was removed, which lowered the pyramid's height to the current 138.5 meters (454.4 ft); what is seen today is the underlying core structure. The base was measured to be about 230.3 meters (755.6 ft) square, giving a volume of roughly 2.6 million cubic meters (92 million cubic feet), which includes an internal hillock. The dimensions of the pyramid were 280 royal cubits (146.7 m; 481.4 ft) high, a base length of 440 cubits (230.6 m; 756.4 ft), with a seked of 5.5 palms (a slope of 51°50'40"). Many people used about 2.3 million large blocks, weighing 6 million tons in total. Mortar was used to make the Great Pyramid become very stable in its structural composition. 

Much of the blocks were placed in boats to go across the rivers of Egypt. Conscript laborers were used to build the pyramid site. As to the question of how over two million blocks could have been cut within Khufu's lifetime, stonemason Franck Burgos conducted an archaeological experiment based on an abandoned quarry of Khufu discovered in 2017. Within it, an almost completed block and the tools used for cutting it had been uncovered: hardened arsenic copper chisels, wooden mallets, ropes and stone tools. In the experiment replicas of these were used to cut a block weighing about 2.5 tonnes (the average block size used for the Great Pyramid). It took four workers 4 days (with each working 6 hours a day) to excavate it. The initially slow progress sped up six times when the stone was wetted with water. Based on the data, Burgos extrapolates that about 3,500 quarry-men could have produced the 250 blocks/day needed to complete the Great Pyramid in 27 years. The Great Pyramid has the Original entrance, many Chambers like the Queen's Chamber including the King's Chamber, the Grand Gallery, etc. 

2. The world's first movable type printing technology for paper books was made of porcelain materials and was invented around AD 1040 in China during the Northern Song dynasty by the inventor Bi Sheng (990–1051). The earliest printed paper money with movable metal type to print the identifying code of the money was made in 1161 during the Song dynasty. In 1193, a book in the Song dynasty documented how to use the copper movable type. The oldest extant book printed with movable metal type, Jikji, was printed in Korea in 1377 during the Goryeo dynasty. The spread of both movable-type systems was, to some degree, limited to primarily East Asia. The development of the printing press in Europe may have been influenced by various sporadic reports of movable type technology brought back to Europe by returning business people and missionaries to China. Some of these medieval European accounts are still preserved in the library archives of the Vatican and Oxford University among many others. Around 1450, German goldsmith Johannes Gutenberg introduced the metal movable-type printing press in Europe, along with innovations in casting the type based on a matrix and hand mould. The small number of alphabetic characters needed for European languages was an important factor. Gutenberg was the first to create his type pieces from an alloy of lead, tin, and antimony—and these materials remained standard for 550 years. It caused the creation of the Gutenberg Bible in 1455.  The 19th-century invention of hot metal typesetting and its successors caused movable type to decline in the 20th century.

3. The Wright brothers invented and flew the first airplane in 1903, recognized as "the first sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered flight." They built on the works of George Cayley dating from 1799, when he set forth the concept of the modern airplane (and later built and flew models and successful passenger-carrying gliders) and the work of German pioneer of human aviation Otto Lilienthal, who, between 1867 and 1896, also studied heavier-than-air flight. Around 400 BC in Greece, Archytas was reputed to have designed and built the first artificial, self-propelled flying device, a bird-shaped model propelled by a jet of what was probably steam, said to have flown some 200 m (660 ft). This machine may have been suspended for its flight. Many people like Abbas ibn Firnas, English monk Eilmer of Malmsebury, and Leonardo da Vinci researched flying and the design of birds. By the 19th century, Lilienthal's flight attempts in 1891 are seen as the beginning of human flight. Following its limited use in World War I, aircraft technology continued to develop. Airplanes had a presence in all the major battles of World War II. The first jet aircraft was the German Heinkel He 178 in 1939. The first jet airliner, the de Havilland Comet, was introduced in 1952. The Boeing 707, the first widely successful commercial jet, was in commercial service for more than 50 years, from 1958 to at least 2013. Now, airplane travel is hugely common in our time in 2024. 

4. The creation of a spacecraft to send humans to the Moon and bring them back to Earth in 1969 was a monumental achievement by humanity. The Apollo Program used a lot of sacrifice to cause humans to go to the Moon. Apollo 11 was the mission that caused this reality to take place. There were previous Apollo programs from Apollo 1 to 10. A Saturn V rocket launched Apollo 11 from Launch Complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center on July 16, 1969, at 13:32:00 UTC (09:32:00 EDT local time). Armstrong's wife Janet and two sons watched from a yacht moored on the Banana River. During the launch, Armstrong's heart rate peaked at 110 beats per minute. He found the first stage the loudest, much noisier than the Gemini 8 Titan II launch. The Apollo command module was relatively roomy compared with the Gemini spacecraft. None of the Apollo 11 crew suffered space sickness, as some members of previous crews had. The Apollo 11 crew with Neil Armstrong and other landed on the Moon on July 20, 1959. Neil Armstrong was on the Moon first and then Aldrin. Aldrin planted the flag of the United States on the Moon. After going to the Earth, the crew had a ticker tape parade in New York City on August 13, 1969, and in Chicago with an estimated six million attended. President Nixon and Vice President Agnew presented each astronaut with a Presidential Medal of Freedom. This was a monumental achievement of humanity. 

5. The discovery of DNA changed how we view humanity and life for decades now. Many parts of DNA were found in the 1800's. Yet, Francis Crick and James Watson were the discoverers of the double helix model of DNA. In April 2023, scientists, based on new evidence, concluded that Rosalind Franklin was a contributor and "equal player" in the discovery process of DNA (in 1953), rather than otherwise, as may have been presented subsequently after the time of the discovery. In 1962, after Franklin's death, Watson, Crick, and Wilkins jointly received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

6. The Human Genome Project (HGP) was an international scientific research project with the goal of determining the base pairs that make up human DNA, and of identifying, mapping and sequencing all of the genes of the human genome from both a physical and a functional standpoint. It started in 1990 and was completed in 2003. It remains the world's largest collaborative biological project. Planning for the project started after it was adopted in 1984 by the US government, and it officially launched in 1990. It was declared complete on April 14, 2003, and included about 92% of the genome. Level "complete genome" was achieved in May 2021, with a remaining only 0.3% bases covered by potential issues. The final gapless assembly was finished in January 2022. Most of the government-sponsored sequencing was performed in twenty universities and research centers in the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, France, Germany, and China, working in the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium (IHGSC). 

The Human Genome Project, through its sequencing of the DNA, can help researchers understand diseases including: genotyping of specific viruses to direct appropriate treatment; identification of mutations linked to different forms of cancer; the design of medication and more accurate prediction of their effects; advancement in forensic applied sciences; biofuels and other energy applications; agriculture, animal husbandry, bioprocessing; risk assessment; bioarcheology, anthropology and evolution. Another proposed benefit is the commercial development of genomics research related to DNA-based products, a multibillion-dollar industry. The sequence of the DNA is stored in databases available for anyone on the Internet. The human genome has approximately 3.1 billion base pairs.  In 1996, the United States passed the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), which protects against the unauthorized and non-consensual release of individually identifiable health information to any entity not actively engaged in the provision of healthcare services to a patient. 

7. The invention and release of the iPhone in 2007 caused a complete acceleration of smartphone technology. The iPhone was the blueprint for the iPad, next-generation laptop computers, and the growth of A.I. technology too. The iPhone was the dream of Steve Jobs of Apple and other human beings. The iPhone was the first mobile phone to use multi-touch technology. Since the iPhone's launch, it has gained larger screen sizes, video-recording, waterproofing, and many accessibility features. Up to the iPhone 8 and 8 Plus, iPhones had a single button on the front panel with the Touch ID fingerprint sensor. Since the iPhone X, iPhone models have switched to a nearly bezel-less front screen design with Face ID facial recognition, and app switching activated by gestures. Touch ID is still used for the budget iPhone SE series. The iPhone is one of the two largest smartphone platforms in the world alongside Android and is a large part of the luxury market. The iPhone has generated large profits for Apple, making it one of the world's most valuable publicly traded companies. The first-generation iPhone was described as a "revolution" for the mobile phone industry and subsequent models have also garnered praise.

Epilogue

When it is all said and done, human beings have a very unique experience in the Universe. We are only here for less than 130 years, but our impact on the world has been major. For example, we are the only species on Earth that traveled into Space plus into the Moon and went back to Earth. We have DNA that acts as transmitters of information that can develop life more thoroughly from being an embryo to an adult human being. We can adapt to some of the most dangerous climates on Earth. We have inspirational inventions that has lessened the time of travel among long distances, cured plus treated illnesses, and grown knowledge. Yet, learning knowledge is not enough. There is a purpose in life. There is the transcendent in the Universe. In other words, life is bigger than us humans. From all of the evidence that I have seen, I do believe in the Creator God who created the Universe. We are not mere accidents as a product of random chance. We have specialized organs, we have a prefrontal cortex that deals with intellectual power, and our cells are filled with electric energy that can heal plus perform magnificent feats in a short span of time (like meiosis, etc.). Therefore, the codes found in genetic material (from DNA to our chromosomes), the electromagnetic fields, the existence of fractals, the Universal laws of our reality, and the influence of light in all matter represent to me concrete evidence of God in organizing the Universe. God is Love and from God comes Light as even the Scriptures mention. Also, Love doesn't mean that we do what we want. We still have to promote righteousness and justice in our lives. We still have to do the right thing in our lives. All things are influenced by Light and from the Universal, Infinite mind. The Infinite, Immortal Mind, The Creator of all Things, and the Infinite Origin of all Power is God to me. 

 

Conclusion (Winter)

Winter times are here in 2024, and new facts about how the world functions transpire. Liz Cheney released her book called "Oath and Honor." This book exposes the Trump movement and the lie that the 2020 election was stolen. It is a book that exposes not only Trump but his enablers. She has criticized pro-Trump Republicans as enablers and collaborators. These people made a conscious decision to violate the oath to the Constitution out of their sick political allegiance to the corrupt Donald Trump. Liz Cheney called Trump "the most dangerous man ever to inhabit the Oval Office." Trump is the most corrupt President of the 21st century and one of the top five worst Presidents in American history in my view. Cheney also condemned the actions of former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (she said he told her that Trump knew he had lost the 2020 election). She has criticized the Republican Congressman Mark Green of Tennessee as calling Trump Orange Jesus (Green denies making that comment about Trump). Liz Cheney said that she would do everything to try to not make Trump win the 2024 election. She said that if Trump is the party's nominee in 2024, she will leave the GOP. The treason that Donald Trump and his allies did for years will never be forgotten by us. Now, Israel has used strikes in southern Gaza which contradicts their previous act of bombing northern Gaza. Today, we have a situation where even Vice President Kamala Harris is right to say to the Israeli government that Israeli military forces have a right to disagree with Hamas's terrorism, but they must adhere to international law in dealing with civilians. 

Massive Palestinian civilians and innocent Israelis have unjustly died in that conflict. Now, you have AIPAC targeting progressive black human beings (who are in Congress) and other members of color Congresspeople disproportionately because these Congresspeople believe in the dignity of Palestinian life (and they use critiques against the far-right extremist Benjamin Netanyahu). AIPAC interests funded MAGA Republicans, who believe in the 2020 election lie too making that group filled with hypocrites (in claiming to be for democracy and funding people who represent the antithesis of democracy). AIPAC is not only targeting Ilhan Omar and Jamaal Bowman. They are targeting Summer Lee of Pennsylvania, Cori Bush, and Ayanna Pressley. Centrist CBC members support AIPAC heavily. Years ago, AIPAC even wanted Donna Edwards from Maryland out of office. In August 2005, Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) were indicted under the Espionage Act on the extraordinary charge that they had improperly received and transmitted classified information that was provided to them by a government official. AIPAC forgets that there is a distinction in desiring Israelis and Palestinians to live in peace and legitimate critique of the far-right Netanyahu government in Israel (legitimate critique is not anti-Semitism). At the end of the day, Israelis and Palestinians deserve to live in peace, liberty, equality, and justice without Hamas terrorism and without occupation.

By Timothy