First civilizations - common factors?

[Rosacrux redux]

Very interesting subject, albeit huge and broad… I got some time so I can attempt to reply to your questions (hope so, at least…). Well, here goes


- What caused slavery?

Lack of sufficient workforce. Slavery was of pivotal importance for the advancement of the early cultures and I believe it was present from the wake of civilization, even in the late tribal stage. Or so anthropological and sociological models are telling us.

- What caused larger-scale warfare as opposed to the more biological teasing and scaring games? The biological scaring and teasing games could be spotted as late as in tribal warfare around year 0, as well as today sometimes in football supporter fights But what caused the determined struggle to kill opponents? When was the first case we can consider an example of this in nature totally unique behavior, which differs us humans from the lower animals?

This was the case from the beginning. When the first tribe tried to survive by grabbing the hunting fields of another tribe, extermination of the "other" became an essential tool in human society. Of course the point at which tribal quarels became actual warfare, is rather obscure. I'd guess when the first organized and stratified societies emerged.

- What caused harems? What caused marriage in the same societies where harems existed? Was monogamy caused by civilization or did it exist before (biology can't reveal much here as some close relatives to humans have monogamy and others have polygamy)?

In war males took part, males died. The females left behind could not be left barren, it would be an incredible waste of resources for the tribe. The only way to ensure fertilization of all available women with the lack of sufficient males, was polygamy. Polygamy was a given in many early societies, although strict monogamy seems like a civilization thing.

- What caused human sacrifice? I mean, not the normal explanation "people believed in religions and wanted to sacrifice to the gods". I mean - why did they initially decide their gods wanted sacrifice? Also could there have been Freudian subconscious thoughts behind human sacrifice, such as wanting power to kill competitors for women, or competitors for power?

I think human beings have been sacrificed from time immemorial: for food. There was little distinction between game and human, methinks. With the development of religious beliefs, the killing of humans became integrated to the religious aspect, and in the next ages it was considered rather normal to sacrifice a human instead of an animal. Something many people don't know: even in 8th century Greece (yes, the place that gave a few centuries later birth to people like Plato, Aristotle, Pythagoras, Archimedes etc. etc.) there was limited human sacrifice practiced. The population control thing doesn't hold water, really.

- Could carthaginian infant sacrifice have begun as birth control, later gone wrong by becoming a religious tradition?

As I said, no population control. Religious tradition, maybe. A way to enhance the power of the clergy over the people? I am not sure. Got to read something about this…

- When did power over a group become a goal of an individual? In biology, it's status and rank that matters, not power to tell people to do things, or power over deciding whether someone should be allowed to live or not. Leaders in nature don't have the same control over the subjects as human leaders have. So when did humans start getting hungry for power in this way? Hungry for depriving people of their free will and self-control by being able to control their actions, through power?

- It's a very human thing, I fear. Primitive, but human. The first organized society must have marked that kind of distinction (the rulers and the ruled).

- When were the first weapons made for killing humans, rather than hunting, made?

I said above that fellow human beings were a common game, so it must've developed simultaneously.

- Did making fire really have such a huge impact on man? Initially, they couldn't grow things, so the usage of fire to prepare fields from forest couldn't have mattered in the early stages. Did making fire cause religion and mysticism, as is sometimes claimed?

Never actually thought of it that way. Don't forget that fire made it easier for humans to distant themselves from animals, so harnessing the power of fire was a huge step forward indeed.

- Why did gold become valuable? It can't be that it's rare, because panda extrement is rare, but isn't a valuable trade good because of it. Is it that humans have a thing for shiny things, in combination with being rare? Truly, the only reason why gold is valuable is because there's a silent agreement that gold is valuable. End that agreement, and gold is worth nothing, because it can't be used for anything practical (very few exceptions at least, and even fewer exceptions in pre-civilization societies and early civilizations).

Actually, not. Gold became so valuable because it is almost eternal. Gold doesn't rust and doesn't decompose. And of course it looks good. And it's rare.

- Where the first cave drawings/art really art? Couldn't the drawings of animals they hunted have been used to instruct new, young hunters? Did spirals and geometrical figures really have a religious importance, or where they just decorations? Geometrical figures are quite natural things for a modern man to draw on a paper when you don't know what to draw and just move the pen around. So wouldn't the geometrical figures rather be explained because it's a biological-mathematical necessity that geometrical figures are simpler to draw?

Define art, please. Human expression when combined with (some sort of) talent is "art", methinks. And much depends on context. Under that light, it was art. Absolutely.

- Usage of clothes - did this happen before or after humans got less hairy than their relatives? What is more probable: that clothes were made to cover certain... uhm... parts, or to keep warm?

Actually, those …ahem… parts shouldn't be kept warmer, because they overheat quite easily and that causes nasty consequences. I'd say it's another of those things separating animal from men, although in the early instances dressing up was a way to protect themselves.

- When exactly did people stop "worshipping" fertility and start "worshipping" sex? When were the around ice-age period with pregnant women and phallos men statues replaced by only phallos cults?

Pregnant women cults exist even now in certain primitive parts of the world. The whole myth of matriarchy behind those assertions you present, is just that: a huge myth. Sex was always intervened with fertility and vice versa. I can't find any distinction.

- When did explosion of birth numbers begin? Much indicates that "casualties", diseases, suffering etc. was higher in early farming societies than in hunter and collecting societies, at least until growing of wheat, corn etc. had been altered to become more effective. So the only way the population in farming societies could increase more in numbers than population in hunter societies would be by a huge explosion of number of children born. Why did humans suddenly have significantly more children and start overpopulating, which has for example today made a nomadic hunting life-style became impossible?

I don't think that the early agrarian societies had more "casualties" than hunters-gatherers. This is perhaps another of those revisionist twists by which some people try to make a reputation for themselves? Dunno, but I'd say the creation of the first "great villages" and subsequently the first organized and stratified societies, was the turning point: by rendering tribal warfare into a more massive thing, the society managed to acquire the aid of much more workforce (slave labour) and so had the chance to grow further.