The Big Picture

I've been gorging on documentaries lately. It keeps my mind occupied so I don't dwell on the emptiness of my home now that my son and roommate have moved out. I'm alone for the first time in well over 20 years. Thankfully, there is a wonderful array of quality documentaries and series available which keep my mind happily engaged turning over the new information. I keep playing with the new ideas to discover whether any of it would be useful in addressing any of the problems I see at work or home. Some documentaries I watch just to feed my own passion for ancient history and the early development of civilizations, technologies, trade and belief systems.

The lessons I've learned from examining humanity's ancient past have given me a strong optimism for the future. Our species was forged by the challenges we faced and conquered. We are incredibly adaptable, brilliantly inventive and, when many of us work together, there isn't much we can't do. Although those very strengths can be misdirected, or twisted with violence, fear or cruelty - it will eventually be squashed. Humans don't like repression, and have repeatedly found ways to defeat, outwit, or sabotage the perpetrators. Again and again we use our wits, and whatever resources we can muster, to meet challenge after challenge.

Where do I get that from?

Research coming out of Catalhyuk (Anatolia), Casma (Peru), Great Britain, China and India has revealed a whole new view of what our species is capable of. Our early civilizations were surprising peaceful. Conflict, war and armed aggression didn't play a significant role until two or more groups wanted the same resources or real estate.

The research by physical anthropologists made leaps in discovering just how our species evolved by new finds of isolated groups of early humans, and new information about the many environmental changes and challenges our ancestors faced time and time again.

So, I guess my faith is in my species. Some believe in God. I respect that belief, but I do not share it. I do believe my confused, and sometimes very confusing, brothers and sisters in the human family will persevere and rise to meet the new challenges we face today with the same brilliance we have used in the past.

Now, if only we can all learn to collaborate, then we won't need coercion or repression to come together in sufficient numbers to effect the changes we need.