Mesoamerican civilizations compared to early Mesopotamia

[Razgovory]

Malthus, I would like to discuss this, and I used to know a decent amount, but I have forgotten too much.

My understanding is that the nature of the writing system is such that it wasn't practical for ordinary business.

Certainly some language systems are better for business than others, but that doesn't mean transacting business was impossible in other languages.

Take for example Roman numerals as opposed to Arabic. Roman numerals suck heavily for doing basic business or engineering calculations, as opposed to Arabic. That did not stop the Romans from doing business and engineering using them, though.

There is nothing whatsoever in Mayan that would prevent its use in accounting or transactional work ... they clearly had the ability to transcribe complicated numbers (they were big in calendrics, for example) and had no problems writing down dynsatic histories.

I think Romans used Greek numbers for their engineering.

[Caliga]

 

I thought that a couple of different writing systems from the Indus civilization ARE known, but nobody has ever been able to actually decipher them?

[Razgovory]

China has been the most advanced nation on earth for a good portion of human history.  It's only the last 200 years or so that's been the exception.

Well, there was that mongol thingy back in 13th century. China and India both had huge populations because of wet rice cultivations which produced large yields and were more reliable then say wheat.  The Europeans never really caught up with them in population despite being having a greater material culture.  The single biggest factor in population is food production which has historically been more dependent on climate and crop then technology.  You can build a huge city in the pre-modern world though importation of food, but you need reliable trade networks to support it.  Ancient Rome is grew to immense size due to Egyptian Grain (which produced huge yields because of the annual flooding of the Nile).

[Siege]

This really comes down to definitions of "advanced", but unless those are dependant on degrees of urbanization, I think it is tough to argue for mesoamerica. Mesoamerica lacked the wheel and most animal husbandry. The writing system of Mesopotamia seems to have developed from practical applications in basic accounting, but in Mesoamerica was mostly ceremonial and not so applicable to everyday use.

Mesoamerica didn't have any convenient animals to domesticate. One can hardly penalize them for that. Not surprising they didn't use the wheel for anything other than toys without draft animals.

Wheelbarrow doesn't need draft animals.
There is no excuse for not using the wheel.

[Razgovory]

Romans didn't figure out the wheelbarrow either.  Neither did the ancient Israelis.

[Barrister]

This really comes down to definitions of "advanced", but unless those are dependant on degrees of urbanization, I think it is tough to argue for mesoamerica. Mesoamerica lacked the wheel and most animal husbandry. The writing system of Mesopotamia seems to have developed from practical applications in basic accounting, but in Mesoamerica was mostly ceremonial and not so applicable to everyday use.

Mesoamerica didn't have any convenient animals to domesticate. One can hardly penalize them for that. Not surprising they didn't use the wheel for anything other than toys without draft animals.

Wheelbarrow doesn't need draft animals.
There is no excuse for not using the wheel.

It's not clear to me that using a wheelbarrow is any better off than carrying a large load on your back.  I know from reading on the goldrush Indians could carry 100lb packs up the mountains (and made quite the fortune doing so from all the cheechakos).

[Razgovory]

Didn't you learn about simple machines in school?  

[Richard Hakluyt]

They would have had decent draft animals if their ancestors hadn't eaten all of them 

[Octavian]

I knew a lady with smallbox.

Luckily you had a small thing that fit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IA_aHsER6c

[garbon]

I knew a lady with smallbox.

Luckily you had a small thing that fit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IA_aHsER6c

I didn't see any indication in his post that it worked out.

[mongers]

Didn't you learn about simple machines in school?

Yeah, and there are other considerations that would make a wheel barrow more useful, though set against the reduced cross-country performance vs backpacking a load.

[Malthus]

I thought that a couple of different writing systems from the Indus civilization ARE known, but nobody has ever been able to actually decipher them?

They know they exist (or strongly suspect they do) because carved inscriptions were found on seal stones (and pot sherds and an alleged "signboard"). What they don't have are any long examples, because (presumably) they were written on perishable materials that do not survive. Hence, it is effectively impossible to decipher their language, since the examples are simply too short and probably mostly consist of proper names & titles.

It would be like attempting to decipher English if all you had of that language were people's Walmart Greeter nametags. "Hi, my name is John", "Hi, my name is Cathy", and an "Exit this way" sign. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indus_Valley_Civilization#Writing_system

[mongers]

I thought that a couple of different writing systems from the Indus civilization ARE known, but nobody has ever been able to actually decipher them?

They know they exist (or strongly suspect they do) because carved inscriptions were found on seal stones (and pot sherds and an alleged "signboard"). What they don't have are any long examples, because (presumably) they were written on perishable materials that do not survive. Hence, it is effectively impossible to decipher their language, since the examples are simply too short and probably mostly consist of proper names & titles.

It would be like attempting to decipher English if all you had of that language were people's Walmart Greeter nametags. "Hi, my name is John", "Hi, my name is Cathy", and an "Exit this way" sign. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indus_Valley_Civilization#Writing_system

Cheers, interesting stuff.

Amusing that the academic debate about interpreting those symbols appears to have gotten rather heated at times.   

[Razgovory]

Didn't you learn about simple machines in school?

Yeah, and there are other considerations that would make a wheel barrow more useful, though set against the reduced cross-country performance vs backpacking a load.

I had to memorize (and later totally forget), a bunch of equations that showed how levers and wheels require less force to move things then just picking them up.

[mongers]

Didn't you learn about simple machines in school?

Yeah, and there are other considerations that would make a wheel barrow more useful, though set against the reduced cross-country performance vs backpacking a load.

I had to memorize (and later totally forget), a bunch of equations that showed how levers and wheels require less force to move things then just picking them up.

And google is one's friend on this won, I knew something about the Chinese using wheelbarrow, but google throw out this, to me, rather informative article:
http://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2011/12/the-chinese-wheelbarrow.html