[Wombat101]

Sure, "Golden Civilizations"; No CFC's, no industrial revolution, no hole in the ozone layer, no fossil fuels and no chemical runoff caused by pesticides.

BUT

There was plenty of slavery, unexplained (and untreated) disease, famine, human sacrifice and absolute monarchs with the power of life and death over every individual.

Sounds to me that when the author is waxing poetic about "Golden Civilizations" what he seems to be referring to is an idealistic (but unfufilled) wish for a pastoral, totalitarian-communist-like society, sans technological progress.

To illustrate the point:

Think of a Stalin-like figure, bedecked in his finery of flayed human flesh, standing upon the balcony of his stone ziggurat (i.e. Kremlin), presiding over the May Day Open-Heart-Surgery-without-anesthetic parade, with thousands of "volunteers" all willing to take a very active (and final) roles, so that the gods (i.e. The State) get their blood sacrifice (which also coincidentally helps reduce the population, saving 'scarce' natural resources), and thus, secure the common harvest (income which will later be ruthlessly redistibuted at the whim of the State).

How dare ou puncture the author's vision of Utopia by asking a logical question about carbon-dated SUV's? (/sarcasm)

[wodinoneeye]

Sure, "Golden Civilizations"; No CFC's, no industrial revolution, no hole in the ozone layer, no fossil fuels and no chemical runoff caused by pesticides.

BUT

There was plenty of slavery, unexplained (and untreated) disease, famine, human sacrifice and absolute monarchs with the power of life and death over every individual.

Sounds to me that when the author is waxing poetic about "Golden Civilizations" what he seems to be referring to is an idealistic (but unfufilled) wish for a pastoral, totalitarian-communist-like society, sans technological progress.

To illustrate the point:

Think of a Stalin-like figure, bedecked in his finery of flayed human flesh, standing upon the balcony of his stone ziggurat (i.e. Kremlin), presiding over the May Day Open-Heart-Surgery-without-anesthetic parade, with thousands of "volunteers" all willing to take a very active (and final) roles, so that the gods (i.e. The State) get their blood sacrifice (which also coincidentally helps reduce the population, saving 'scarce' natural resources), and thus, secure the common harvest (income which will later be ruthlessly redistibuted at the whim of the State).

How dare ou puncture the author's vision of Utopia by asking a logical question about carbon-dated SUV's? (/sarcasm)


You forgot about the tasty bits being distributed to offset the protein deficient diets....