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oi. Lets not forget you start with: > If freedom and democracy were universal values then they would have shown up in some of the earliest cultures, which they
by Quarrelsome 8y ago
oi. Lets not forget you start with:
> If freedom and democracy were universal values then they would have shown up in some of the earliest cultures, which they did not.
We have a ton of resource from the Greeks because they wrote shit down. By invoking "the earliest" civilizations you're hiding behind a greater unknown because we lack an equivalent level of written resource until ~3500 BC.
So written resource becomes available 5,500 years ago and democracy has written examples available 2,000 years ago, 3,500 years after written record.
Ergo, according to your bullshit if something occurs 3,500 years after writing is established even though that was 2,000 years ago that means _nothing_ toward "universal values".
I can't believe you'd twist history like this to much such bollocks points. What the fuck does "universal values" even mean? We can barely trust the tablets we have and we have limited to no written record of societies beyond 3,500 years ago. But because of this window of 3,500 years between writing and democracy not appearing you classify it as "non-universal". You're full of shit by basing your entire argument on this window that conveniently fulfils it. Humans have existed for hundreds of thousands of years yet this 3,500 year window is all that matters to you. Dwell on that.
For reference, I am not arguing that democracy IS a universal value but just against that you can prove what is or isn't a universal value by cherry picking our patchy written record like you do.
Alex is a shit marker to be fair but gives a general gist for the rise of the Hellenic world. Examples of democracy within city states existed prior to 6 BC Athens but 6 BC Athens is the best known one.
- lovich 8y agoFirst off, you can calm down, no need to call me full of shit because you don't like my arguments. As to your points. We have written history from thousands of years before the Greeks. The code of Hammurabi predates them significantly. We also have scattered historical records from other ancient cultures and it's not like their government system was a mystery. They had Kings and emperor's, not elected leaders. Even with the Greeks, how many of the city states had any sort of democratic system and weren't a monarchy or oligopoly? Youre accusing me of cherry picking but all you can point to is a single geographic area in a relatively small span of time and even then, only a few of the population centers had any sort of democracy.
- Quarrelsome 8y agoits still a form of democracy. I'm accusing ALL of us as cherry picking. Human history is cherry picking because we know so little of it because of the perish-ability of everything but the most hardy of tablets. To look at history and make strong assertions about what is or isn't universal values is a disingenuous position. Sociology is a difficult science today in the modern world, let alone applying it to history. I am not cherry picking because my point is that your assertion is too strong for what we know. My position is that "we don't really know".
- dang 8y agoSince we just asked you to stop breaking the site guidelines and then you posted this, I've banned this account until we get some indication that you will use HN as intended in the future. If you don't want to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com with that. In HN comments, it's more important not to turn this site into a flaming pit than it is to be right about Hellenic antiquity.