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It only appears like stagnation when you look at history because the fruits of their civilization was systematically eradicated by conquerors. See for example

It only appears like stagnation when you look at history because the fruits of their civilization was systematically eradicated by conquerors. See for example the Nagualism tradition which was equally as developed as Vedic philosophy. But its teachers were all slaughtered and its books burned by the Catholic Church. By the 20th century “nagual” has become a slur. Now we look back and say memo-Americans were primitive and did nothing for tens of thousands of years: No, they were far more advanced than Europeans, but their knowledge was dangerous to the colonial mission and therefore expunged from history.

marcus_holmes 8y ago
Yes! I always wonder about how far this goes... Humans from 100,000 years ago were basically like us. Our oldest history goes back maybe 15,000 of those years. Australian Aboriginal history, the longest I'm aware of, goes back less than half of that. We know that humans travelled over the Pacific, traded between South America And North Africa, for example. But because we don't have any artifacts from those periods we assume that this was haphazard and random rather than deliberate and organised. But artifacts just don't survive this long. So we have no idea what kind of societies were around 75,000 years ago. They could have discovered iron and made iron tools or weapons. But iron tools will completely disintegrate in 75,000 year, while stone ones won't. So we only see the stone tools, and assume they only had stone tools. It's interesting to speculate, but as there's no evidence (nor can there be) it'll remain an interesting speculation until we invest time travel.
- erikpukinskis 8y ago
  Well, I have realized there’s more evidence than I thought. Oral traditions are not that easy to stamp out. It is all underground now though. And certainly not readily accessible to the Academy, given that it is a fundamentally colonial institution.
  - marcus_holmes 8y ago
    Yeah, but "oral history" is only evidence that the history exists now. Not that it existed 10,000, 1,000 or even 10 years ago. The poster child for this is the druids in the UK. The Romans went on a deliberate campaign to destroy the druids. They documented it in their written histories, culminating in the invasion of the holy island of Anglesea. They stamped the whole religion out thoroughly. They had ~400 years to do that. Then there was ~1000 years of Christianity, not at all tolerant of other faiths. Then there was the Victorians, who were really, really keen on the occult and ancient knowledge. And suddenly an ancient oral tradition of druidism pops up. Convenient. I know there are oral histories that are sacred to Australian indigenous peoples, and I don't doubt for a second that they are true, but I'm always wary of trusting them.

marcus_holmes 8y ago

Yes! I always wonder about how far this goes... Humans from 100,000 years ago were basically like us. Our oldest history goes back maybe 15,000 of those years. Australian Aboriginal history, the longest I'm aware of, goes back less than half of that. We know that humans travelled over the Pacific, traded between South America And North Africa, for example. But because we don't have any artifacts from those periods we assume that this was haphazard and random rather than deliberate and organised. But artifacts just don't survive this long. So we have no idea what kind of societies were around 75,000 years ago. They could have discovered iron and made iron tools or weapons. But iron tools will completely disintegrate in 75,000 year, while stone ones won't. So we only see the stone tools, and assume they only had stone tools. It's interesting to speculate, but as there's no evidence (nor can there be) it'll remain an interesting speculation until we invest time travel.

erikpukinskis 8y ago
Well, I have realized there’s more evidence than I thought. Oral traditions are not that easy to stamp out. It is all underground now though. And certainly not readily accessible to the Academy, given that it is a fundamentally colonial institution.
- marcus_holmes 8y ago
  Yeah, but "oral history" is only evidence that the history exists now. Not that it existed 10,000, 1,000 or even 10 years ago. The poster child for this is the druids in the UK. The Romans went on a deliberate campaign to destroy the druids. They documented it in their written histories, culminating in the invasion of the holy island of Anglesea. They stamped the whole religion out thoroughly. They had ~400 years to do that. Then there was ~1000 years of Christianity, not at all tolerant of other faiths. Then there was the Victorians, who were really, really keen on the occult and ancient knowledge. And suddenly an ancient oral tradition of druidism pops up. Convenient. I know there are oral histories that are sacred to Australian indigenous peoples, and I don't doubt for a second that they are true, but I'm always wary of trusting them.