Presidential debate!!!!


According to the superior man from the analects of Confucius, none of the candidates was the superior one. I say that because as XV.20 " What the superior man seeks, is in himself. What the mean man seeks, is in others. Both Candidates during the presidential debate picked on and talked badly about each other as if it were middle school. Each candidate did not explain quite clearly, because instead of going in depth about how each candidate succeed while in office, but instead how the other candidate could fail.




XIV.29 The master said, " the superior man is modest in his speech, but exceeds in his actions" Neither candidate was modest. this goes back to the last quote from Confucius. Each candidate did not extensively explain an issue, rather spoke about thy self and badly about the other candidate. To sum this bad trail of comments, both candidates need to stop talking about themselves and how great they are, they need to put more implementation to what they can do for us as registered voters.


IV.16 "The mind of the superior Man is conversant with virtue; the mind of the base man is conversant with gain" Both candidates need to put more virtues toward their campaign, rather than making the campaign a reality show.

Chapter 2 Documents
The question I chose to answer was: What can you infer from the code about th kind of social problems that afflicted Mesopotamia?

Based on the code I am sure that there was a lot of homelessness or people having to look for housing with their friends or family. For  many people in failure to comply with the law, the party whom was affected must take their house upon not complying with the law. I can see some disparity here since people who may have known how to use the system might have had big plots of land. In many cases possession looks to have been something taken too seriously because of this basis. Merchant recipts must have been too strict, leaving someone to oversee a house must have been uncommon, and hiring mercenaries must have been a last resort.

Tied to this is the judicial system, which looks pretty harsh. There must have been a shortage of judges since if a judge made a mistake he was hurt economically, and could not keep practicing his job. I assume that a lot of judges ended their practice broke, since they had to pay 12 times of what they assigned to the party that was ordered to pay up. Not only economically was harm done, but also physically since the tooth for tooth method was born and/or first written for the first time in this society. Adding to all the harm, many crimes such as robbery were punishable by death, and others were harsh such as hopping on the river. The river sometimes meant death and this must have caused either really good behavior or a lot of deaths.

Marriage and woman treatment also looks complicated, since marriage rules tend to not have incline to any forgiveness, and at the same time can leave a lot of baggage.

Chapter 2

As societies developed, so did the individuals that formed part of society. With agriculture surplus, came urbanization, and with urbanization came the diversifying of jobs that people had in urban societies. Priests, artisans, merchants, servers, and even slaves. Hierarchy developed, Kings,scholars and priest maintained order through taxation, protection, and education. No longer did all people need to farm to make a living, rather people specialized to help society move forward.

 However, the downside to this transition in civilization was that people were relegated in status with the establishment of hierarchy. Women were now confined to jobs out of position of power, unless they were within a higher standing of the hierarchy. Most women had to stay at home and have kids, work as vendors or servants. At the same time, War prisoners, people who owned debt, among others were taken as slaves. The only difference between slaves in ancient times is that the children of slaves were not limited to only slavery. At the same time, people who were conquered accepted the empire that conquered them and merged into society at the lower end. The equity that existed during the gatherer-hunter period vanished completely.

At the same time all these things were happening, the structure of family as we know it was born. Wives would be killed if they got caught cheating with another man, but men could sleep with other women as long as they were not someones wife. Equity was never established, neither was monogamy defined very clearly. That explains why infidelity to a significant other still exists in a portion of society to this day.
   

First Agriculture!!!!!

The transition from hunter gathering was a breakthrough in human society. I thought before this reading that gathering-hunting was a more extensive time than that of the transition into agriculture. The textbook indicates that the transition happened because of the end of the ice age. I find it mind blowing that irrigation started back in those times by women precisely. They were the gatherers to begin with, and they just took the seeds of their gatherings and started planting in a more efficient way. I understand that  the process was not overtime, but the fact that a lot of the first crops are not something that is on the table everyday made me google them for an extra experience for my inner foodie. I am also a bit skeptical on animal domestication in the Americas. The only domesticated animal I can think of besides the llama and alpaca is the xoloitzcuintili, also known as the Hairless dog which is believed to have been domesticated about 3500 years ago. I also credit the book for calling corn the biggest plant engineering in history. I agree, because corn has been and is to this day the number 1 staple in food in present day Mexico.

I was also surprised that present day Ethiopia was not as dry as it is today. The landscape of the first agricultural days was crucial to the development of agriculture. I can see clearly why the author said that the agricultural revolution was a need rather that an evolution. I look forward to the class lecture.