Thursday, January 01, 2004

Thinking about going to Monks Mound New Year's Day, and how the monument was built over generations, in different sections, higher and higher, how, from an evolutionary perspective, mound building is a paradox. On the one hand, having a culture capable of enlisting the human power to build and support monuments represents a profound change in the organization of homo homo sapien. On the other hand, based on the geometry of the project, the people who built the early layers probably produced the greatest volume dirt with the lowest return. Maybe that WAS the pinnacle. A mound that was maybe not so high but that everyone could stand on. I wonder if the archaeological record shows a less stratified society in the early phases of construction. The higher stages may have either spurred or been the product of a society where there were fewer people on top, both literally and socio-economically. Or it could have reflected a greater concern for the evolution of society as whole, knowing that your ultimate goal will not be reached for generations, doing the hardest, least rewarding part of the job anyway. Or it could have been some early intelligentia, realizing that as society grew and became more prosperous, it would be more difficult to either maintain power and prestige over that growing number of people or simply stabilize a restless population. What better way to quell existential angst, when a subsistence based economy, when you fight every season just to exist, develops a surplus. And then starts wondering why the hell the tiny elk clan has all the goods, when they aren't really protecting us from anything real. Or, perhaps even more dangerously to the genes we all carry, starts wondering why the hell we exist at all. What better way than building a mound, something huge and ambiguous for some higher purpose. It would be fascinating to have conversations between the illuminati, if they do exist, of today and the illuminati from different centuries. I wonder what the mound builders would think of our military industrial complex. If they would think it a good thing, or think we're barbarians. "Hey, we may have built a mound to keep the plebes under control, but the point was to create a harmonious society. Your entire stratification control model is build around the idea of getting your plebes to hate other plebes." Or if they'd laugh and talk about how they could never get their plebes to buy into organized violence. 4:06:31 AM