The world's ancient civilization can be divided into six major plates, namely the ancient West Asian civilization plate, the ancient Egyptian civilization plate, the ancient Greek civilization plate, the ancient Indian civilization plate, and our ancient Chinese civilization plate. Unfortunately, Australia and sub-Saharan Africa, despite their vast size, have not produced any civilizations that are commendable.
These six ancient civilization plates have made great contributions to the progress of human civilization, and they have laid the cornerstone of the development of human civilization. The so-called cornerstone is the part that has been embedded in the genes of the development of civilization and can no longer be shaken. Among the cornerstone contributions of each major sector, which is the most important one? Let's take stock of them one by one.
1 Ancient civilizations of the Americas
The contribution of American civilization is the easiest to summarize, because in the long history of human civilization, American civilization has developed independently for most of the time, and when it merges with other civilizations, it is also the beginning of its demise. Although American civilizations have incredible knowledge of astronomy, mathematics, architecture and other disciplines, and fort Saksaywaman and Nazca lines are even suspected of being alien relics, most of the civilizations in the Americas have been annihilated in history and have no direct impact on the process of human civilization.
The greatest gift left by American civilization to mankind may be nothing more than some scraps of their civilization - crops, corn, potatoes, sweet potatoes, tobacco, peppers and other foods that we cannot do now are the products of American civilization, and the people of Sichuan and Chongqing will certainly agree with this view.
A product of American civilization
2. Indian civilization
When it comes to the contribution of ancient Indian civilization, many people will definitely think of Arabic numerals for the first time. Yes, Arabic numerals have greatly improved the efficiency of digital writing, provided the best tools for the development of mathematics, and are the cornerstone of modern society. But it is not yet the greatest contribution of Indian civilization, and before there were Arabic numerals, it did not prevent Europeans and Chinese to solve multiple equations with their own numeral writing system, although it may be a bit bumpy.
The greatest contribution of ancient Indian civilizations to humanity was the spiritual world they created. No other people in the world is so obsessed with the spiritual world as the Indians and obsessed with creating it. Most importantly, the spiritual world they created was successfully exported to the world, such as Buddhism. More than that, India's spiritual way of thinking has clearly influenced and enlightened the rest of the world, such as the "Three Doctors of the East" whose blessings Jesus came to send blessings when he was born in the Bible, which is likely to be Indian.
Indians living in the spiritual world
3. Greek civilization
Although many people have doubts about the authenticity of Greek civilization, the Greek philosophers who lived in the same era as Confucius often have millions of words of their remains, and no one can think of this, let alone those who study the Analects of less than 20,000 words, and know the difficulty of passing on ancient knowledge?
But there is no doubt about it, and that is that the germ of scientific thinking originated in ancient Greece. Science has grown into a towering tree today, but its first humble seed undoubtedly grew in Greece. Scientific thinking has brought human beings into modern society, and it will also lead human society into the future.
The fruit of scientific thinking
4. Egyptian civilization
The pyramids built by the ancient Egyptians are always reminiscent, and while we marvel at the fact that this civilization was able to create such a great building five thousand years ago, we can't help but wonder, what has been left for us by this distant civilization?
The glorious architecture, exquisite statues, and inventions that still have a place in our lives (glass, toothbrushes, wigs, etc.) may have obscured what really mattered, that the life of tangible things is limited and dissolves over time, and that the gadgets they invented may also be forgotten because they are replaced by something better. What the Egyptians left us with really important was the alphabet.
Although no one in the world now uses any of the Egyptian alphabets, the way in which language is conveyed through alphabetical arrangements and combinations originated in Egypt, which can be said to be the source of all the letters used by humans.
A gift of Egyptian civilization
5. West Asian civilizations
The ancient West Asian civilization was the eldest son of human civilization, and when most of the world was still in a state of obscurity, West Asia had begun to flash the spark of civilization. The Sumerian civilization may have been a premature child, but definitely a precocious child. It seems that without a little prelude, it came to the world so suddenly, and as soon as it was born, it crossed the infant stage and ran around the ground, and archaeologists in later generations racked their brains to explain this abnormal situation. It was born with writing, cities, metals, and all the elements of civilization, and the Sumerians could even watch the performance while drinking beer.
With the advantage of the first mover, it has left countless things to this world, tearing down the edifice of human civilization, you will see that every cornerstone of the lowest ground is engraved with the name of Sumerians, cities, calendars, laws, armies, carriages, wheels, mathematics, zoology, geography...
It's almost impossible to figure out the most important of these contributions, well, one—the peculiar calendar that divides the week into seven days, which must feel especially strongly when we wake up from our slumber on Monday by an alarm clock.
The Sumerians did good deeds
6. Chinese civilization
If you want to list the fifty greatest inventions in the world, the four great inventions of our ancient times will definitely be among them, the porcelain and silk we invented once made foreigners holding pottery bowls and wearing linen clothes amazing, our domesticated rice is one of the world's three major grain varieties, and the tea we cultivate is one of the world's three major drinks... But that's not enough, because what we need is the cornerstone of civilization.
Our ancient inventions continued to spread to the world, but our ancient ideas were confined to East Asia. We can get Koreans, Japanese, and Vietnamese to learn Confucianism, but these ideas that make us proud have not even crossed Central Asia, Europeans did not know Confucius until very late, and our influence on the ancient world seems limited to our inventions.
But there is one idea that is an exception, that is, our ancient ideal of "the unity of the world", "the unity of the world" has finally given Confucianism a worldwide influence.
There seems to be no civilization in the world except China that pursues this absolute equality, Europeans have not completely escaped the influence of aristocratic society to this day, Indians even nakedly divide people into hierarchies, and some religious doctrines will advocate equality for all, but their purpose in pursuing equality is to enter heaven after death. Only The Confucians are pursuing pure equality, and under the infusion of this sense of equality, Chinese can shout the slogan "The prince will have a kind of peace" two thousand years ago, and this cry is a call for a civilian world. Under the illumination of this idea, China took the lead in breaking the shackles of the door valve system and the hereditary system, and inspired the world the arrival of a civilian era.
Before the Enlightenment, Europeans could not imagine a plebeian world, a society without kings, nobles, or hierarchies. They did not understand why China screened the management class from the plane through the imperial examination, and why there were no aristocrats in China. "Mankind certainly cannot imagine a better government than this: everything is decided by the subordinates of the first level, and officials must go through several rigorous examinations before they can be hired. That's the Chinese Empire... Human wisdom cannot come up with a political organization that is better than Chinese politics. "Their laws are imbued with the concept of 'benevolence', and in other countries the law is used to punish crimes, but in China, its role is even greater, in praising good deeds... In the ancient Chinese legal system, no matter how remote the place, even the untouchables could not be sentenced to death without the judgment of the official office..." (Voltaire)
China's "Datong" ideology has prompted China to become a civilian and secular country, and this model has inspired Europeans who have groped in the dark, injecting inspiration into their ideological enlightenment, all of which have made democratization the mainstream of the world, and respect for "public opinion" has become the common value of the world for the first time. When the eyes of the thinkers were finally on the common people, the inspiration for communism naturally appeared...
The ultimate influence of Chinese civilization