Re: Maya and Civilization

On 28 Sep 2003 09:35:03 -0700, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
(hotmoon) wrote:

>What we call "civilized" depends entirely upon quality of the lives of
>the people within a culture and how they treated one another and how
>they treated out-group members.  Compassion is the indicator of
>"civilization"; not buildings.

Civilized is where 2 or more tribes of people can live in
the same camp without killing each other. A civilization
like the aztec civilization counts because large people
where accumulated and functioned in one place with
large numbers of families. There was law and law enforcement
and an administrative government that every now and then cut
loosed and killed a whole bunch of people.

But on the other hand the Europeans killed people for owning
cats, setting of several hundred years of devastating
plaques. The romans used to civilize people by impaling
disgruntled roughians on poles. Civility is a subjective
thing.