Comments by "Stephen Villano" (@spvillano) on "Stefan Milo" channel.

  1. A better case could be made between Africa and India discovering iron working first. Given the timeline between India working iron before Persia, I suspect India learned how to work iron and the knowledge spread via trade routes, with Europe being last, as they were still recovering from Volcanic disasters in the Med. China was also certainly working iron long before Europe, again making sense if India had been trading and that knowledge followed trade routes. Alas, any evidence for Africa has likely been long lost due to colonization and the destruction that wrought. As for the difficulties working iron, much was based upon the color of the iron being worked to determine temperature. Furnace temperatures can be assessed crudely either by experience or even by behavior of clay placed in the furnace, as overheated clay has its own distinct behavior. Mastering carburizing, that's pretty much pure experience. But, people then were as smart as people today are, our only advantage is greater knowledge of chemistry, metallurgy and physics. Now, one to really bake your noodle: How advanced would humanity have been had there been no plagues?
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  2.  @ikengaspirit3063  yep, modern technology has really deliriously impacted people. Why, now they live past age 30 and most children live to become adults, rather than having 2 out of 5 survive to adulthood. Utter destruction, that surviving thing and all! Yes, colonization fucked things up tremendously. Modernization, not so much. Although, industrialized nations are still compounding that via pollution.
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  3.  @ikengaspirit3063  we do have a plethora of historians, archeologists and sociologists graduating each and every year from university. Documenting pretty much anything is exceptionally inexpensive these days as well, so documenting before such traditions and practices fade away or die off is easy, if we merely exercise the will and discipline needed to do so. Although, for the archeological record, that is man hours and manpower intensive, as anyone who has worked on a dig can attest to. But, moving forward is necessary to improve lives and extend lifespans, so we have to be intensive, meticulous and accurate, while still advancing. We've had many a construction project halted for archeology and that's right and proper, the project completed after the dig and recovery was completed.
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  4. A further tip off is that the holes are flared on both ends, a sharp edge would cut fibers, rather than feed them through intact. Also, there'd largely be one type of fiber found as residue, rather than mixed as one would find in soil.
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