Ancient Mythology Summary

1) The connection between Mesopotamia and the development of civilization is the Sumerian tribe that arrived to that land. They were the first to read and write, and city-states rumored to have civilizations evolve around them are found surrounding Mesopotamia. Additionally, many of the first creation stories include Mesopotamia as the birthplace of civilization.

2) The debate regarding Pythagoras and his theorem is very strong because not much is known of him since neither he nor his pupils left many writings, thus we only know some facts from contradicting accounts written two centuries after his death. However, it is now known that he did not discover the Pythagorean Theorem nor the connection established between musical intervals and simple

numbers.
3) According to medieval theologians, the clear and original meaning of the account of creation in the Genesis is that chaos is a condition in which there are no things; a world where whatever exists does not have a name.

It is the naming that makes the separation if chaos into cosmos, when things with names begin to exist. Medieval theologians imposed on this creation story the concept that the world was created ex nihilo (out of nothing).

4) Atomism tells us that everything in the universe is fashioned out of small invisible and eternally existing particles called atoms. Certain qualities of atoms explain why different substances have different attributes.

5) According to Plato, geometrical shapes relative to the Pythagorean philosophy apply to our world by existing in the Platonic world. For example, the motion of the heavens can be described as circular and in Pythagorean philosophy the circle is the perfect, idealized shape. As well, planets were also presumed to follow a spherical orbit. Another philosophy inherited from Pythagoras is that cosmos is a place of order and goodness.

6) The clash between their interests was that Plato based his idea of nature and life on mathematical evidence and scientific proof, while Aristotle made conclusions about the world based his vague observations, lacking any concrete verification of his

ideas.
7) Aristotle’s philosophy differs from Plato’s in that it emphasizes human perception of how the world appears to be over investigation of how the world actually is. Meanwhile, Plato would prove his assertions and theories with actual experimentation and mathematics, employing principles that originated from Pythagoras’ time. Furthermore, for Aristotle the world of change happened between the Earth and the Moon. Overall, both Plato and Aristotle were interested in planets and astronomy.
8) At the time of Muhammad, the West rediscovered classical knowledge and there was a boom of knowledge and information in the Arab world. This outburst of knowledge became inaccessible to the world for a long time.
9) Humanism was surprisingly integrated into Christianity and became known instead as humanistic Christianity. One of the Greek understandings of love changed to “platonic” to explain the love between Man and God. Humanism made Christianity focus more on rational thinking and observation.
10) Ptolemy was similar to Aristotle because he placed the Earth and mankind itself at the center of his cosmology and the spiritual world, and his ideas were also quite vague and lacking proof. They were based on assumptions.
11) Copernicus was fearful of his colleagues’ reactions to his word and wished to find more proof before presenting his theories. Additionally, his partaking in so many fields of study made him a busy man.
12) In Aristotle’s cosmos, Earth was the bottom of the universe, the place to which earthly objects fell. The heavens are to be found at and beyond where the moon is; a region that is unchanging and spotless.
13) Galileo disproved some of Aristotle’s cosmologies by gathering more data using his newly invented telescopes. He made the cosmology in want of more elaboration when he discovered the sun’s spots and the mountains on the moon’s surface. This discredited the idea that both these stellar objects are supposed to be “perfect”.
14) Tycho Bache was famous for his accuracy in astronomical observations, an attribute which Aristotle’s cosmology majorly lacked. Other than that, most of his cosmology aligned with Aristotle’s ideas.
15) The Church slows down a lot of the progress that science can otherwise gain, since it refuses to accept many novel theories unless they truly function for other phenomena and situations. Simultaneously, by doing so, it challenges the scientific world to further its study and evolve the theories it proposes, actually acting as a catalyst for better scientific explanations.