David Bebbington recounts cyclical history is history that repeats itself. It repeats itself much like a revolving wheel. This wheel has only one revolution, and then repeats. All individuals follow a same pattern of growth, decline, and death. (Bebbington, 2000).
The pattern rose due to its parallel to nature. Nature revolves in seasons of spring, summer, fall, and winter. This spans from the new growth or birth of the season to the eventual end of the season. The same belief transferred to life itself. A person is born and grows early in the season. Then enter adulthood for their period of summer. The eventual decline in the individuals is reminiscent of fall. Eventual death occurs to all. Further supported this theory was
watching societies rise and fall. Each governmental term, dynasty, or civilization eventually ended. Cyclical history has three different variants to it. The first variant is associated with the rise and fall of civilizations and dynasties. This one is primarily the primary belief throughout China. The second variant holds the belief that the world passes through a cycle over a period. Tis second variant belief is throughout India. The third variant, often called primitivism, focuses on section of the cycle. Over time, society decays. This can be seen in the belief that the lost Golden Age (or birth) moves forward. The cycle is downwards, moving society towards decadence death. This last variant is throughout the world. As seen in China, the rise, and fall of dynasties relay on the belief that it was the “mandate of heaven, given to the first ruler of a dynasty and forfeited by the last” (Bebbington, 2000). Moral irresponsibility explained the transfer of power to a new ruler. This occurred as the ‘mandate of heaven’ withdrawn from a ruler that misgoverned. It set the stage for the new ruler to come in. The second variant to the cyclic pattern was the Indian’s cosmic cycles. This belief held on to that, the universe cycles through four stages. Each stage is a Yuga, or age, of the cycle. With the progression of each Yuga, comes a decrease in human mortality, morality, and overall happiness.
Knowles perfectly times Finny’s fall as the “summer session” is ending and the “winter session” is beginning. This fall shows the clear break between the two sessions and the two seasons. Knowles also has an interesting play on words with the falling of Finny, and fall the season. Knowles purposely does this because, as Foster states, “autumn [symbolizes] decline.” This is shown in A Separate Peace, because there is a clear decline in Finny’s character. He is originally described as very athletic, but with the fall, he can no longer can participate in sports, as the doctor states, “Sports are finished for him.” This is perfectly timed for the seasons to show how the seasons affect people in novels, such as autumn showing the initial decline from the Finny we see in the summer
Change and continuity are two major principles of life. They can easily be applied to history because their application accurately portrays the circumstances, and characterizes the era of interest. Merriam-Webster defines continuity as an uninterrupted connection, succession, or union, or an uninterrupted duration or continuation especially without essential change. Change is defined as to make different in some particular, to alter, to make radically different, to transform, or to give a different position, course, or direction to. These antonyms are critical in understanding history.
In “What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why?” Edna St. Vincent Millay says that “the summer sang in me” meaning that she was once as bright and lively as the warm summer months. In the winter everyone wants to bundle up and be lazy, but when summer comes along the sunshine tends to take away the limits that the cold once had on us. She uses the metaphor of summer to express the freedom she once felt in her youth, and the winter in contrast to the dull meaningless life she has now. There are many poets that feel a connection with the changing of seasons. In “Odes to the West Wind” Percy Bysshe Shelley describes his hopes and his expectations for the seasons to inspire the world.
Maps of Time: An Introduction to Big History by historian David Christian explores a “modern creation myth” (2). Christian takes his readers from the big bang to modern day in a technical and historical narrative. He believes that big history is a new, yet important, area of history ignored by historians. Christian tells us big history is “a coherent story about the past on many different scales, beginning, literally, with the origins of the universe and ending in the present day” (2). The strength in Christian’s argument is in that he carefully takes his readers through each stage in history, much like a textbook, using charts, graphs, pictures, and the language for each area, like astronomy or biology. However, Christian’s goal is not complete. Christian, at multiple points, tells his readers there are many more details and theories that surround any one of his given subjects. Although his book is a great overall coverage for a topic as large as big history, his readers may wonder if such the idea of big history is a good one.
In " Circles and Lines " historian John Demos writes about the shape of life across the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries covering a traditional, a transition and a more modern time period. Demos traces change through these time periods and asserts the use of a mid 18th century Philadelphia Chippendale chair to demonstrate the transition of American life from circular to linear.
“It [history] is like a river. From any vantage point, a river looks much the same day after day. But actually it is constantly flowing and changing…one day, when the banks are thoroughly weakened and the rains long and heavy, the river floods and bursts its banks, and may take a new course.” (Kay 1948)
The driving force of history is in the conflicts of social classes, the bourgeoisie and proletarians. The thriving relationships between different classes is what develops history. The struggles and hardship that the proletarians has
In their attempts to explain the historical process, Diamond and McNeill both take similar approaches by proposing that everything is explicable when one applies some simple laws and principles. McNeill supplements this notion with the idea that sometimes, however, things happen by chance and may not be explained by the overarching patterns that seem to govern everything else. Zinsser, on the other hand, simply submits that there are tremendous alternatives at any given point throughout history without trying to explain each one. Both Diamond and McNeill’s models fall prey to their own over-ambition since neither can completely explain every event they claim they can. Of the three, Zinsser’s model, due largely to its nondeterministic nature, clearly serves as the most reasonable view of the historical process.
The theme of the circle of life is represented in the His Immortality poem by Thomas Hardy, the lighting Crashes song by Live, and in The Lion King by Disney. In His Immortality, when one memory of a person dies, another range of memories are born. The song, lighting Crashes, is about a baby being born and an older woman dying. In Disney’s The Lion King, shows how after on great leader that has ruled over Pride Rock dies, another will soon take his place. This would be the birth of another wise leader. In all of these stories, the circle of life theme is present. The circle of life keeps balance meaning if one person or thing were to die, another would be born and will always repeat. Not only is this theme current in these three stories, but also in everyday life.
Iggers opens the book by talking about a revolutionary way that the Western world was taught about history. Throughout the book he ascertains the changes that take place throughout historiography and the nature of history itself. He also examines prior historical notions and the way that historiography was altered after World War II. History morphed from previous antiquarian teachings into a deeper, more evaluated approach. Historians gained a more intimate relationship with postmodern ideas and began looking at history in an objective manner using contemporary discipline. Iggers studies the way postmodernism was changed by new social sciences which allowed more detail into cultural influences and the problems surrounding globalization theories. He also explains the birth of microhistory which replaced macrohistory.
Fukuyama's article states that the world is nearing the "end of history". While the phrase "end of history" seems to suggest imminent doom and the end of the world. That is, however, not what he is suggesting. Fukuyama argues that history, or in other words the growth and development of human ideals and philosophies, is reaching its peak. The article delves into the various eras of the past, such as the Renaissance, and explains the strengths and weaknesses of the main ideologies during those eras.
Three aspects could be in place for this type of shaping a peoples' initial character. The three are the feeling of “never again,” “let's keep doing this,” and “wait; go back.” Within the “never again” aspect, there have been low points in history that no one wants to go back to. Like during World War II, when Adolf Hitler persecuted the Jewish. In the “keep doing this” aspect, the people think that their leader is making progress. They want to keep going in that direction... to progress. The “go back to where we were” aspect is that the current situation isn't going as well as things in the past have. They want to go back to when progress was being
Though the past may bring "a revival and restoration of the misery"(Limerick 473), I believe it is necessary to know and study our past. Through this essay I shall explain how knowledge of the past helps improve the quality of future output, satisfy our human thirst for knowledge, and understand certain polices and regulations.
By analyzing Earthly life one would easily find confirmations for THE PRINCIPLE OF REPETITION. THIS IS FUNDAMENTAL BASIC PRINCIPLE THAT RECURS IN ALL CREATION, MEANING ANYTHING THAT COMES UNDER THE TERMS ‘MOVEMENT’ OR ‘SUBSTANCE’. If the cycle of a day & night or the cycle of a year REPEAT, WHY would not be the case with our Physical planet bound life? Martinus pointed out that, paraphrasing, one who does not RECOGNIZE REINACARNATION refuses plain fact that Sun shines over other continents while he
The third hypothesis, the unawareness of death hypothesis (Hrdy 1999) states proposes that the mothers cannot distinguish between the live and dead body, atleast for the first few days, hence carry them as if they were still alive. In Yunnan snub-nosed monkeys (Li et al. 2012 ), it was recorded that the behaviour of the mothers changed after the death of the infant, with increased grooming and social avoidance, which is atypical of normal behaviour. The mode of carrying these infants also changed after their death. In geladas (Fashing et. al) and snub-nosed monekys(Li et. al. 2012), it was seen the dead body was carried using one hand, in chimpanzees (Biro et. al. 2010),the dead infants were seen being pulled by their limbs; instead of ventrally as they usually are. Apart from this, several other exploratory behaviours by the mothers in all the cases provide proof to refute the hypothesis that the mothers do not know that