Minute Paper 1/31

I found today’s discussion about how history has effected our perspective on the progression of time, and how that shift of perspective has resulted in a change in the way we view and approach the future very enlightening. Originally I interpreted the idea of how the Jewish people wrote the first history as being a result of these people experiencing limited change(s) in their lives. This, I thought, caused them to study their past, which would have seemed diverse in comparison to their present existences. Unfortunately I was missing the entire point of why we looked at “From Death to Life” in the first place. Professor Candy’s explanation, of why we read the article, outlined how the Jewish peoples’ creation of a written history made them rethink their cyclical view of time and adopt a linear model in which the future is unknown and constantly changing. This, in my opinion, brings up the question: if written history is in fact the main reason people began to look at time in a linear fashion, causing us to try to prepare for the unknown instead of believing we are simply going through known cycles, is it possible that it is also where more complex forms of society like towns and cities (both of which seem to generally be inhabited by people with linear outlooks on time) originated from, as an attempt to better protect ourselves or be prepared for the unknowns of futures?

Mark Alexander