The archaeology thread

A revolt, not a revolution. They wanted personal freedom, they didn't want Rome to abolish slavery altogether. That's a very modern idea, and it is doubtful any slave back in the day could conceive of such a change.

That's the thing about these big socio-cultural paradigm shifts. Before the shift, no one can imagine a world that is different, after the shift, no one can imagine how anyone could not have wanted it or thought of it.

Edited by Redmess on Jan 16th 2024 at 7:51:03 PM

Not to disagree, but I should note that the people who leave written evidence behind are the elites, especially when in societies like the Roman one.

True, but I think that idea still holds. It can be very hard to imagine change, especially in times when social and technological development is very slow, and the world doesn't really change all that much from one decade to the next. This is also our bias: we live in times of unprecedented social change, where society can undergo large changes one decade to the next.

It's probably tied to literacy and education. That really opens the mind to imagining things that are not currently true.

Well as I said it is not an outright disagreement, but a noting that historical record is not without bias. Though I suppose that it could be argued that even if there were some abolitionists at the time, which is not impossible, it was very rare at best. Otherwise, people would have complained about them.

Edited by Risa123 on Jan 16th 2024 at 9:24:28 PM

Well, like I said, it is a big mental leap to go from wanting personal freedom to full abolitionism, especially when your world is very small and you don't really know anything but your own life and that of those close to you. And the people who don't write to us tend to be those with such a limited world view. Which would be easily over 80-90 percent of the population for most of history.

Also, and related, people who have to worry about their day to day survival, and getting their family through the next winter, don't really have much mental space or time to think about such questions like why the world is the way it is.