Monday, October 6, 2025

Shang Dynasty in Anchent China

 The Shang dynasty during the second millennium BCE.

Roughly around the 16th century or 3600 years ago, located at the city of Yin, near what is now the modern city of Anyang.

Around the same time, the civilisations of Mycenaean Greece, Ancient Egypt and the decline of the Hittite Empire. 

One thing about the Shang dynasty is that they had a fairly advanced writing system; the Shang dynasty's scribes would write on the scapula of oxen, then they would heat it up, and when it cracked, read the cracks in the bones in order to read the future.

As we know, the Shang dynasty was built around the Yellow River and the Yangze River, since that was where they could cultivate plants, ruled by Di Xin.

11th Century BCE, and when the Shang dynasty was active, there was a consort who is debated to have been "corrupted" Di Xin, named Daji, which made him less competent and more corrupt.

When the Shang dynasty ended, Di Xin was defeated in the battle of Muye, and he was defeated by King Wu of Zhou, starting the Zhou dynasty. The Zhou dynasty continued for another 800 years. 

They were people who were masters of bronze (an alloy of copper and tin) and used it to make weapons and bronze chariots that they would ride into battle.

It is according to legend that the earliest era in ancient Chinese history is known as the Mythical Period, during which the Xia dynasty ruled over China, and then in 1760, the Shang dynasty took over.
We do not know when the Shang dynasty took over from the Xia dynasty; all we know from archaeological finds is that the Shang dynasty ruled China from 
1766 to 1046 BCE.

During excavations in the city of Anyang, they showed us inscriptions on bones and bronze, which the Shang dynasty dubbed "dragon bones", which were written in a proto-Chinese script.
These scripts on the dragon bones give us insight into their daily lives and how they did things. 
Their agriculture, their systems of government, their medical treatments and much more were learned from these scripts.  

The Shang dynasty followed an interesting way of rule, by getting a council of advisers and other bureaucrats to run the governing body.
They also heavily used bronze, developed their own writing system, which they used on the dragon bones, and developed a more sophisticated irrigation system.

The Shang dynasty along the Yellow River had loess (which is pronounced as "less"), which is a type of soil that is fertile for growing crops. 
The Shang dynasty farmers made a large surplus of food, so that many people in the higher parts of their culture were able to develop more sophisticated art and technology.

Then, in 1046 BCE, the Shang dynasty was taken over by the Zhou dynasty, which was a "subject" under Imperial rule.

The Ancient Chinese also had things called Oracle Bones, which were bones that had "Prophecies" and divination of the future. Normally written on the shells or bones of animals, to tell the future, these were one of the ways that we found out about their civilisation through their writing.

The oracle bones were also used to write not just futures but also other things, and they can actually be read by modern Chinese speakers to a degree since the symbols are very similar to modern Chinese writing. 

How these Oracle bones would work is that the Chinese kings would take animal bones, and then they would write the date and their names on these bones, then they would take them and heat them up until they cracked, then they would interpret the cracks as an answer.

These bones were normally used in reading the future, too, often used to determine childbirth, crop yields and sending soldiers to war.
Nearing the end of the dynasty, these oracle bones were mainly kept for the king to use to tell the future and were not often used by the commoners.

They also made their own writing system that helped them improve on their technological advancements. 
Using bones to write on, they documented eclipses and other events. They also used even and odd numbering in their texts. Around 1250-1150 BCE, there was a book named the I-Ching, which was centred around divination and fortune-telling.

The Shang also had advancements in music, most notably the Ocarina, a wind instrument. Flutes made from bones, bells, chimes, and drums were found at dig sites.

The Shang dynasty also used a lunar calendar, which they had trained astronemers to adjust the calendar throughout the years to maintain accuracy. They used this calendar to schedule crop harvesting and planting, and other tasks.

The Shang used tin, copper, and by combining them together, they made bronze, which was one of their technological advancements during their time.
They used this bronze in ceremonial and weapons. And since it was an alloy of two good metals, getting both benefits from both lets bronze be much stronger than both tin and copper. 

They made weapons from this bronze, along with composite bows, made with animal sinew, which are the muscles of animals,s along with horns and wood, making bones much stronger.
Along with their composite bows, they also made chariots to ride into battle on, their bows were much smaller.
Because of this fact, and were able to be at the same strength as a full wooden bow, and due to their smaller size, the archers were able to carry these on chariots, which gave the archers a mobile place to shoot and fire arrows from. 





Wednesday, June 25, 2025

Organization in the human body

Our bodies are very organised, because without them, we would die.

There is a hierarchy of organisation for our bodies, and they are: the Cells, Tissues, Organs, and Organ systems. 

Cells are the smallest unit of life on this planet, being small and specialised to take on tasks.
Tissues are large groups of specialised cells and often coat large amounts of space on our bodies, like the tissues in our mouths, and the tissues that form when we hurt we hurt ourselves, named scar tissues.

Organs and Organ Systems are for well, what they are named; these organs are often known as the Lungs, Kidneys, your Heart, and other organs. 

Organ systems are systems of organs that work together to perform functions. 

One of them is the respiratory system, which works so that you can breathe.
The respiratory system works is the diaphragm contracting to allow air to enter the nose, and the air flowing through the Trachea, which is the windpipe, then it goes into the lungs.

 

Acceleration

Acceleration is the speed gained over time; for example, a sports car is significantly faster than a normal car due to its enhanced acceleration.

The calculation is the change in Velocity divided by Time. The standard way of writing it is m/s, or meters per second.
If we simplify it, is it m/s^2 or meters per second squared, something to keep in mind is that both velocity and acceleration are different, as if we take a car and drive it on a road, and take photos every second and overlay them together, it looks like the car is getting further and further away each photo. 

This is an accurate depiction of what acceleration looks like. This style of diagram is named 'the oil-drop diagram' because it looks like an oil drop.

Another thing to keep in mind is that velocity is a vector, meaning it has a direction associated with it, indicating the direction in which the object is moving.
But if the object is slowing down instead of speeding up, then it is decelerating.




Tuesday, June 24, 2025

Plants and Animal cells

 Plants and animals are different, but the cells are very similar, with some subtle differences.

Plant and animal cells have a cell membrane, which is the protective wall around the cell, along with the Cytosol, which holds all of the small organelles. Such as the Nucleus and Mitochondria, which are in the fluid part of the cytoplasm.

There is also a big difference.
The plant cell has a 'cell wall' which is much bigger than the cell membrane and is what makes the plant rigid instead of floppy.

They also have these small green things, named Chloroplasts, which also come with the benefit that, making these plants green, they will convert sunlight into their own food and sugars for the mitochondria to break down for the plant. Mitochondria provide energy for the cell to move things in and out of the cell membrane, as it isn't a static wall and lets things go in and out while expending energy.



Thursday, June 19, 2025

Hinduism, the ideas of Brahman, Atman, Samsara and Moksha.

Hinduism is one of the oldest religions in the world, dating back as far as 5,000 years ago or 1500 BCE.

There are some elements that come from the Vedic period and shape the core beliefs of modern Hinduism. It is believed that the roots of Hinduism come from an Indo-Aryan people native to central Asia.

Hinduism is a merged religion since there are many ways to practice Hinduism, such as the Sindhu in Sanskrit, the Hindus in Persian, and the Indus in Latin.

There are many differences in the religion; the people who believe the spiritual part is the most valuable are the Upanishads, which means 'coming near to', which people consider as their way of becoming closer to god.

Brahman is the 'reality' of things, the 'illusion of reality' is named as Maya, and Atman means the separation of reality. Atman is often associated with Brahman.

When you die in Hinduism, your 'Atman' gets taken to another reality, like a new Identity, like being reborn, and being different, and it is accepted that this is 'another life'.

The word Dharma, which, after a lot of time passed, was turned into Karma, meaning a sort of fate that if you do good or bad 'actions'.
You get good or bad karma, karma is how your actions will decide your fate when you get reborn.


Wednesday, June 18, 2025

Position, Velocity, and Speed

 Position is a location, using references as a scale on where it is, if we were to put a toy car on a road, we don't really know where it is, but if we put say, a pole on it's left, then we can use the pole as 0, and any number afteer is is positive and any number before it is negitive. 

Location is a "vector", which is a direction of travel. 
If the car were to move, say 225 meters in 3 seconds, and it started at 10 meters, what would be the formula for it? First, we need to know the distance, which is a simple minus 25-10, which gives us 15.
Second, we need to have another value, which is something called velocity, meaning how fast something is going. We know that it travelled 15m in 3 seconds,  so we take the 15 and divide it by 3, which gives us '5'. So it we can confidently say that the car travelled 5m/s or 5 meters per second.

Now we can discuss speed, which is how fast an object is moving. Speed is the distance divided by time, which in this question is 15/3, which gives us 5m/s. 
Keep in mind that these equations are applicable when the object is moving at a constant rate. However, if the object is slowing down or speeding up, they depict the average speed of the object. 

One thing to keep in mind is that speed is just a value; it doesn't matter what direction the object is travelling, it only matters how fast. While distance is for calulating 'distance' and is for when it is travelling back and forth with positive and negative positions. 

Niger

 This country is Niger, not Nigeria, these are two different diferent African countries, and the males put on a beauty pagent for female judges that can choose the winner and the female judge will sleep with them.

Niger is bordered by 7 other countries, Algeria, Mali, Chad, Libya, Nigeria, Benin, Burkina Faso, and is landlocked and takes around 1.3millionn square kilometerrs or over 500,000 square miles, split into 7 regions with the captial Niamey in the south west, and the second largest city being Zinder in the southeast and Maradi in the central.

95% of the population lives in the south, where all the roads are, with only one road going into the mining town, Arlit. 
In the northeastern part is the Saharan Region, which only uses dirt roads, and there is a military outpost which patrols the border with Libya. 

The road from Libya into Niger passes by the Kouru Arkenne airstrip, with two airports the Diori Hamani International Airpot, and Agazes' Nano Dayak, they are working with Benin, to make a rail line.

During Colonial times Niger's borders were kind of weird because for a time, because unnti 1921, half off Chad's land because of the borders being drawn by the French and other Colonisers.

Their landmarks are very small and hard to find since the majority is in the Sahara desert, like the UTA flight 772 crash site monument in the sand, hundreds of kilometres from any buildings. And the Tenere tree, which is the only tree in around 400 kilometres, until a drunk driver strangely knocked it down in the 70s.

Other historical or interesting landmarks are: 
The Nguigmi desert caravan town, the Maradi palace and grand bazar, the National museum of Niger, the Djado and Djaba ruins, the Agadez grand Mosque, the Ayorou hippo tours, the Gobero cemetery site which is over than 10,000 years, the cave drawings of Tituidit and Dobous, the Tuareg festival, the Timia oasis town, Kaoure Giraffe reserve, the animal store of balleyara, the city of Zinder which is the cultural captial of Niger, the Berni corner and Sultan's palace.