Slope from equation

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

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- [Instructor] We've got the
equation Y plus two is equal

00:00:01.801 --> 00:00:04.446
to negative two, times X minus three.

00:00:04.446 --> 00:00:06.466
And, what I wanna do is figure out what

00:00:06.466 --> 00:00:10.464
is the slope of the line
that this equation describes?

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And there's a couple of ways
that you can approach it.

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What my brain wants to do is well,

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I know a few forms where it's easy

00:00:16.556 --> 00:00:17.989
to pick out the slope.

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For example, if I can manipulate

00:00:19.096 --> 00:00:21.293
that equation to be in the form Y

00:00:21.293 --> 00:00:24.543
is equal to MX plus B, well then I know

00:00:25.531 --> 00:00:28.486
that this M here, the
coefficient on the X term,

00:00:28.486 --> 00:00:31.245
well that's going to be my slope.

00:00:31.245 --> 00:00:34.952
And B is going to be my Y intercept,

00:00:34.952 --> 00:00:37.424
we cover that in many other videos.

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Another option is to get
into point-slope form.

00:00:40.426 --> 00:00:44.913
So the general framework
or the general template

00:00:44.913 --> 00:00:47.099
for point-slope form is,
if I have an equation

00:00:47.099 --> 00:00:50.766
of the form Y minus Y1
is equal to M times X

00:00:51.855 --> 00:00:54.091
minus X1, well then I immediately know

00:00:54.091 --> 00:00:56.378
that the line that this equation describes

00:00:56.378 --> 00:00:59.208
is going to have a slope of M once again.

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And here the Y intercept
doesn't jump out at you.

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Let me make sure you
can read this over here.

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The Y intercept doesn't jump out at you,

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but you know a point that is on this line.

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In particular, you know
that the point X1, Y1

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is going to be on this line.

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X1, Y1.

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So let's look at our original example.

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So it might immediately jump out

00:01:23.880 --> 00:01:27.325
at you that this is actually
in point-slope form.

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You might say, well okay, I see I have

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a minus X1, so X1 would be three,

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I have my slope here and
that answers our question,

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our slope would be negative two.

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But here it says plus two,
I have to subtract a Y1.

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Well, you could just rewrite this,

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so it says, so you have
Y minus negative two

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is equal to negative
two times X minus three,

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and then you see it's exactly

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this point-slope form right over here.

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So our slope right over
there is negative two,

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and then if I were to ask you,

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well give me a point
that sits on this line,

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you could say, alright,
an X1 would be three,

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and a Y1 would be negative two.

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This point sits on the line,
it's not the Y intercept,

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but it's a point on the line and we know

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the slope is negative two.

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Now another way to approach this

00:02:20.424 --> 00:02:23.634
is to just manipulate it so that we get

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into slope-intercept form.

00:02:26.215 --> 00:02:28.721
So let's do that, let's manipulate

00:02:28.721 --> 00:02:31.852
it so we get into slope-intercept form.

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So the first thing my brain wants

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to do is distribute this negative two,

00:02:36.677 --> 00:02:39.536
and if I do that, I get Y plus two

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is equal to negative 2x, negative two

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times negative three, plus six.

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And then I can subtract
two from both sides,

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and then I get Y is equal
to negative 2x plus four.

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And so here I am in
slope Y intercept form,

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and once again, I could
say, alright my M here,

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the coefficient on the
X term, is my slope.

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So my slope is negative two.

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Let's do another example.

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So here, this equation
doesn't immediately go

00:03:19.442 --> 00:03:22.709
into either one of these
forms, so let's manipulate it.

00:03:22.709 --> 00:03:24.052
And if it's in either one of them,

00:03:24.052 --> 00:03:26.212
I like to get into slope Y intercept form,

00:03:26.212 --> 00:03:29.080
it's a little bit easier
for my brain to understand.

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So let's do that.

00:03:31.411 --> 00:03:34.828
So let us collect, well let's get the Xs,

00:03:36.503 --> 00:03:38.662
let's just isolate the Y
on the right-hand side,

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since the 2y is already there.

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So let's add three to both sides.

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I'm just trying to get rid
of this negative three.

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So if we add three to both sides,

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on the left-hand side we
have negative 4x plus 10

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is equal to 2y, these cancel out.

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That was the whole point.

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And now to solve for Y, we just have

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to divide both sides by two.

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So if we divide everything by two,

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we get negative 2x plus
five is equal to Y.

00:04:12.992 --> 00:04:14.989
So this is in slope-intercept form.

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I just have the Y on the
right-hand side instead

00:04:16.701 --> 00:04:17.904
of the left-hand side.

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We have Y is equal to mx plus B,

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and so our M is the coefficient

00:04:22.782 --> 00:04:24.748
on the X term right over here.

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So our slope is once
again, is negative two,

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and here our Y intercept is five,

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in case we wanted to know it.

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Let's do one more
example, one more example.

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Alright, so once again, this
is in neither slope-intercept

00:04:42.631 --> 00:04:45.175
or point-slope form to begin with,

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so let's just try to get
it to slope-intercept form.

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And like always, pause the video,

00:04:48.871 --> 00:04:51.698
and see if you can figure it out yourself.

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Alright, so let's get all the Ys

00:04:53.718 --> 00:04:55.682
on the left-hand side isolated,

00:04:55.682 --> 00:04:58.587
and the Xs on the right-hand side.

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So let me get rid of this negative 3x.

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So I'm gonna add 3x to both sides,

00:05:06.461 --> 00:05:08.768
and let's get rid of
this 3y right over here.

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So let's subtract 3y from both sides.

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You couldn't do this, I'm
doing two steps at once,

00:05:14.022 --> 00:05:15.027
but once again, I'm trying to get rid

00:05:15.027 --> 00:05:17.126
of this 3x, so I'm trying to get rid

00:05:17.126 --> 00:05:19.096
of this negative 3x, so I add 3x

00:05:19.096 --> 00:05:20.872
to the left, but I have
to do it to the right

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if I want to maintain the equality.

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And if I want to get rid of this 3y,

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well I subtract 3y from here, but I have

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to do it on the left-hand side

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if I want to maintain the equality.

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So what do I get?

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That cancels out, 5y minus 3y is 2y,

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is equal to 2x plus 3x is 5x,

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and then these two characters cancel out.

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And so if I want to solve for Y,

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I just divide both
sides by two and I get Y

00:05:48.873 --> 00:05:52.434
is equal to five halves X, and I'm done.

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And you mights say wait,
if this doesn't look

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exactly like slope-intercept form,

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where is my B?

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Well your B, if you wanted to see it,

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you could just write plus zero,

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B is implicitly zero right over here.

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So your slope, your slope is going

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to be the coefficient on the X term,

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it's going to be five halves.

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And if you want to know your Y intercept,

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well it's zero, when X is zero, Y is zero.


Golden Age of Athens, Pericles and Greek Culture

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:01.431 --> 00:00:02.277
- [Instructor] In other videos,

00:00:02.277 --> 00:00:05.152
we've already talked
about how Classical Greece

00:00:05.152 --> 00:00:07.108
has had an immeasurable impact

00:00:07.108 --> 00:00:08.653
not just on Western civilization,

00:00:08.653 --> 00:00:11.050
but on civilization as a whole.

00:00:11.050 --> 00:00:13.191
In order to understand the period

00:00:13.191 --> 00:00:15.258
that we call Classical Greece,

00:00:15.258 --> 00:00:18.092
it's valuable to place it
in context on a timeline,

00:00:18.092 --> 00:00:20.963
so I have significant conflicts or events

00:00:20.963 --> 00:00:24.473
that happened to the Greek
world on this timeline,

00:00:24.473 --> 00:00:28.635
especially in the fifth
and fourth centuries BCE

00:00:28.635 --> 00:00:31.023
In the beginning of the fifth century BCE,

00:00:31.023 --> 00:00:33.269
you have the Greco-Persian Wars,

00:00:33.269 --> 00:00:36.559
where the Greek city states
are able to fend off attack

00:00:36.559 --> 00:00:38.897
from the great Persian Empire,

00:00:38.897 --> 00:00:40.705
and then they go on the offensive.

00:00:40.705 --> 00:00:44.159
But as we exit the fifth century BCE,

00:00:44.159 --> 00:00:46.939
the city states start
fighting amongst themselves.

00:00:46.939 --> 00:00:49.535
You have Athens leading the Delian League

00:00:49.535 --> 00:00:53.053
in a fight against
Sparta and their allies,

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which significantly
weakens the city states.

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It ends with Athens losing,

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but all of the city
states have been weakened,

00:00:59.970 --> 00:01:03.343
and it leaves them open to be
conquered by the Macedonians,

00:01:03.343 --> 00:01:05.353
in particular Phillip of Macedonia,

00:01:05.353 --> 00:01:07.960
and then his son Alexander the Great

00:01:07.960 --> 00:01:10.914
is able to not just keep control

00:01:10.914 --> 00:01:13.300
of Greece, of the city states,

00:01:13.300 --> 00:01:15.268
but conquer Egypt and Persia

00:01:15.268 --> 00:01:20.189
and get all the way to modern
day Afghanistan and Pakistan,

00:01:20.189 --> 00:01:21.787
but after his death,

00:01:21.787 --> 00:01:23.441
you then have his successors,

00:01:23.441 --> 00:01:26.347
and Greece falls under
the Antigonid dynasty.

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But eventually as we get into the second

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and first century BCE,

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it goes under Roman control,

00:01:34.355 --> 00:01:36.844
and we've talked about
this Classical period,

00:01:36.844 --> 00:01:39.439
all of the various contributions.

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We've talked about the
contributions in philosophy,

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from people like Socrates,

00:01:45.650 --> 00:01:48.530
and Socrates's student Plato,

00:01:48.530 --> 00:01:51.030
and Plato's student Aristotle,

00:01:52.100 --> 00:01:54.471
but there were also
significant contributions

00:01:54.471 --> 00:01:56.204
in mathematics.

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You have Pythagoras,

00:01:58.085 --> 00:02:01.223
who actually predates these philosophers,

00:02:01.223 --> 00:02:05.834
and he's most famous,
especially to many of us,

00:02:05.834 --> 00:02:08.140
for his Pythagorean Theorem

00:02:08.140 --> 00:02:09.515
and a lot of mathematics

00:02:09.515 --> 00:02:13.521
and the foundations of a lot of geometry.

00:02:13.521 --> 00:02:15.831
But he and his followers,

00:02:15.831 --> 00:02:19.088
they were actually creating
something of a mysticism,

00:02:19.088 --> 00:02:21.722
of a religion around mathematics,

00:02:21.722 --> 00:02:24.191
and even a philosophy
that would later influence

00:02:24.191 --> 00:02:26.396
some of the other philosophers
that we talk about,

00:02:26.396 --> 00:02:30.097
especially this ideal
of ideal platonic forms.

00:02:30.097 --> 00:02:33.136
You can imagine, if you're
studying perfect right triangles,

00:02:33.136 --> 00:02:35.782
there's no such thing as
a perfect right triangle

00:02:35.782 --> 00:02:37.041
in the universe.

00:02:37.041 --> 00:02:39.782
These are ideas that we use in geometry,

00:02:39.782 --> 00:02:41.440
and other things in the universe

00:02:41.440 --> 00:02:44.206
are really just approximations of these,

00:02:44.206 --> 00:02:48.490
but to appreciate the
philosophical side of Pythagoras,

00:02:48.490 --> 00:02:51.101
here are some quotes from him,

00:02:51.101 --> 00:02:53.268
or quotes ascribed to him.

00:02:54.229 --> 00:02:57.590
"There is geometry in the
humming of the strings.

00:02:57.590 --> 00:03:01.423
"There is music in the
spacing of the spheres.

00:03:03.617 --> 00:03:06.784
"Reason is immortal, all else mortal."

00:03:07.990 --> 00:03:11.641
And you see even in the sixth century BCE

00:03:11.641 --> 00:03:13.908
this thread of Greek thinking,

00:03:13.908 --> 00:03:16.457
putting reason at a very high level,

00:03:16.457 --> 00:03:18.383
not just trying to explain everything

00:03:18.383 --> 00:03:19.672
with pure mysticism,

00:03:19.672 --> 00:03:22.031
although Pythagoras definitely was,

00:03:22.031 --> 00:03:25.334
and Pythagoreanism was
definitely about mysticism,

00:03:25.334 --> 00:03:27.294
but it was mysticism that at the core

00:03:27.294 --> 00:03:30.042
had mathematics and geometry.

00:03:30.042 --> 00:03:32.414
But continuing on with significant

00:03:32.414 --> 00:03:36.061
mathematical contributions
from ancient Greece,

00:03:36.061 --> 00:03:37.311
we have Euclid.

00:03:39.085 --> 00:03:41.188
We don't know all of the exact details

00:03:41.188 --> 00:03:43.173
of his birth and his death,

00:03:43.173 --> 00:03:46.349
but he is the Father of Modern Geometry,

00:03:46.349 --> 00:03:48.037
and as you can see in this map here,

00:03:48.037 --> 00:03:51.031
he didn't live in what we
call Greece proper today.

00:03:51.031 --> 00:03:52.357
He lived in Alexandria,

00:03:52.357 --> 00:03:54.910
a city established by Alexander the Great,

00:03:54.910 --> 00:03:57.099
and this is during the Hellenistic Period

00:03:57.099 --> 00:03:58.826
where all of the territory,

00:03:58.826 --> 00:04:00.748
or most of the territory
that had been conquered

00:04:00.748 --> 00:04:04.620
by Alexander the Great was
still ruled by his successors.

00:04:04.620 --> 00:04:06.412
Egypt was ruled by Ptolemy,

00:04:06.412 --> 00:04:08.692
establishing the Ptolemaic dynasty

00:04:08.692 --> 00:04:10.998
in the time of Euclid,

00:04:10.998 --> 00:04:13.129
and Euclid lived in that great center

00:04:13.129 --> 00:04:16.036
of learning and the arts, Alexandria,

00:04:16.036 --> 00:04:18.036
which even exists today,

00:04:19.027 --> 00:04:22.277
and he is most famous for his Elements.

00:04:23.985 --> 00:04:28.170
This is a much later
printing of his Elements,

00:04:28.170 --> 00:04:30.051
of Euclid's eEements,

00:04:30.051 --> 00:04:33.569
but you would be amazed
how much of modern geometry

00:04:33.569 --> 00:04:35.485
has been described by Euclid.

00:04:35.485 --> 00:04:38.633
Even your geometry
textbook can trace it back

00:04:38.633 --> 00:04:41.065
directly to Euclid's Elements.

00:04:41.065 --> 00:04:44.168
Abraham Lincoln famously
learned every proof

00:04:44.168 --> 00:04:48.348
in Euclid's Elements in
order to fine tune his mind.

00:04:48.348 --> 00:04:50.069
So you can really view Euclid

00:04:50.069 --> 00:04:52.236
as the Father of Geometry,

00:04:54.492 --> 00:04:55.948
but that's not all.

00:04:55.948 --> 00:04:59.839
There are many other contributors
in philosophy and math,

00:04:59.839 --> 00:05:02.410
and this is just, once again, a sample

00:05:02.410 --> 00:05:04.712
of all of the folks who contributed.

00:05:04.712 --> 00:05:06.172
On the side of philosophy,

00:05:06.172 --> 00:05:07.406
you have Xenophon,

00:05:07.406 --> 00:05:10.136
who was another one of Socrates' students

00:05:10.136 --> 00:05:11.424
in addition to Plato,

00:05:11.424 --> 00:05:13.585
and in fact, the life of Socrates

00:05:13.585 --> 00:05:16.464
we learn from the writings
of Plato and Xenophon.

00:05:16.464 --> 00:05:18.176
Xenophon was also a historian

00:05:18.176 --> 00:05:20.816
who gave us some accounts of
the later Peloponnesian War.

00:05:20.816 --> 00:05:23.816
You have the famous cynics,

00:05:23.816 --> 00:05:27.401
Antisthenes and his student Diogenes,

00:05:27.401 --> 00:05:30.260
Diogenes, famous for living
in a barrel in Athens,

00:05:30.260 --> 00:05:33.899
and somewhat insulting
Alexander the Great.

00:05:33.899 --> 00:05:35.717
But these cynics, which
the word is derived

00:05:35.717 --> 00:05:37.243
from being dog like,

00:05:37.243 --> 00:05:39.132
these are people who were philosophers

00:05:39.132 --> 00:05:41.704
who gave up the trappings of materialism

00:05:41.704 --> 00:05:44.327
and caring, frankly, what
other people thought.

00:05:44.327 --> 00:05:47.682
As we go a little bit out of
our timeline right over here,

00:05:47.682 --> 00:05:48.786
you have Archimedes,

00:05:48.786 --> 00:05:50.676
one of the greatest mathematicians

00:05:50.676 --> 00:05:52.926
and scientists of all time,

00:05:54.159 --> 00:05:58.132
but you also have
contributions in the arts,

00:05:58.132 --> 00:06:02.349
some of the most famous
playwrights of the ancient time,

00:06:02.349 --> 00:06:04.882
Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides.

00:06:04.882 --> 00:06:07.726
Aristophanes, we might
remember as being a bit

00:06:07.726 --> 00:06:10.093
of a thorn in the side of Socrates.

00:06:10.093 --> 00:06:11.300
He wrote about Socrates,

00:06:11.300 --> 00:06:12.653
but it was more of a parody.

00:06:12.653 --> 00:06:14.971
You have contributions in medicine,

00:06:14.971 --> 00:06:16.948
the famous Hippocrates.

00:06:16.948 --> 00:06:19.828
The Hippocratic Oath
still has an influence

00:06:19.828 --> 00:06:22.021
on modern medicine.

00:06:22.021 --> 00:06:25.658
You have some of the earliest
what we could say historians

00:06:25.658 --> 00:06:26.975
that we know of,

00:06:26.975 --> 00:06:30.772
Herodotus, famously giving
us the accounts we have

00:06:30.772 --> 00:06:32.658
of the Greco-Persian Wars,

00:06:32.658 --> 00:06:33.732
a lot of what we even know

00:06:33.732 --> 00:06:35.924
about the ancient Persian Empire.

00:06:35.924 --> 00:06:37.360
You have Thucydides,

00:06:37.360 --> 00:06:39.886
who gives us accounts
of the Peloponnesian War

00:06:39.886 --> 00:06:41.553
along with Xenophon.

00:06:42.963 --> 00:06:45.885
And so when you see this density

00:06:45.885 --> 00:06:48.135
of arts, sciences, learning

00:06:49.359 --> 00:06:50.456
in one place,

00:06:50.456 --> 00:06:53.283
a lot of this was centered in Athens.

00:06:53.283 --> 00:06:56.723
It makes you wonder what
was going on at that time,

00:06:56.723 --> 00:06:58.937
and historians do call the period

00:06:58.937 --> 00:07:03.488
from when the Athenians were
able to fend off the Persians

00:07:03.488 --> 00:07:06.902
all the way until the end
of the Peloponnesian War

00:07:06.902 --> 00:07:09.635
as the Golden Age of Athens,

00:07:09.635 --> 00:07:10.594
and for good reason.

00:07:10.594 --> 00:07:13.624
Look at this flourishing of
the arts and the sciences

00:07:13.624 --> 00:07:16.137
that developed during that period.

00:07:16.137 --> 00:07:20.178
You might wonder what was
happening in terms of government,

00:07:20.178 --> 00:07:23.411
and government of this period might be one

00:07:23.411 --> 00:07:25.836
of the longest lasting influences.

00:07:25.836 --> 00:07:29.169
As we exit the sixth century BCE in 507,

00:07:30.440 --> 00:07:34.357
you have Greek Democracy
taking root in Athens,

00:07:36.362 --> 00:07:38.986
and in fact, the word
democracy is a Greek word,

00:07:38.986 --> 00:07:40.925
government by the people.

00:07:40.925 --> 00:07:42.822
And shortly after that,

00:07:42.822 --> 00:07:46.286
during the Golden Age of Athens,

00:07:46.286 --> 00:07:49.619
you start having leadership by Pericles.

00:07:51.158 --> 00:07:52.169
He was an orator.

00:07:52.169 --> 00:07:53.084
He was a statesman.

00:07:53.084 --> 00:07:54.315
He was a general.

00:07:54.315 --> 00:07:55.994
In this period right over here

00:07:55.994 --> 00:07:56.974
that I have in orange,

00:07:56.974 --> 00:07:59.582
often known as the Age of Pericles,

00:07:59.582 --> 00:08:01.974
he helped Athens invest significantly

00:08:01.974 --> 00:08:04.641
in the arts and in architecture.

00:08:05.765 --> 00:08:07.348
Some of the most iconic structures

00:08:07.348 --> 00:08:10.246
we now associate with
Greece or ancient Greece

00:08:10.246 --> 00:08:12.972
were built during his time.

00:08:12.972 --> 00:08:14.814
They were promoted by him.

00:08:14.814 --> 00:08:17.700
Here you have a picture of the Acropolis,

00:08:17.700 --> 00:08:19.685
which is this rock outcropping,

00:08:19.685 --> 00:08:21.262
which still exists in Athens

00:08:21.262 --> 00:08:25.090
as it likely looked during
the time of Pericles,

00:08:25.090 --> 00:08:27.804
during the Golden Age of Athens,

00:08:27.804 --> 00:08:29.292
and you can see here in particular

00:08:29.292 --> 00:08:30.446
the most famous structure.

00:08:30.446 --> 00:08:33.181
The Parthenon, a lot of
which still stands today,

00:08:33.181 --> 00:08:37.388
was constructed under
the rule of Pericles.

00:08:37.388 --> 00:08:39.672
As I mentioned, the Greek
city states get conquered

00:08:39.672 --> 00:08:41.036
by the Macedonians,

00:08:41.036 --> 00:08:43.300
but after the death of
Alexander the Great,

00:08:43.300 --> 00:08:45.964
falls under the control
of the Antigonid dynasty,

00:08:45.964 --> 00:08:48.748
but eventually, as we get
into the second century BCE,

00:08:48.748 --> 00:08:50.283
off of this timeline,

00:08:50.283 --> 00:08:52.454
it comes under Roman control,

00:08:52.454 --> 00:08:55.038
becomes part of the Roman Empire.

00:08:55.038 --> 00:08:58.932
But the Roman Empire is itself
significantly influenced

00:08:58.932 --> 00:09:01.336
by Greek culture, Greek mathematics,

00:09:01.336 --> 00:09:04.198
Greek architecture, Greek philosophy,

00:09:04.198 --> 00:09:05.666
and in a lot of ways,

00:09:05.666 --> 00:09:08.481
the Romans end up becoming the caretakers

00:09:08.481 --> 00:09:12.209
of much of this culture that
we talk about in this video,

00:09:12.209 --> 00:09:14.566
and once you have the
decline of the Roman Empire,

00:09:14.566 --> 00:09:16.824
especially the western Roman Empire,

00:09:16.824 --> 00:09:19.771
and Europe enters into the Middle Ages,

00:09:19.771 --> 00:09:22.361
you have the Islamic world that acts

00:09:22.361 --> 00:09:23.690
as a bit of a bridge

00:09:23.690 --> 00:09:27.975
of this Greek culture into
the European Renaissance

00:09:27.975 --> 00:09:29.664
and eventually the Enlightenment.

00:09:29.664 --> 00:09:32.658
And so we can trace even our modern views

00:09:32.658 --> 00:09:34.656
of science and philosophy

00:09:34.656 --> 00:09:37.431
all the way back to these Greeks,

00:09:37.431 --> 00:09:40.360
and so I'll leave you with this quote

00:09:40.360 --> 00:09:42.527
from the Roman poet Horace

00:09:43.434 --> 00:09:46.743
who wrote this around
the first century BCE.

00:09:46.743 --> 00:09:50.377
"Captive Greece took
captive her fierce conqueror

00:09:50.377 --> 00:09:54.544
"and instilled her arts in
rustic Latium," or Laecium.

00:09:55.592 --> 00:09:56.945
And so what he's saying is,

00:09:56.945 --> 00:09:59.674
even though Rome had conquered Greece,

00:09:59.674 --> 00:10:02.740
Greece's culture took
captive her conqueror,

00:10:02.740 --> 00:10:05.847
took captive the Roman culture,

00:10:05.847 --> 00:10:09.613
instilled Greece's arts
in the rustic Latin world.


Socrates Plato Aristotle

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.961 --> 00:00:02.753
- [Instructor] Ancient Greece was not even

00:00:02.753 --> 00:00:04.180
a cohesive empire.

00:00:04.180 --> 00:00:06.582
It was made up of many city states,

00:00:06.582 --> 00:00:08.665
led by Athens and Sparta.

00:00:09.651 --> 00:00:13.031
But, despite its fragmentation,
it's made innumerable

00:00:13.031 --> 00:00:15.976
contributions to, not
just Western civilization,

00:00:15.976 --> 00:00:18.703
but civilization as a whole.

00:00:18.703 --> 00:00:20.922
And those are contributions in terms of

00:00:20.922 --> 00:00:23.654
forms of governance, like democracy,

00:00:23.654 --> 00:00:26.750
contributions in medicine,
contributions in the arts,

00:00:26.750 --> 00:00:29.421
in mathematics, in the sciences.

00:00:29.421 --> 00:00:32.403
But perhaps their most famous contribution

00:00:32.403 --> 00:00:34.916
is in terms of philosophy.

00:00:34.916 --> 00:00:36.632
And if we're going to
talk about philosophy

00:00:36.632 --> 00:00:40.203
in ancient Greece, the most
famous three philosophers

00:00:40.203 --> 00:00:43.120
are Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.

00:00:44.124 --> 00:00:47.165
Now, before we get into the first of them,

00:00:47.165 --> 00:00:49.020
and really the teacher of Plato,

00:00:49.020 --> 00:00:51.072
who was then the teacher of Aristotle,

00:00:51.072 --> 00:00:54.245
let's get a little bit of
context on this time period.

00:00:54.245 --> 00:00:57.468
So, as we enter into
the fifth century BCE,

00:00:57.468 --> 00:00:59.862
a couple of things are emerging.

00:00:59.862 --> 00:01:03.279
First, you have a new Athenian democracy.

00:01:04.715 --> 00:01:09.458
Then, as you get into that
century, the Persians invade,

00:01:09.458 --> 00:01:14.094
try to conquer Greece several
times, but unsuccessfully.

00:01:14.094 --> 00:01:17.226
But then, the Greeks start
fighting amongst themselves,

00:01:17.226 --> 00:01:20.467
led on one side by Athens,
on the other side by Sparta,

00:01:20.467 --> 00:01:23.535
and that's the Peloponnesian
War, which ends with

00:01:23.535 --> 00:01:26.728
Sparta being victorious, but
all of the Greek city states

00:01:26.728 --> 00:01:28.771
being weakened dramatically.

00:01:28.771 --> 00:01:32.628
Now, between the end,
especially the first part

00:01:32.628 --> 00:01:35.294
of the Greco-Persian
Wars, and the end of the

00:01:35.294 --> 00:01:38.281
Peloponnesian War, it
was actually a time of

00:01:38.281 --> 00:01:40.214
Athenian prosperity.

00:01:40.214 --> 00:01:42.874
They were leading this semi-empire,

00:01:42.874 --> 00:01:44.929
they were investing in the arts,

00:01:44.929 --> 00:01:48.234
and it's often called
the Golden Age of Athens,

00:01:48.234 --> 00:01:52.151
and that's the world in
which Socrates emerged.

00:01:54.694 --> 00:01:57.860
Like many philosophers,
Socrates led a very

00:01:57.860 --> 00:01:59.680
interesting life, and it's worth noting

00:01:59.680 --> 00:02:01.904
what we know about him
does not come directly

00:02:01.904 --> 00:02:02.881
from his writing.

00:02:02.881 --> 00:02:05.018
We don't have surviving
accounts of his writing.

00:02:05.018 --> 00:02:07.806
It comes mainly through the
writing of his students,

00:02:07.806 --> 00:02:10.396
Xenophon, and, most notably, Plato.

00:02:10.396 --> 00:02:14.260
We also get some parody of
Socrates from Aristophanes,

00:02:14.260 --> 00:02:17.642
that Socrates himself
did not appreciate much.

00:02:17.642 --> 00:02:20.162
But what we know is
that he started in life,

00:02:20.162 --> 00:02:21.630
he was a stone mason,

00:02:21.630 --> 00:02:23.687
he even acted as a soldier, a hoplite,

00:02:23.687 --> 00:02:25.675
during the Peloponnesian War.

00:02:25.675 --> 00:02:28.805
But he is, of course, most
famous for being a philosopher

00:02:28.805 --> 00:02:30.440
and for being a teacher.

00:02:30.440 --> 00:02:32.809
And his teaching style,
the Socratic method,

00:02:32.809 --> 00:02:36.086
is still viewed as something
of a best practice today.

00:02:36.086 --> 00:02:38.893
Rather than lecturing
students, to, instead,

00:02:38.893 --> 00:02:42.767
ask incisive questions that
force a student to deepen

00:02:42.767 --> 00:02:46.282
their thinking and get closer
to the root of an issue,

00:02:46.282 --> 00:02:50.208
and to learn how to think
rather than just having

00:02:50.208 --> 00:02:52.970
knowledge transmitted to them.

00:02:52.970 --> 00:02:55.531
Now, what's also notable about Socrates

00:02:55.531 --> 00:02:59.279
and his many students,
including Plato and Aristotle,

00:02:59.279 --> 00:03:02.487
is that they took a departure
of how to think about

00:03:02.487 --> 00:03:05.204
the world from most of the ancient world.

00:03:05.204 --> 00:03:07.905
Most of the ancient world
was focused on the gods

00:03:07.905 --> 00:03:10.377
and the metaphysical
explaining everything.

00:03:10.377 --> 00:03:13.423
And, while the ancient Greeks
did have a large pantheon

00:03:13.423 --> 00:03:17.692
of gods, Socrates and
his fellow philosophers

00:03:17.692 --> 00:03:19.927
tried to figure out how the world works,

00:03:19.927 --> 00:03:22.826
why we are here, somewhat
independent of the gods.

00:03:22.826 --> 00:03:23.984
They tried to reason it through,

00:03:23.984 --> 00:03:26.327
they tried to talk it
through, think about it

00:03:26.327 --> 00:03:28.469
from a rational point of view.

00:03:28.469 --> 00:03:32.219
And to get a flavor of
that, here is a quote.

00:03:33.063 --> 00:03:36.372
"True wisdom comes to
each of us when we realize

00:03:36.372 --> 00:03:39.787
"how little we understand
about life, ourselves,

00:03:39.787 --> 00:03:41.293
"and the world around us."

00:03:41.293 --> 00:03:44.470
So, unlike many ancient
societies that just tried to

00:03:44.470 --> 00:03:46.707
explain everything
through the metaphysical

00:03:46.707 --> 00:03:49.757
or through the gods, here
you have Socrates saying, no,

00:03:49.757 --> 00:03:51.720
an ideal true wisdom

00:03:51.720 --> 00:03:55.477
is when you appreciate how little we know,

00:03:55.477 --> 00:03:58.394
this form of intellectual humility.

00:03:59.708 --> 00:04:03.875
Now, Socrates lived during
this Golden Age of Athens,

00:04:05.228 --> 00:04:09.829
a time when democracy was
flourishing, the Age of Pericles.

00:04:09.829 --> 00:04:11.987
But he himself was a little bit skeptical

00:04:11.987 --> 00:04:14.237
of unfettered or pure democracy.

00:04:14.237 --> 00:04:17.536
He was worried, well,
what if the people voting

00:04:17.536 --> 00:04:20.166
aren't educated to make
the types of decisions?

00:04:20.166 --> 00:04:22.538
Maybe they can be
manipulated by a demagogue,

00:04:22.538 --> 00:04:26.264
someone who just tells 'em
exactly what they want to hear.

00:04:26.264 --> 00:04:29.049
And so he was a bit of
a controversial figure,

00:04:29.049 --> 00:04:32.968
especially as you get to the
end of the Peloponnesian War.

00:04:32.968 --> 00:04:35.879
Remember, Athens loses
the Peloponnesian War.

00:04:35.879 --> 00:04:40.560
It went from being this powerful
head of this Delian League,

00:04:40.560 --> 00:04:43.830
something of an empire, this wealthy city,

00:04:43.830 --> 00:04:47.028
and now it's a subjugated
state, it's tired from war.

00:04:47.028 --> 00:04:48.763
And so you can imagine there's a lot of

00:04:48.763 --> 00:04:51.647
political infighting, and
Socrates ends up being

00:04:51.647 --> 00:04:53.146
one of the casualties.

00:04:53.146 --> 00:04:57.313
He is actually put on trial
by his fellow Athenians.

00:04:59.917 --> 00:05:03.162
This is a depiction of
the trial of Socrates,

00:05:03.162 --> 00:05:06.241
and it shows Socrates defending himself

00:05:06.241 --> 00:05:09.772
from the accusations brought against him.

00:05:09.772 --> 00:05:13.939
Refusing to recognize the gods
acknowledged by the state,

00:05:15.264 --> 00:05:18.550
importing strange divinities of his own,

00:05:18.550 --> 00:05:20.300
corrupting the young.

00:05:21.173 --> 00:05:25.771
And his defense, which both
Xenophon and Plato write about,

00:05:25.771 --> 00:05:29.331
called The Apology, he's
bewildered, he says,

00:05:29.331 --> 00:05:31.872
where is all of this coming from?

00:05:31.872 --> 00:05:34.285
Now, it is true, he
did not invoke the gods

00:05:34.285 --> 00:05:36.127
when he's trying to explain the universe.

00:05:36.127 --> 00:05:39.106
And, yes, he was trying to
teach the young to think.

00:05:39.106 --> 00:05:41.904
But by no means, if you
look at what he was doing,

00:05:41.904 --> 00:05:43.922
or at least our modern
accounts coming through Plato

00:05:43.922 --> 00:05:47.216
and Xenophon, does it
seem like he was trying to

00:05:47.216 --> 00:05:50.452
undermine the state in some way.

00:05:50.452 --> 00:05:52.905
But, needless to say, it comes to a vote,

00:05:52.905 --> 00:05:55.587
and maybe he's a victim of his own fears

00:05:55.587 --> 00:05:58.357
of a pure democratic process,

00:05:58.357 --> 00:06:00.819
but, amongst the 500 Athenians voting,

00:06:00.819 --> 00:06:02.949
280 say that he is guilty,

00:06:02.949 --> 00:06:05.782
and 220 say that he is not guilty.

00:06:06.618 --> 00:06:09.224
He is given a chance to think about

00:06:09.224 --> 00:06:11.236
what his penalty should be.

00:06:11.236 --> 00:06:13.990
And the charges, at least
in the Athenian's minds,

00:06:13.990 --> 00:06:15.395
were quite serious.

00:06:15.395 --> 00:06:17.645
But Socrates famously says,

00:06:19.826 --> 00:06:23.869
"An unexamined life is not worth living."

00:06:23.869 --> 00:06:25.908
And so, even though many
historians think that

00:06:25.908 --> 00:06:29.761
he might have been able to
get exile if he asked for it,

00:06:29.761 --> 00:06:31.928
he was sentenced to death.

00:06:33.376 --> 00:06:36.154
And this is a painting
done much, much later

00:06:36.154 --> 00:06:39.793
of what that death of Socrates
might have looked like.

00:06:39.793 --> 00:06:44.721
But you see here Socrates about
to, or maybe he just drank

00:06:44.721 --> 00:06:48.675
the hemlock, which is the
poison which will kill him.

00:06:48.675 --> 00:06:53.388
So, even though he had to
die for these pretty spurious

00:06:53.388 --> 00:06:56.458
allegations, his legacy lives on,

00:06:56.458 --> 00:07:00.625
and it lives on most famously
in his student Plato.

00:07:02.996 --> 00:07:06.595
Now, Plato is famous for many things.

00:07:06.595 --> 00:07:11.387
There's this notion of a
Platonic ideal form that,

00:07:11.387 --> 00:07:13.255
whether you're talking about a circle,

00:07:13.255 --> 00:07:15.922
or a ball, or a dog, or a chair,

00:07:17.343 --> 00:07:20.601
that there's an ideal
form that is independent

00:07:20.601 --> 00:07:23.261
of what your senses are telling you,

00:07:23.261 --> 00:07:26.224
or what the chair in
front of you might be,

00:07:26.224 --> 00:07:30.160
that that's an imperfect
version of that ideal form.

00:07:30.160 --> 00:07:32.588
The word Platonic, in
general, you'll hear applied

00:07:32.588 --> 00:07:35.431
to many different concepts,
some of the meanings

00:07:35.431 --> 00:07:37.681
having changed over time.

00:07:37.681 --> 00:07:40.928
The other thing that Plato is famous for

00:07:40.928 --> 00:07:43.453
is the notion of an academy.

00:07:43.453 --> 00:07:45.569
The place where he taught his students

00:07:45.569 --> 00:07:49.486
was a little field outside
the walls of Athens,

00:07:50.361 --> 00:07:53.976
named for the Athenian hero Akademos,

00:07:53.976 --> 00:07:58.709
and so that area became
known as Plato's Academy.

00:07:58.709 --> 00:08:02.256
And ever since then, places
of learning have often been

00:08:02.256 --> 00:08:06.280
referred to as academies,
just like Khan Academy.

00:08:06.280 --> 00:08:10.223
But Plato was also concerned,
like his teacher Socrates,

00:08:10.223 --> 00:08:13.723
with the nature of how we should be ruled.

00:08:15.732 --> 00:08:18.529
"There will be no end to
the troubles of states,

00:08:18.529 --> 00:08:21.701
"or indeed of humanity
itself, till philosophers

00:08:21.701 --> 00:08:24.490
"become rulers in this
world, or till those

00:08:24.490 --> 00:08:28.030
"we now call kings and
rulers really and truly

00:08:28.030 --> 00:08:31.786
"become philosophers, and
political power and philosophy

00:08:31.786 --> 00:08:35.207
"thus come into the same hands."

00:08:35.207 --> 00:08:37.793
So, like Socrates, he's weary of how

00:08:37.793 --> 00:08:38.872
they have been governed.

00:08:38.872 --> 00:08:40.956
And, remember, we're now after the period

00:08:40.956 --> 00:08:41.943
of the Peloponnesian War.

00:08:41.943 --> 00:08:44.588
The city states of
Greece, especially Athens,

00:08:44.588 --> 00:08:47.074
have been dramatically
weakened, so a lot of people

00:08:47.074 --> 00:08:48.666
might be thinking, including Plato,

00:08:48.666 --> 00:08:52.253
is there a better way to govern ourselves?

00:08:52.253 --> 00:08:56.086
Now, Plato's most famous
student is Aristotle.

00:08:58.186 --> 00:09:02.150
And, like his teacher, Aristotle
is famous for many things

00:09:02.150 --> 00:09:05.611
and explored many
dimensions of the universe.

00:09:05.611 --> 00:09:09.331
But he is probably most
famous for being the tutor

00:09:09.331 --> 00:09:12.699
of Alexander the Great when
Alexander the Great was young.

00:09:12.699 --> 00:09:16.711
Phillip of Macedon,
Alexander the Great's father,

00:09:16.711 --> 00:09:19.780
as he conquers the weakened city states

00:09:19.780 --> 00:09:21.685
after the Peloponnesian War,

00:09:21.685 --> 00:09:25.763
he also conquers Aristotle's
home town of Stagira,

00:09:25.763 --> 00:09:27.890
and he enslaves the population.

00:09:27.890 --> 00:09:30.600
And so, when he goes to
Aristotle to tutor his young son,

00:09:30.600 --> 00:09:33.748
who ends up being called
Alexander the Great eventually,

00:09:33.748 --> 00:09:36.551
Aristotle says, okay, my fee will be

00:09:36.551 --> 00:09:38.875
free the people of my town.

00:09:38.875 --> 00:09:42.792
His town is freed, he
tutors a young Alexander,

00:09:43.859 --> 00:09:46.122
when Alexander is in his early teens,

00:09:46.122 --> 00:09:50.154
and he also gets support
for a center of learning.

00:09:50.154 --> 00:09:53.835
He creates a Lyceum,
which is his version of

00:09:53.835 --> 00:09:55.700
Plato's Academy.

00:09:55.700 --> 00:09:59.599
And, just like you saw with
Socrates and you see with Plato,

00:09:59.599 --> 00:10:03.784
Aristotle continued this
tradition of a focus on learning

00:10:03.784 --> 00:10:07.524
and a humble acceptance
of all that there might be

00:10:07.524 --> 00:10:10.643
in the world, this
rationality that we now see

00:10:10.643 --> 00:10:12.508
in modern science, that you didn't see

00:10:12.508 --> 00:10:13.557
from a lot of the ancients,

00:10:13.557 --> 00:10:17.944
who were focused on the
metaphysics and the gods.

00:10:17.944 --> 00:10:20.705
"It is the mark of an educated mind

00:10:20.705 --> 00:10:25.094
"to be able to entertain a
thought without accepting it."

00:10:25.094 --> 00:10:29.144
And I'll leave you there,
but the big takeaway is,

00:10:29.144 --> 00:10:32.130
going from Socrates,
to Plato, to Aristotle,

00:10:32.130 --> 00:10:34.431
and there were many
other Greek philosophers,

00:10:34.431 --> 00:10:38.626
you have the seed of what you
could call modern rationality.

00:10:38.626 --> 00:10:41.969
Roughly 2,000 years later, you
have the European Renaissance

00:10:41.969 --> 00:10:45.260
that starts reemerging
many of these same ideas,

00:10:45.260 --> 00:10:48.629
all the way providing a
bridge into the Enlightenment,

00:10:48.629 --> 00:10:53.153
and now our modern, hopefully
fairly rational view

00:10:53.153 --> 00:10:54.236
of the world.


Cultural Syncretism in Central Asia

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.475 --> 00:00:02.475
- [David] Hello historians and welcome to

00:00:02.475 --> 00:00:05.093
South Central Asia circa 280

00:00:05.093 --> 00:00:06.671
BCE.

00:00:06.671 --> 00:00:09.663
We're looking at two empires

00:00:09.663 --> 00:00:12.964
that occupied some of the same area.

00:00:12.964 --> 00:00:14.993
We've got the Mauryan Empire here.

00:00:14.993 --> 00:00:16.549
You can see that this is the
expansion that took place

00:00:16.549 --> 00:00:18.512
under Ashoka around

00:00:18.512 --> 00:00:19.345
250

00:00:19.345 --> 00:00:20.473
BCE.

00:00:20.473 --> 00:00:23.773
The Mauryan Empire encompasses
the Indus River Valley.

00:00:23.773 --> 00:00:26.503
This is today what is Pakistan.

00:00:26.503 --> 00:00:28.848
Over here, we've got this
region that is known as Gandara

00:00:28.848 --> 00:00:32.090
which is actually we think
what the name Kandahar

00:00:32.090 --> 00:00:34.619
in Afghanistan comes from today.

00:00:34.619 --> 00:00:37.009
What we've got here is this

00:00:37.009 --> 00:00:40.265
intersection between two empires.

00:00:40.265 --> 00:00:43.042
We've got the Seleucid
Empire over here in orange.

00:00:43.042 --> 00:00:44.534
These are, remember the remnants,

00:00:44.534 --> 00:00:45.990
this is one of three remnants

00:00:45.990 --> 00:00:48.244
of the empire of Alexander the Great.

00:00:48.244 --> 00:00:52.070
His general, Seleucus, took
this part of Asia Minor,

00:00:52.070 --> 00:00:54.765
stretching into Central Asia.

00:00:54.765 --> 00:00:59.298
This is the extent of that
empire around 280 BCE.

00:00:59.298 --> 00:01:02.582
What happens in 250 BCE
is that a satrapy of

00:01:02.582 --> 00:01:06.153
the Seleucid Empire called Bactria

00:01:06.153 --> 00:01:07.258
secedes.

00:01:07.258 --> 00:01:08.984
It fights a war of independence

00:01:08.984 --> 00:01:11.328
to establish itself as its own kingdom.

00:01:11.328 --> 00:01:14.073
This is what we call the
Greco-Bactrian kingdom.

00:01:14.073 --> 00:01:16.492
This is around 250 BCE.

00:01:16.492 --> 00:01:20.085
It names itself Bactria,
after the great city of Bactra

00:01:20.085 --> 00:01:22.710
which gives it name to
Afghanistan's Balkh province

00:01:22.710 --> 00:01:23.888
and up here on the northeast,

00:01:23.888 --> 00:01:25.405
you can see the city of Fergana

00:01:25.405 --> 00:01:27.898
which is today in Uzbekistan.

00:01:27.898 --> 00:01:31.518
If you remember from the
article about the Silk Road,

00:01:31.518 --> 00:01:33.947
this is the very same Fergana

00:01:33.947 --> 00:01:35.840
where the Han Chinese first encountered

00:01:35.840 --> 00:01:39.257
those heavenly horses that sweated blood.

00:01:40.365 --> 00:01:44.248
What I wanna talk about
is the culture of this

00:01:44.248 --> 00:01:46.939
purple region of Greco-Bactria

00:01:46.939 --> 00:01:48.988
because for many hundreds of years,

00:01:48.988 --> 00:01:52.062
this region had been passed
back and forth between

00:01:52.062 --> 00:01:53.849
Indian powers

00:01:53.849 --> 00:01:56.383
and Macedonian powers.

00:01:56.383 --> 00:01:58.113
It has Hellenic influences

00:01:58.113 --> 00:02:00.367
and it also has Indian influences.

00:02:00.367 --> 00:02:02.277
That means we're gonna be
talking about something called

00:02:02.277 --> 00:02:03.433
cultural syncretism.

00:02:03.433 --> 00:02:06.454
Let me put that down right
here in the middle of China.

00:02:06.454 --> 00:02:07.837
Cultural

00:02:07.837 --> 00:02:08.754
syncretism.

00:02:10.036 --> 00:02:12.379
What syncretism is is a

00:02:12.379 --> 00:02:15.067
mixing of cultural objects.

00:02:15.067 --> 00:02:16.660
That's really it.

00:02:16.660 --> 00:02:20.928
It's the mixture of cultures
and ideas and faiths.

00:02:20.928 --> 00:02:22.812
Follow me over here

00:02:22.812 --> 00:02:24.477
because I am interested in talking about

00:02:24.477 --> 00:02:27.035
the influence that Greek culture had

00:02:27.035 --> 00:02:29.798
on Buddhism and vice versa.

00:02:29.798 --> 00:02:30.881
These are two

00:02:32.034 --> 00:02:35.184
representations of the Buddha
from around the same time,

00:02:35.184 --> 00:02:37.139
and in fact, from around the same region,

00:02:37.139 --> 00:02:40.276
the region of Gandara
near modern-day Kandahar.

00:02:40.276 --> 00:02:43.124
So, within the kingdom
of Bactria that we saw.

00:02:43.124 --> 00:02:45.573
Sandwiched between Hellenic influences

00:02:45.573 --> 00:02:47.937
and Indian influences.

00:02:47.937 --> 00:02:51.985
Both of these works are
from the 1st Century CE.

00:02:51.985 --> 00:02:53.199
But let's talk about this footprint

00:02:53.199 --> 00:02:56.407
because this was a pretty
common way to depict the Buddha

00:02:56.407 --> 00:02:58.676
prior to the 1st Century CE.

00:02:58.676 --> 00:03:02.442
We see, this is what's called
an aniconic representation.

00:03:02.442 --> 00:03:04.621
This represent a footprint of the Buddha.

00:03:04.621 --> 00:03:06.621
You can see here some of

00:03:07.717 --> 00:03:10.997
the themes of Hinduism and Buddhism,

00:03:10.997 --> 00:03:14.364
so we've got this dharmachakra wheel

00:03:14.364 --> 00:03:16.203
in the center of the sole.

00:03:16.203 --> 00:03:17.340
We've got

00:03:17.340 --> 00:03:18.330
triratnas

00:03:18.330 --> 00:03:19.163
here

00:03:19.163 --> 00:03:20.486
near the heel.

00:03:20.486 --> 00:03:22.187
We've got, as you can
see them very faintly,

00:03:22.187 --> 00:03:23.520
little swastikas

00:03:25.029 --> 00:03:27.527
near the metatarsals yonder.

00:03:27.527 --> 00:03:30.831
And these are all
Buddhist or Hindu symbols

00:03:30.831 --> 00:03:34.315
that approach depicting the
Buddha but do not actually

00:03:34.315 --> 00:03:37.059
put the Buddha into any kind of

00:03:37.059 --> 00:03:38.561
human physical representation.

00:03:38.561 --> 00:03:41.066
It's more about what the
Buddha has left behind

00:03:41.066 --> 00:03:43.782
so that human beings can
follow in his footsteps.

00:03:43.782 --> 00:03:47.500
But around the same time in
the same region we see this.

00:03:47.500 --> 00:03:48.567
This is a statue.

00:03:48.567 --> 00:03:51.798
This is the standing Gandara Buddha.

00:03:51.798 --> 00:03:54.052
This again dates from the 1st Century CE

00:03:54.052 --> 00:03:56.280
from the same region

00:03:56.280 --> 00:03:57.793
of Bactria.

00:03:57.793 --> 00:04:00.540
But you can see this is the Buddha wearing

00:04:00.540 --> 00:04:01.425
Greek clothing.

00:04:01.425 --> 00:04:05.091
This is a Greek chiton
and that's a himation.

00:04:05.091 --> 00:04:07.622
These are forms of Greek dress

00:04:07.622 --> 00:04:11.480
and the Buddha is being
depicted in a Greek style.

00:04:11.480 --> 00:04:12.809
This is very similar
to the other sculpture

00:04:12.809 --> 00:04:15.500
that we're seeing coming out of

00:04:15.500 --> 00:04:17.646
Hellenistic cultures at the same time.

00:04:17.646 --> 00:04:20.151
And so what we see when we
see this Gandara Buddha,

00:04:20.151 --> 00:04:21.241
the standing Buddha,

00:04:21.241 --> 00:04:24.251
we have the combination of Buddhist faith

00:04:24.251 --> 00:04:26.550
or Buddhist philosophy combining

00:04:26.550 --> 00:04:29.133
with Greek cultural aesthetics.

00:04:30.860 --> 00:04:33.803
Indeed, Buddhism was
practiced in this region

00:04:33.803 --> 00:04:36.212
for many hundreds of years.

00:04:36.212 --> 00:04:39.705
Since if you recall,
let's go back to the map,

00:04:39.705 --> 00:04:42.081
because you're recall
that Fergana and Bactria

00:04:42.081 --> 00:04:43.724
and all of these cities
throughout Central Asia,

00:04:43.724 --> 00:04:45.796
Kandahar is back down here,

00:04:45.796 --> 00:04:47.463
are on the Silk Road

00:04:48.541 --> 00:04:49.975
that connect

00:04:49.975 --> 00:04:54.142
the world of what's called
as the west shore to China.

00:04:55.049 --> 00:04:57.320
Through Fergana and through Bactria,

00:04:57.320 --> 00:05:00.965
you could get to the
great centers of India.

00:05:00.965 --> 00:05:03.011
You can get to Pataliputra and Suvarnagiri

00:05:03.011 --> 00:05:06.364
and have access to the sea routes

00:05:06.364 --> 00:05:07.871
of trade.

00:05:07.871 --> 00:05:10.087
Many historians believed that it is

00:05:10.087 --> 00:05:13.724
through the cities of the
Greco-Bactrian kingdom that

00:05:13.724 --> 00:05:17.411
Buddhism made its way along
the Silk Road to the various

00:05:17.411 --> 00:05:18.411
oasis cities

00:05:20.116 --> 00:05:21.070
of Central Asia,

00:05:21.070 --> 00:05:23.144
and from then on,

00:05:23.144 --> 00:05:24.503
into China.

00:05:24.503 --> 00:05:25.550
We see syncretism

00:05:25.550 --> 00:05:28.707
whenever cultures
combine with one another.

00:05:28.707 --> 00:05:31.179
And it is said that
when Alexander the Great

00:05:31.179 --> 00:05:33.540
came to the head waters
of the Indus River Valley,

00:05:33.540 --> 00:05:36.200
remember this is in upper Pakistan,

00:05:36.200 --> 00:05:38.449
he brought many philosophers with him

00:05:38.449 --> 00:05:40.404
to meet with the great thinkers

00:05:40.404 --> 00:05:43.627
of the Hindu ascetic tradition.

00:05:43.627 --> 00:05:47.036
These, the Greeks called
the Gymnosophists,

00:05:47.036 --> 00:05:50.196
which means the naked
thinkers because these men

00:05:50.196 --> 00:05:53.742
were so devoted to the
practice of philosophy

00:05:53.742 --> 00:05:55.942
that they fasted and they wore

00:05:55.942 --> 00:05:57.819
either no or very little clothing

00:05:57.819 --> 00:06:00.109
because they felt that it got in the way

00:06:00.109 --> 00:06:03.228
of their pursuit of knowledge and wisdom.

00:06:03.228 --> 00:06:06.106
And if you make a study
of Greek philosophy,

00:06:06.106 --> 00:06:09.027
you will see the impact
that these Indian thinkers

00:06:09.027 --> 00:06:13.596
had on Greek philosophy
during this period as well.

00:06:13.596 --> 00:06:16.057
Let's talk about some other
examples of syncretism.

00:06:16.057 --> 00:06:19.864
This right here is the Nestorian Stele

00:06:19.864 --> 00:06:23.648
or rather this is a rubbing
of the Nestorian Stele.

00:06:23.648 --> 00:06:25.400
This is a giant limestone block

00:06:25.400 --> 00:06:28.795
that was erected in 781 in Chang'an,

00:06:28.795 --> 00:06:32.526
the imperial capital of
the Tang Empire in China.

00:06:32.526 --> 00:06:35.596
Celebrating 150 years of
Nestorian Christianity.

00:06:35.596 --> 00:06:36.429
If you look very closely,

00:06:36.429 --> 00:06:38.562
you can see this little cross up here.

00:06:38.562 --> 00:06:39.806
There you go.

00:06:39.806 --> 00:06:43.452
There's your Nestorian
cross, see right there.

00:06:43.452 --> 00:06:46.338
You can see all these Chinese text that

00:06:46.338 --> 00:06:49.144
symbolizes the important connection

00:06:49.144 --> 00:06:53.058
of the Church of the East to Tang China.

00:06:53.058 --> 00:06:55.495
What's interesting about
this stone monument

00:06:55.495 --> 00:06:59.662
is the way in which Christianity
is described within it.

00:07:00.954 --> 00:07:04.362
In order to proselytize
to a Chinese population,

00:07:04.362 --> 00:07:06.813
Nestorian Christianity

00:07:06.813 --> 00:07:08.968
adapted its approach

00:07:08.968 --> 00:07:10.268
to suit

00:07:10.268 --> 00:07:13.851
the mores of the people that lived there.

00:07:13.851 --> 00:07:14.934
In this text,

00:07:16.687 --> 00:07:18.520
Christ is described in

00:07:19.435 --> 00:07:21.433
Daoist and Buddhist terms.

00:07:21.433 --> 00:07:23.647
Let me read you a little
bit of the translation.

00:07:23.647 --> 00:07:26.542
"A virgin gave birth to
the holy one in Syria.

00:07:26.542 --> 00:07:28.535
"A bright star announced
the felicitous event

00:07:28.535 --> 00:07:30.021
"and Persians observing the splendor

00:07:30.021 --> 00:07:31.420
"came to present tribute.

00:07:31.420 --> 00:07:32.920
"The ancient dispensation is declared

00:07:32.920 --> 00:07:35.269
"by the 24 holy men was then fulfilled.

00:07:35.269 --> 00:07:37.167
"And he laid down great principles

00:07:37.167 --> 00:07:38.620
"for the government and
families and kingdoms."

00:07:38.620 --> 00:07:41.490
They're talking about the messiah here.

00:07:41.490 --> 00:07:42.818
"He established the new religion of the

00:07:42.818 --> 00:07:45.846
"silent operation of the
pure spirit of the Triune.

00:07:45.846 --> 00:07:48.493
"He rendered virtue
subservient to direct faith.

00:07:48.493 --> 00:07:50.527
"He fixed the extent of
the eight boundaries."

00:07:50.527 --> 00:07:51.812
Now, we're getting into some concepts

00:07:51.812 --> 00:07:53.386
from Mahayana Buddhism.

00:07:53.386 --> 00:07:57.058
"Thus completing the truth
and freeing it from dross.

00:07:57.058 --> 00:07:59.425
"He opened the gate of the
three constant principles."

00:07:59.425 --> 00:08:01.616
Again, these are Buddhist concepts.

00:08:01.616 --> 00:08:05.185
The impermanence, suffering, and non-self.

00:08:05.185 --> 00:08:07.228
"Introducing life and destroying death.

00:08:07.228 --> 00:08:08.890
"He suspended the bright sun to invade

00:08:08.890 --> 00:08:09.926
"the chambers of darkness,

00:08:09.926 --> 00:08:12.329
"and the falsehood of the
devil were thereupon defeated.

00:08:12.329 --> 00:08:14.437
"He set in motion the vessel of mercy

00:08:14.437 --> 00:08:17.102
"by which to ascend to
the bright mansions.

00:08:17.102 --> 00:08:19.130
"Whereupon rational
beings were then released,

00:08:19.130 --> 00:08:21.133
"having thus completed the
manifestation of his power,

00:08:21.133 --> 00:08:24.180
"in clear day he ascended
to his true station."

00:08:24.180 --> 00:08:26.400
You can see the way that

00:08:26.400 --> 00:08:28.183
Buddhist thought

00:08:28.183 --> 00:08:29.266
is being used

00:08:31.509 --> 00:08:33.609
to contextualize Christianity,

00:08:33.609 --> 00:08:36.543
and really, that's what
syncretism is all about.

00:08:36.543 --> 00:08:39.455
It's about taking a new idea,

00:08:39.455 --> 00:08:40.713
this thing,

00:08:40.713 --> 00:08:43.198
and putting it in line with this stuff,

00:08:43.198 --> 00:08:46.387
the eight boundaries,
the constant principles,

00:08:46.387 --> 00:08:49.197
freeing the truth from dross.

00:08:49.197 --> 00:08:51.982
What these Nestorian missionaries
were attempting to do

00:08:51.982 --> 00:08:56.031
was take these Christian
principles and recast them

00:08:56.031 --> 00:08:56.864
in a

00:08:56.864 --> 00:08:59.333
Buddhist or Daoist light.

00:08:59.333 --> 00:09:02.866
Taking something and recasting
it to fit the context

00:09:02.866 --> 00:09:04.291
of a new situation.

00:09:04.291 --> 00:09:05.471
You can learn anything.

00:09:05.471 --> 00:09:06.304
David out.


The Fall of Empires

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:01.043 --> 00:00:03.429
- [Sal] Steve, what are doing here?

00:00:03.429 --> 00:00:04.262
- [Steve] Hey, Sal.

00:00:04.262 --> 00:00:07.428
We're gonna look at this
question of, why do empires fall?

00:00:07.428 --> 00:00:10.106
- [Sal] And for those of you
who don't know Steve Schraeder,

00:00:10.106 --> 00:00:12.609
he is a World History
Fellow here at Khan Academy

00:00:12.609 --> 00:00:15.536
and also a former World History teacher.

00:00:15.536 --> 00:00:18.044
- [Steve] So what we want to
do here is use this big ideas,

00:00:18.044 --> 00:00:21.389
these big factors that are
somewhat common across empires,

00:00:21.389 --> 00:00:24.683
to sort of understand how
specific empires fell.

00:00:24.683 --> 00:00:28.745
- [Sal] Let's start in Achaemenid Persia.

00:00:28.745 --> 00:00:31.450
So, Achaemenid Persia,
it's an empire that lasts

00:00:31.450 --> 00:00:33.894
for roughly 200 years.

00:00:33.894 --> 00:00:36.641
And I guess the obvious thing
about Achaemenid Persia,

00:00:36.641 --> 00:00:38.671
it gets taken over by Alexander the Great.

00:00:38.671 --> 00:00:42.782
So I'll just go ahead and
throw invasion on that list

00:00:42.782 --> 00:00:44.615
for Achaemenid Persia.

00:00:44.615 --> 00:00:46.903
So, outside of invasion,
if we go through the rest

00:00:46.903 --> 00:00:50.148
of this list, it clearly
was a large empire,

00:00:50.148 --> 00:00:52.828
so maybe there was an
element of over expansion.

00:00:52.828 --> 00:00:55.848
It was governed in a fairly federated way

00:00:55.848 --> 00:00:57.885
through these satraps.

00:00:57.885 --> 00:01:01.462
You might have had bad
leadership be a role.

00:01:01.462 --> 00:01:04.263
Darius III, famous for
deserting his troops

00:01:04.263 --> 00:01:05.478
on the battlefield.

00:01:05.478 --> 00:01:06.459
- [Steve] Yeah, and on top of that,

00:01:06.459 --> 00:01:08.394
we might throw in economics as well,

00:01:08.394 --> 00:01:11.356
because as Alexander conquers
bits and pieces of the empire,

00:01:11.356 --> 00:01:13.694
he's also depriving them of the resources

00:01:13.694 --> 00:01:15.685
that those areas would provide.

00:01:15.685 --> 00:01:19.518
- [Sal] So, now let's
move on to Maurya India.

00:01:20.480 --> 00:01:22.384
Once again, a significant empire,

00:01:22.384 --> 00:01:24.662
lasts definitely over 100 years

00:01:24.662 --> 00:01:27.220
and it's actually the
largest unified empire

00:01:27.220 --> 00:01:29.187
over the Indian subcontinent.

00:01:29.187 --> 00:01:33.033
And it starts with three
fairly strong rulers

00:01:33.033 --> 00:01:35.150
and it's known, especially
with Ashoka the Great,

00:01:35.150 --> 00:01:37.716
for spreading of the Buddhist religion.

00:01:37.716 --> 00:01:41.017
So why, in your mind, Steve, did it fall?

00:01:41.017 --> 00:01:43.384
Which of these factors
played most strongly?

00:01:43.384 --> 00:01:44.377
- [Steve] Well, the
first one that jumps out

00:01:44.377 --> 00:01:45.699
is over expansion.

00:01:45.699 --> 00:01:48.307
Once Ashoka dies, you see
the empire really lose

00:01:48.307 --> 00:01:50.529
a lot of that northwestern territory.

00:01:50.529 --> 00:01:52.544
What we did see is some religious strife.

00:01:52.544 --> 00:01:54.216
You mentioned that
Ashoka worked really hard

00:01:54.216 --> 00:01:56.840
to spread Buddhism and he did follow that

00:01:56.840 --> 00:01:59.047
in some of his policies
which led to some tension

00:01:59.047 --> 00:02:02.162
between some of the Hindu
population in the empire.

00:02:02.162 --> 00:02:04.886
- [Sal] And so you could also
call that division as well.

00:02:04.886 --> 00:02:06.053
So, moving on.

00:02:06.957 --> 00:02:08.606
Go to Han China.

00:02:08.606 --> 00:02:11.801
It began to fall the end
of the second century CE

00:02:11.801 --> 00:02:14.561
and then falls in the third century CE.

00:02:14.561 --> 00:02:19.108
Which of these factors led
to its eventual demise?

00:02:19.108 --> 00:02:19.941
- [Steve] Right.

00:02:19.941 --> 00:02:21.845
So I think we want to start
looking at the fall of Han China

00:02:21.845 --> 00:02:24.523
from the lens of the
Yellow Turban Rebellion.

00:02:24.523 --> 00:02:27.716
And that is partly a religious movement

00:02:27.716 --> 00:02:31.191
and it also is partly sparked
by environmental factors

00:02:31.191 --> 00:02:33.798
leading to food shortages.

00:02:33.798 --> 00:02:35.662
- [Sal] And food shortages
might affect the economy.

00:02:35.662 --> 00:02:36.755
- [Steve] Absolutely.

00:02:36.755 --> 00:02:38.637
And there's a lot of internal migration

00:02:38.637 --> 00:02:42.423
to look for better jobs within
Han China because of this.

00:02:42.423 --> 00:02:43.821
- [Sal] Do you think
leadership played a role?

00:02:43.821 --> 00:02:44.654
- [Steve] Yeah.

00:02:44.654 --> 00:02:46.859
There was a lot of dissatisfaction
with the Han emperor

00:02:46.859 --> 00:02:49.668
and how he was sort of dealing
with some of these problems.

00:02:49.668 --> 00:02:51.393
And over time, efforts
to defeat the rebellion

00:02:51.393 --> 00:02:53.795
led to regional warlords
gaining more power

00:02:53.795 --> 00:02:56.176
and then they eventually
carve out their own kingdoms

00:02:56.176 --> 00:02:57.428
from the Han domain.

00:02:57.428 --> 00:02:58.261
- [Sal] Okay.

00:02:58.261 --> 00:03:01.424
And then, overlapping
in time with Han China,

00:03:01.424 --> 00:03:04.094
we of course have the famous Roman Empire.

00:03:04.094 --> 00:03:05.434
And on my timeline
here, this first section

00:03:05.434 --> 00:03:07.931
is the Roman kingdom, then Roman republic,

00:03:07.931 --> 00:03:10.104
and then you have the formal Roman empire

00:03:10.104 --> 00:03:14.150
that collapses at the
end of the fifth century.

00:03:14.150 --> 00:03:17.005
So which of these factors
do you think played...

00:03:17.005 --> 00:03:18.600
In the Western Roman empire is collapsed,

00:03:18.600 --> 00:03:21.260
the Byzantine empire, the
Eastern Roman empire continues on

00:03:21.260 --> 00:03:23.383
for roughly a thousand years more.

00:03:23.383 --> 00:03:25.006
- [Steve] Well, let's start
with the obvious point there

00:03:25.006 --> 00:03:26.106
that there is a division.

00:03:26.106 --> 00:03:27.758
There's a formal political division

00:03:27.758 --> 00:03:30.042
that's gonna weaken both
halves of the empire

00:03:30.042 --> 00:03:31.904
in terms of the resources available.

00:03:31.904 --> 00:03:34.241
We also have, at the same
time as that division,

00:03:34.241 --> 00:03:36.380
religious issues going on.

00:03:36.380 --> 00:03:39.023
We have Christianity being
declared the official religion

00:03:39.023 --> 00:03:40.990
of the Roman empire at this time

00:03:40.990 --> 00:03:42.556
and that leads to internal conflicts

00:03:42.556 --> 00:03:44.766
between those who are Christians
and those who are not.

00:03:44.766 --> 00:03:47.542
- [Sal] You have migrations and invasions.

00:03:47.542 --> 00:03:51.732
You have famously the Huns
migrating into Eastern Europe

00:03:51.732 --> 00:03:54.435
and then putting pressure
on the Germanic tribes

00:03:54.435 --> 00:03:58.547
to oftentimes come into the
Roman empire, but that led to...

00:03:58.547 --> 00:04:01.566
So that was both migrations and invasion.

00:04:01.566 --> 00:04:03.331
- [Steve] Yeah, and in this
case, it's sometimes hard

00:04:03.331 --> 00:04:05.533
to separate invasion from migration.

00:04:05.533 --> 00:04:07.460
- [Sal] And I would throw in economy

00:04:07.460 --> 00:04:11.264
since the Roman empire, in
its expansionary period,

00:04:11.264 --> 00:04:13.495
was constantly getting new territory

00:04:13.495 --> 00:04:17.757
which would add tax
revenues to Rome's coffers.

00:04:17.757 --> 00:04:21.321
It allowed for more and more
slaves who could work for Rome.

00:04:21.321 --> 00:04:24.998
Once you get into the
third, fourth century CE,

00:04:24.998 --> 00:04:27.145
that expansion starts to stop

00:04:27.145 --> 00:04:30.170
and so it stops that
ever-growing pile of money

00:04:30.170 --> 00:04:32.267
and ever-growing pile of labor.

00:04:32.267 --> 00:04:34.736
So, I'd argue economy played a role.

00:04:34.736 --> 00:04:36.881
You can never point to just one factor.

00:04:36.881 --> 00:04:39.689
Empires are these very complicated things

00:04:39.689 --> 00:04:41.626
but there are these general themes

00:04:41.626 --> 00:04:43.809
and as a student, it's
valuable to think about them

00:04:43.809 --> 00:04:45.812
in a framework something like this.

00:04:45.812 --> 00:04:47.264
- [Steve] So all these factors won't apply

00:04:47.264 --> 00:04:49.248
to every single empire you look at.

00:04:49.248 --> 00:04:51.296
They're a good starting point
when you start thinking about

00:04:51.296 --> 00:04:54.895
those questions of why did
this particular empire fall?

00:04:54.895 --> 00:04:55.728
- [Sal] Awesome.

00:04:55.728 --> 00:04:56.561
Thanks, Steve.

00:04:56.561 --> 00:04:57.676
- [Steve] Thanks, Sal.


Early Silk Road

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.201 --> 00:00:02.318
- [Instructor] In our
study of world history

00:00:02.318 --> 00:00:04.921
we have looked at many different empires

00:00:04.921 --> 00:00:06.892
and several of them are depicted

00:00:06.892 --> 00:00:08.886
on this map right over here.

00:00:08.886 --> 00:00:11.649
We spent a lot of time on the Roman Empire

00:00:11.649 --> 00:00:14.217
and in the highlighted yellow
you see the Roman Empire

00:00:14.217 --> 00:00:15.942
at roughly its maximum extent.

00:00:15.942 --> 00:00:19.263
And on this timeline you
see the Roman Kingdom

00:00:19.263 --> 00:00:22.855
and then the Roman Republic
and then the Roman Empire

00:00:22.855 --> 00:00:24.276
which ends in the fifth century

00:00:24.276 --> 00:00:26.564
although the Eastern Roman
Empire, the Byzantine Empire,

00:00:26.564 --> 00:00:29.803
continues on for roughly
another thousand years.

00:00:29.803 --> 00:00:31.001
Now we also have depicted here

00:00:31.001 --> 00:00:32.793
a significant Persian Empire.

00:00:32.793 --> 00:00:34.888
You have the Parthian Empire

00:00:34.888 --> 00:00:38.416
and they were preceded
by the Seleucid Empire

00:00:38.416 --> 00:00:41.325
and they were succeeded
by the Sasanian Empire

00:00:41.325 --> 00:00:42.585
but I have the Parthians depicted here

00:00:42.585 --> 00:00:44.909
on the timeline and on the map.

00:00:44.909 --> 00:00:46.745
I also show Han China,

00:00:46.745 --> 00:00:47.578
both the Eastern and Western Han Dynasties

00:00:47.578 --> 00:00:50.732
both the Eastern and Western Han Dynasties

00:00:50.732 --> 00:00:53.671
you can see on this timeline as well.

00:00:53.671 --> 00:00:57.177
And in India, I show the
Maurya Dynasty on the timeline

00:00:57.177 --> 00:00:59.194
I don't depict it here on the map

00:00:59.194 --> 00:01:02.133
but on the map I show the Kushan Empire

00:01:02.133 --> 00:01:04.862
and I also show it on the timeline.

00:01:04.862 --> 00:01:07.753
Now the reason why I
wanna depict these empires

00:01:07.753 --> 00:01:10.487
at this specific time in the world

00:01:10.487 --> 00:01:12.160
is to highlight the fact that

00:01:12.160 --> 00:01:14.690
they weren't operating
in complete isolation.

00:01:14.690 --> 00:01:15.773
In fact, as we get to the
second and first century BCE,

00:01:15.773 --> 00:01:19.904
In fact, as we get to the
second and first century BCE,

00:01:19.904 --> 00:01:22.237
especially as we get into the Common Era,

00:01:22.237 --> 00:01:23.872
we start seeing a significant amount

00:01:23.872 --> 00:01:27.296
of trade and interaction
between these empires.

00:01:27.296 --> 00:01:28.404
Not to say that there wasn't trade

00:01:28.404 --> 00:01:30.350
and interaction before that time

00:01:30.350 --> 00:01:31.932
but it started to get accelerated

00:01:31.932 --> 00:01:33.712
and to a large degree it got accelerated

00:01:33.712 --> 00:01:37.006
because you had these continuous empires

00:01:37.006 --> 00:01:38.437
that at least within their borders

00:01:38.437 --> 00:01:40.555
were able to provide
some level of stability

00:01:40.555 --> 00:01:43.185
for someone to travel across roads

00:01:43.185 --> 00:01:45.561
or travel across borders.

00:01:45.561 --> 00:01:48.584
And so you start to see the emergence

00:01:48.584 --> 00:01:50.752
of these trading networks.

00:01:50.752 --> 00:01:55.126
In red you see trading
roads or paths in red

00:01:55.126 --> 00:01:58.364
and in blue you see those paths by sea.

00:01:58.364 --> 00:01:59.866
And this isn't even comprehensive.

00:01:59.866 --> 00:02:00.942
And even what I show on the empires

00:02:00.942 --> 00:02:02.547
are many other smaller kingdoms

00:02:02.547 --> 00:02:04.489
that also existed in the world

00:02:04.489 --> 00:02:06.174
that I just don't have depicted here.

00:02:06.174 --> 00:02:10.203
But what this contiguous
block of empires allowed

00:02:10.203 --> 00:02:12.614
is for the trade of goods and ideas

00:02:12.614 --> 00:02:13.896
and sometimes collectively

00:02:13.896 --> 00:02:16.428
the routes that were used for this trade

00:02:16.428 --> 00:02:18.501
is referred to as the Silk
Road or the Silk Roads

00:02:18.501 --> 00:02:21.077
is referred to as the Silk
Road or the Silk Roads

00:02:21.077 --> 00:02:23.564
or really you could say, the Silk Routes.

00:02:23.564 --> 00:02:25.681
And so it's a collective number of paths

00:02:25.681 --> 00:02:27.717
that people used to trade things.

00:02:27.717 --> 00:02:29.219
Now why call it silk?

00:02:29.219 --> 00:02:30.315
Now why call it silk?

00:02:30.315 --> 00:02:32.731
Well it all boils down to silk

00:02:32.731 --> 00:02:36.721
being a major commodity of
trade at this time period.

00:02:36.721 --> 00:02:38.765
So if you wanna think
about the different things

00:02:38.765 --> 00:02:39.823
that were traded around the world

00:02:39.823 --> 00:02:42.123
that were traded around the world

00:02:42.123 --> 00:02:44.527
this is just a sample of it.

00:02:44.527 --> 00:02:45.360
Silk which comes from
cocoons of these silk worms

00:02:45.360 --> 00:02:48.615
Silk which comes from
cocoons of these silk worms

00:02:48.615 --> 00:02:50.820
that eat mulberry leaves

00:02:50.820 --> 00:02:53.631
was considered a sign of wealth.

00:02:53.631 --> 00:02:55.972
It was considered the finest cloth

00:02:55.972 --> 00:02:59.749
and China had a monopoly
on how to make silk

00:02:59.749 --> 00:03:02.081
for many hundreds of years

00:03:02.081 --> 00:03:05.886
even after the period that we
were talking about right here.

00:03:05.886 --> 00:03:07.802
So you can imagine around the world

00:03:07.802 --> 00:03:09.683
people were interested in getting access

00:03:09.683 --> 00:03:11.015
to that Chinese silk.

00:03:11.015 --> 00:03:13.255
But silk wasn't the only
thing that was being traded.

00:03:13.255 --> 00:03:14.389
In fact, in order to trade

00:03:14.389 --> 00:03:17.524
you need to give something in
exchange for even that silk.

00:03:17.524 --> 00:03:20.882
One of the Chinese motivations
for trading with others

00:03:20.882 --> 00:03:23.002
is having access to horses.

00:03:23.002 --> 00:03:23.984
is having access to horses.

00:03:23.984 --> 00:03:26.561
Horses were valuable not
just for transporting goods

00:03:26.561 --> 00:03:27.796
but also in wars

00:03:27.796 --> 00:03:31.106
especially fighting some
of their northern enemies

00:03:31.106 --> 00:03:33.268
who had access to horses.

00:03:33.268 --> 00:03:36.517
They also were able to
get gold from Europe,

00:03:36.517 --> 00:03:39.262
be able to get cotton from India.

00:03:39.262 --> 00:03:42.074
In Europe you also had
other manufactured goods.

00:03:42.074 --> 00:03:45.490
So you had this fairly
vast trading enterprise

00:03:45.490 --> 00:03:49.945
emerge between these
different parts of the world.

00:03:49.945 --> 00:03:53.071
And to be clear, some of
the things that were traded

00:03:53.071 --> 00:03:55.648
allowed or facilitated the trade itself.

00:03:55.648 --> 00:03:58.035
I mentioned horses were a
source of transportation

00:03:58.035 --> 00:03:59.477
but camels in particular

00:03:59.477 --> 00:04:02.265
were very powerful
sources of transportation

00:04:02.265 --> 00:04:04.492
especially across Central Asia

00:04:04.492 --> 00:04:07.351
and as you get into the
Middle East and Africa

00:04:07.351 --> 00:04:09.605
because you have these
large swaths of desert.

00:04:09.605 --> 00:04:11.473
Camels can not only carry a lot

00:04:11.473 --> 00:04:12.739
but they had a lot of stamina

00:04:12.739 --> 00:04:15.781
and they did not have to
stop for water as frequently.

00:04:15.781 --> 00:04:16.681
In a lot of world history,

00:04:16.681 --> 00:04:19.634
we focus on the large non-nomadic empires

00:04:19.634 --> 00:04:22.132
like the Roman Empire and Han China

00:04:22.132 --> 00:04:24.628
but as trade became more important

00:04:24.628 --> 00:04:27.610
especially as you go through Central Asia,

00:04:27.610 --> 00:04:29.837
you could imagine that many of the people

00:04:29.837 --> 00:04:31.551
who were very good at trading

00:04:31.551 --> 00:04:32.817
who were good at moving things

00:04:32.817 --> 00:04:34.518
were people who were good
at moving themselves,

00:04:34.518 --> 00:04:38.540
in particular, the nomadic
people in Central Asia.

00:04:38.540 --> 00:04:41.361
Many of their cities
along these trade routes

00:04:41.361 --> 00:04:43.693
became more and more wealthy

00:04:43.693 --> 00:04:44.526
became more and more wealthy

00:04:44.526 --> 00:04:46.748
and more and more powerful.

00:04:46.748 --> 00:04:50.577
Now as I mentioned, goods
were not the only thing

00:04:50.577 --> 00:04:54.340
that were transported along these routes.

00:04:54.340 --> 00:04:58.620
One of the not so good things
was the spread of disease.

00:04:58.620 --> 00:05:00.500
So in the historical record,

00:05:00.500 --> 00:05:04.296
we have two major plagues in
Rome during the Roman Empire

00:05:04.296 --> 00:05:06.952
we have two major plagues in
Rome during the Roman Empire

00:05:06.952 --> 00:05:09.278
and we believe these
plagues were small pox

00:05:09.278 --> 00:05:12.260
although some people believe
it might have been measles.

00:05:12.260 --> 00:05:14.849
And it is believed that
it came from traders.

00:05:14.849 --> 00:05:17.556
It came from Asia, from the Middle East,

00:05:17.556 --> 00:05:19.469
and these were significant plagues.

00:05:19.469 --> 00:05:21.980
And the reason why we think
that it was due to trade

00:05:21.980 --> 00:05:23.995
is that there's some evidence in Han China

00:05:23.995 --> 00:05:25.385
during this first plague

00:05:25.385 --> 00:05:28.295
of similar symptoms of a similar plague.

00:05:28.295 --> 00:05:30.139
But it really affected Rome.

00:05:30.139 --> 00:05:31.879
In these plagues, it's estimated that

00:05:31.879 --> 00:05:34.885
as much as 10% of the
population might have died.

00:05:34.885 --> 00:05:35.951
In certain cities

00:05:35.951 --> 00:05:38.900
it might have been 25,
30% of the population.

00:05:38.900 --> 00:05:41.276
Some historians even
point to these plagues

00:05:41.276 --> 00:05:44.233
as destabilizing the Roman Empire.

00:05:44.233 --> 00:05:46.954
And this is a theme that you'll
see often in world history

00:05:46.954 --> 00:05:48.592
where if you have a population

00:05:48.592 --> 00:05:51.302
that doesn't have exposure
to something, say small pox,

00:05:51.302 --> 00:05:52.154
and all of a sudden

00:05:52.154 --> 00:05:54.786
they encounter a population
that does have exposure

00:05:54.786 --> 00:05:58.023
well that small pox might wreak havoc.

00:05:58.023 --> 00:05:59.859
But it wasn't just disease,

00:05:59.859 --> 00:06:03.141
you also have the spread of ideas

00:06:03.141 --> 00:06:05.695
and technology and religion.

00:06:05.695 --> 00:06:08.162
And the two religions that perhaps

00:06:08.162 --> 00:06:10.839
benefited the most from the early trade

00:06:10.839 --> 00:06:13.916
along the Silk Route or the Silk Roads

00:06:13.916 --> 00:06:16.591
were Christianity and Buddhism.

00:06:16.591 --> 00:06:19.526
And Buddhism, in particular
was very appealing

00:06:19.526 --> 00:06:22.135
to many of these Silk Road merchants.

00:06:22.135 --> 00:06:23.745
The Kushan Empire, in particular

00:06:23.745 --> 00:06:26.411
started to significantly spread Buddhism.

00:06:26.411 --> 00:06:29.044
In previous videos we talk about
Ashoka sending missionaries

00:06:29.044 --> 00:06:33.335
but the Kushan Empire help
spread Buddhism into China

00:06:33.335 --> 00:06:35.168
and into the Far East.

00:06:36.025 --> 00:06:37.561
So what we talked about in this video

00:06:37.561 --> 00:06:39.763
was the very beginning of the Silk Road.

00:06:39.763 --> 00:06:42.137
As we get into the first few centuries BCE

00:06:42.137 --> 00:06:44.831
or the first few centuries
of the Common Era.

00:06:44.831 --> 00:06:47.610
But as we'll see, the
Silk Road will continue on

00:06:47.610 --> 00:06:51.777
for many hundreds or really
over a thousand years.


Buddhism

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.176 --> 00:00:01.626
- [Sal] We're now
going to talk about one of

00:00:01.626 --> 00:00:04.297
the most significant figures
in all of human history,

00:00:04.297 --> 00:00:07.471
and that is Siddhartha Gautama,
who would later be known

00:00:07.471 --> 00:00:10.741
as Buddha, as the awakened
one, or the enlightened one.

00:00:10.741 --> 00:00:12.948
Now before we get into his life,

00:00:12.948 --> 00:00:15.864
let's think about the
context in which he was born.

00:00:15.864 --> 00:00:18.342
So we see from this timeline,
most accounts place his

00:00:18.342 --> 00:00:21.763
birth at around 563 BCE,
although there are some

00:00:21.763 --> 00:00:24.641
historians who think that he
might have been born about

00:00:24.641 --> 00:00:27.445
100, 150 years later than that.

00:00:27.445 --> 00:00:29.542
But either way, that
would've been near the end of

00:00:29.542 --> 00:00:31.080
the Vedic Period.

00:00:31.080 --> 00:00:33.602
And the Vedic Period is
named after the Vedas,

00:00:33.602 --> 00:00:37.867
these Hindu scriptures
written by those Indo-Aryans

00:00:37.867 --> 00:00:41.876
who came into India,
most historians believe,

00:00:41.876 --> 00:00:45.043
around 1500 BCE, or maybe before that.

00:00:46.632 --> 00:00:48.781
Now by the time of Siddhartha's birth,

00:00:48.781 --> 00:00:50.971
Hinduism was really
starting to take shape.

00:00:50.971 --> 00:00:53.248
Many of the things that
we would now recognize as

00:00:53.248 --> 00:00:57.071
modern day Hindu practice already existed.

00:00:57.071 --> 00:00:59.738
And he was born into that world.

00:01:01.071 --> 00:01:03.163
Now on this map here you
see the major sites of

00:01:03.163 --> 00:01:04.179
Buddha's life.

00:01:04.179 --> 00:01:07.199
He's born in Lumbini,
modern day southern Napal,

00:01:07.199 --> 00:01:11.296
he eventually meditates at
Bodh Gaya under the Bodh tree

00:01:11.296 --> 00:01:13.163
where he reaches enlightenment.

00:01:13.163 --> 00:01:15.460
He does his first preaching at Sarnath,

00:01:15.460 --> 00:01:18.530
and then he eventually dies at Kushinagar.

00:01:18.530 --> 00:01:20.987
And to modern Buddhists,
these are still considered

00:01:20.987 --> 00:01:23.415
major pilgrimage sites.

00:01:23.415 --> 00:01:27.448
So he's born, according
to tradition, at Lumbini.

00:01:27.448 --> 00:01:30.207
His mother is in transit
and born along the way

00:01:30.207 --> 00:01:31.261
at Lumbini.

00:01:31.261 --> 00:01:35.792
His mother dies shortly afterwards,
he's raised by his aunt,

00:01:35.792 --> 00:01:38.243
but his father in some accounts is a king,

00:01:38.243 --> 00:01:42.960
a chieftain, and he's able
to give the young Siddhartha

00:01:42.960 --> 00:01:47.206
Gautama a very good,
a very sheltered life.

00:01:47.206 --> 00:01:49.404
And this life continues into his 20s,

00:01:49.404 --> 00:01:53.215
he's able to get married, have a child.

00:01:53.215 --> 00:01:57.382
But at the age of 29 he's
able to leave the compound.

00:01:58.652 --> 00:02:01.768
He's able to see the world
as it really is outside of

00:02:01.768 --> 00:02:04.590
this world that his father
has created for him,

00:02:04.590 --> 00:02:08.200
and he sees old age, he sees
sickness, he sees poverty,

00:02:08.200 --> 00:02:12.289
and this creates a lot of
consternation in Siddhartha.

00:02:12.289 --> 00:02:15.706
He wonders why this is so,
why is there this suffering

00:02:15.706 --> 00:02:16.827
in the world?

00:02:16.827 --> 00:02:20.550
And so he decides, once again, at age 29,

00:02:20.550 --> 00:02:23.559
to seek the truth, to try
to understand the universe

00:02:23.559 --> 00:02:24.578
as it is.

00:02:24.578 --> 00:02:26.542
And remember, this is in
India where it was common

00:02:26.542 --> 00:02:29.437
practice for religious
ascetics to go off into the

00:02:29.437 --> 00:02:32.930
woods and to meditate about
the true nature of reality,

00:02:32.930 --> 00:02:35.313
try to obtain moksha.

00:02:35.313 --> 00:02:38.341
So he goes and follows that same practice.

00:02:38.341 --> 00:02:41.501
And for six years, he is
going through the woods,

00:02:41.501 --> 00:02:45.050
he's wandering, he's left all
of his possessions behind,

00:02:45.050 --> 00:02:46.122
he has left his family behind.

00:02:46.122 --> 00:02:49.065
He famously starts off
trying to go in the mold

00:02:49.065 --> 00:02:51.986
of these Hindu ascetics,
letting go of everything,

00:02:51.986 --> 00:02:55.937
including trying to deprive
the body of food and water,

00:02:55.937 --> 00:02:57.810
and he almost kills himself.

00:02:57.810 --> 00:03:02.087
But then eventually, at age
35, he makes his way to the

00:03:02.087 --> 00:03:05.170
town of Gaya, now known as Bodh Gaya.

00:03:06.268 --> 00:03:10.147
And over there he meditates
under a sacred fig tree,

00:03:10.147 --> 00:03:12.299
later known as the Bodhi tree.

00:03:12.299 --> 00:03:14.770
And he meditates there for seven days.

00:03:14.770 --> 00:03:17.860
And on the seventh day, it strikes him,

00:03:17.860 --> 00:03:21.422
he has a revelation, he
awakens, so to speak.

00:03:21.422 --> 00:03:24.002
And according to Buddhist
tradition, from that moment

00:03:24.002 --> 00:03:27.585
he becomes the Buddha,
or the awakened one.

00:03:30.137 --> 00:03:33.926
And for the next 49 days he
makes no contact with anyone,

00:03:33.926 --> 00:03:38.124
but he eventually makes
his way to Sarnath.

00:03:38.124 --> 00:03:42.870
And at a deer park there he
re-encounters five of his

00:03:42.870 --> 00:03:45.607
previous followers and
they had given up on him.

00:03:45.607 --> 00:03:48.254
But now they see that
there's a change in Siddhartha,

00:03:48.254 --> 00:03:49.858
now the Buddha.

00:03:49.858 --> 00:03:53.671
And he begins to explain
to them what he has seen,

00:03:53.671 --> 00:03:55.588
what he has discovered.

00:03:58.547 --> 00:04:01.747
This is a quotation from the
Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta,

00:04:01.747 --> 00:04:03.429
what is was called in the Pali language,

00:04:03.429 --> 00:04:05.809
which was the language of Buddha's time.

00:04:05.809 --> 00:04:09.857
And it can be translated as
Setting the Wheel of Dhamma,

00:04:09.857 --> 00:04:11.953
which is another word for
Dharma, the (mumbles) word

00:04:11.953 --> 00:04:14.234
Dharma, in motion.

00:04:14.234 --> 00:04:18.884
And Dhamma in Hinduism
means this cosmological law.

00:04:18.884 --> 00:04:21.390
What you should follow in your life.

00:04:21.390 --> 00:04:25.570
Dhamma in Buddhism, or Dharma
in Buddhism can mean that,

00:04:25.570 --> 00:04:28.153
but it can also mean the
teachings of Buddha and the

00:04:28.153 --> 00:04:30.415
Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta.

00:04:30.415 --> 00:04:32.610
The sayings of Buddha at
Sarnath are considered to be

00:04:32.610 --> 00:04:35.327
his first teachings to his followers.

00:04:35.327 --> 00:04:37.825
"There are these two
extremes that are not to be

00:04:37.825 --> 00:04:40.485
"indulged in by one who has gone forth.

00:04:40.485 --> 00:04:41.396
"Which two?

00:04:41.396 --> 00:04:44.026
"That which is devoted
to sensual pleasure with

00:04:44.026 --> 00:04:47.193
"reference to sensual
objects: base, vulgar, common,

00:04:47.193 --> 00:04:50.256
"ignoble, unprofitable;
and that which is devoted

00:04:50.256 --> 00:04:54.609
"to self affliction: painful,
ignoble, unprofitable.

00:04:54.609 --> 00:04:57.929
"Avoiding both of these
extremes, the middle way

00:04:57.929 --> 00:05:01.591
"leads to calm, to direct
knowledge, to self-awakening,

00:05:01.591 --> 00:05:02.841
"to Unbinding."

00:05:03.747 --> 00:05:06.560
So this is considered to
be Buddha's first reference

00:05:06.560 --> 00:05:09.227
to the notion of the middle way.

00:05:10.419 --> 00:05:13.176
And what's interesting here,
he's saying things that

00:05:13.176 --> 00:05:15.511
are consistent with many
of the Hindu ascetics

00:05:15.511 --> 00:05:16.503
of the time.

00:05:16.503 --> 00:05:19.087
That you shouldn't devote
yourself to sensual pleasure,

00:05:19.087 --> 00:05:21.329
with reference to sensual
objects, base, vulgar,

00:05:21.329 --> 00:05:23.116
common, ignoble.

00:05:23.116 --> 00:05:25.249
But he's also saying that
you shouldn't go the other

00:05:25.249 --> 00:05:26.499
extreme either.

00:05:26.499 --> 00:05:29.108
You shouldn't devote
yourself to self-affliction,

00:05:29.108 --> 00:05:30.719
painful, ignoble, unprofitable.

00:05:30.719 --> 00:05:33.524
That, too, is not going
to lead to the truth.

00:05:33.524 --> 00:05:37.999
He says, avoid both of these
extremes, the middle way.

00:05:37.999 --> 00:05:41.859
Now in the Dhammacakkappavattana
Sutta he goes on

00:05:41.859 --> 00:05:45.859
to describe what are known
as four noble truths.

00:05:49.083 --> 00:05:52.410
"Now this, monks, is the
noble truth of suffering,"

00:05:52.410 --> 00:05:56.286
or dhukka, "Birth is
suffering, aging is suffering,

00:05:56.286 --> 00:05:58.490
"death is suffering:
sorrow, lamentation, pain,

00:05:58.490 --> 00:06:00.690
"distress, and despair are suffering.

00:06:00.690 --> 00:06:02.909
"Association with the
unbeloved is suffering,

00:06:02.909 --> 00:06:05.512
"separation from the loved is suffering.

00:06:05.512 --> 00:06:08.844
"Not getting what is wanted is suffering."

00:06:08.844 --> 00:06:12.010
So the first noble truth,
he's describing this notion

00:06:12.010 --> 00:06:14.938
of dhukka, this notion of suffering.

00:06:14.938 --> 00:06:17.168
And later on he goes to expand on it.

00:06:17.168 --> 00:06:19.514
Saying it's not just
traditional notions of sorrow,

00:06:19.514 --> 00:06:23.640
lamentation, pain, distress,
but it's also trying to

00:06:23.640 --> 00:06:26.790
desire or pursue anything
that is temporary in nature

00:06:26.790 --> 00:06:31.198
will eventually lead to
dhukka, or suffering.

00:06:31.198 --> 00:06:34.281
"And this, monks, is the
noble truth of the origination

00:06:34.281 --> 00:06:37.378
"of suffering, the craving
that makes for further

00:06:37.378 --> 00:06:40.470
"becoming -- accompanied
by passion and delight,

00:06:40.470 --> 00:06:44.100
"relishing now here, and
now there -- craving for

00:06:44.100 --> 00:06:46.718
"sensual pleasure, craving for becoming,

00:06:46.718 --> 00:06:48.860
"craving for non-becoming."

00:06:48.860 --> 00:06:51.979
So that cause of the
suffering is this craving.

00:06:51.979 --> 00:06:55.040
Craving for these impermanent things.

00:06:55.040 --> 00:06:58.624
"And this, monks, is the
noble truth of the cessation

00:06:58.624 --> 00:07:01.783
"of suffering: the remainderless
fading and cessation,

00:07:01.783 --> 00:07:03.823
"renunciation, relinquishment, release,

00:07:03.823 --> 00:07:06.736
"and letting go of that very craving."

00:07:06.736 --> 00:07:10.676
So here he's saying, "Look,
you don't have to suffer,

00:07:10.676 --> 00:07:13.670
"there's a way to escape from it."

00:07:13.670 --> 00:07:17.019
And it's essentially to stop that craving.

00:07:17.019 --> 00:07:19.290
That's the third noble truth.

00:07:19.290 --> 00:07:22.196
"And this, monks, is the
noble truth of the way of

00:07:22.196 --> 00:07:26.216
"practice leading to the
cessation of suffering."

00:07:26.216 --> 00:07:29.110
So, how do you actually
practice life in way

00:07:29.110 --> 00:07:31.631
that you can seize this suffering?

00:07:31.631 --> 00:07:34.627
"Precisely this Noble Eightfold Path,"

00:07:34.627 --> 00:07:37.321
which is another concept
which is quoted a lot in

00:07:37.321 --> 00:07:39.879
Buddhism, this notion of
these eight things that

00:07:39.879 --> 00:07:44.399
you need to do in order to
escape from this suffering,

00:07:44.399 --> 00:07:47.128
from this dhukka, from this craving.

00:07:47.128 --> 00:07:51.662
"Right view, right resolve,
right speech, right action,

00:07:51.662 --> 00:07:55.788
"right livelihood, right
effort, right mindfulness,

00:07:55.788 --> 00:07:58.502
"and right concentration."

00:07:58.502 --> 00:08:01.978
This comes from the Dhammapada,
which you can interpret

00:08:01.978 --> 00:08:03.811
as the path to dhamma.

00:08:05.289 --> 00:08:08.727
And Buddha says, "All that
we are is the result of

00:08:08.727 --> 00:08:10.419
"what we have thought: it
is founded on our thoughts,

00:08:10.419 --> 00:08:12.540
"it is made up of our thoughts."

00:08:12.540 --> 00:08:15.290
Which is a core idea in Buddhism.

00:08:16.710 --> 00:08:20.043
That this notion of separateness,

00:08:20.043 --> 00:08:21.697
this is just due to our thoughts,

00:08:21.697 --> 00:08:23.344
it's all happening in our mind.

00:08:23.344 --> 00:08:26.363
The psychical reality
that you think is somehow

00:08:26.363 --> 00:08:29.568
more permanent than
the transient thoughts,

00:08:29.568 --> 00:08:31.602
it's all happening in your thought,

00:08:31.602 --> 00:08:34.239
it's all happening in your
mind and the separateness

00:08:34.239 --> 00:08:36.540
is really an illusion.

00:08:36.540 --> 00:08:39.468
And once again, very similar
idea to what we see in the

00:08:39.468 --> 00:08:40.985
Upanishads.

00:08:40.985 --> 00:08:45.152
Now one final idea, Buddha
taught throughout his life,

00:08:46.227 --> 00:08:48.374
and eventually dies at Kushinagar,

00:08:48.374 --> 00:08:50.217
which is one of those four
pilgrimage sites that we

00:08:50.217 --> 00:08:51.462
saw on that map.

00:08:51.462 --> 00:08:54.171
But really accelerated
the spread of Buddhism,

00:08:54.171 --> 00:08:58.630
especially beyond India,
was the reign of the emperor

00:08:58.630 --> 00:09:01.284
Ashoka during the Maurya Empire.

00:09:01.284 --> 00:09:04.282
And we talk about Ashoka, we
have a whole video on him,

00:09:04.282 --> 00:09:08.528
but he eventually converts to
Buddhism and he sponsors it,

00:09:08.528 --> 00:09:11.304
he builds temples, and he
sponsors missionaries to

00:09:11.304 --> 00:09:15.569
spread Buddhism from Europe
all the way to China.

00:09:15.569 --> 00:09:18.572
And so Buddha was obviously
the central figure,

00:09:18.572 --> 00:09:21.264
but Ashoka was the accelerant
that spread Buddhism

00:09:21.264 --> 00:09:22.347
to the world.