Posts by Aaron Fox19

It feels like there's a huge shift toward characters who are just deeply, profoundly lonely. I find myself relating more to the isolation and the "searching for connection" vibe than the actual action scenes lately. Does anyone else feel like these stories are becoming more about the emptiness of modern life than the actual powers?

Here's something for you losers...

No... I don't need a leader. I can't stand authority figures.
I'm fiercely independent... just like the mountain man Jeremiah Johnson.😛

I respect people with actual backbone—people who follow their own compass instead of some boss. I'm a huge advocate for anarchy. And I don't mean street riots; I mean true social autonomy.

Faith is a private matter. On this planet, belief systems are incredibly diverse; you've got everything from the guy on the cross, to bald seated figures, bearded nomads, or various human and animalistic demigods and gods.

Personally, I'm not biologically wired for conventional faith, so I went with Zeus and the Gods. It works for me because they actually reflect human personalities.

As for how we all got here? I have no clue why or how... and most days, I don't care.

And you aren't just talking nonsense; you sound like a very rational person trying to see the bright side of life.
That's fine by me...

Rachel Palmer56 said:Look, every single word carries weight, which means every sentence has an ultimate purpose.
It’s on us to actually learn how to read between the lines once in a while.
Trust me, if understanding the Bible is hard enough, trying to decipher a human being is even worse.
But at the end of the day, the ability to understand lies within ourselves.
I’m reading you, even if I haven't truly "read" you until now. Even lone wolves like you need to talk to someone sometimes, even if it’s just through some digital footprint like this.🙂

That was a beautiful way to put it. It’s smooth, welcoming, and you don't feel any hesitation about opening up or placing your trust in someone.
I accept the deal, and I hope we can actually make this corner of the internet interesting.
You take the lead; I’m not great at navigating this stuff.
Now that I’ve laid everything out upfront, maybe we won't end up talking about nothing at all...
To keep things from getting cold, here is a song to get the energy moving.

Up until now, this conversation actually made sense.
Look, I don't want to be rude, but I struggle to talk about things in a broad, rambling way without losing the point...
It’s not that I’m refusing to do it, I just don't have the knack for it...
I'm honestly worried we're going to run out of things to say pretty fast... You clearly know how to hold a conversation.

So who am I supposed to chat with now?

Megan Chase43 said:Aaron Fox19, just go over there to check them in and tell them you're my buddy so they skip the paperwork. Get ready... there are some hot girls there.

Are you seriously trying to push me away..?
And why exactly...?☕

I get it. My posts are getting on your nerves because they aren't what you want to see. Fine.
But I'm doing this on purpose. It isn't an accident...

So, where are these "hot" girls located..?
What does "hot girl" even mean to you?🤔

Megan Chase43 said:Linear B was deciphered, but Linear A remains a mystery.

Evans found tablets in Knossos featuring a script that wasn't alphabetic. There are two symbol systems that look similar but aren't identical. They were dubbed Linear A and Linear B.
Blegen discovered Linear B tablets at a Mycenaean palace unearthed in the city of Pylos, and later, those same types of tablets were found right in Mycenae itself.
Champollion used a bilingual document—the Rosetta Stone—to crack his code, but there was nothing like that available for deciphering Linear B. Every attempt was a dead end until Ventris and Chadwick decided to work under the assumption that the language was Greek. That’s when the equivalencies started appearing, and the two of them managed to crack 65 out of 90 characters.

Because identity in the ancient world was defined primarily by language, this shifts the entire timeline of Greek history. Instead of starting in the 8th century, we move back to the mid-second millennium BCE, specifically the end of the 15th Century, because that's when Mycenae becomes part of the Greek story.
You can see it for yourself in the show; the older professor mentions how certain local Mycenaean deities actually merged into the Greek Pantheon and took their places on Olympus.

The mere thought that there is still so much left to uncover about a lost civilization is enough to excite anyone searching for meaningful answers about the people who inhabited this planet before us...

I can't even put into words how stunned I was watching the segment on the Antikythera mechanism. It blew my mind that long ago, they didn't just have the concept, they had the actual execution regarding how the Greeks organized their lives.
Just imagine an instrument that advanced, rivaling modern technology.
It leaves you asking one question over and over: how?

Most of the Wonders of the World refer to the Greek world anyway...

Talking about the Greeks is like talking about one of the great mysteries of the world... You can never get enough. It's nectar for free thinkers. You can never fully grasp the world if you don't understand the significance of the Greeks...
Quite simply, if we accept the sad truth that every civilization falls once it reaches its peak, then we have to wonder where our own end is hiding...
Did the Greeks know the same thing?!

Megan Chase43 said:I'm telling you, both the host and the professor are Helen. 🙏I actually enjoyed following this thread and watching how they talked to each other. And that light flirting at the end? Pure gold.😍 Too sweet.

Hmm... I can't say I noticed that. In this case...

Megan Chase43 said:The discovery of Linear B changed everything. These tablets were strictly administrative—lists of warehouse inventory, supplies, and various logistics. It gives you a crystal-clear window into how life actually functioned in Mycenae. While you can see Eastern influences bleeding into Crete, the core of their culture remains distinctly their own. Essentially, the Minoan culture was spreading its reach across Greece.

But that letter hasn't been deciphered yet—and if we can't crack Etruscan either, then what are we actually doing here?
And when that happens? Who knows.Finally, some actual good news from ancient history. Maybe there's even a mention of Helen in here.

Megan Chase43 said:I can just picture Agamemnon yelling about how the Cretans don't even have decent beads.

Your passion is intense... even Achilles would be jealous.

Megan Chase43 said:Thanks, Aaron Fox19. It’s beautiful.

I visited Mycenae, Epidaurus, Delphi, and of course, all the major sites in Athens. Mycenae was actually closed off for construction, but I still managed to get a look at the Lion Gate. You have to feel that atmosphere for yourself. It’s essential if you've spent any part of your life dedicated to this culture. I didn't truly feel at peace until I saw Parnassus.😁

The Minoan culture....
Watching that show, they brought up that insane fortress again. Apparently, those massive stones are such a mystery that even the experts can't figure out how they were actually built.

What’s your take on this?

Delphi is the gold standard. Especially that inscription.Know yourself.

Megan Chase43 said:I was looking for an image of Achilles on some kind of pottery and stumbled upon this. It's just a school presentation on the basics of colonization, starting from those first Ionian colonies in Asia Minor.
The most interesting part at the end—something I didn't know—is how the Old Town Field in the US served as one of the best-preserved examples of ancient Greek land distribution across the entire Mediterranean...

http://www.slideshare.net/Strukovnas...a-prezentacija

😍

Plato had a sense of humor. 😬

Thanks, Megan... Let me offer a poem as a small token of appreciation for what you've shared here regarding a world that might be gone, but will never truly vanish as long as people like us are around to remember it.

I've been to Pharos, seen the stone tablet they eventually sent back to its home island of Paros... I've stood on Corcyra and seen the very first Greek pier...
Ugh.

Hmm... sounds interesting.
You can really feel that Greek spirit here.

I’ll add something to this. I’ve been reading this book lately—slowly, thoroughly, and with total devotion for months now. I'll drop a few lines here just for my own soul...

..He thrusts his spear with such force that it slams into Achilles' shield,
And Achilles quickly pulls the shield away from his body to dodge
the blow.
It never occurred to him that the shield was a divine creation, designed to be
impenetrable to any mortal hand.
Of the five plates that made up the shield, two were bronze, two were zinc, and one was gold.

Then Achilles hurls his spear and strikes Aeneas on the shield where the bronze is thinnest.
The impact is massive, splitting the shield and driving the spear deep into the ground.
A chill runs through Aeneas and darkness clouds his eyes because he’s left completely defenseless. With a terrifying cry, Achilles lunges at him with a bare sword in hand.
To defend himself against the attacker, Aeneas grabs a heavy stone with his right hand, intending to hurl it at him.

Poseidon, seeing Aeneas' obvious doom, rushes onto the battlefield.
Stepping between the heroes, he shrouds Achilles in a thick fog, blinding him to Aeneas.
He pulls a spear from the shield, places it at Achilles' feet, and whisks Aeneas away to safety on the edge of the battlefield.

Megan Chase43 said:I get what you value about them—that drive to enrich life with things that go beyond mere survival, moving past just religion. There are so many vital aspects of their culture; in my opinion, their beauty and philosophy are among the most significant.
It seems to me that when it comes to urban development, the Romans were ahead. At one point, the city of Rome had 2 million residents. It took...
I honestly don't recall Aristotle saying something like that. Maybe he did, but to me, it sounds much more like ideas from Plato's Republic. I know Aristotle believed the best political community is one formed by middle-class citizens. In his view, the wealthy are too spoiled from childhood and become disobedient, leading them to rule only through despotism. The poor are too humiliated and weak to follow principles of reason or to command, so they have to be ruled like slaves.

I'm not sure, but I can say you're probably right... It might indeed be Plato's Republic.

What fascinates me about the Danaids is that simple yet incredibly powerful essence...
Men, bare bodies, philosophy, fate...
They put everything into context, and it all possesses such sense and style...
Incredible... Such tiny little colonies created so much, spanning everywhere from Colchis to Syracuse to the Nile delta or Scythia....

What kind of Greek man had to be to grasp all of this in one relatively short lifetime? It’s as if their destiny was predetermined, whispered to them the moment they understood their first words. As if they knew this wasn't their world and that they were essentially leaving the moment they were born.
A boldness that borders on awe... It might not be an exact match for time, but it brings to mind the definition of a gentleman... Someone who fights for battles that are already lost...
As if they stole that very sense of purpose from the Greeks..

stormybison42 said:Every world eventually has to collapse; that’s just how it works. **The whole foundation of Christianity rests on free will.** The world we live in right now is the direct result of that free will—the choices made by Adam. If you want to get technical about religious conventions and who believes what where, then fine, go ahead. ☕

It's interesting how every civilization that ever rose had to fall. From the Sumerians to Elam, there's nothing left of them. Just gone. Everything resets to zero.

I want to emphasize two points here..

I recently watched a documentary (I think it was a CNN production) that compared Athens and Sparta, specifically looking at them as city-states and their infrastructure..
Can we even imagine a mid-sized American city today having such a perfectly organized drainage system, street cleaning, precise street layouts, and a structured arrangement of homes and temples and plazas?
Everything was meticulously ordered, though Sparta lagged behind significantly because they simply didn't prioritize urban planning and stuff like that.
Their entire goal was to forge an absolutely unquestionable military powerhouse, stretching all the way to Mount Taygetus...
They were building a warrior—a man of war—under the eyes of Ares...
In contrast, Athens was developing a much broader philosophy..

Didn't Aristotle envision a world where every king would be a philosopher, and vice versa?
Wasn't it ultimately the Greek striving to rise above lower human traits and ascend into something truly worthy of admiration...

They were always pushing to create something new. They knew perfectly well that, at his core, Man is just a fickle, vulnerable, and often hard-to-understand two-legged animal..

Megan Chase43 said:"In the eyes of the Greek, man's defining trait wasn't intelligence—not in the way we spread it around today—but rather a specific kind of courage known in their tongue as arete ... Their favorite heroes were Achilles, the bravest of men, and Ulysses, whose brilliant mind would have been worthless without his fearless heart...
The lesson from Greece is less about politics and more about morality; it’s a lesson in humility and temperance that keeps a person grounded. A man is capable of understanding but also capable of ignoring; he loves life but knows it's fleeting; he uses his intellect with pleasure but never forgets that the future belongs to the Gods...
That Greek experienced human passion but remained aware of his own weaknesses. That's why he doesn't despise his enemy. "

Everything said here suggests the Achaeans were basically supermen compared to modern people. You have to look at our current standards of living—our housing, our transport, the sheer opportunities available to an individual during a lifetime...

From all this, I can sense that steel-like willpower in the Greek, that raw drive for life.
It was a simple grasp of commerce, of developing what you have, of pure creation, always shadowed by the realization that the Gods will eventually judge every mortal.

I don't have enough words to express my admiration.
How could a world like that fall apart? Now, we just have religious conventions that have completely suffocated free thinkers—the very thing the Greeks clearly valued most.
Free thought...

Megan Chase43 said:*Antifraza...using an opposite term, an ancient rhetorical device for a litotes figure, especially when a word is used in a sense completely contrary to its primary meaning. If the concept is expressed through a negated opposite, it's akin to irony.

Antifraza is proof of a certain level of consciousness, isn't it? They actually used their brains. They didn't just blindly follow whatever was wrong... They knew how to recognize logic.

Megan Chase43 said:Are you actually sure the Skitian tribes were Greek? I don't think they were. Herodotus gives them plenty of space in his book. I'm not sure if it was all Skitian tribes or just some of them, but they practiced human sacrifice... every hundredth prisoner 🙂

They did all sorts of things, look at this...

2) The Skiti gouge out the eyes of all their slaves to get the milk they live on, and this is how they prepare it. They take bone pipes that look a lot like flutes, insert them into the rear of a mare, and blow through them. While some blow, others milk her. They say they do this because the blowing causes the mare's veins to swell and relaxes her. Once they're done milking, they pour the milk into large wooden vessels, and the blind people gather around the vessel to churn it. They collect the milk that settles on the surface, considering it the best part, while the liquid underneath is seen as inferior. That’s why the Skiti blind every man they capture. They aren't farmers; they're nomads.

Herodotus, History (Book Four)

Herodotus called them bald men (I don't think he liked them much🤣).

The Achaeans are the Achaeans.

That's not what I said...

Look... the Skiti and the Gepids were extremely hostile toward the Greek colonizers expanding along the edge of the Ponto. From the Danube delta through Crimea to Colchis (modern-day Abkhazia), areas they rarely settled.

During times when the Skiti were more inclined toward trade, those Greeks would enter their territory with caution.
Most of the time, they were just warring against one another..

To be clear, the Skiti killed any Greeks they captured; there's specific mention of pirates from Crimea..
While the Greeks had culture, laws, art, crafts, temples, food production, and pottery, the Skiti just ran wild across the steppes, carving out their destiny through plunder..
There's no doubt the Skiti described here had long hair and beards, looked intimidating, wore clothes wrapped around their bodies and legs held by leather straps, and carried weapons ready at hand..

Greek History on the Black Sea was the first book I managed to finish this year...

It is an absolutely phenomenal read..

The stuff about the Skiti really blew my mind—specifically the fact that they left behind massive rampart remains in what we now call Kievan Rus, right at the Belskoe site... Estimates suggest they poured something like 11 million man-hours into building them..

The book clearly details accounts from Greeks who traveled inland from their coastal colonies along the Ponto, witnessing the sheer scale of this Skitian wonder firsthand...

Oh, those Achaeans... Glory to the Gods for you..

To be flawed and actually own up to it—that’s true consciousness. It gives you an edge over the people who are too slow to catch on.

I'm willing to take the risk of being here, because years slip by while days just drag on forever.
People need a spark of excitement to snap them out of their mindless daily grind.
So, if you write with enough passion, you'll feel a surge of power from above hitting us mere mortals, who so often forget that we don't have to spend our lives walking small beneath the stars...

"Happiness is a journey," or whatever someone once said.