So much depends...

[mythingperson]

How would the world be different, if one greedy man - probably a goatherd - hadn’t decided to betray his people? In 480 BC, Ephialtes looked out at the amassed forces of the Persians blockaded at Thermopylae, and apparently thought he was on the losing side. He showed them a way around the Greek army, a narrow track through the mountains which cut

Comments

[mythingperson]

"This is fascinating."

Thank you! :)

"I wish I would've done what I love."

What do you love?

" I already have 10,000 dollars in debt and will have more after another three years. College is such a tough decision to make now."

That is a terrible, terrible burden, and I'm sorry you're having to carry it. :(

[medleymisty]

Americans have made their choices. They want to be ignorant and they want to live in poverty and they want to be a third world country. If they didn't, they'd be demanding free education for everyone.

God I wish I had the resources to get out of here while the getting is good. Even without a college degree, I know enough about history and humans and society to know where this kind of thing ends up.

[mythingperson]

"Americans have made their choices. They want to be ignorant and they want to live in poverty and they want to be a third world country. If they didn't, they'd be demanding free education for everyone."I don't think this is really fair - the thing about established systems is that they are DAMNED hard to change and get rid of, especially in favor of radically different solutions. It's not so much that Americans have made their choices and want this the way it is, as that we don't know how to change what we have into something better, and we often can't agree on what better looks like. I mean, hell, I want it different. But I don't know how to make a difference, beyond doing the things that I do - volunteer, support legislation and legislators for the kinds of changes I support, give money to causes, that kind of thing. What am I going to do, go down to the local University's board of regents and tell them they need to find a different way to pay for the staff, the professors, the research, the education they're doing there? That

[ashgaelsonaria]

I studied what I wanted but my health got in the way.
I wrote a peace segesting that Nefretiti and Helen of Troy could have been the same person as one version of the Trojan war says that she was spirited to Egypt.

[mythingperson]

"I studied what I wanted but my health got in the way."

That sucks. I'm sorry.

"I wrote a peace segesting that Nefretiti and Helen of Troy could have been the same person as one version of the Trojan war says that she was spirited to Egypt."

It's an interesting theory, but one I personally wouldn't agree with - the most widely accepted site for the Trojan War is Troy VIIa, and it was destroyed sometime in the 1180s BC. Nefertiti is really well documented historically in the 1300's, so there's a pretty big gap of time there. Even presuming that the historical Troy is Troy VI instead of VIIa, that still puts the fall around 1275 BC.

Nefertiti was an amazing woman, and she did a lot in Egypt. She's a fascinating person to study. :)

[ashgaelsonaria]

Yes. I still use what I learned. Animal science is a complex field and having pets means that I use it a lot.

Granted.
There is so much mystery surrounding her. Mainly because the Egyptians believed that if you destroy the memory and accounts of someone you destroy their afterlife and cast their spirit into oblivion. It is likely that he was the Pharaoh in the story of Joseph but his attempt to force monotheisum on Egypt was very unpopular ...

[jem0000000]

I remember walking into my faculty advisor's office holding the paperwork to take Koine (Biblical) Greek two years after I completed my foreign language requirements. I expected a huge argument -- this isn't useful, you should be doing something that will help you get a job, all the other things adults said to me when I was adamant about a liberal arts college rather than a community college, despite the cost -- but he just looked at me, smiled, and said that he'd taken Greek in college too. :)

I'm still paying it off. But it was worth it.

[mythingperson]

"... but he just looked at me, smiled, and said that he'd taken Greek in college too. :) "

That's awesome!

There's really so much to be gained from studying another language - any language, honestly. You get the perspective of another people, I think, and that's incredibly valuable. And just deciphering the text and learning the structures of grammar develops all kinds of critical thinking skills. And you can do a lot of reading with koine!

[jem0000000]

It was! :)

We were largely looking at it within the context of Christianity, so I didn't get nearly the amount of cultural information that I did from studying Latin or even Spanish. But there was a lot of grammatical stuff, and it was more challenging than Latin, particularly in having a different alphabet and a more complex grammatical structure. (Also Latin has relatively few exceptions to the rules, which makes it pretty easy once you memorize the basic forms.) I wish I could have taken more than just a year, though. It was a lot of fun. :)

Yes! The only thing is that I discovered pretty quickly that it's not as easy to find ancient Greek texts that are still in the original as it is to find English translations. ;)

[halfshellvenus]

I majored in music for my undergrad degree, though I minored in math and had a fair number of language credits, too.

That was one of the beauties of college, I thought-- to pursue your passion, and also to try new things once that pesky General Ed stuff was out of the way. Two trimesters of philosophy with a required health class as the third "wedge"? Totally worth it.

[mythingperson]

:D I'm so glad you got to study broadly. What languages have you studied?

[halfshellvenus]

German (because it was offered starting in 7th grade, so I took the opportunity!), and then Beginning Welsh (because it's my heritage, and how often does THAT opportunity come along?)

My past career in classical music radio exposed me to a lot of pronunciation rules and random vocabulary for other languages as well. But as a result, since Spaniards have so little presence compared to others, Latin and Italian are much more firmly "in there" and I am always making ridiculous pronunciation mistakes in Spanish. I have to come to a complete stop to say "Las Cruces" with the soft "s" sound in the middle instead of saying "KROO-chays." It's laughable!

[mythingperson]

I took a few years of German, too! I fear I've forgotten more than I ever learned, though. Sigh.

Welsh is neat! I've never learned even a tiny bit of that one, and it fascinates me because it just looks so alien to my eyes.

And yes, those romance languages can be very pesky with pronunciation variations. My Latin background does not serve me well either when I fumble around with Spanish.