An example of the evolution of culture through the use of technology can be demonstrated by looking at the progression of medical advancements. Morgan identified these stages as; middle savagery, upper savagery, lower barbarism, middle barbarism, upper barbarism and civilization.
500BC- treated illnesses with magic and herbal remedies. Use of supernatural powers of a shamans, gods, witch doctors. Illnesses would be healed with herbal medicines and some crude attempts at surgery.
500-1400AD- Superstition still ruled the beliefs about medicine. Medical schools and hospitals were beginning to be built to look at medicine as a science. First identification of measles and small pox.
1400-1600- Study of anatomy and dissection dead bodies. Discovery of that the heart recycles blood and acts as a pump to circulate it throughout the body. Doctors were expensive or not reachable so the use of midwives and herbal remedies continued. Minor surgeries such as bloodletting, boil removal, and removal of teeth were commonly done at local barbershop.
18th/19th century- experimental use of live smallpox vaccines, use of ether for anesthesia, discovery of bacteria which led to the use of antiseptics.
20th /21st century- discovery of X-rays, ultrasound and CAT and MRI scans. Penicillin is first used. Research and technology like lasers improved medical procedures. Organ transplant, embryonic stem cell treatments, cloning of the first mammal.
In keeping with Morgan’s theory of uniform and progressive cultural evolution the technology that is currently in use would place our culture in the “civilized” stage while other cultures that continue to utilize traditional/indigenous medicine would be classified as the “savagery or barbaric” stages of evolution.
Nineteenth-Century Evolutionism
This was a period in science and human thought that affected great changes in how people understand the world and human development.
Notable people of this era include:
Charles Darwin and Alfred Wallace,
Herbert Spencer,
Sir Edward Burnett Tylor,
Lewis Henry Morgan,
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
Notable publications include:
-Herbert Spencer, The Social Organism (1860)
-Lewis Henry Morgan, Ethnical Periods (1877)
-Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Feuerbach. Opposition of the Materialist and Idealist Outlook (1845-1846)
-Edward Burnett Tylor, Science of Culture (1871)
The readings from this section share some similar tendencies, one among these is the idea of human interaction as an evolutionary process. Spenser’s theory is very unilateral in suggesting that civilization progress, or evolve. His writing gives an analogous view of civilization and human interaction as a biological organism, suggesting that the social factors of human interaction have evolved from simplistic to more complicated. This…
View original post 209 more words
jumpinhare 