Stephanie Paris

#cells #science #k-5
This book one of the best books I had found for an elementary lesson about cells! It begins by comparing cells to bricks as children know bricks, then goes over cell theory in a kid-friendly way, and finally, it talks about what cells do. Throughout the book, there are many great pictures and show examples of different types of cells, and provides fun facts. Just like any other great informative science book, it also includes a DIY science cell experiment where they study how diffusion works, and the materials are cheap and accessible.… (mais)

I liked this book for two reasons. First, the graphics in the book are amazing. Some of the images are actual photographs while others are illustrations to show certain things. For example, a chapter in the book talks about water pressure affecting a person's ears when swimming. The author included an cartoon image of an ear, labeling the eardrum and tubes that are affected. I thought that this was great way to show the reader what exactly is causing an ache to your ear when swimming. The second thing I liked about this book was the writing. There isn't one page in the book where there is one solid long paragraph. There are short paragraphs put into boxes that are either at the top, bottom, left or right of the page. For example, when book describes floating, there is a short paragraph at the top of the page but then a huge image of a ship underneath. The picture of the ship then has another box beside of it with facts.
Overall, the main idea of this book is to describe how water and air pressure is a part of lives in many unique ways.… (mais)

This is a very ancient story, probably one of the oldest that we have, having been written in ancient Mesopotamia. Despite its age it is still a relatively recent discovery, namely because we did not actually know about it until the clay tablets were dug up in northern Iraq. In fact many of the stories from ancient Mesopotamia are relatively recent discoveries having been hidden under the desert sands for millennia. I guess that is one of the good things about clay tablets in that they preserve quite well (though paper does as well, as the Nag Hammadi Library and the Dead Sea Scrolls attest to).
This is the Mesopotamian story of the creation of humanity and it includes a story about the flood. In a way it has connections with the Genesis account in the Bible, I that there are a few similarities in both works. However there are also a number of differences as well. We must keep in mind though that this text is quite corrupt, meaning that there are sections of the text that are missing and in many cases it is impossible for us to actually piece together what is being said, though the style of writing can help (the Mesopotamians seemed to like repeating lines in much the same way that the Old Testament does).
I should make clear my opinion of the Genesis account first of all. Now, traditionally it is held that Moses wrote the Pentateuch, which are the first five book of the Bible. Now, I do not dispute that, however my position is that Genesis was compiled and added to the Penteteuch by Moses, but the sources from which he complied Genesis are much older. Personally I do not buy into the redactionist argument in relation to the Old Testament, nor do I accept the source criticism approach, in that the Old Testament was written in Babylon during the captivity by a collection of priests who compiled a collection of myths that had developed over the intervening years. I consider that the biblical account is a first hand account, and considering my theological stance, see no problem with a omnipotent deity making sure that the true account is handed down.
Also, I see no reason why this account should supercede the Genesis account, and the only argument seems to be that people are so challenged by the biblical account that they must look for a different explanation for our origins and thus we turn to other ancient accounts despite the fact that these accounts are corrupted. I do not accept the 6000 odd year old Earth theory that was concocted by the Bishop of Ulster simply because I believe that the purpose of dating in the Old Testament was not necessarily put in place a method to enable us to calculate the exact age of the Earth. Since the Bible is not meant to be a scientific text, I do not believe that we should be applying scientific and mathematical concepts to it.
One of the things that I did notice about this story was that it seemed to be a political text. It is difficult for me to understand how the story was delivered and who it was delivered too. Was it something that was kept and shared amongst the nobility and the priesthood, or were these stories told to the slave population as well? It seems in a way to be something that would be told to the hoi poloi as a means to reminding them of their place in the world. The reason I say this is because of the reason behind the creation of man and the fear that the gods had in relation to humanity.
At the beginning we seem to have two layers within the realm of the gods. There were the gods that were in charge of the world, and then there were the Igigi who seemed to the the labourers. However it appears that the Igigi rebelled against the gods and laid siege to their holy city, and as such humanity was created to perform the work that the Igigi were performing, and this allowed the gods (who decided they no longer wanted to work) to sit back and relax. This seems to be a common theme in relation to a class system. The upper class does not want to work, so they force the lower classes to work, however as one class becomes more numerous or influential, they rebel and force themselves into the lazy class, as I will call them. In fact, this seems to reflect a Marxist view of history, in that it is dominated by class war, and we can see from this ancient text that the class war was being fought as far back as ancient Mesopotamia.
The problem with humanity was that the gods had made them too powerful, and as they became more powerful, and more populous, they became more of a threat. One suggestion is that the gods became annoyed because of all of the chattering that would come from humanity, though I suspect that it has more to do with fear of being overthrown. We see some connections with the biblical account as well since humanity went to war against the deity numerous times, and each time the diety acted to defend his position (not that it was threatened anyway). In the biblical account we see the beginning of a shortened lifespan, the dispersion of the population, and also the creation of languages. We see similar events in this epic.
What is noticeable is the actions that the gods perform to defend their position against an ever increasing human population. First of all disease is sent to wipe them out, however that does not succeed and humanity keeps on expanding, so they then send drought and famine, however one of the gods shows mercy and sends dew to water the land. Then there is something about 'tying up the air'. This is quite baffling as some people could almost suggest as if the population of Earth was being cut off from the rest of the galaxy. Is this an ancient account of the end of interstellar travel? Who is to know, though I will not be staking my reputation on it, but rather just float the idea simply because it is there. In any case, how did the ancient Mesopotamians know about the atmospheric covering of Earth, and how did they know that if they went too high then there would be no air? The only explanation is that they noticed that as they climbed higher up the mountains then the air would become thinner.
Finally we have the flood, though I do not necessarily want to go into too much details. Now, I am a supporter of a world wide flood as indicated not only in the Bible but here as well. Now, it is not surprising that an ancient Mesopotamian story would talk about a flood, the reason being is that it would always be flooding in the cradle of civilisation, and sometimes the floods would be so massive that the entire desert would be covered in water. This is possible and factual, however that is also ignoring all of the other flood stories the world over. It is not simply a question of stories and myths travelling around the Middle East by merchants, but rather ancestral memories dating back to the first post-deluvian man, that being Noah. We also consider that Palestine was mountainous (and still is), as is Greece (who have their own story of the flood with the survivor being Deucalion). Now mountainous countries do not make good settings for a world wide flood story, unless of course the flood was world wide (and I suspect that there is enough water on the Earth, especially if the sunken continental plates are risen, to flood the Earth). Look, I could go into a very deep scientific argument on the possibility of a world wide flood (and some Christian writers have done so), but I really don't want to go down that path at this time, and when I get to Gilgamesh (which is the next book on my list, sort of), I will probably try to steer away from it and focus more on the question of immortality and defeating death.

Now, even though I have already completed a commentary on this book I still cannot help but go over a few more aspects of this story because I feel that there is actually a lot more to consider than meets the eye. It is also very useful to compare with the biblical account, if only to see the similarities. Some would suggest that this book disproves the biblical account, however I generally take a different approach by saying that it actually goes a long way to support it. Others argue that the biblical account was written to counter these creation myths, and that I do not doubt, however we must still consider that the main purpose of the biblical account (as well as the others) is to outline our origins and to explain why the world is in the state that it is in.
First of all there is the creation of man, however it is interesting to note that this does not occur until later in the first tablet (the story is divided into tablets, which are basically the same as pages). Humanity was created from clay (which is the same as the biblical account) however the clay was also mixed with the blood of a dead god and with the spittle of each of the living gods. This, once again, is similar to the biblical account in where God breaths life into humanity thus indicating a divine origin and nature of our race. However, it differs in that the creator is the female god, and that she used a womb as a means of creating humanity. This obviously is reflective of what the ancients originally could see around them, particularly noting that a baby is formed in the womb of a female.
Being an origin myth the Atrahasis also explores the nature of the main Mesopotamian gods, with Anu, Ellil, and Enki dividing the world up amongst them. Anu was given the sky to be his domain, Ellil was given the Earth, and Enki was given the seas. In a way it is similar to the division in the Greek myths, with Zeus taking command over the sky, Hades being given the underworld (namely because the Earth was the domain of humanity) and Poseidon being given the sea. I suspect if we look closer to the Mesopotamian gods we will see a number of similarities with the Greek gods, though we should note that Ellil seems to be the god that has the biggest gripe with humanity while Enki is the one who always seems to step in and protect them.
The final aspect that I wish to explore is the nature of rebellion, something that I have flagged above as being central to the text itself. It appears that the text is really about rebellion and how the gods dealt with humanity's rebellion. This is critical as it provides the link to the biblical account in that the bible is really about humanities rebellion against God, and his response to it (though the Bible is also the story of how God redeems humanity). The interesting thing in the Atrahasis is that there are two rebellions, the first being the Igigi and the later being humanity. While not explicitly stated in the bible, there are a number of hints as to an angelic rebellion. This seems to be the same as the rebellion of the Igigi, however it differs in that the bible is very clear that the rebellious angels were cast out of heaven where as the Igigi's demands were met. Further, note that the Mesopotamian gods were not overthrown. This differs from the Greek myths in that there are also two rebellions, the first being the Titans rebelling against the rule of the old gods, and then the new gods rebelling against the Titans. In both events the rebels won and overthrew their predecessors. This could be reflective of the invasions that occurred over the period of Ancient Greek history known as the Dark Ages. It is quite possible, or more than possible, that the later gods were introduced by the invaders, and that the changes in the heavenly powers is indicative of these invasions.
Finally, the Atrahasis can be found here: Atrahasis… (mais)