Episode 97

The fifth episode in a series with Gyrus which sprawls across a variety of topics in anthropology, cosmology, cognitive science and recent political developments. Gyrus continues talking about his evolving ideas about "polar cosmology" leading us back to the topic of egalitarianism and how hunter-gatherer societies allowed hierarchies to develop. Gyrus describes some important work done by radical anthropologists David Graeber and David Wengrow on seasonal gatherings and how these may be key to answering this question. The 12,000 year old site at Göbekli Tepe comes up, leading on to a brief discussion of cave art and Graham Hancock's writings on the topic.

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• axis mundi
• Gyrus, North (Strange Attractor Press, 2014)
• age of civilisation
• anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens sapiens)
• Neolithic era
• hunter-gatherers
• Terence McKenna
• David Graeber
• David Wengrow
• D. Wengrow, What Makes Civilization?: The Ancient Near East and the Future of the West (OUP, 2010)
• egalitarianism
• anarchoprimitivism
• Radical Anthropology Group (London)
• D. Wengrow and D. Graeber, "Farewell to the 'Childhood of Man': Ritual, Seasonality, and the Origins of Inequality", Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 21(3) (2015) 597–619
• Glastonbury Festival
• Pierre Clastres
• Éienne de la Boétie
• Göbekli Tepe
• G. Hancock, Supernatural: Meeting with the Ancient Teachers of Mankind (Century, 2005)
• cave paintings
• coming of age (rite of passage)
• alien abduction
• DMT (N,N-Dimethyltryptamine)
• Eurasian eagle-owl (Bubo bubo)