In John Lewis Gaddis's essay “The Landscape of History, Part II” he talks about how a human's maturity is measured by the ability of an individual to recognize his or her own insignificance compared to that which has preceded them. If this is true, then it is necessary that we abandon any false pretences of presentism and see that our accomplishments are not restricted to the contemporary.
In the modern age success is measured directly by advances in technology. With these advances occurring so rapidly it is hard to appreciate the improvement. Inventions such as the making of a computer with a 2.2 GHz processor and a 250 GB hard drive as opposed to the last model of 2.0 GHz and 200 GB are very insignificant advances when taken in the historical context of technological progression. As early as 400 BC Mayans invented the earliest known solar calendars. They also created a sophisticated mathematical system and independently came up with the concept of zero as a number. These are inventions that are timeless. These are the types of advances that we should take time out of our lives to look at and admire the ingenuity of their makers.
The Mayans combined three different calendars to keep track of time, the Tzolkin, the Haab, and the Long Count. All three of these were based on the movements of the sun, moon, and Venus, and the combination of the three produced an incredibly accurate calendar. The Tzolkin was composed of 260 days and used the numbers 1-13 and a repeating series of 20 days which acts like our days of the week and number of the months. The Haab calendar consisted of a 365 day solar cycle containing eighteen months with twenty days, and one short month with only five days named a Wayeb. When combining the Haab and the Tzolkin you get the calendar round, which was good for measuring time in relative terms but only for about a 52 year period. The long count was used just to measure time over large periods of time. The Mayans even understood that the 365 days in their calendar round was not a complete year and implemented their own leap year.
One of the things that let the Mayans make such an accurate calendar without telescopes is the mathematical system they developed. The Mayan system works in base 20 and uses only three symbols; a dot which equaled one, a bar that is equivalent to five, and the symbol zero which is characterized by a shell. In Europe people were trying to understand the Roman Numeral system but it had no zero and there was no direct connection from the number to the symbol making it difficult for those without education to understand. The simplicity of the Mayan counting system allowed unanimous comprehension because the numbers are symbolic; a stone can equal a dot, a stick the bar, and a closed hand for zero.
The Mayans came up with the concept of zero without any outside influences, this can only be said for three civilizations in humanities entirety. They then applied it to their base 20 system as a placeholder and used it for mathematical calculations. The Mayans used this symbol more than 1,000 years before the idea was ever used in Europe.
The Mayans are only one civilization and all of their achievements combined are trivial when compared to everything that has happened throughout history. In knowing this however one should not get discouraged and think that all they do is for naught, and will be considered unimportant by all. One should simply recognize what has come before them and respect it, and according to Gaddis in doing this reach self-maturation.
