How could a conspiracy survive millennia of years?

Of all human endeavors it seems that they share one trait. They all end. Every civilization, language, and technology has been replaced. How then could a conspiracy survive all this. How could a small group, or group of families, actually stay in control through this. I have asked this question for twelve years. I share my conclusions now. Do with them as you will.

• First the approach to a possible answer.
  
• Second if a theory has any credence there should be some evidence.
  
• Third a commentary on a few great men of history.
  

First the approach to a possible answer.

Every approach seems to reach a dead end. In every case I looked at the group in question went extinct. The Medes, the Annunaki, The Templars, you name it. Every one of them has a major break in the line of their existence. Deciding this approach was not working I tried another.

Tracking the wealth. This approach is even worse. The wealth jumps around within the civilizations, organizations, groups, and families themselves. One brother kills another for the throne. A new group rises up to control Rome, over and over. Someone defects, has a conversion, or changes their mind.

What about the literature. Again there is no obvious single thread. Writing and records are lost, discovered, aggregated, diffused, willfully destroyed, or outright mocked by their own descendants. Even the longest surviving cultures have huge breaks in their continuity attested to by records of their own mini-Renaissance, where the past ways are re-discovered.

So I tried a new approach. Or new to me anyway. I asked a simple question. Could I make a conspiracy that would last through all time.

This immediately flooded my mind with a myriad of other questions. Why would my own children care, or even bother to continue it. What definition of outsider would resist mutation over time and prevent the conspiracy from falling into the hands of others. How could a small group survive the storms of history intact and not wind up just another shipwreck on the shores of history. And many more. Ideals change, values change, philosophy changes, and even rituals change.

At least now I have some operating parameters. The conspiracy should be resistant to change, yet dynamic enough to mutate. Membership should be able to change while preserving the original idea. And what ever it is, it should be precious enough to be worth keeping secret, yet of little value so no desperate person would sell it off to save themselves.

I submit my current theory now. Mathematics fits the bill. But how? How does one make conspiracy of math. To look for clues I moved back to looking for evidence.

I examined my own personal experience with math. Being a product of my times, I thought back over public education in America. I remember being just another student struggling with addition and multiplication tables. Just like everyone else. Doing drills, repetitions, learning by rote. But I also remember later, students saying things like "you're smart" or "can you show me how..." What happened. How did so many people seem to be falling behind in algebra. Why do so few sign up for trigonometry. Why is calculus not a requirement to get into college.

I went back over my memory, probed further with my feelings. My first theory was long division. That seemed to be the breaking point. Memorizing multiplication tables seemed ok enough for everyone to at least try. But at long division I saw many people who just didn't get it. Others who just sighed and resigned them selves, yet it was clear that they had decided math wasn't for them. In still others outright hostility to being forced to learn long division. One student even challenged the teacher. "This is no use in the real world."

Ok, so I've got a theory. I've got an "idea" that can appear like a guarded secret, yet can't be sold off. And I've got a hunch that this can be used for great control, even predictive like results. But I still don't get how it's a conspiracy. Is it possible that we are being intentionally taught math the wrong way, and we don't even know it. Scarier still, is it possible that the original conspirators died off, and mankind is saddled with an encrypted math system. Leaving us with no key to unlocking the damage.


part 2 will be posted tomorrow.

math truly scares me... when faced with a difficult problem or formula i get the horrible gut wrenching feeling of freefalling.. i just thought you would like to speculate on that..

It is now tomorrow in Hawaii . . .

So I meditated. What do I really know about mathematics. Immediately intimidated I realized the room was already full of the giants of history. Euler, Archemedes, Pythagoras, just to name a few. Surely if these men had not solved the totality of math, no one would.

Ok, so let's accept that the geniuses of math are not deceived. Where then to hide the conspiracy. My instincts leapt straight to math education. It's not that a conspiracy wants no one to understand the secrets, it's just that they want few to understand them. Is there a way to approach math where everyone could become an Escher?

Looking at math education theory leaves me even more frustrated. I recoil and regroup. I almost give up. Maybe math really is just too hard. The key to unlocking it would have to be everywhere by now anyway. If it exists at all.

What could possibly have existed for all this time, right before our very eyes, and all of mankind just couldn't see it. At least, not for what it was. Feeling I was on dangerous ground of putting my own ego over that of all humanity by even asking these questions I come to a full stop. Desparing of my own hubris I retreat to my religious upbringing as a Catholic.

Then it hits me like a bolt of lightning.

What is the first math function in the bible.

division not addition.

We learn to add first in school.

But the Bible starts with "divided the light from the dark."

I run find a bible and start reading genesis.

"...and God blessed them, saying, be fruitful, and multiply..."

Ok, so lets try this theory out. I don't even know how to phrase it. Start with division, then learn multiplication maybe. Addition and subtraction comes later? The doubt is coming back, but at this point I have so much invested in it that I press on.

Like someone who just wants the answer I jump over all the problems rising up in my mind and just assume it works. "Ok, what if it's a _given_ that learning math is easier if one starts with division. Well, addition is easier. There's no getting around that. But it also occurs to me that desert comes at the end of the meal. The light fluffy, fun to eat part. The broccoli and chewy meat comes first. Much to the angst of children. Are we starting our children out with desert by teaching addition first so that they are full and not interested when they get to division.

I have an image of a teacher with a first grade class. She has a pie and is going to cut it. "Now class I'm going to cut this pie so each one of you gets a piece." The class is very interested.

Maybe it is possible to start with division. I have doubts. Big ones. And I feel like I'm floundering. So I go back to the great men of math. How would this affect them.

"Not at all."

Any mathematician can work a problem forwards or backwards. They can use addition to do division or multiplication. In fact one of the principals of math is that it MUST give the same answer forwards or backwards.

Then the conspiracy theory comes back in the room. If it is easier, and if any child can be raised to be a Babbage, then those in the know will have the ultimate gift. Genius level comprehension of math. In fact the occasional brilliant men of math have overcome the upside down way it is taught will be a great asset. Useful but unable to undo the secret.

Seems like a perfect fit for a conspiracy that could survive millennia.

But if it's true, where is the evidence.

Well, the bible starts with division, then moves to multiplication. It does not start with addition. But surely there is more evidence than that.

Part 3 will be posted tomorrow

Multiplication IS addition.
Division IS subtraction.

"Be fruitful and ADD"

I'm going back and read your OP and posts again.

It is now Friday in Abu Dahbi

Second if a theory has any credence there should be some evidence.

1. The great pyramids.

Add one block at a time, and one can build a pyramid. Is the great pyramid a monument to the inception of the conspiracy to teach math in the wrong way? Why was the cutting and transporting of stones reserved to the high priests and holy elect. Isn't quarrying a process where one divides out blocks from the bedrock.
I belive the method was to snap a chalk line, drill holes, drive stakes in, and pour water over them. The stakes absorb the water, expand, and crack! Along the perforated line a block is divided out of the rock.
Basic addition and subtraction is sufficient for the servants who place the stones, make bricks, or follow the design plans.
What would a monument to division look like. Would it be massive pyramid shaped hole in the ground.

Ok, this is not evidence. I'm probably just seeing what I want to see. I move on.

2. The calendar systems

Add up days and one gets a week. Add up weeks and one almost gets a month. Add up months and one almost gets a year. Are calendar systems a monument to learning math the wrong way. Are we taught to add up days to get a week, to add up weeks for a month. That this month has an extra day, or this one a day less.
But the calendar makers start by dividing the year. First into seasons, then months, and then they find some unit smaller than months that seems to work best. A seven day week, a ten day week (Egyptian), or a twenty day week (Aztec), etcetera.
Some fiddling with addition and subtraction is needed to make it work right. The Aztecs have 5 "evil" days to round out the year, sometimes 4. The Egyptians . . .

Ok, this is not evidence. I myself have admitted that math works both ways. One could start with a day and figure out a year, or one could start with a year and figure out a week.

3. The law

I have no clue. Isn't law divided into royal and common, or criminal and civil, or property and contract. But how is it taught. Is it taught in a slowly accumulated series of discreet pieces. I think it's call precedent, or case histories.

Ok, this is not evidence. I feel like I'm just making the achievements of humanity wear a suit of clothes that I made for them. I'm not convinced.

4. Agriculture.

The civil authority divides up the land into lots. The farmer divides up the lot into fields and rows. They plant, they harvest, they multiply their seed. Herdsmen multiply their flocks.
I don't know any farmers. I don't know how farming is taught. Do people learn farming by first being added as an extra set of hands for the harvest. No clue.

Ok, this seems to be evidence that their is _no_ conspiracy to teach math wrong.

5. War.

Divide and conquer. Heard it, before. Was this principle a guarded secret for a very long period of time. Once again, no clue.
I do remember from my time in boot camp that the first thing done was I was assigned a billet number. Basically so I would know my place in the rank and file. This seems to be a type of "addition" approach to learning. I do remember that sometimes people were subtracted from our company, and sometimes people added. But everyone was aware of what division we were in.

Ok, so this isn't evidence either. In fact now I think I dreamed up the whole thing because I was in boot camp, and my military experience has affected my outlook on the world and the way it works.


Part 5 tomorrow. The last instalment.

The last instalment.

I'm sorry, I've lost my nerve.


David Grouchy

my good man ,please continue ,for i lost touch with math as soon as i got to division ,i do not know my addition by heart or subtraction and because of this i have had a negitive live ,i am now in the prosess of re learning ,and every word made sens to me ,this is a wonderful thread

please continue multiplying your thread

many thanks


Nephi

Now I'm not much fo reading the bible... but I'm pretty sure the first thing is "let there be light"... sounds like adding something to nothing to me....

Holy thread necromancy Batman!
Isn't this post from last winter?


David Grouchy