Free Essays on Advantages of Stupidity

Most people say being stupid will lead nowhere. They claim that it is the worst possible condition in which to spend one's life, and if possible, it should be completely avoided. Yet, perhaps if people took a closer look at some of the advantages stupidity had to offer, they wouldn't have such a negative attitude toward it. After reading this paper, one will understand the advantages of stupidity. Admittedly, stupidity has certain disadvantages. Life isn't a bowl of cherries. And being stupid doesn't make it any fruitier. Being stupid can annoy even the most sensitive people. If one acts stupid, and does it in the wrong crowd, like a group of adults, it will seem more immature than funny. If one is forced to act stupid while dealing with lower life forms, for example, high school teachers, one may encounter barriers such as cruelty and insensitivity, with the utterance of statements like, "Think with your head straight!" or, "You have a brain, use it." Yet these are all true, there are still many advantages to stupidity. The first advantage is very easy to understand. Stupid people are never asked to do a lot. Many have noticed that people tend to steer away from someone they feel may be stupid. This is for a very good reason. The stupidity that they posses makes a name for them, a name that can be very difficult to shake. It could possibly be a word that describes the working habits of the person, such as "crappy". Yet, this creates a positive situation for the stupid person. They will have a lot of free time on their hands for more of life’s truly meaningful pleasures. Some of these activities are combing facial hair, and counting the pixels on a Sony TV. Now, there has been a rumor going around that suggests that stupid people have low expectations. This is true. They are so stupid that they don't realize great from O.K. They could have a Sanyo cordless phone, but would probably choose instead a Pier... Free Essays on Advantages of Stupidity Free Essays on Advantages of Stupidity Most people say being stupid will lead nowhere. They claim that it is the worst possible condition in which to spend one's life, and if possible, it should be completely avoided. Yet, perhaps if people took a closer look at some of the advantages stupidity had to offer, they wouldn't have such a negative attitude toward it. After reading this paper, one will understand the advantages of stupidity. Admittedly, stupidity has certain disadvantages. Life isn't a bowl of cherries. And being stupid doesn't make it any fruitier. Being stupid can annoy even the most sensitive people. If one acts stupid, and does it in the wrong crowd, like a group of adults, it will seem more immature than funny. If one is forced to act stupid while dealing with lower life forms, for example, high school teachers, one may encounter barriers such as cruelty and insensitivity, with the utterance of statements like, "Think with your head straight!" or, "You have a brain, use it." Yet these are all true, there are still many advantages to stupidity. The first advantage is very easy to understand. Stupid people are never asked to do a lot. Many have noticed that people tend to steer away from someone they feel may be stupid. This is for a very good reason. The stupidity that they posses makes a name for them, a name that can be very difficult to shake. It could possibly be a word that describes the working habits of the person, such as "crappy". Yet, this creates a positive situation for the stupid person. They will have a lot of free time on their hands for more of life’s truly meaningful pleasures. Some of these activities are combing facial hair, and counting the pixels on a Sony TV. Now, there has been a rumor going around that suggests that stupid people have low expectations. This is true. They are so stupid that they don't realize great from O.K. They could have a Sanyo cordless phone, but would probably choose instead a Pier...

How Ancient Hunters Used Desert Kites

How Ancient Hunters Used Desert Kites A desert kite (or kite) is a variation on a type of communal hunting technology used by hunter-gatherers throughout the world. Like similar ancient technologies such as buffalo jumps or pit traps, desert kites involve a collection of people purposefully herding a large group of animals into pits, enclosures, or off steep cliff edges. Desert kites consist of two long, low walls generally built of unmortared fieldstone and arranged in a V- or funnel shape, broad at one end and with a narrow opening leading to an enclosure or pit at the other end. A group of hunters would chase or herd large game animals into the wide end and then chase them down the funnel to the narrow end where they would be trapped in a pit or stone enclosure and easily slaughtered en masse. Archaeological evidence suggests that the walls dont have to be tall or even very substantialhistorical kite use suggest that a row of posts with rag banners will work just as well as a stone wall. However, kites cannot be used by a single hunter: it is a hunting technique that involves a group of people planning in advance and working communally to herd and eventually slaughter the animals. Identifying Desert Kites Desert kites were first identified in the 1920s by Royal Air Force pilots flying over the eastern desert of Jordan; the pilots named them kites because their outlines as seen from the air reminded them of the childrens toy kites. Extant remnants of kites number in the thousands, and are distributed throughout the Arabian and Sinai peninsulas and as far northward as southeastern Turkey. Over a thousand have been documented in Jordan alone. The earliest desert kites are dated to the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B period of 9th-11th millennia BP, but the technology was used as recently as the 1940s to hunt the Persian goitered gazelle (Gazella subgutturosa). Ethnographic and historic reports of these activities state that typically 40-60 gazelles could be trapped and killed in a single event; on occasion, up to 500-600 animals could be killed at once. Remote sensing techniques have identified well over 3,000 extant desert kites, in a wide variety of shapes and configurations. Archaeology and Desert Kites Over the decades since the kites were first identified, their function has been debated in archaeological circles. Until about 1970, a majority of archaeologists believed that the walls were used to herd animals into defensive corrals in times of danger. But archaeological evidence and ethnographic reports including documented historic slaughtering episodes have led most researchers to discard the defensive explanation. Archaeological evidence for the use and dating of kites includes intact, or partially intact stone walls extending out for a distance from a few meters to a few kilometers. Generally, they are built where the natural environment helps the effort, on flat land between narrow deeply incised gullies or wadis. Some kites have constructed ramps leading gently upward to increase the drop-off at the end. Stone-walled or oval pits at the narrow end are generally between six and 15 meters deep; they are also stone-walled and in some cases are built into cells so that the animals cant gain enough speed to leap out. Radiocarbon dates on charcoal within the kite pits are used to date the time that the kites were in use. Charcoal isnt typically found along the walls, at least not associated with the hunting strategy, and luminescence of the rock walls has been used to date them. Mass Extinction and Desert Kites Faunal remains in the pits are rare, but include gazelle (Gazella subgutturosa or G. dorcas), Arabian oryx (Oryx leucoryx), hartebeest (Alcelaphus bucelaphus), wild asses (Equus africanus and Equus hemionus), and ostrich (Struthio camelus); all of these species are now rare or extirpated from the Levant. Archaeological research at the Mesopotamian site of Tell Kuran, Syria, has identified what appears to be a deposit from a mass kill resulting from the use of a kite; researchers believe that the overuse of desert kites may have led to the extinction of these species, but it might also be climate change in the region leading to changes in regional fauna. Sources Bar-Oz, G., et al. â€Å"Role of Mass-Kill Hunting Strategies in the Extirpation of Persian Gazelle (Gazella Subgutturosa) in the Northern Levant.†Ã‚  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 108, no. 18, 2011, pp. 7345–7350.Holzer, A., et al. â€Å"Desert Kites in the Negev Desert and Northeast Sinai: Their Function, Chronology and Ecology.†Ã‚  Journal of Arid Environments, vol. 74, no. 7, 2010, pp. 806–817.Kennedy, David. â€Å"The ‘Works of the Old Men’ in Arabia: Remote Sensing in Interior Arabia.†Ã‚  Journal of Archaeological Science, vol. 38, no. 12, 2011, pp. 3185–3203.Kennedy, David. â€Å"Kites - New Discoveries and a New Type.†Ã‚  Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy, vol. 23, no. 2, 2012, pp. 145–155.Nadel, Dani, et al. â€Å"Walls, Ramps and Pits: the Construction of the Samar Desert Kites, Southern Negev, Israel.†Ã‚  Antiquity, vol. 84, no. 326, 2010, pp. 976–992.Rees, L.W.B. â⠂¬Å"The Transjordan Desert.†Ã‚  Antiquity, vol. 3, no. 12, 1929, pp. 389–407.