Great civilizations - why do they fail?
Yesterday I watched the historical drama film 'Agora' released in 2009 that was originally in Spanish and translated to English. The movie revolves around a philosopher, mathematician and astronomer called Hypatia, played by Rachel Weisz, during the Roman empire and her discoveries to understand heliocentric model of solar system in the midst of turmoil of religious unrest. Its quiet unfortunate that such a great civilization which was so advanced in thinking, culture and acceptance was lost to the mob riots. As the movie depicts, Roman empire has taught us gender equality, social acceptance, creative and forward thinking but also the other side of the fall due to religious intolerance and unguided domination. Agora, named after public gathering in ancient Greece (Alexandria in particular), is an exceptionally great movie to understand why civilizations have failed in the past. Roman empire prospered as it was more advanced than other cultures. B...