Losing our brains with disruptive technologies (XXXVII): Sports at its roots.
Have a beautiful Friday. We are blissful about it. We continue praying for the eradication of the Coronavirus, once we find a vaccine or a natural traditional confirmed remedy for this virus, things will be perfectly fine for everyone, everywhere. If I were a wealthy person, I wouldn´t hesitate to sponsor the natural cure for Coronavirus. I am convinced that the cure is in the natural plants that God has honored us to cultivate and to care for. But I am not a high net worth individual. I am simply a corporate strategy advisor and an author “in work in progress” stage, which makes me extremely vulnerable to pandemics economic recessions.
“Sweet Dreams”. A baby Bambi painted by Eleonora Escalante 2020. Fabriano 5. Size: 5″ x 7″. If you wish to buy it contact me please. The revenues obtained from my paintings are for the improvement of this blog. Photo reference inspiration: Public Internet domain.
Temporary regional dome strategies? Yesterday I was thinking meanwhile I was painting this beautiful baby Bambi. My thoughts took me to consider that once societies are healed from Coronavirus, we can continue to work “normally” inside our own territories, only if each territory protects its customs gates, borders, and airports. If each country or a group of neighbor nations closes its borders perfectly as a dome strategy, business inside that area, in particular, can continue “as usual”. It can happen, at least temporary… until the whole world is healed. By closing frontiers, and taking high sanitary measures to control the entrance of external goods or products, then a nation can diminish the virus infections to none. A transient short term dome protective strategy is perfectly possible to do it, not just on a territory level but on a land regional level. For example, once the coronavirus cases are completely wiped out in Guatemala-El Salvador and Honduras, these three nations can create a strategic territorial alliance to close the borders to other nations who still have infected cases. Nevertheless, inside these three countries trading and business flows can continue perfectly. Even short-distance flights can take place just between Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. This could be a test, a regional dome strategy that can work temporarily, only impermanently for a few months. This strategy can be applied to Central America as a region too. Or to other regions which could be coronavirus free soon.
Diversifying Sources of Income. The fact that we are entering a global recession, will affect every single industry in the world. Some experts have anticipated GDP negative percentages of minus 4%. In consequence, I am also worried about my expected sources of income. We have become so globalized that my potential sponsors (which are the same that help universities) will restrict the economic possibilities to all of us. Accordingly, I will apply to several advisory jobs (consulting mandates) with the United Nations network as of this week, I will need to find or diversify new sources of income. Since I started the Volvo Ocean Race 2017-2018 saga (by the year 2017) I have been fully dedicating my time to write and to improve my articles´ content quality. I have been dedicating 70% of my time to write and look for advertising academic sponsorships for this blog. And only 30% to look for advisory mandates with the international cooperation entities. This will shift. As of next week, I will accelerate my consulting search applications, and I will also reduce the frequency of my publications as of the following saga. It is natural, if companies or universities decrease their sales, it is a cascade effect, they also reduce their advertising expenses, and the probability to find academic or research sponsors for this blog diminishes. With time, once we get back to a better global economic position, I bet that all my articles, will inspire those who do philanthropic education donations to consider my work, and finally I will be able to find a set of solid sponsorships to my literary online production.
Let´s start today the recreation activities. It occurred to me to put the leisure, recreation, sports and art activities all together when it comes to answering the question of how these activities are being affected by disruptive technologies. And the answer is that these activities are the most stricken by NAIQI tech.
Recreation means the refreshment or rejuvenation of one´s body or mind through an activity that amuses or stimulates well-being. It also means to play. Once we understand the profound meaning of the word recreation, we immediately begin to observe what do societies have invented to recreate themselves over thousands of years. And the words sports, arts and other leisure resting human actions come to our brains automatically.
Sports at its origins. Human beings have characterized themselves for playing in between. Playing competitively, fiercely. Someone wins. Someone loses. Since the origins of our civilizations, there is archaeological evidence that suggests that humans have always played in between using objects or not. Egyptian artistic expressions from royal tombs around 2000 years BCE hint us that this culture wrestled, jumped, and engaged in ball games and stick fights. Homer´s Greek Iliad literature express us how the greek practiced different type of games knitted with religious motives. “By around 1000 years BCE, since the Greeks were devoted to secular sports as well as to sacred games, no polis, or city-state, was considered a proper community if it lacked a gymnasium where, as the word “gymnos” indicates, naked male athletes trained and competed”(Brittanica.com). Romans had other sport preferences. Ancient Romans preferred boxing, wrestling, and hurling the javelin to running footraces and throwing the discus. Chariot races were also popular in the Ancient Rome empire; Rome’s Circus Maximus attracted multiple spectators to see them.This Roman circus and the Byzantine hippodrome continued to provide chariot racing long after Christian protests (and heavy economic costs) ended the gladiatorial games, probably early in the 5th century AD. Regardless, the institutionalization of the Ancient Olympic games by 776 BC, the stadium was created with the purpose of providing the opportunity to audiences to see the sports of the epoch. Ancient Olympics started with running events, and later more competitive events were added in the track and field format (pentathlon). With time, and as the sports events evolved, by the year 164 BCE those sports which were played at the Olympics were the disciplines of Track and Field-Athletics (49%), Combat Sports (32%), Chariot Racing (11%), Equestrian Riding (4%) and Artistic Performance or gymnastics (4%). The spectator interests became relevant, and history has kept a record of these events to our days.
Traditional African sports included the ball games (similar to what is today baseball and football. Wrestling was also a common sport between African tribes, plus the contests for runners and jumpers. Since ancestral times, the Africans were excellent runners, its resistance to keep the pace for long distances has been dated by the first incursions of the Egyptians into the African continent.
When it comes to Asian cultures, middle east civilizations, India, China, and Japan characterized themselves as high-end wrestlers, which practiced religious rituals tied to the hand-to-hand struggle itself. In Asia, the martial arts as an unarmed hand to hand combat military skill, found its nascent development in the 3rd century BCE, China, Korea, Japan, and Southeast Asia. The Japanese Samurai also practiced archery, which was one of the most important disciplines of Asian warriors, extensively. Archery was a key knowledge domain for Turkey.
Passion for horses. Asian cultures included the Middle eastern cultures cherished horses. Since before the Hittite times, the Asian aristocracy and leaders developed the polo sports and similar equestrian contests, which were by far the most distinctive Asian contribution to modern sports. Nomads from Afghanistan and Central Asia to Persian histories and manuscripts show their dedication to equestrian polo sports. By 627 AD, polo had spread throughout the Indian continent and reached China, where it became a passion among those who were affluent enough to own horses. Since then, the vast majority of polo players were Asian emperors and their relatives from several dynasties.
The new world was also involved in sports. The Mayan, Aztecs, Olmecs and Incan civilizations have left us with infrastructure that suggests their adoration to play ball sports. The mesoamerican ball game was most likely invented BCE, and it was connected to the religious ceremonies too.
Evidence about how sports became competitive. Any activity involving physical exertion and specific skills, governed by rules or by pre-agreed procedures or customs, designed to compete either individually or in teams, is a sport.
Why are we revisiting our human ancestry relation with sports? Wait for more on my next post. Thank you for reading to me. Blessings.
Source of reference utilized to write this article:
https://www.britannica.com/sports/sports#ref253549
https://www.oldest.org/sports/sports/
https://thesportjournal.org/article/olympic-sports-of-the-future/
Disclaimer: Illustrations in Watercolor are painted by Eleonora Escalante. Other types of illustrations or videos (which are not mine) are used for educational purposes ONLY. Nevertheless, the majority of the pictures, images or videos shown on this blog are not mine. I do not own any of the lovely photos or images posted unless otherwise stated.
Eleonora Escalante Strategy 