How was the expansion of trade and exploration in the post classical era important to china during the song dynasty

2686-2181 bce-- "egyptian civilization developed along the nile river in large part because the river’s annual flooding ensured reliable, rich soil for growing crops."

1069-664 bce-- "ancient egyptians developed wide-reaching trade networks along the nile, in the red sea, and in the near east."

from thales, who is often considered the first western philosopher, to the stoics and skeptics, ancient greek philosophy opened the doors to a particular way of thinking that provided the roots for the western intellectual tradition. here, there is often an explicit preference for the life of reason and rational thought. we find proto-scientific explanations of the natural world in the milesian thinkers, and we hear democritus posit atoms—indivisible and invisible units—as the basic stuff of all matter. with socrates comes a sustained inquiry into ethical matters—an orientation towards human living and the best life for human beings. with plato comes one of the most creative and flexible ways of doing philosophy, which some have since attempted to imitate by writing philosophical dialogues covering topics still of interest today in ethics, political thought, metaphysics, and epistemology. plato’s student, aristotle, was one of the most prolific of ancient authors. he wrote treatises on each of these topics, as well as on the investigation of the natural world, including the composition of animals. the hellenists—epicurus, the cynics, the stoics, and the skeptics—developed schools or movements devoted to distinct philosophical lifestyles, each with reason at its foundation.

with this preference for reason came a critique of traditional ways of living, believing, and thinking, which sometimes caused political trouble for the philosophers themselves. xenophanes directly challenged the traditional anthropomorphic depiction of the gods, and socrates was put to death for allegedly inventing new gods and not believing in the gods mandated by the city of athens. after the fall of alexander the great, and because of aristotle’s ties with alexander and his court, aristotle escaped the same fate as socrates by fleeing athens. epicurus, like xenophanes, claimed that the mass of people is impious, since the people conceive of the gods as little more than superhumans, even though human characteristics cannot appropriately be ascribed to the gods. in short, not only did ancient greek philosophy pave the way for the western intellectual tradition, including modern science, but it also shook cultural foundations in its own time.

1. the townshend acts of 1767 “threaten the country with poverty and ruin.”

at a town meeting held at faneuil hall in boston on october 28, 1767, boston freeholders and residents discussed the implications of the brutal townshend acts levied against the colonists. the townshend acts were a set of four acts passed by the british parliament in the summer of 1767 in order to generate revenue for the crown (through duties on goods such as lead, glass, paper, and tea) as well as exert british control over the increasingly rebellious colonists.

during the oct. 28 meeting, the bostonians found:

the excessive use of foreign superfluities is the chief cause of the present distressed state of this town, as it is thereby drained of its money: which misfortune is likely to be increased by means of the late additional burthens and impositions on the trade of the province, which threaten the country with poverty and ruin.

as a result, the citizens unanimously voted to boycott all british-made goods.