10 Ways Ancient China And Rome Interacted Long Before Marco Polo

While Europe battled and traded, China appeared to be a civilization that had grown completely independently of the West. However, the truth is that China has been in contact with the West since the Roman Empire. As far back as the time of Julius Caesar, the empires of China and Rome influenced each other in more ways than you’d expect.

10A Roman Legion Fought In China

In 53 BC, Marcus Crassus led a Roman army against the Parthian Empire in modern Iran. He had intended to spread the Roman Empire to the east, but the Parthians proved stronger than he imagined. The Romans were defeated, Crassus was beheaded, and his soldiers were executed.

One legion, though, may have escaped alive—by running east instead of west. According to one theory, a Roman legion may have joined the Hun army as mercenaries and gone to war against the Chinese. Chinese writing describes foreign mercenaries using a “fish-scale formation” that perfectly fits the description of the Roman tortoise formation.

The legion was captured by the Chinese and sent to a town called Liqian to defend against Tibet. There, they may have settled down, started families, and lived out their lives. Today, the people of Liqian have blue eyes, fair hair, and Roman noses. DNA tests show that they are 56 percent Caucasian.

9A Chinese Envoy Reached Caesar Augustus

Photo via Wikimedia

The Chinese started exploring the West in 200 BC and found their way to Rome during the reign of the first Roman emperor, Augustus, about 20 years before the birth of Christ.

Florus, a Roman historian, wrote about a group of Chinese envoys that came to Rome shortly after Augustus took his place on the throne. Florus believed that they had simply been drawn to the magnanimity of Rome, but Chinese history suggests that they were just trying to see who was in the West.

The Chinese were immensely different from the Romans and shocked the people who saw them. “In truth,” Florus wrote, “it needed but to look at their complexion to see that they were people of another world than ours.”

8Revealing Dresses Made From Chinese Silk Caused A Scandal In Rome

After the Chinese envoys reached Rome, the Romans started buying Chinese silk in massive quantities. According to Pliny the Elder, the empire spent hundreds of millions of sesterces each year on Chinese silk.

The senate soon tried to ban it because the silk was expensive and Roman women were walking around in see-through clothes. In Pliny’s words, Chinese silk dresses “cover a woman and at the same moment reveal her naked charms.”

Some people were upset. Others saw the women walking around in transparent dresses and felt nothing but gratitude to the Chinese. Every attempt to ban Chinese silk failed, and the women of Rome went on scandalizing high society.

7A Chinese Worker Was Found In A Roman Gravesite

Photo credit: McMaster University via ScienceDaily

At a Roman imperial estate called Vagnari, a skeleton was found buried in a cemetery for slaves of the emperor. When researchers ran tests on the skeleton, they estimated that the man was buried around the first or second century AD. They also found that he was East Asian, probably Chinese.

It’s not entirely clear how a Chinese man made his way to Rome and ended up in servitude to the emperor, but he did. He didn’t get much of a welcome for his trouble. After his death, other slaves were buried on top of him.

He was buried with a single pot. Interestingly, though, the pot was Roman-made. The slave didn’t have a single Chinese possession on him and seems to have assimilated into the life of a Roman slave in every way.

6The Parthian Empire Blocked Rome From Trading With China

The Romans could make a sea silk that they harvested from clams, and they tried to sell it to China. But when the two countries shared materials, they barely understood each other. The Romans thought that Chinese silk was combed off of leaves. When the Chinese found out that Romans got silk from clams, the Chinese thought that the Romans were lying.

The Romans tried to send envoys to the Han nation, but the Parthian Empire blocked every trade route. They had a monopoly in colored silk, and they weren’t about to let any Roman trade interfere with it.

A Chinese envoy named Gan Ying tried to reach Rome, but he was blocked by the Parthians as well. At the Black Sea, Parthian merchants convinced him that the short trip would take more than two years. Gan Ying turned back home, his diplomatic mission was stopped, and the Parthians kept their monopoly.

5The Chinese Believed That Romans Kicked Out Their Kings When It Rained

Photo via Wikimedia

Gan Ying didn’t come home empty-handed. He had picked up stories about Rome on the way and shared them with the Chinese. These stories were later written down by a historian named Ban Gu.

Ban Gu wrote a detailed description of Rome—its cities, the life of its peasants, and its government. He said, “Their kings are not permanent. They select and appoint the most worthy man. If there are unexpected calamities in the kingdom, such as frequent extraordinary winds or rains, he is unceremoniously rejected and replaced.”

Roman roads, he claimed, were full of “ferocious tigers and lions” and anyone traveling with less than 100 armed men would be devoured. He also claimed that Rome had a floating bridge 100 kilometers (62 mi) long.

By the end, Ban Gu had given up on all the ridiculous stories he’d heard and didn’t record the rest.

4Marcus Aurelius Brought Rare Animals To China, And They Weren’t Impressed

Rome and China finally made contact in AD 166. An emperor, believed to be Marcus Aurelius, sent an envoy to the East carrying a bounty of elephant tusks, rhinoceros horns, and turtle shells. To the Romans, these were exotic gifts, and Marcus Aurelius must have been determined to win over the Chinese.

The Chinese weren’t impressed. “The tribute brought was neither precious nor rare,” they wrote. Then they speculated that the amazing stories they’d heard about Rome “might be exaggerated.”

After Aurelius, contact between the two countries became common. Another envoy brought a Roman treatise of astronomy to China. In AD 230, Alexander Severus sent colored glass to the Wei Emperor Taitsu. Fifty years later, Emperor Carus sent another tribute to China.

China was now well-known to the Romans—so much so that China made its way onto Ptolemy’s map of the world.

3The Yin And Yang Symbol Came From Rome

The Taoist yin and yang symbol is one of the most iconic images connected to China. According to one theory, though, it might be Roman.

Seven hundred years before the first Taoist yin yang appeared, the same symbol showed up in a Roman book called the Notitia Dignitatum. The book lists Roman functionaries, including their titles and the insignia that mark their branches. One of those insignia is identical to the Taoist yin yang.

Although the book was written at the start of the fifth century AD, it may have been an attempt to keep alive the traditional symbols from the time of Augustus. This means that the yin yang might have been a part of Rome from the dawn of the Roman Empire.

It’s also possible that the Taoists picked the same symbol by chance. Still, we know that Rome and China were sharing ideas. Other than the colors, these symbols are identical.

2Roman Coins Were Found Under A Japanese Castle

Photo credit: Planet Sci Tech

The Romans may have made it even farther than China. Underneath a castle on Okinawa Island, archaeologists found four copper coins bearing the image of Emperor Constantine I. They were printed in AD 400.

There is no record of the Romans traveling to or making contact with Okinawa, so historians are at a loss to explain how the coins got there. The castle, though, was a major trading post for China. It’s possible that the coins were carried there by other Asian traders who knew about the Roman Empire.

Either way, Roman culture traveled all the way to Japan.

1China Had A Thriving Christian Community

In the sixth century, a Christian sect called the Nestorian Church made its way to China. The first to cross into China were two monks sent by the emperor to steal silkworms so that he could set up a silk market of his own.

A missionary named Alopen came with more noble intentions in AD 635. Alopen successfully spread Christianity throughout China. Over the next 150 years, Chinese Christians set up a church in the capital, Chang’an, established Christian communities across northern China, and earned official recognition for the religion from the Tang Empire.

They also translated Christian documents, which were written in both Syriac and Chinese. Their spread had a huge impact on Chinese history. The Syriac script on them formed the basis for the written Mongolian and Manchu languages.

Later, Manchu became the official language of the empire, meaning that every imperial edict in China was written in a language imported from Christian missionaries.

10 Fascinating Maps That Will Change How We See The United States

10US Defense Spending is Insane

Image credit: Bank of America via Vox

It’s common knowledge that the United States spends a lot on defense, but most of us are probably unaware of its true extent. According to this map from Bank of America’s “Transforming World” atlas, US military spending comfortably dwarfs that of the rest of the world’s nations combined.

In case it isn’t quite clear, the map above gives each country a total area based on their defense budgets in billions of dollars. That small circle at the top of the US represents Canada’s spending, while the smaller one below represents Mexico’s. Almost all of South America except for Brazil and pretty much all of Africa spend so little that each country is barely a pinprick. The US, by contrast, is represented as a gigantic beach ball of a nation.

Aside from visualizing how insanely out of proportion US defense spending is, it also shows how much the country dominates the globe militarily. Of all the other high-spending nations, only two, Russia and China, wouldn’t traditionally be classed as US allies (India and Saudi Arabia might come somewhere in the middle). If we assume the nations of Europe, plus Australia, Japan, and South Korea, are all working to project a similar ideology to the US, then the country’s military allies essentially dominate the entire globe.

9The Most Racist Parts Of The US Aren’t Where You Think

Image credit: Seth Stephens-Davidowitz via The Washington Post

When talking about racism in the US, many people automatically think of the Deep South. Former Confederate states have an unfavorable reputation as far as race relations are concerned. But one study published in PLOS ONE disagrees. As the map above shows, the Appalachian region, extending into the Northeast, may be the most racist of all.

The map’s conclusions are drawn from methodology pioneered by data scientist Seth Stephens-Davidowitz. In an older paper, he tracked how frequently people searched Google for a certain n-word to make predictions about how race affected President Obama’s re-election chances. The authors of this paper did the same, focusing their search by region and eliminating variations on the word that are more associated with gangster rap. While not everyone searching for the n-word is automatically a racist, it makes sense that the sheer volume of data that Google has might highlight general trends. You can see the results above.

What’s surprising here is how strangely racism seems to be distributed. Ohio, Vermont, and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula suffer badly, while Florida and Texas barely register. East of Texas, the number of searches for the n-word is almost always much less than average. Most notably, the red-highlighted areas coincide with regions that have a higher mortality rate among black people—8.2 percent higher on average. This suggests that perhaps the map isn’t very far off from the truth.

8Individual US States Are Richer Than Most Countries

Image credit: Carpe Diem via The Washington Post

The US has by far the highest GDP of any nation on Earth, with only China really coming close. In terms of GDP per capita, the US is also very near the top, behind only wealthy micro-nations like Luxembourg and oil-rich states like Qatar. In short, the US is rich, but you might not know exactly how rich. The country is so rich that even individual states have larger GDPs than most countries.

The map above shows what countries each state would be based on its GDP. The results are jaw-dropping. California has an economy roughly comparable to Brazil’s, while Texas is on a par with Australia. North Carolina matches Norway, Pennsylvania is Switzerland, and Alaska is Luxembourg. Tiny Rhode Island is turning over as much as all of Bulgaria.

Even super-rich Middle Eastern kingdoms can’t compete against single US states. Saudi Arabia’s GDP is only the size of Illinois’s, while Qatar only breaks even with Alabama’s. All of this shows just how stunningly wealthy the US is. Although the figures are from 2013, there’s no doubt that the country still outstrips everywhere else on Earth for GDP. After China, the country with the next highest GDP in 2014 was Japan. Their economy was worth over $12 billion less than the US.

7The US Housing Market Is Crazy

Image credit: Zillow via Vox

It’s a well-established fact that the housing market in New York City is crazy. The cost of an apartment is frequently so far out of whack with average wages that it gives you a headache just thinking about it. It’s one thing to simply think about it and another to actually see it. This map by Zillow aims to show just how distorted the housing market is by having each state’s size reflect the value of its housing stock.

The result is a geographical whirlwind that shows just how lopsided house prices have become. While it’s no surprise that densely populated California should be biggest, it’s astonishing to see just how tiny Texas is. Despite being the second-largest state by population, as well as one of the richest, Texas’s housing is worth about the same as New York’s. This is thanks to the overwhelming concentration of extremely expensive property in Manhattan, parts of Queens, and Long Island. Even Florida is bigger than it should be, thanks to all those expensive beachfront retirement properties.

You could play endless games comparing different regions of the US on this map, but there’s no denying its central message: The housing market in some regions has gone crazy. We all know how well that usually ends.

6How The US Would Look If States Were Redrawn To Have Equal Populations

Image credit: Neil Freeman

Most of America’s population is concentrated in the major cities on the coasts or in the South. Texas has a larger population than Australia, while more people come from New York state than are in the Netherlands. By contrast, Glasgow is as populated as the entire (rather empty) state of Wyoming. These discrepancies have led some to wonder what the US would look like if states were redrawn to give all 50 an equal population. The example above, by Neil Freeman, will change the way you look at each state forever.

A huge chunk of the western United States is taken up by a mere three states, which Freeman has chosen to rename Salt Lake, Shiprock, and Ogallala. Meanwhile, California, Texas, and the eastern US have disintegrated into a whirling mishmash of competing boundaries. Michigan alone has become the states of Detroit, Menominee, and Firelands (the last two shared with other states), while Florida has split into Canaveral, Tampa Bay, and part of King. Washington state (now renamed Rainier), on the other hand, has absorbed all of Alaska.

Freeman has a serious political point to make with this, about how the state-based electoral college gives undue weight to some people’s votes while sidelining others. Even if that aspect doesn’t interest you, it’s still a fascinating depiction of a US that will never exist.

5US Immigration Isn’t What You Might Believe

Image credit: Business Insider

Whether Americans like it or not, immigration is a fact of modern life. Across the states, people born in other countries are filling millions of jobs. Pop culture (and lazy stereotyping) would suggest these are solely menial jobs that others would rather not do. When they crunched the numbers, Business Insider found something different. The typical jobs done by immigrants vary wildly depending on what state they’re in.

As this map shows, different states need foreigners for vastly different things. In the West and South, immigrants tend to do manual labor jobs such as agricultural work or construction, with some housekeeping thrown in for good measure. Go north, and things start changing. At least five states have immigrants mostly taking up work as cooks. Another four have them working as college teachers. A full seven states rely on immigrants to work as nurses, home health aides, or personal health aides—a hugely vital profession. In Delaware, the most likely job for an immigrant to have is working as a software developer.

4US Counties Have Been Ranked by Beauty

Image credit: The Washington Post

If you’re living in the US, do us a favor. Go to your window and take a look at what your county has to offer. Do you find it boring, hideous, or beautiful? Well, we’ve got some weird news for you: Your opinion doesn’t count for squat. In the 1990s, the federal government objectively ranked each county in the continental United States in terms of natural beauty.

The map above shows the results. The dark green blocks represent what the government considers to be the most beautiful counties (or the “highest in natural amenities,” as they put it), while the dark yellow ones represent the worst. The criteria excluded human activity and emphasized “the physical characteristics of a county area that enhance the location as a place to live.” According to the report, the authors think Ventura County, California, is the best-looking place in the whole country. By contrast, Red Lake County, Minnesota, is considered the bastard love child of Quasimodo and the Elephant Man.

To be absolutely clear, these rankings are objectively ridiculous. It took less than three seconds on Google to find this rather fetching picture of Red Lake County. (Two of those seconds were spent looking at cat gifs.) But it sure is fascinating to see how the federal government perceives your home area. As The Washington Post pointed out, the fact that DC doesn’t rank at the very bottom suggests that some bias might be creeping in.

3The US Is A Nation Of Goats

Image credit: The Washington Post

Have you ever wondered to yourself just where the United States keeps all its goats? If so, The Washington Post’s Wonkblog has you covered. In January 2015, they produced this map showing the location of every single goat in the US. The results were unexpectedly fascinating.

In 2012, the US Department of Agriculture did a census of every goat in the country. They found there were over 2.6 million goats living in the nation. That means if the goats were given their own state, it would be more populous than Wyoming, Vermont, North Dakota, and Washington, DC, combined.

Did we say “if”? According to the data, the goats already have their own state, and it’s called Texas. It has the highest concentration of goats of any state. Of the 21 counties in the US where goats outnumber people, only one of them isn’t in the Lone Star State. In Edwards County, there are 22 goats for every single Texan.

That doesn’t let the other states off the hook. Of the nation’s 3,143 counties, 2,996 are home to commercial goat farms. Only Alaska seems sufficiently not enamored by goats to keep the blighters at arm’s length. Combine this with the 3.2 million videos on YouTube dedicated to Capra aegagrus hircus, and it becomes clear that the US is a nation of goats.

2The US Is Far Whiter Than You Think

Image credit: Nathan Yau

The US is built on immigration. It’s the largest refugee-taking nation in the world. It has a historic indigenous population, a significant black population, and a president who is half Kenyan. It would be fair to call the United States one of the most multicultural societies on Earth. However, doing so masks an undeniable reality. The US is still utterly, overwhelmingly white.

In a series of maps for his Flowing Data blog, Nathan Yau used US Census data to map the distribution of different races at a county level throughout the United States. His survey of Asians found a few pockets in California and some isolated groupings elsewhere. His survey of blacks found a large clustering in the South, and very few groupings elsewhere. Whites, on the other hand, dominated the whole map.

With the exception of Indian reservations, white people formed the vast majority of the population in almost every county outside the Deep South. This included Latinos (who aren’t considered a separate racial group by the Census), but an alternative map separating out those who identify primarily as either category shows it really doesn’t make much of a difference.

This won’t come as a surprise to anyone who knows the Census figures. Non-Latino whites still make up around two-thirds of the US population. The US is much whiter than most people imagine, whether they’re pro- or anti-immigration.

1San Francisco Is Full Of Human Poop

Image credit: William via Vox

Sometimes it takes a really great piece of data visualization to help us grasp an important point—a point so fundamental that it needs to be understood by as many people as humanly possible. Such a point is knowing that San Francisco is being utterly overwhelmed by a tidal wave of human poop.

In October 2015, a data visualizer known simply as “William” developed an animated map collecting all reports of human poop in the city. The map begins in summer 2008 and ends in summer 2015. The more reports of poop, the bigger and bluer the circles get. What he uncovered was an out of control pooping epidemic.

In the last seven years, people dropping a log on the streets of San Francisco has gone from disappointingly frequent to completely off the chart. While the map’s start records a few clusters around the downtown area, by the time we hit 2015, half the city is lost under an avalanche of human waste.

To give you an idea of how bad things are getting, in 2012, a city escalator became so clogged with poop that it stopped working, and a hazardous waste materials team had to be called. The number of people pooping in the city has since gotten worse. San Francisco may have swept the boards on the government’s natural beauty rankings above, but we’re betting no one in Red Lake County, Minnesota, is spending their spare time pooping on escalators.

Top 10 Area 51 Secrets that you don’t know

10. Food and Entertainment

If Area 51 is to be isolated, the people working there should be secret, their amenities should be secret and their food should also be secret. No third person should know from where they get the food, who gets them the food and also what they eat. Most of the times, the people working there and the army deployed there are served Lobsters and Oysters which is available at the ‘place’ itself. They have a streak night once in a while. A single tennis court, a bowling alley and the fluctuating radio are their only source of entertainment.

9. The ‘Hello Phone’

Yes, you are a woman whose hubby works at Area 51, what is going through your mind? Have you made a mistake of marrying him? Married Women say that their husbands never ever let a small secret out even to their closest of kin. People work there for years together, and the communication is once in a while (once for every 6 months). The once in a while communication is short lived with the OXCRAFT interruptions and network failures. ‘I do not know where I am, but I am fine and am at my work’, this is what the people who work there say to their acquaintances on phone. The phones employed here are special phones named Hello Phones which cannot be identified in anyway (location can’t be identified). There have been instances where relations broke up because either of the partners weren’t able to cope with the peer work pressure.

8. Presence of Dangerous chemicals

A few witnesses who had been there say that Area 51 contains large quantities of unknown chemicals which have been burnt in open pits. The biopsy reports of bodies of the people who were killed there due to various reasons say that high levels of dioxin, dibenzofuran, and trichloroethylene are present there. The people who worked there complained of skin, level and respiratory injuries. There are reports which say US defense has handled toxic material improperly and illegally. Several cases/petitions were filed in the court against this activity but the court disallowed the petition stating ‘State Secrets Privilege’ as the reason.

7. Interplanetary Aircraft/Moon Landing

There is a Conspiracy Theory which says Moon landing was staged at Area 51. This theory is well supported by video evidences which show the army men and astronauts testing land rovers and various life support equipment. The increased number of UFO sightings, credible reports from observers led us to conclude that the interplanetary aircraft was designed, manufactured and tested here. Manned observation air-crafts (fly in the outer space) were manufactured which could fly at great heights and spy enemy country activities without getting noticed. Design and manufacture of such air-crafts elsewhere would raise speculations about US’ activity. So, Area 51 was the best place for this purpose. A12 Spy plane was used to photograph the area secretively when US’ Ship Pueblo was captured by the North Korean Forces. This spy craft which traveled at extra ordinary heights (space) gave brilliant pictures of the ships’ exact location which gave tremendous leads to the US Navy to attack and get back the ship.

6. OXCART

OXCART was a miracle. It flew at 2200Kmph, required 186 miles just to take a simple U-Turn. So, initially area 51 wasn’t considered for testing OXCART. But, later Area 51 was given thumbs up because the authorities felt the place was right to test a secret project like OXCART. The aircraft made a hell lot of noise during its take off, had strategic bombing capabilities, had the side looking cameras and sensors, had a long lifetime period and was regarded as one of the best ‘intelligent’ air-crafts. Initially ‘land’ wasn’t sufficient for OXCART activities at Area 51. To accommodate this ‘beauty’, additional 38000 acres of land was acquired, denied public access and extra runway space and base were constructed. OXCRAFT required special fuel in order to fly at great speeds and heights. This fuel had to withstand extremely high temperatures and had to be stored and transferred using special equipment. Special equipment facility was made available at this base. An American Airlines pilot who saw OXCRAFT compared OXCRAFT to a goose and American airlines to a gosling. This statement says it all about OXCRAFT and ultimately about Area 51s uniqueness.

5. UFO Activity

With so much research and development happening there in the field of Avionics/Aeronautics, UFO couldn’t be left behind. UF0 – Unidentified Flying Objects has always been the world’s ‘Most Wanted’. Everybody in the world from a school going child to a Highly Learned Scientist wanted to know what’s happening in the outer space, who lives there, is life possible there and many mystery things. USA built a conspiracy by exploring the UFO world in a illegal/secretive fashion. The conspiracy facts included storing, examining and reverse engineering of a crashed alien craft, study of the occupants in space and manufacturing of air-crafts based on alien technology. Meetings with extraterrestrials also happened. The means of Weather Control were worked on and experimented. Time Travel technology is almost coming to reality only because of Area 51 activities. Area 51 activities were trying to make the impossible to become possible though secretively and unofficially. A ‘Disappearing aircraft’, Underground rail-road system were developed based on Alien Technology secretively.

4. Security

The first thing is that no civilian will get to know  the location of Area 51, even if he/she gets to know about the location, the army deployed will stop him/her several hundred Miles far off from this location. The view of Area 51 from that particular point (where the person is stopped) will be like a scenery (far off hills and mountains surrounded by forest). There are Closed Camera TVs everywhere round the perimeter of the place. Even an animal won’t pass by unnoticed. Photography is strictly provided inside Area 51 and in the places surrounding it and use of camera will lead to use of deadly force (authorized). Buried motion sensors are used for surveillance. Civilian and Military air traffic (regular) is prohibited. This area is not found on US Geographical Maps and Images. The authorities make sure that the satellite images are censored before getting global.

3. The ‘Files’

Reports suggest that many confidential files and data are dumped at Area 51. These files include UFO Confidential details, several financial issues and political issues. Witnesses say that these files can create havoc and lead to the downfall of USA Government and USA on a whole if made public (disclosed). The computers here can create a chaos if accessed by a third party. Wiki-leaks details included the information from these computer systems. All these systems were destroyed when the wiki leaks episode happened.

2.  Dreamland

It is basically a large military airfield with equipment, facilities area so fantastic anybody can ever dream of. So, it is considered a Dreamland of a Commander/Major of any nation’s army/defense. It supports weapon and Aircraft testing. It covers an area of about 10miles (rectangular space), has wide and well maintained road connection through the jumbled hills, has all the equipment and freedom for nuclear weapon testing, offers a Nuclear Waste Repository and keeps updating itself with the latest technologies. There are underground tunnels which connect to various important parts of the country. It is considered the world’s most secretive place. With all these facilities, the enemy country will never know what the USA Army is up to, its defense plans, its operations, its machinery will always remain secretive. A traveler travelling across it could never view it openly. The reason for this still remains a secret. It is completely shut from the world. There is no television or radio, and the only communication signals are available once in a while (in the evenings – moving between the mountains).

 1. Weapon/Aircraft Testing

It is USA’s secretive site for Cold War Operations. Even if all the rumors about Area 51 are neglected, a common man will still believe that US government is up to something at this particular area. The fact is that the US Government always keeps denying activities at this place, and it has always been a mystery. Now, let us explore the weapon and aircraft base of USA at Area 51. All the enemy air-crafts captured during wars have been installed there. Continuous testing of all these air-crafts keeps happening there trying to explore the Aircraft and Missile technology, identify the defects and ultimately helping USA Defense to design/manufacture a better Aircraft. The spying activities are also administered from this place. Use/Testing of Nuclear weapons is banned by UNO (United Nations Organization). So, Area 51 serves as a safe place to test the nuclear weapons. A clear idea about the weapons’ range, destructive power and the incurring loss can be got from these tests. Area 51 has an airfield which has two huge dirt runways and can be used for bombing and artillery practice. Reports say that Area 51 played a major role during World War 2 (pre Hiroshima, Nagasaki Nuclear Bombing). ‘Dragon Lady’ (the high altitude, day-night, electronic sensor), super powerful aircraft was tested here for the first time. It was used for War, weather intelligence, satellite calibration and communication purposes later (was a part of Cold War).Unusual and exotic propulsion systems which could destroy the entire world in a span of few days were developed and tested here. Even though so much was happening at this ‘point’, the world knew nothing of it.

Top 10 God’s Greatest Gifts to Mankind

 10.  Places of worship  : embodiment of faith

 

According to Hindu scriptures, there are 320 million Gods though many believe that Brahma is the Supreme One . Muslims worship Allah , the Christians are the devotees of Jesus Christ and so on.

A church holds mass ceremony , has parts of it dedicated to distinguished saints and has figures of Lord Jesus and Mother Mary. Temples are abode of idols of Shiva, Durga , Ganesh , Vishnu and so on. There are many ceremonial practices held inside them and they attract devotees throughout the year. Sikhs visit the Gurudwara and remember the life and times of Guru Nanak. Muslims read their Namaz at a mosque and offer prayer to Allah.

Places of worship bring people closer to the Almighty. It provides them with peace of mind .

 9. Religious doctrines : Divine beacon of light

 

The holy books or scriptures serve as a cardinal source of guidance for many of us. It is not mandatory for people to stick only to the wise-talk provided in their own religious books. One can always venture out and  seek guidance from other religious doctrines too.

An amalgamation of all such meaningful advice will enhance one’s knowledge and lead to a better understanding of religion , themselves and most importantly the world which shelters them.

 8. Man-Woman : One for the other

 

Imagine a world full of men, without a trace of women and vice versa . It must have surely sent ripples across your mind. Men and women complement each other. Women essay the role of a caring mother , a loving wife/girlfriend , an encouraging  sister.On the other hand, men play their part of an affectionate father , a pampering brother and a protective husband/boyfriend . At the same time both men and women prove to be dependable friends.

It is said in the Bible that God created man/Adam in his own image and then went on to create woman/Eve from the rib of Adam. Oftentimes, this view has invited sharp criticism tagging it as downright misogynistic . Yet, if one believes in the theory of God creating mankind , one cannot overlook the fact that He created both the sexes to be a pillar of strength for one another and also for procreation.

7. Nature : A prized possession

 

Be it the mighty Himalayas or the roaring Amazon  ; the enigmatic Pacific Ocean or the resplendent Sahara desert . These glorious epitomes of natural beauty do not cease to leave us awe-struck.

These places have been present since time immemorial and no man can ever think of either altering them or imitating one of these masterpieces. So, is it not fair then to term them as  creations of the Almighty God ?

In contrast to man-made buildings , they have not required repair work and exists unperturbed so far.

For aesthetic reasons and various other purposes , these natural resources remain our top priority . Hence , we should not indulge in activities that may somewhat dim their glory.

6. Fellow-beings : the Flora and the Fauna

 

Humans are considered as social animals and the most rational among all living beings on earth. Animals,plants and birds bring that much-needed variety to our existence.

It is said that God has assigned us the role of a guardian , in an effort to safeguard the diverse genetic pool of several other species.It is essential for maintaining the food chain on earth.

Trees beautify our surroundings and provide us with oxygen . Some animals stay at our homes as pets and become a member of our families.

 5. Art and literature : Seeking inspiration from the Almighty

 

Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained by John Milton , Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri , The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown , The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins , Devi by Devdutt  Pattanaik,  Muhammad: A Biography of the Prophet by Karen Armstrong and the list goes on.

These works and many others have drawn inference from the concept of God either subtly or in great detail .

The Greek gods  serve as an important subject for film-makers and painters even today. With films like Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief and Clash of The Titans , classical mythology continues to capture the imagination of one and all.

 4. Wisdom : Know thy mind

 

Think wise and act wiser. This is the mantra one should adopt for a fruitful existence .

One can pose a question on how God contributes to our wisdom . So, here is the answer to it.

Remember the story from the Bible about God planting the Tree of Knowledge in the garden of Eden ? Adam and Eve were strictly instructed not to have the fruit from that tree but curiosity drove Eve and she took the plunge . Later on , Adam too ate the apple on Eve’s insistence.

God ,  on learning about their misadventure, banished them from heaven and from then, their misery began. The only bit of silver lining being that they had acquired knowledge and wisdom, which  helped mankind to survive on earth for so long.

Wisdom alone has prompted human beings to bring about new inventions. These inventions have made their lives comfortable than before.

3. Festivals : Reasons to celebrate

  

Who needs a reason to celebrate ? This is a common phrase one gets to hear these days. Neverthelesss , the aura surrounding festivals persists till date . They bring together the entire community on the same platform . Offering prayers , feasting heartily , singing and dancing and buying new clothes make us wait for festivals with bated breath.

2. Life and its many emotions

No matter what biologists and scientists come up with , God is the only one we thank for this beautiful experience called Life . It is almost instinctive in nature to show our gratitude to the Almighty , who has breathed life into lifeless mortals . He has also filled us with emotions like kindness , mercy , pity , love and also greed and jealousy.

What would a man or  a woman be without these feelings or sensations ?

It is said that because of the Eternal curse borne by man as a result of disobeying God in Eden , he has lost the gift of immortality, which God had earlier enriched him with.

“DUST THOU ART TO DUST RETURNEST” –  Henry Longfellow , A Psalm of Life .

 1. God : The fountain of faith

The above mentioned points would have been of no use if the entity named God was absent in our lives.  He is the source from which we derive everything , including our existence .Therefore , it is pertinent to say that God’s greatest gift to mankind is He, Himself. We worship Him , fear Him , love Him and depend on Him.