Cosmology

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

Cosmology. while today it has scientific meanings. back in the day when mankind tries to understand the World (and later The Universe). the point of view is nothing scientific. it rather associates with the social beliefs (Proto-Religions), one that evolves into Science, other, the Religion.

Cosmology - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Back in the day, each individual city has urban plans based on their respective cosmology, with the 'Sun, Moon, Stars', the very center represents the center of the Cosmos. and this is where religios site, palace, and administration buildings are. even the Crown Temple is built to represent the center of Cosmos, be there Mount Meru, Mons Olympus, Valhala, and others.
The Biggest known example in Southeast Asia is Angkor Wat. originally a center of Yasodharapura, Capitol of Khmer Empire. The other cities in Thailand follows this example.
- Lopburi (a big Prasat at the very center of the city, though now it became infested with monkeys, and fewer men lives there.
- Ayutthaya
- Bangkok (Especially the East Side of Menam.)
- Nan City (The place i live in)
A representation of 'Cosmos Center' built by ruling Prince (or King) before unification with Siam in early 20th Century is named 'Wat Phumin' temple. i've visited it several times. it is built to represent Mount Meru itself, with Ananda (Name of a big serpent or dragon) carrying the mountain (and the very Cosmos). the temple building itself has four facades. The painting inside is actually a 'news gazette' of that time. heralding the Industrial Era, with contemporary warfare fought primarily with flintlock firearms (a la Linear Infantry), supported by cannons. (And how it breaks a city wall), IMAO if it is a news gazette it should told me of either First two Anglo-Burmese War, or War between Siam and Dai Viet of the same era (if not the same decade), and subsequent French Invasion of Vietnam .

This is more important than Astrology. I'm not sure back then if it is one and same. While Astrology is important when founding city or doing big things. Citybuilding uses 'Cosmology'.
Should Cosmology replace Astrology or being one successive 'tech' (or civic)? I don't really agree that Astrology enables holy sites, Cosmology does (and it should also enables monument.)

Do you all think Firaxis is right or wrong when it comes to Ancient Era technology? should Cosmology introduced in Civ 7?

 

[Marla_Singer]

That is an interesting topic.

I'm working on a personal project in which I tried to elaborate a tech tree. Be it "cosmology" or "astronomy", I don't really know where to put it but I know there is something important in that. It could be a prerequisite for both "sailing" and "calendar", the idea being that sky knowledge was important both to determine latitude positoning and targetting a cape for Ancient sailors (sailing) and optimize seasonal plantations (calendar), but then many Civ games makes of astronomy a Renaissance tech dating back to Copernicus and Portuguese navigation (which succesfully were able to determine longitude positioning, therefore allowing navigation on the high seas).

 

[BuchiTaton]

Cosmology is a science that studies the universe as a whole, its origin, development and structure. Astronomy is also a science but centered to the study of celestial objects like stars, planets, satellites, etc.
The earlier Astrology is the study of all the celestial cycles loaded with religious* beliefs, at this point both topics were in a broad sense the same. So for CIV abstraction level is better to keep the use of Astrology for the spacial and temporal elements of celestial cycles and their relation with their practical and religous importance.

Now, personally Im not found of the use of whole study desciplines as "technologies", when there are options like use methods and devices. For example Calendar could be used to cover its importance for agriculture and religion synthetized in ancient monuments, temples and urban planning that were related to the sky observation. Meanwhile the later technology related to navigation could be the Astrolabe or the Compass.