This will be an odd sort of OT thread, I think, about
an observation on my part that is curious for sure, but the irony of it makes me want to put it out there.
As we know, the caves in Lascaux, France, hold paintings made by a prehistoric people that date back 17,000 years. I just happened on to a website about
them recently, and, though having seen the pictures of them before, was again struck by their poignancy and beauty..
They are remarkable paintings both in the level of artistic skill they present, and in the picture of life, mostly a violent world of hunting scenes, that they depict.
There is one scene in particular from the caves that is so very moving in what it shows, and so very striking in its display of the skill of the ancient artist who painted it.
It is the scene of the dying hunter, attacked and killed by a large bison, which is itself mortally wounded, as evidenced by its guts hanging out from a lower-body wound inflicted by the dying hunter or by his comrades. It is a scene of violence and death. The scene is so dramatically presented that even after 17,000 years one can almost still hear the terrible scream, depicted on the face of the wounded, dying hunter:
https://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailv2&ccid=nqgqcgkb&id=2085c917d48d54e4d85dd6d570137d869146086f&thid=oip.nqgqcgkbbhtd6wlwhnbsqghafy&mediaurl=https%3a%2F%2Fi.pinimg.com%2Foriginals%2Feb%2F5b%2Ffe%2Feb5bfe62514cf492dfe89913943aecf7.jpg&cdnurl=https%3a%2F%2Fth.bing.com%2Fth%2Fid%2Fr.9ea1aa7202810474ddeb02f084d06caa%3frik%3Dbwhgkyz9e3dv1g%26pid%3Dimgraw%26r%3D0&exph=1191&expw=1522&q=lascaux+paintings+hunter+bison+bird&simid=608032610686355265&form=irprst&ck=01a73e39c8225f843b0d569574b53202&selectedindex=0&idpp=overlayview&ajaxhist=0&ajaxserp=0 But it may also have been intended as a scene of hope, as the presence of the bird at the bottom of the painting has been interpreted by some as representing the soul of the dying hunter, preparing to take flight to heaven following the hunter's demise.
Indeed, did our ancient ancestors believe in an afterlife
17,000 years ago? And it's a scene that depicts life in that era as a constant battle of humans against violent predators, bison, woolly mammoths, saber-toothed tigers, and the like, ready and able at a moment's notice to attack and kill our human ancestors.
A frightful world, where a dangerous predator lurked around every corner, and a world that we moderns fortunately left behind long ago.
Or did we?
Now my ironic point: the more dangerous micro-organisms that we deal with today, whether deadly disease bacteria, deadly viruses, or frequently fatal microbes, are just as much "deadly predators" in our world today as the bison and mammoths we left behind were long, long ago.
As I walk down the streets of my city today, the possibility that I will be attacked by an angry bison is non-existent. The possibility that some of my body cells will be attacked by cancer virus is real.
True, a cancer micro-organism is hardly as scary as an enraged, charging, horned bison, but, given enough time, maybe just as deadly.
How ironic. That in spite of 17,000 years of progress in our civilization, we, like our ancestors, still must greatly fear "deadly predators" in the wild.
Whether they are huge or tiny.