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Are the persistent themes the outcome of generation via the authors' predilections, or of winnowing via the readers'?

Ok I read it. More it served the interests of power, "Protestantism (and, of course, Christianity generally) had a need to enforce the discipline of delayed gratification".

It has a heckuva closing sentence.



Interesting, the theme that "the dangers of knowledge (Pandora, Genesis) may be as old as humanity.". Did that one stem from power (and pesky upstarts) too?

(Is nixtamalization (of cornmeal) an example or a counterexample?)


What is the field that studies or pontificates upon the historical? forces that led to various cultural themes?




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