Science: The Mayan Calendar

What is Science?

According to the Oxford Dictionary, as mentioned above, science is the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behaviour of the physical and natural world through observation and experimentation (Oxford Dictionaries | English, 2018). That being said, science is a field that relies on international collaboration to make it work well (Schmoch and Schubert, 2008). Things like the Scientific Method, which is used world wide to perfect the practice of science is fundamental in accurate dissemination of information using testable explanations and predictions (Gauch, 2003; Stodden, 2010 and Cohen, 2013). Science is not this alone, its is also a mindset and it has given man the ability

In 2000 BC the Mayans were cultivating crops like maize, beans and chili (Douglas et al., 2015 and Lentz et al., 2015). They developed the Maya Script which is a fully developed writing system in the third century BC (Matsumoto, 2018). One of their most notable accomplishments is the Mayan Calendar, this is actual made up of three calendars that interlock (Markman and Markman, 2014). The first calendar is called the Tzolkin, there are 13 numbers and 20-day names, these rotated through a cycle until they returned to the first number and day. They whole cycle lasts 260 days (Angulo et al., 2017). Priests use this calendar to determine when to sow or harvest crops as well for determining when religious ceremonies need to occur. The second calendar is called Haab and it is made up of 18 months with 20 days per month, this calendar is 365 days long. The Tzolkin and The Haab calendar come into sync every 52 years which is called the Calendar Round (Milbrath, 2017). The third calendar is called the Long Count Calendar which was used for long term dates, it is both cylindrical and linear, its linear form allows for dates to be determined far in the future or the past (Brandes, 2016) The Mayan Calendar inspired the modern calendar that we use today – this is a prime example of how pre-colonized civilizations contributed to what we now called “Western