WHAT DID THE MAYANS DO THAT THE ROMANS COULD NOT?

No, it's not speak Mayan.  Smarty pants.  This, so it said in Google, is the 360 day Mayan calendar.  So that is mysterious in itself.  But that's not what got to me tonight.  What it is, is the wonderment that goes with not only the Mayans, the Aztecs, The Incas, the Egyptians and all those other pre-historic peoples who found out about all these things.  How could they know?  Is that all they had to do is to stay up and watch the stars to see where they were going?  How did they know what is Venus and what is Betelgeuse?  How did they come to figure out how to predict stuff?  How did they know that after 13 full moons the year was over?  How did they know that they could build a temple with a door that would tell them exactly what time it is every single cycle by the way the door let the sun come in?  Did they pay people to sit there and watch that stuff?  The other day we talked about scientists having to be ready to have their theory proven wrong.  Can you imagine being as Mayan and having some Aztec, blood drinking savage come up to you and tell you that you're wrong?  After all that observatory time?   If it were I, guess whose blood would be drunk?  In this case though,from what I heard the other day by a real, honest to goodness Mayan [yeah, they're still around.  They mostly inhabit the country called Belize.]  that the Mayans have an ace in the hole over the Aztecs.  See, the Mayans are the ones who came up with the "0" in the western hemisphere.  We know that it is the Phoenicians or some such people in that other corner of the world who got it over there, but the Mayans found it here too.  However, there are others who make the same claim.  Not the least of whom are our Indian friends.  So see, with all their engineering savvy and their ultra efficient armed forces, the Romans could not even think "zero."  How could they build roads without a "0"?  How could they measure anything without being able to mark the starting point, "0"?  Beats the life outta me!
Finally, I have to repeat what I once opined within these intellectual confines.  There has to be, even now in the age of cyber space, a spiritual communication between sentient beings.  The concept of "0" is a good example in point.  I personally do not doubt that the "0" could have been "invented", call it "discovered" if you wish, in different corners of the world.  Perhaps even in a fairly closely circumscribed amount of time.  Yes, even without travel and without man-made cyber space.  Don't ask me how they did it.  I think what probably happened is that someone got angry enough to sit down and invent one.  Maybe it didn't look like "0".  Then again, we know that in the Arabic system it sure looks like zero.  So, take that, you Romans.  Maybe that's why your empire fell.  You couldn't pay your debts because you had no way of figuring out how many zeros to put after the 999999999999999999999.9999999 denaria.  [That's a neuter, accusative plural for those who don't know the Roman language.]
Now you know what was keeping me awake.
Tomorrow, the forbidden subject.  Send your children to the baby sitter's house.