A Russian friend of mine told me that growing up during the Soviet Union, it was required by law that anytime anything was learned in class, the teacher had to first preface the learning by acknowledging Soviet Socialism.

To re-recap – humanity lived more or less in a superstitious, religious darkness for its entire history until, some Europeans starting in the 16th century, began systematically practicing a thing called the scientific method and then using that thing, they created other things like The Enlightenment, which in turn brought about still other things like Modernism and the Modern World – which gave us long lives, cars and text messaging.

Why does the sky turn black and start bellowing with loud noises, torrential rain, and streaks of light?

Thunderstorms are terrifying even in the context of modern civilization, but they must have been especially terrifying to our ancestors living in the wilderness.