Solar Cycles, Light, Sex Hormones and the Life Cycles of Civilization: Toward Integrated Chronobiology

Abstract

The emerging discipline of complexity science, applied to the social sciences, seeks to study the rise of human civilization as a part of a natural, evolving biological system that exploits energy resources to fuel its growth into a complex social system. In order to understand the whole system, the reductionist approach, typical to Western science, must be supplanted. The atomistic study of various scientific fields as separate mechanical parts of the system must be broadened, creating a more holistic view of human culture as an integral part of larger universal process of evolution and creation. In this article I wish to integrate the various scientific fields, including physics, chronobiology (studying the effect of solar cycles on biological growth), biology, evolutionary psychology, and the social sciences, to achieve a unified understanding of our cultural evolution.