Civilizations at their peak present curious spectacles. They ooze wealth and pride, produce fantastic art and technologies, all while shredding the foundations of their prosperity. Their citizens seem to believe they eclipse mundane restrictions of time and space. The monuments their predecessors have left in Rome, on Easter Island, in Egypt, in Venice, littered like warning beacons elsewhere throughout the world, demonstrate such faith may not match reality. A rock thrown skyward must believe, at the top of its arc, fleetingly, that it is flying…