Current Events > What is the commonly accepted theory for Europe's technological advancement?

(+) Yeah! (+)

I don't think it is disputed that Europe lead the world into the Industrial Revolution and was far more advanced than the rest of the world up until the 20th century.

But what was it about Europe that allowed them to do so while other continents like Asia and Africa stagnated?

Is geography the only reason?

Maybe it just had more collapses?

Bronze age, Roman, etc. One thing about collapses, is that they simplify things without losing the basics , especially the materials they use. Yes, an advanced metal and glass sea instrument may now just be lost wonder technology, but you still know how to make bronze and more importantly can now make iron.

The climate and resources version of "a small 1 million dollar loan from father".

Europe: Modest weather, plenty of cattle, horses to carry people hundreds of miles, and relatively few predatory/dangerous animals.

Sub-Saharan Africa: Harsh weather, few animals that can be domesticated for cattle, no animals that will provide safe travel so you're on foot, and absolutely everything is out to kill you.

If horses trampled riders to death the way that zebras did, if lakes in Europe hid crocodiles, their advancement would have been stalled as well.

part of it could be animals

Europe has way more workable animals than Africa and the Americas
don't know how it compares to Asia

Sephiroth_C_Ryu posted...

Maybe it just had more collapses?

Bronze age, Roman, etc. One thing about collapses, is that they simplify things without losing the basics , especially the materials they use. Yes, an advanced metal and glass sea instrument may now just be lost wonder technology, but you still know how to make bronze and more importantly can now make iron.

Asia also had numerous countries with dynasties that collapsed though.

Europeans went to Asia and Africa, killed/enslaved everyone, and stole everything.

That was a decent starting point.

Britain's early lead in the First Industrial Revolution could be chalked up to the fact that by happy fortune, it found itself sitting on top of millions of tons of coal. You need an efficient source of energy to power technological development.

War.

Europe had way more war which created a need for people to come up with better ways to kill each other.

Like the whole old kingdom of Egypt had no war and didn't have a military. For hundreds of years they just lived in peace.

The industrial revolution started with textiles. Some clever people in the US and the UK came up with a way to mass assemble that shit. Industrial espionage eventually spread it to places like France. They came up with ways to mass produce other products. Eventually it was more profitable to sell the machines and designs than it was to keep them secret. So every country could pick it up as they developed.

If you want to know how Europe got so advanced before that, it's paper and writing. China was more advanced than them, so they actually had an early lead.

If you're searching for 1 single root cause, you'll never find it.
It's dozens of factors that stack(ed) up and multiplied one another.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/9/3/8/AAA_aCAAEuuC.jpg

Vivaldi7 posted...

If you're searching for 1 single root cause, you'll never find it.
It's dozens of factors that stack(ed) up and multiplied one another.

I'd say that's it in a nutshell: it's not something you can put in a nutshell.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]


A horse is what a horse has been for a long, long time. It isn't as if Europeans had the fortitude to domesticate killer horses and Africans were too lazy to do the same with zebras. They were simply given two different types of animal to work with.

FortuneCookie posted...

It isn't as if Europeans had the fortitude to domesticate killer horses and Africans were too lazy to do the same with zebras. They were simply given two different types of animal to work with.

Though there's an interesting theory about how animal domestication is linked to technological progress. One proposed theory for why indigenous American tribes never progressed much was because cattle weren't native to the Americas.

If cattle were found in the Americas they would have been more effectively used for work instead of just food and various inventions would have naturally been implemented as a result.

A little bit of luck, a little bit of theft. Same way people get ahead today.

Rich get richer. Once you get that first leg up its easier to stay ahead.

CRON posted...

Zebras are next to impossible to tame iirc. It's not like they're identical to wild horses. Though there's an interesting theory about how animal domestication is linked to technological progress. One proposed theory for why indigenous American tribes never progressed much was because cattle weren't native to the Americas.

If cattle were found in the Americas they would have been more effectively used for work instead of just food and various inventions would have naturally been implemented as a result.

Why did you isolate half of the sentence? It started out with me saying, "It isn't as if..."

I was in agreement that zebras could not be domesticated.

FortuneCookie posted...

Why did you isolate half of the sentence? It started out with me saying, "It isn't as if..."

I was in agreement that zebras could not be domesticated.

Completely read it wrong. My mistake.

Colonialism, luck, lack of barriers, presence of natural resources, I think.

CRON posted...

Completely read it wrong. My mistake.

No worries. I'll just have to be careful with how I structure my sentences.

kurdt032 posted...

Europeans went to Asia and Africa, killed/enslaved everyone, and stole everything.

That was a decent starting point.

Then eventually went to the Americas and killed/enslaved and plundered everything they could as well.

Wine

Wine looks better in glass, and to get that glass you need more, and more technological advancements.

Because of glass, you get better "glasses" which therefore extends the time that a scientist, or inventor can work and invent even with bad eyesight from old age (Sometimes doubling the amount of time they can do so!), and you also get a whole selection of people who couldn't work/invent before being able to, because of the improvements with glasses.

Ideas take time to spread, especially back then wth limited communication of the day. It took Christianity hundreds of years to spread across just Europe.

industrialization occurred in stages depending on the political, economic, geographical, and cultural conditions of respective parts of europe.

britain, with its significant insulation from continental conflicts, domestic stability and order, coal reserves, an ecosystem using technological precursors like mills and steam pumps, and large estates with not much going on being run by aristocrats pouring large sums of money into tinkering with things, was the first to develop it. low countries and central europe, especially parts of the holy roman quilt which had fostered conditions comparable to britain, was next to catch on. the med came later, and much later, eastern europe.

not sufficiently informed to comment on why the ottomans, mugals, or especially qing (which probably developed the precursor technologies centuries earlier) weren't first movers on industrialization.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/9/7/1/AAKd0vAAEuuj.jpg