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big & old! plus other stuff too.
Good points all!
We've brought up some great stuff here, but to return to the original question (and since we cannot predict the future), we will have to go with a retirement at this time (2002).
what is the Civ 3 scoring system?
Well, China big and China old.
Do I wish it factored in more than that?
Of course.
But it doesn't! So while it may be repetitive or "unintelligent", it is the key argument. According to Civ 3 scores, that's what counts.
Further, "Western" civ as a whole is not included.
But back to more interesting discussion,
As for the Greek Hellenistic culture reigning supreme at its time, I think not. We just have better records of its existence. It held considerable sway over mideast, north africa, balkan & mediterranean europe. that is not remotely the world.
You've still left out northern central europe, north america, south america, southcentral africa, asia, 'russia', oceania...Just because our current knowledge has fewer records of the civilizations of the time, did not mean those civs were non-existent. They might have been, but not necessarily. we only know that we do not have as detailed records as we do for mesopotamia and the mediterranean civs.
And some records do exist. We are simply not aware of them because we as westerners do not care (*in general, of course there are exceptions). But you can find it. Read some Indian history of the time. Read some Chinese history of the time. Harder to find but it exists. Btw, Alexander & Hellenism was stopped cold by India.
The reason we bank so much on euro-mideast civs is because western heritage derives itself from this. We call the Tigris and Euphrates the cradle of Civ because that is the immediate predecessor to Judaism (thus Christianity and Islam) and palestine is the crossroads of three continents. thus the mingling of Greek classicism with Roman and Semitic culture. Throw in Egypt too, but they're less influential (unless you buy into Alan Moore's "From Hell" Freemasons). We go from this to a regression in the feudal age but a restoration in the renaissance and expansion from there to the rise of the nation-state* . Then we can trace the path from Renaissance Italy to France and England. (Or better yet, from the Irish to the English). Then from the British Empire to NA (current US & Can), and nominally to Africa & India (see earlier long post), plus Australia. We can add that English society meddled alot in continental affairs, incl. a driving power in WW1&2. It is a bit of a leap to say England was the new Rome. It was substantially different and much of our current western civ was developed there and cannot be traced to Rome or Greece. (Rationalism & Enlightenment is oft attrib'd to France, but France's Voltaire got it from England.) Add in Industrial Rev. Bam! I can see how persuasive it is.
((*Nation State. Feudal society was not "national" and territories and people were often "traded"). The nation-state is the requirement for a civilization entity. Greece had it. Egypt had it. Rome had it. Byzantium had it. Medieval Europe generally did not. Holy Roman Empire did not. Germanic states did not (we see them as highly nationalistic now, but before unification they saw themselves as primarily Bavarian, or Prussian, or Hessian, not German). France acquired it during the time of Jean D'arc. England acquired it after Norman invasion, or a little later. Italy certainly did not until Garibaldi. ))
For the Greek argument to work, you may as well say Minoan culture wins because on Crete it was supreme for a while. Every civ is supreme in its local area. None is globally dominant (yet), and none really outweighs any of the others.
Let me restate my point, you can make plenty of arguments for the contributions of Rome, Greece, and England to the "world", but what you are really referring to is the Western world (which is only 1/3 of the global pop, and even less if we track back through time. let me also add that military-political-economic dominance does not equate to civilizational dominance. you must factor in culture. Also note that most colonies & treaty ports were ruled like the khanate. overlordship but local administration & customs. import culture for the foreign nationals who must be there, not for the local masses.)
Yes, Rome, Greece, and England dominate the western world, but only the western world. Not the whole world. And not even for "most" of history. just most of the history we are taught in schools (because that's our focus, and our historians write about our civ, not others. you must take into account this bias if you want to be balanced.) We do not acknowledge the specifics of other civs because we don't know them! We can only aggregate them. If we took the time to study, and did the research, and learned the non-Romance languages (many not even phonetic*), we may come to appreciate the way in which Sinic (or other) culture affect the lives of non-western world. It still will not mean as much to us because we do not live or think in those ways, but we may see how deep and broad it reaches into daily life, just like how the Western Civ does with us.
((*That brings up another point. While phonetic languages are technically superior due to abstraction, they have not been fully adopted by everyone yet! (it's the same argument for metric SI being superior to Imperial, but US economy is huge and inertia to change is only beginning to shift now.)))
So, again another long post. hopefully this makes more sense now. you've all brought up some great points that made me think longer and harder about it. I have no problem changing my mind, but my argument was too robust for me to deflate. it survived. I'm sticking with my vote. For either the Civ 3 reason, or the "can't lump all as Western Civ and even if you could it is arguably not superior to Sinic Civ" reason.
Or the fact that Canada will conquer the world before 2050! Just you wait! You think we're all nice and friendly, but that's just Chretien garbling his words again. You think he's saying "I hereby dedicate this new arena to the gold medal winning Canadian Olympic hockey team." Really, he's saying "All your base are belong to us!"
Good points all!
We've brought up some great stuff here, but to return to the original question (and since we cannot predict the future), we will have to go with a retirement at this time (2002).
what is the Civ 3 scoring system?
Well, China big and China old.
Do I wish it factored in more than that?
Of course.
But it doesn't! So while it may be repetitive or "unintelligent", it is the key argument. According to Civ 3 scores, that's what counts.
Further, "Western" civ as a whole is not included.
But back to more interesting discussion,
As for the Greek Hellenistic culture reigning supreme at its time, I think not. We just have better records of its existence. It held considerable sway over mideast, north africa, balkan & mediterranean europe. that is not remotely the world.
You've still left out northern central europe, north america, south america, southcentral africa, asia, 'russia', oceania...Just because our current knowledge has fewer records of the civilizations of the time, did not mean those civs were non-existent. They might have been, but not necessarily. we only know that we do not have as detailed records as we do for mesopotamia and the mediterranean civs.
And some records do exist. We are simply not aware of them because we as westerners do not care (*in general, of course there are exceptions). But you can find it. Read some Indian history of the time. Read some Chinese history of the time. Harder to find but it exists. Btw, Alexander & Hellenism was stopped cold by India.
The reason we bank so much on euro-mideast civs is because western heritage derives itself from this. We call the Tigris and Euphrates the cradle of Civ because that is the immediate predecessor to Judaism (thus Christianity and Islam) and palestine is the crossroads of three continents. thus the mingling of Greek classicism with Roman and Semitic culture. Throw in Egypt too, but they're less influential (unless you buy into Alan Moore's "From Hell" Freemasons). We go from this to a regression in the feudal age but a restoration in the renaissance and expansion from there to the rise of the nation-state* . Then we can trace the path from Renaissance Italy to France and England. (Or better yet, from the Irish to the English). Then from the British Empire to NA (current US & Can), and nominally to Africa & India (see earlier long post), plus Australia. We can add that English society meddled alot in continental affairs, incl. a driving power in WW1&2. It is a bit of a leap to say England was the new Rome. It was substantially different and much of our current western civ was developed there and cannot be traced to Rome or Greece. (Rationalism & Enlightenment is oft attrib'd to France, but France's Voltaire got it from England.) Add in Industrial Rev. Bam! I can see how persuasive it is.
((*Nation State. Feudal society was not "national" and territories and people were often "traded"). The nation-state is the requirement for a civilization entity. Greece had it. Egypt had it. Rome had it. Byzantium had it. Medieval Europe generally did not. Holy Roman Empire did not. Germanic states did not (we see them as highly nationalistic now, but before unification they saw themselves as primarily Bavarian, or Prussian, or Hessian, not German). France acquired it during the time of Jean D'arc. England acquired it after Norman invasion, or a little later. Italy certainly did not until Garibaldi. ))
For the Greek argument to work, you may as well say Minoan culture wins because on Crete it was supreme for a while. Every civ is supreme in its local area. None is globally dominant (yet), and none really outweighs any of the others.
Let me restate my point, you can make plenty of arguments for the contributions of Rome, Greece, and England to the "world", but what you are really referring to is the Western world (which is only 1/3 of the global pop, and even less if we track back through time. let me also add that military-political-economic dominance does not equate to civilizational dominance. you must factor in culture. Also note that most colonies & treaty ports were ruled like the khanate. overlordship but local administration & customs. import culture for the foreign nationals who must be there, not for the local masses.)
Yes, Rome, Greece, and England dominate the western world, but only the western world. Not the whole world. And not even for "most" of history. just most of the history we are taught in schools (because that's our focus, and our historians write about our civ, not others. you must take into account this bias if you want to be balanced.) We do not acknowledge the specifics of other civs because we don't know them! We can only aggregate them. If we took the time to study, and did the research, and learned the non-Romance languages (many not even phonetic*), we may come to appreciate the way in which Sinic (or other) culture affect the lives of non-western world. It still will not mean as much to us because we do not live or think in those ways, but we may see how deep and broad it reaches into daily life, just like how the Western Civ does with us.
((*That brings up another point. While phonetic languages are technically superior due to abstraction, they have not been fully adopted by everyone yet! (it's the same argument for metric SI being superior to Imperial, but US economy is huge and inertia to change is only beginning to shift now.)))
So, again another long post. hopefully this makes more sense now. you've all brought up some great points that made me think longer and harder about it. I have no problem changing my mind, but my argument was too robust for me to deflate. it survived. I'm sticking with my vote. For either the Civ 3 reason, or the "can't lump all as Western Civ and even if you could it is arguably not superior to Sinic Civ" reason.
Or the fact that Canada will conquer the world before 2050! Just you wait! You think we're all nice and friendly, but that's just Chretien garbling his words again. You think he's saying "I hereby dedicate this new arena to the gold medal winning Canadian Olympic hockey team." Really, he's saying "All your base are belong to us!"
see you all later.
) we had in our school rooms in the 50's might have covered 2/3 of the world. (Canada, India, Australia, large parts of Africa, etc.)
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