202. harper - Sep. 10, 1998 - 9:53 PM PDT
thomasd: Message #182
I thought Nikola Tesla already did most of that. :)
203. resonance - Sep. 10, 1998 - 10:15 PM PDT
I would, to satisfy my idle curiousity, sit at Bannockburn and try to figure out who the 'fresh force' of knights were that took the field late and broke the English.
204. harper - Sep. 10, 1998 - 11:07 PM PDT
res:
I thought it was the Templars (they were BIG in Scotland). I have friends who portray soldiers in the army of Robert the Bruce. Maybe they know. Or have an idea.
205. resonance - Sep. 10, 1998 - 11:59 PM PDT
Many people believe it was the Templars, harper, for many reasons; the Scots and English Templars were largely never turned over to the English monarch, and Robert Bruce was at that time excommunicated and therefore unsympathetic to the papal demand that the Templar holdings be confiscated and the Templars arrested. The Scots armies were at that time suddenly adopting good battle tactics, tactics most notable as being used by the Saracens against the Templars. The Templars were the best, most competent soldiery in Europe at that time, and Bruce would have been quite happy, all told, to have them in his ranks. A charge by Templar and Templar-trained knights, fresh upon the field, would have certainly broken the English army at Bannockburn, which had been fighting all day with little progress.
(Most of this comes from my reading of _The Temple and the Lodge_, by Bagient and Leigh, BTW). What's more, Bagient and Leigh offer some interesting and compelling reasons as to why other Templars fleeing Europe might have gone to Scotland. These reasons are substantiated by some historical findings, such as 'hidden' Templar graveyards and holdings, and the strange influx of Near Eastern thought into Scotland at that time.
The scenario certainly sounds reasonable, and at this state of the Templar pseudomythology, is eminently believable. None of the conspiracy ideology ever enters into the possible Templar presence at Bannockburn, and several historians have gone on record saying that they believe the Scots and English Templars, with perhaps others, fought there for Robert Bruce.
The reason I want to see it is simply because the Templar myth has soooo much conspiracy gobbledygook surrounding it that no one is sure where to draw the line as to what they did and did not do. And it would have been interesting to see, at any rate.
206. HCaulfield - Sep. 11, 1998 - 12:11 AM PDT
I envy:
Nazarene shepherds
Temujin's pony boy
Mourners at Tutankhamun's funeral
John von Neumann's poker buddies
La Giaconda
207. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 12:59 AM PDT
Initiated economic aid to the Weimar Republic? What the hell for? All it needed to do was to stop printing money.
And Yale already has a chair in Ancient History.
And, at last, do tell me the meaning of "Psmenudo".
208. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 1:03 AM PDT
Frayvader: Haven't we had enough of this nonsense "history" thread? The last history thread sucked, though the one before that was pretty good. Time to transform this one into a bona fide history thread, instead of keeping it a cyber-meeting hall for Society of Creative Anachronism freaks and History Channel addicts.
209. resonance - Sep. 11, 1998 - 1:50 AM PDT
The man who'd bring a copying machine to the Library of Alexandria is talking about the Society of Creative Anachronism 'freaks'. The irony is delicious.
PE, are you saying that if the Weimar republic had just stopped printing money, it would have stabilised Germany? Why, perchance, didn't this occur to the people running the mint? And why wouldn't economic aid have helped?
And don't be coy. I know that you're a huge Menudo fan.
210. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 2:34 AM PDT
A man who would take his PORTABLE copy machine & GENERATOR with him to the Library of Alexandria is a scholar....
I've no idea what Menudo is.
"PE, are you saying that if the Weimar republic had just stopped printing money, it would have stabilised Germany?"
Yes, if by "stabilise" you're using the standard definition of low fluctuations in prices.
"Why, perchance, didn't this occur to the people running the mint?"
Why doesn't it occur to the Russian goverment now? Or in the early 1990s? Or to the Bolivians, the Brazilians, and several dozen other countries in the 1980s?
"And why wouldn't economic aid have helped?"
What would you have done? Germany was not physically destroyed. Her prewar economic infrastructure was intact. The only problem was a huge national debt (because of the reparations) and embarassed public finances.
What would have helped was the U.S. cancellation, or diminution, of inter-allied war debts. French debt to the UK, and the British debt to the United States, was the principal cause for the French intransigence that the Germans pay their reparations on time and in full. Eventually, the various Dawes and Young Plans ended up doing away with the reparations, but it took a long time, and not before the damage was done.
211. stostosto - Sep. 11, 1998 - 2:42 AM PDT
In idle and profoundly non-productive curiousity, I searched the web for "Menudo" in the vain hope that I woldn't have to admit I don't know what it is and so not know what it is that PsEsmus is accused of. Problem with such things is it provides one with less than unambiguous results. (6,134 web pages of Menudo) My best guesses are that PseudE is blamed for being either a fan of a particular Mexican soup or of some Spanish-language pop group which somehow previously has managed to escape my attention. So, help me out: Which one is it?
212. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 2:45 AM PDT
That's not to say that the hyperinflation wouldn't have happened in the absence of punitive reparations. The Germans had accumulated a massive internal debt during the war which they intended to pay for by winning and exacting reparations from the allies, much as Bismarck had done to the French in 1871. The war lost, the Germans obviously couldn't meet its debt payments and, because of opposition from the right, it didn't raise taxes. Hence monetisation of the debt. But reparations -- which amounted to 1% of German national income -- didn't help any! Reparations needlessly exacerbated the deteriorating situation in Germany.
213. stostosto - Sep. 11, 1998 - 2:52 AM PDT
PsE,
this is probably not the time or the thread, but insofar as the allied demands that Germany pay huge war reparations played a role in destabilising the German economy, wouldn't it have helped matters if these demands hadn't been made in the first place? Personally, I think the post WWII Marshall Plan is one of the most brilliant and magnificent pieces of foreign policy in history. The crucial point of it was not so much the aid in itself as the attached demands that the receiver countries deregulate and open up their economies. If such a thing had taken place in the 20s and 30s, the big depression wouldn't have been nearly as bad, neither for Germany nor for anyone else.
214. stostosto - Sep. 11, 1998 - 2:57 AM PDT
Instead, much of the macroeconomic policy of the 20s was aimed at restoring the gold standard with devastating deflatory effects. By the way, the great German hyperinflation took place in 1922-23 - 10 years before Hitler's seize of power.
215. resonance - Sep. 11, 1998 - 2:57 AM PDT
Well, I don't see how 'economic aid' excludes rolling back the German debt. Come on, now.
Sto:
It's the group. All the way. They dance and sing catchy things. PE, I know in my heart of hearts, is a closet devotee. It has to do with expressing the duality of man.
216. stostosto - Sep. 11, 1998 - 3:05 AM PDT
res,
thank you. I will immediately go out and roam this city's record stores for CDs with Menudo. I'd like very much to connect with PE on a duality level.
217. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 3:06 AM PDT
stostosto (Message #213)
"...this is probably not the time or the thread..."
Why not? I'm trying to forcibly convert this thread into a history thread, though I admit economic & financial history is a little too esoteric for most.
"...but insofar as the allied demands that Germany pay huge war reparations played a role in destabilising the German economy, wouldn't it have helped matters if these demands hadn't been made in the first place?"
Yes, of course. But the politics of 1918 made that impossible.
A major difference between Versailles and previous peace treaties which punished the losers was that the latter always exacted more moderate penalties. Kissinger notes in _A World Restored_ how temperate were the claims of Vienna 1815 and (Bismarck's) Paris 1871. And it makes sense. The First World War was the first major war of the mass age, a total war whose hardships translated into resentful jingo passions and thus democratic pressure for revenge. The British election of 1918, for example, had a desperate Liberal MP demanding that the "Germans be squeezed till the pips squeak". Clemenceau argued at Versailles that no French government could survive which did not demand full compensation for war damage from the Germans. This level of truckling to popular passions in the conduct of diplomacy was probably unprecedented. Hence the severity of Versailles.
According to Charles Kindleberger's definitive _A Financial History of Western Europe_, until the Young Plan of 1932, Germany paid an average annual *effective* reparations bill equivalent to 1% of German national income. (So I understated the burden previously.) "Effective" because reparations didn't entirely constitute cash and bullion, the payments of which were indeed often renegotiated, postponed or partially cancelled. However, you may recall that the French occupied the Ruhr in 1927-1932 and confiscated German coa
218. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 3:07 AM PDT
"Effective" because reparations didn't entirely constitute cash and bullion, the payments of which were indeed often renegotiated, postponed or partially cancelled. However, you may recall that the French occupied the Ruhr in 1927-1932 and confiscated German coal earnings as payment in kind for defaulted reparations.
219. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 3:10 AM PDT
I didn't say economic aid excludes rolling back debt. But "economic aid" usually means direct transfers. So you should have been more specific.
220. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 3:16 AM PDT
"Personally, I think the post WWII Marshall Plan is one of the most brilliant and magnificent pieces of foreign policy in history. The crucial point of it was not so much the aid in itself as the attached demands that the receiver countries deregulate and open up their economies."
Hmm. Then the Marshall Plan must have been a failure, because none of the European economies "opened up" in any sense we would recognise today. How does Labour's Britain or Germany's social market economy fit in with what we would today call liberalisation? Or were you talking about deNazification?
"If such a thing had taken place in the 20s and 30s, the big depression wouldn't have been nearly as bad, neither for Germany nor for anyone else."
This is the most eccentric reasoning I've read. The Great Depression wouldn't have been as bad if Europe's economies had been more "open" in the 20s and the 30s? What does that mean? How, for example, would the Federal Reserve's failure to do anything about the catastrophic contraction in money supply in 1929-30 been affected by more "open policies" in the 1920s? And European economies became more closed as a result of the Depression: with competitive protectionism & devaluation.
"Instead, much of the macroeconomic policy of the 20s was aimed at restoring the gold standard with devastating deflatory effects."
Yes, but Germany was not on the gold standard in the 1920s, nor in the 1930s. The only major countries that (stupidly) went back to the gold standard at a pre-war parity were Britain and France. But even the gold standard wouldn't have been disastrous had the pound not been pegged so damned high!
221. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 3:27 AM PDT
By the way, the shrinking of monetary aggregates was a Europe-wide phenomenon. For all the emergency bridge loans from the League of Nations or the Bank for International Settlements or the Bank of England, politicians in Europe could not keep up with the unprecedented rate of bank runs and bank failures. The liquidity that was being injected into countries like Austria (a major but little known episode in the international history of the Great Depression) from abroad was much too little to deal with them.
222. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 3:51 AM PDT
stostosto
Oh, I now realise what you must have meant about "openness". Yes, European countries after the war were much more open to trade with another than before the war. In fact, in terms of the sum of exports & imports as % GDP, intra-European trade volumes after the 1940s were probably double the period before the 1940s.
But contrary to your opinion, any earlier openness would not have made a jot of difference to the Great Depression. In fact, the Depression could have spread faster.
223. henryada - Sep. 11, 1998 - 4:39 AM PDT
I would like to go back to the reign of Tiberius and Caligula and see if they really were barking or just a little depressed.
224. henryada - Sep. 11, 1998 - 4:44 AM PDT
Or perhaps just over-excited.
225. stostosto - Sep. 11, 1998 - 5:27 AM PDT
PseudE,
I would really love to respond to your posts, but I just realized I haven't got the time right now. All I can tell you now is that I have just bought a double CD with Menudo which turns out to be a Puerto Rican dance band... It is called "El Reencuentro. 15 años despues". I have it playing right now. resonance called it "catchy"... I don't really know if that is the right word... perhaps I will think of a better one.
Why time travel when you can cyber travel?
226. Msivorytower - Sep. 11, 1998 - 6:30 AM PDT
"Well, maybe Stanford for Patsy, though it's distinctly second best."
WHAT!!!! To YALE????!!!
Equivalent perhaps, different in strengths, surely, but second to YALE????!!!
You are cursed for such a profanity.
(And I noticed your other comments....very good.)
227. Msivorytower - Sep. 11, 1998 - 6:33 AM PDT
"A man who would take his PORTABLE copy machine & GENERATOR with him to the Library of Alexandria is a scholar...."
Now this is absolutely true. Not only would that man be a scholar, he'd be a very clever one too, far thinking, and exhibit superior planning strategies.
MsIt is humbled before such brilliance.
228. harper - Sep. 11, 1998 - 8:06 AM PDT
Pseudo:
Go home and play on the Economics thread and let us have a little fun.
BTW, it's the Society *for* (not "of") Creative Anachronism.
In Message #217 you said:
"The First World War was the first major war of the mass age, a total war whose hardships translated into resentful jingo passions and thus
democratic pressure for revenge." Given that (and I don't necessarily agree) what is your take on the Thirty Years War in the same vein?
229. arielthesprite - Sep. 11, 1998 - 8:10 AM PDT
Harper, I could have reduced it to 3 months. Don't ask how, I'd have to kill you if I told.
230. harper - Sep. 11, 1998 - 8:18 AM PDT
ariel:
Well, it's all that defenestration crap. Could never happen today -- windows are sealed shut.
231. arielthesprite - Sep. 11, 1998 - 8:23 AM PDT
Ha, Harper! I saw all that in my scrying glass. I decided I didn't want to time travel and accidentally cause a break in the flow of time, so I'd use a scrying glass instead.
232. Bendigen - Sep. 11, 1998 - 9:02 AM PDT
I would like to go back to the beginning. Clear up the big debate of creationism vs God's will once and for all.
233. DocBrown - Sep. 11, 1998 - 9:21 AM PDT
harper, PseudoErasmus has just as much right to enjoy this thread as we do. Personally I like the addition of economic insights into history. If you are going to criticise him, latch onto this from Message #14:
> Hey, there are only two reasons to go back in
> time: 1) to photocopy every damned parchment
> lost in the mist of antiquity . . . [snip]
> 2) to collect field data. Would love to compare
> the per capita income of England or France in
> 1500-1600 and China 1500-1600.
PseudoErasmus, was this a joke? How could anyone, even you, find economic data so orgasmic that they would prefer it to culturally significant events such as the life of Jesus or Muhammad? I consider myself a data geek with almost no cultural savvy, but even I would prefer to learn the truth of these anecdotal events over data acquisition.
As for copying all the writings of antiquity, I would put a higher priority on observing and recording the events in my own words. Afterwards I might scoop up some documents of the period to compare notes with their historic accounts and amuse myself with their fiction.
234. FrayVader - Sep. 11, 1998 - 10:04 AM PDT
PE Message #208:
"Frayvader: Haven't we had enough of this nonsense "history" thread? The last history thread sucked, though the one before that was pretty good. Time to transform this one into a bona fide history thread, instead of keeping it a cyber-meeting hall for Society of Creative Anachronism freaks and History Channel addicts."
Is this the same PE whom last week was decrying the fact that there hasn't been a new thread in the Fray for over a year? Personally, I've found this thread a refreshing change of pace which allows people to discuss real historical facts (as you have done) while exercising their imaginations a bit. We'll have another pure history thread one of these days, but in the meantime, enjoy this, the Fray's first new thread in over a year.
235. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 10:42 AM PDT
Harper: But I don't want an econ thread, but a history thread. And given a new history thread, I'm perfectly willing to talk about (yet again) why the Battles of Tours and Poitiers are fraudulently given an importance they don't deserve; or why the Mongol onslaught in Asia was the most important of the thousands of barbarian attacks on civilisation in the history of the world.
I'm really quite doubtful about how frequent "total wars" were in the pre-modern (before 1800) period. Most wars then were engagements of relatively small armies (compared to modern standards), fought far from major population centres by mercenaries and volunteers more than by conscripts. In how many pre-modern wars were fielded armies comprehending even single-digit percentages of a country's population? Although the numbers of men fielded are an excellent indicator of the society's total involvement, nonetheless, "total war" or "mass war" concept is not just about the numbers of individuals fighting.
One of the most bellicose times and places was Ashikaga Japan (1368-1600). This was a period of constant battles among feuding warlords, and unending are the tales of rapine, village burnings, crop confiscations, mass beheadings, and general blood & gore. Yet, demographers and economic historians note that this was also a time of rapid population and economic expansion. This suggests that these wars were relatively small-scale affairs important to feuding nobles and not the central fact of daily life that a straight military or political history of medieval Japan might mislead one to think. (Or anachronistic costume history in the case of some people...)
A feudal depostism just can't field hundreds of thousands of troops on the battleground. It takes a highly bureaucratic and, I daresay, democratised, state to mobilise millions for organised butchery. It also takes a lot of money, which must then mean the ability to direct the economy
236. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 10:44 AM PDT
OK, I take that back: you don't need a democratised state.
But it always takes a lot of money, which must then mean the ability to direct the economy for the purposes of war. Before the 19th century, nation-states had to beg private bankers for credits in order to finance military campaigns -- because their power of wealth confiscation was limited, or because their central banking system was too primitive to monopolise domestic capital. John Brewer investigates the origins of the modern military state in The Sinews of Power: War, Money and the English State, 1688-1783. Paul Kennedy also has an interesting essay entitled "Strategy versus Finance in Twentieth Century Britain".
The crucial difference between something like the First World War and petty prolonged heel-clicking-clanking skirmishes like the 100 Years' War is that society as a whole, economically and politically, throws its weight behind the prosecution of war. The Great War was the first example by which modern societies fought the war both at home and on the battlefield, with both arenas being of equal importance. During previous european or extra-europen wars it was still possible for certain sectors to remain isolated from the effects of war. Agriculture and industry (and those people employed in these areas) interacted with government indirectly through systems of production and exchange. However during WW1 governments dictated and passed policy which acted as forms of industrial and agricultural control.
In short, civil society was temporarily suspended. A pretty much unprecendented thing.
237. AzureNW - Sep. 11, 1998 - 12:48 PM PDT
purrr....purrr....purrr....
238. granks - Sep. 11, 1998 - 1:18 PM PDT
For what it is worth, I think the idea of time travel to gain insight on the past rather than to change things that have happened. I would choose the opportunity to see Christ die and rise again (no religious interest, just wondering)
I would travel back to see why Hitler could hynotize an entire country....to be there for the painting of the Mona Lisa.....the sigining of the Declaration of Independence.....the list would go on but they would answer questions not change what has happened.
239. HCaulfield - Sep. 11, 1998 - 1:32 PM PDT
"But it always takes a lot of money, which must then mean the ability to direct the economy for the purposes of war."
This isn't true either. Temujin recruited an army of cowboys & kept it in the field with nothing but the promise of booty. There was no economy to "direct", those who stayed home knew what to do with the yaks.
240. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 1:38 PM PDT
Oh, please, don't be a jokester. "Temujin" didn't conduct a mass war.
241. thomasd - Sep. 11, 1998 - 2:22 PM PDT
Re. 202 -
harper -
Tesla was primarily involved with power distribution. He had little or nothing to do with linear amplifying devices or their applications, which is the area I specified.
242. Bendigen - Sep. 11, 1998 - 2:46 PM PDT
Re: Granks post;
This has been throttled to death in the sci-fi genre; but here goes anyways. How can you change the past in time travel, since the future is determined by what happened in the past. If you travelled back in time, your impact on the future would already be made before your birth(???) Thus, the effect of any changes would already have been made before you went back in time in the first place.
Any other suggestions.
243. davidtudor - Sep. 11, 1998 - 2:52 PM PDT
I would like to have a medical miracle and live in Florence from about 1300 to about 1550. With money and position, of course. Talent in any number of categories would be nice too.
244. stostosto - Sep. 11, 1998 - 5:56 PM PDT
Funny, how everybody wants to go to Europe on their time travel. I think I have registered one post where the protagonist wanted to see how a native American culture of the Mississippi delta which was extinguished several hundred years ago (the native culture, not the delta) was like. But apart from that, it is Europe all along...
I am not complaining, just wondering why. I can see two possible explanations:
1. There is much more written down about European history than history from other parts of the world. And while this theoretically might lead to a greater curiousity about other parts of the world, instead it simply leads to oblivion of them.
2. Most people in the Fray are of European descent, and so going back to Europe is really exploring one's own background. It is as close you can get to the most interesting subject of all: One self.
245. Msivorytower - Sep. 11, 1998 - 6:33 PM PDT
stostosto
Well, several have indicated an interest in the Mediterranian countries, the Middle East, and even the Far East.
In addition, some of us were interested in collecting data on long lost civilizations from pre-history. Again, not much interest in Europe there.
Perhaps you didn't read all the posts.
246. Msivorytower - Sep. 11, 1998 - 6:34 PM PDT
that's Mediterranean.....
sigh...
247. JustSayYo - Sep. 11, 1998 - 6:53 PM PDT
I would like to have a chance to view plate tectonic movement of earths land masses. Wouldn't it be cool to see that evolution? To be correct as to what moved from where with absolute certainty. It would be fascinating to watch in slow motion time travel, say about five thousand years every few seconds. Observe then move on. Of course as the masses grow farther apart the few seconds will become a few minutes to allow adjustments around the globe for total viewing pleasure.
248. stostosto - Sep. 11, 1998 - 7:13 PM PDT
MsIT,
No, I admit I haven't read all the posts. I took a chance to see if it could move the discussion in a new direction. It is beginning to, well, (I don't want to be arrogant, how shall I put this..?) bore me.
249. stostosto - Sep. 11, 1998 - 7:15 PM PDT
Sorry about that, I am off, ta-ta!
250. Msivorytower - Sep. 11, 1998 - 7:17 PM PDT
stostosto
Ah yes, boredom. I know it well. Move away to your hearts content.
However, the early discussion was quite interesting, IMO.
251. labarjare - Sep. 11, 1998 - 7:39 PM PDT
Missy - I see more and more sighs. Those fingers of yours are really hopping around that board, I guess. (g)
um, this thread CAN'T go anywhere after people have given their wish lists.
Pseudo is correct (for a change...hahahaha). A real history thread is in order.
252. Msivorytower - Sep. 11, 1998 - 7:43 PM PDT
Lab!
Ya, I'm getting too excited these days. My fingers start stumbling over each other. "Finger twisted" so to speak....
What's up?
253. Seamus - Sep. 11, 1998 - 8:52 PM PDT
Two items on my time travel itinerary:
1 Accompany Tocqueville and bud around 'Murica
2 Meet and congratulate and encourage Edmund Morel, Roger Casement, William Sheppard, and George Washington Williams.
254. arkymalarky - Sep. 11, 1998 - 9:01 PM PDT
I agree about the history angle. I want to hear PE's explanation of his view on the Mongolian invasion.
But if this is a wish list, there are so many times and places that would be fascinating to experience. I haven't read all the posts, but if I had to choose one out of all points in time and place, I think I'd choose the very spot where I am now when the first people inhabited it. Having collected remnants of the people who considered this very spot their home, I'd like to see what day-to-day life was for them. Since it would be impossible for me to select one major point in time above the rest, that would probably give me more personal satisfaction than anything else.
255. boohab - Sep. 11, 1998 - 10:36 PM PDT
you guys are nuts. if i had a time machine, i'd move forward in time just to observe where we go from here, just to satisfy my curiousity.
then i'd go back to prehistory and start a farm somewhere it's never been done yet. collect tribute and young virgins and basically live like a, hmmmm, king. yeah king that's what we'll call it.
but wait, then there's the jurassic age. i guess i just couldn't keep still, and i'd ultimately become very corrupt, then ultimately very godlike. rather like what's his name in groundhog day.
256. CalGal - Sep. 11, 1998 - 10:42 PM PDT
"Young virgins"?
Boohab.
I'm....well. Not disappointed. But geez.
257. resonance - Sep. 11, 1998 - 10:55 PM PDT
Finding out how things turn out might make for an awfully boring existence. I would have to think long and hard about whether or not I'd do it.
Having said that, I've always thought that the fact that I'll never learn how all this turns out, what happens after I die... sucks. Maybe I'll just leave the time machine in the garage until I'm old.
258. coralreef - Sep. 11, 1998 - 11:15 PM PDT
Well, if you go forward you'd find out if you'll get to *be* old at all.
As for the Mongolian hordes, I'd go back and encourage Gedik Ahmed Pasha, Grand Admiral of the Ottoman fleet who in 1480 came very close to sacking Venice, to go ahead and sack Venice and blow off returning home to see his dying Sultan. I mean, how many times do you get a chance to snuff out the Renaissance in its infancy?
259. resonance - Sep. 11, 1998 - 11:19 PM PDT
The Venetian renaissance, anyway.
Besides, using a time machine to go forward won't tell you anything but *how* something might come about. The fact that you went forward would change everything, a priori, and you'd still have an infinite number of possible timelines diverging from your initial starting point.
260. coralreef - Sep. 11, 1998 - 11:19 PM PDT
Well, that wasn't the Mongols of course, but the Ottoman empire. I'm curious about the Mongols and all the rest too, but will a History thread last long enough? If only we could go forward and find out....
261. resonance - Sep. 11, 1998 - 11:21 PM PDT
Granted, most of what you saw would probably come to pass -- most of what you saw that doesn't directly impinge upon you that is. But as far as your own life, I can't help but think that seeing a possible future wouldn't change the way you live and what you do. Especially if you found out about certain events in advance.
262. resonance - Sep. 11, 1998 - 11:22 PM PDT
This is giving me a pretty good idea for a short story. I haven't had a good idea like this in a while.
263. resonance - Sep. 11, 1998 - 11:22 PM PDT
Gah. You know what I meant.
264. coralreef - Sep. 11, 1998 - 11:23 PM PDT
Italy in general, I meant. Excuse my mangling it all, including the divergent timelines bit. I'm not up on my time travel. So if going forward would change things, then you aren't really seeing the future are you? I guess it would be kind of pointless then.
265. coralreef - Sep. 11, 1998 - 11:25 PM PDT
That was a crosspost of sorts....
266. godless - Sep. 12, 1998 - 12:35 AM PDT
If I wanted to go and live somewhere I would pick 1890's New York or pre quake San Francisco.
If we are playing wheels of If and want to change things; I would go to England in 1840 and introduce Charles Babbage to Joseph Henry. I am sure I could persuade Babbage to cross the Atlantic and work with Henry or vice versa..
267. ScottLoar - Sep. 12, 1998 - 6:50 AM PDT
A History Thread? The first was a dialogue between a few people, the second lasted about 100 posts and revolved around obscure battles, and now there is a cry for a third? On what? Economic history? That's sure to thrill and inspire diverse comment, isn't it?
268. hashke - Sep. 12, 1998 - 7:09 AM PDT
I would like to ride bareback, carrying an eagle-feathered lance, with the old Navajo warriors (hashké naabaah) to take vengeance on those consummate pricks Colonel Chacon and Kit Carson, the massacrerers of The People, the Diné, at Canyon del Muerto (Ane'é Tséyi')---knowing full well that one of the two of them would, as in a dream, metamorphose into (who else?) John Wayne.
269. Msivorytower - Sep. 12, 1998 - 7:13 AM PDT
ScottLoar
Yes, but we liked it didn't we? I remember some lively exchanges in the History threads of old. Frankly, if you want appeal, look to the Starr report and gaze into the mindless gloating of the ideologues. A portent of the future, and our past.
Hashke
".....knowing full well that one of the two of them would, as in a dream, metamorphose into (who else?) John Wayne."
Oh the irony.
270. FrayVader - Sep. 12, 1998 - 7:17 AM PDT
I would hope that the fascinating wishes in this thread might evolve into some interesting discussions of history. In fact, several such pleasant diversions *have* occurred.
271. hashke - Sep. 12, 1998 - 7:19 AM PDT
MsIt:
Are there too many ironies in the fire here?
272. Msivorytower - Sep. 12, 1998 - 7:22 AM PDT
Hashke
Only if the heat has gotten too "smelting"......
273. ScottLoar - Sep. 12, 1998 - 8:07 AM PDT
If I'm not wrong the defeat of the Navajo (and the burning of their peach orchards)at Canyon del Muerto marks the end of the Navajo as raiders and the beginning of their transition to herders and farmers. They settled into this life fairly comfortably, and by the 1890's the couriers bringing invitation of Wovoka's Ghost Dance to the Navajo were politely rebuffed. This transition from mounted raider (similar to the Apache) to pastoralist was so successful that the Navajo now number among the largest (the largest?) tribe of Native Americans, far surpassing their historical numbers. I guess their defeat at Canyon del Muerto ultimately served the Navajo well, eh?
274. wabbit - Sep. 12, 1998 - 8:22 AM PDT
I'd like to see Machu Picchu when it was a thriving community.
275. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 12, 1998 - 8:33 AM PDT
Loar doesn't know what the hell he's talking about. He wasn't even here for the first history thread -- which was lively and excellent and comprised of many discussants & eventually a thousand posts.
276. ScottLoar - Sep. 12, 1998 - 8:57 AM PDT
PseudoErasmus, you are a frigging jerk. I did not contribute to the first History thread where you enunciated your cribbed theory of the importance of geography because, frankly, I hadn't the time or inclination. Moreover, any prolonged exchange with you devolves into your safe grounds - a discussion of economics and the relevancy of statistics.
Recall the second history thread, ass, and the effect it had on the Fray - nil. But, if a history thread is submitted then I'll surely contribute my opinions on those subjects in which I am competent.
277. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 12, 1998 - 9:21 AM PDT
Loar: You had better stick to what you do well -- attribute every human problem to the Vices of Sloth, Gluttony and Avarice.
The first History thread contained NOT ONE word of my comments about geography & history. That was in the religion thread and then later, to some extent, in the second history thread.
"Moreover, any prolonged exchange with you devolves into your safe grounds - a discussion of economics and the relevancy of statistics."
What prattle. But I suppose you're short on barbs. Or I must have unconsciously introduced regression analyses into the discussion of the Merchant of Venice when I hosted it, or perhaps I provided links to bar charts & scattergrams in my extensive comments on movies, language, Keats's Eve of St. Agnes, and of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima & N. and God knows what else.
278. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 12, 1998 - 9:25 AM PDT
Oh, and those frequency distribution charts among the comments about the early Christian rejection of terrestrial sphericity.
279. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 12, 1998 - 9:30 AM PDT
Since a "devolution into economics" is obviously a concern, I won't discuss any economics at all in any potential new history thread (as I didn't in the last two), or if this thread turns into one. Believe it or not, the vast majority of my comments in the Fray over the last two years have not been about economic matters at all.
I think there are enough people interested in a history thread -- such as Harper, RustlerPike, resonance, surely Stostosto, etc. -- that this one should be formally converted.
280. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 12, 1998 - 9:31 AM PDT
All the same, don't start until Monday!
281. ScottLoar - Sep. 12, 1998 - 9:42 AM PDT
Pseudoerasmus, your characterization of my arguments and motives is grossly and unconscionably wrong yet allows you the comfort of disparagement, proving that you've a first rate intellect in a third rate character. You do revert to your safe ground when pressed, or quit with a tossed sarcasm. But why trade barbs and quips with you? To what end? It's a frigging waste of time and amuses only the small gallery of onlookers who attend your posts for their admitted wit.
282. ScottLoar - Sep. 12, 1998 - 9:46 AM PDT
By the way, stupidly believing that I attribute every human problem to the Vices of Sloth, Gluttony and Avarice you, PseudoErasmus, may dismiss my arguments in future without engaging me. I forfeit nothing by being taken lightly by those who believe such as you.
283. ScottLoar - Sep. 12, 1998 - 9:49 AM PDT
Please dismiss the "devolution into economics" as my personal concern and plow on with it as you will.
284. hashke - Sep. 12, 1998 - 9:51 AM PDT
ScottLoar Message #273:
Actually, I took some poetic liberties with the characters. How else, Chacon being a Spaniard, to come up with John Wayne? Carson did not seriously come onto the killing fields until around 1860 or so. The canyon massacre took place in 1805.
The massacre at Canyon del Muerto of course enraged the Navajos, and although they sued for peace, they continued guerilla harrassment against Whites and other Indian tribes. So, the Navajos were raising hell (while becoming agrarians and herder) with the Acomas, the Hopis, the Zunis, with their old enemies, the Utes, for another half century, although other peace treaties budded here and there throughout that period.
(continued)
285. hashke - Sep. 12, 1998 - 9:59 AM PDT
In 1861 a Colonel Canby ordered Kit Carson, who was organizing a campaign against the raiders, "to instruct the commanding officer not to take any male prisoners, and if any men fall into his hands to execute them at once. Women and children will be turned loose and ordered to go into their own country." The onslaught led to capitulation and exile of the Navajos to Fort Sumner until 1868.
The Navajos didn't really settle down until late in the 19th century, when they continued nursing whole new sets of evolving problems.
See Frank McNitt's THE NAVAJO WARS and Robert Young's THE ROLE OF THE NAVAJO IN THE SOUTHWESTERN DRAMA.
286. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 12, 1998 - 10:04 AM PDT
Message #282
Actually, I don't take you lightly. I respect your intelligence. It is precisely for this that we have not exchanged barbs in recent months. However, I find your prose insufferably orotund, and I cannot contain myself any longer. You make yourself a target with that early 19th century pastiche of the King James Bible that you call a style.
287. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 12, 1998 - 10:06 AM PDT
Hashke
Do you know anything about the charge that the U.S. army deliberately infected American Indians with various diseases like measles & typhus in the 18th & 19th centuries? I was interested in learning something about this.
288. ScottLoar - Sep. 12, 1998 - 10:38 AM PDT
PseudoErasmus, please, cavilling is unbecoming.
Hashke, interesting account, but the command of Colonel Canby does not surprise me for it was repeated a hundred times again during the Indian Wars and done by both whites and Indians. Indian warfare was massacre, and the sight of disemboweled, tortured and disfigured corpses in the woodlands and plains disturbed whites. Not odd, eh?
Nevertheless, the defeats by the Navajo tempered them to a herders' life and saved their people and culture, would you not agree? Compare them, then, to the Indians of the high plains today.
289. hashke - Sep. 12, 1998 - 11:02 AM PDT
PE:
I have heard of such but have nothing substantive to contribute. Have you tried some web searches?
Scott:
Yes, but the Navajos have been more vigorous in hanging onto their language than have most tribes of the plains. The defeats did pacify and demoralize the Navajos and Apaches, and turn them to other activities. Compare the Germans (twice whacked this century) and the Japanese. Is there a law to be drawn here?
290. ScottLoar - Sep. 12, 1998 - 11:26 AM PDT
The comparison of the Germans and Japanese with the Navajo and Apache is mismatched for defeat does not always pacify, and German and Japanese culture was not transformed by their defeat. The law to be drawn from the Indian experience of the New World is that when modern civilization hits neolithic cultures it leaves behind chaos, and the neolithic cultures cannot be reconstructed.
291. resonance - Sep. 12, 1998 - 12:40 PM PDT
"The comparison of the Germans and Japanese
with the Navajo and Apache is mismatched for
defeat does not always pacify, and German and
Japanese culture was not transformed by their
defeat."
Transformed? Perhaps not, but they were certainly changed. Viz the change in the role of the Japanese emperor (a sociopolitical cornerstone) and the change in the economies (there's that word!) of the two nations.
How was Navajo culture transformed directly by their defeat?
292. Blaise - Sep. 12, 1998 - 12:54 PM PDT
BIRCH AGAINST AN EVENING SKY 1798
Once again, you wake to the crow's plea.
The birch huddle around the lake,
like peasants stoking a fire.
You break the soil slowly. A hawk circles the wind.
You toss the seeds and bless them,
like your father's hands.
Imagine the long illustrious wheat,
the women pounding flour,
they sing old rhymes to their children's children,
like a miracle, nothing changed.
The birch blow in the whimsical light—almost
black against the dusk. And when
the sun slants down into the middle of the forest
like hammered copper, and the stream
overflows from the snow,
the geese will vanish like hushed bells,
like a sleigh,
crossing the ice in the dark.
293. hashke - Sep. 12, 1998 - 1:02 PM PDT
Scott:
I made no argument that defeat *always* pacifies. I simply suggested a larger scale comparison. It is arguable that, as a result of overwhelming defeat, the progressions from an ethos of book burning and racial extermination, or Nanking raping, to more benign and constructive activities constitute perceptible cultural transformations.
As for the unreconstructability of trashed neolithic cultures, io son d'accordo con voi.
294. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 12, 1998 - 1:17 PM PDT
I don't know what Loar is talking about. Of course Germany was transformed by defeat -- utterly transformed. It's possible, though, that he's quibbling about whether it was the defeat or the occupation/deNazification which effected the transformation.
As for Japan, it too was transformed. Forget the emperor. It is self-evident in everything else that is Japan.
I do acknowledge that Japan has been less thoroughly transformed than Germany. After all, leading grandees of the ruling Christian Democratic Party aren't usually seen at cemetaries honouring the Nazi dead. Yet LDP bigwigs make an annual pilgrimmage to the Yasukuni Shrine in Ueno to quite literally pray for the souls of war criminals.
295. PseudoErasmus - Sep. 12, 1998 - 1:25 PM PDT
*** Loar's Law of Devolution into the Safe Grounds of Economics***
Actually, I overstated something in my previous post, and Resonance is wrong on one thing:
the economies of Japan and Germany weren't really transformed. That is, the post-war industrial structure of the two economies is more or less what it was before the war. Germany maintained its dual structure: giant industrial corporations tightly controlled by leading banks, alongside an array of middle-sized companies without long-standing or close relationships with major banks.
In Japan, MacArthur broke up the zaibatsu (conglomerates owning every kind of business, and controlled by a handful of people). But after the occupation ended they were reborn as the keiretsu: networks of two or three dozen corporations with large proprietary stakes in each other, centred around the old zaibatsu banks.
296. JustSayYo - Sep. 12, 1998 - 2:27 PM PDT
I wish to comment upon the Native American concerns presented in previous posts.
This is almost always speculation wrt normal historical channels that persons in the general public have as reference. I've watched PBS specials which gave very clear and accurate accounts of the native situation. I've also read some novels, some magazines and many National Geographic articles. So now the source is substantiated. Take it as you wish.
I) Were diseases in some manner deliberately given to the natives?
If speculation from without a source is desired then the answer has been yes. Some evil persons of the past may have infected natives via blankets or visits of infected persons. The later is well documented. The priests who visited the Canadian (Quebec) natives decimated them.
II)Mostly natives were driven to a fro as expanssion persisted. Of note the natives of Florida fought fiercely for maybe a decade to expell the immigrants. Those they fought were many a trained soldier. The protracted fighting was from small groups of natives organized and led by the charizmatic Joseph. When he was killed the people mostly dispersed and settled where they were told to.
III) The cherokee have a heart wrenching history. They emulated the U.S. constitution and are the only native peoples to have ever adopted an alphabet. They have written language and books. They had representatives elected to negotiate with the U.S. government. They also had a pact not to sell their land, the breaking of which was punishable by death. I know some of them were killed for their part in unauthorized sales of native lands. Then to top it all off the U.S. army forced them to march to Oklahoma to the 'Indian Territory'. This is known as the famous 'Trail Of Tears'.
The good news is that modern Cherokee are buying back their native lands, as are other tribes. Small tracts at a time. Maybe they can get some special places back and I wish them well.
Hope this is a li
297. JustSayYo - Sep. 12, 1998 - 2:29 PM PDT
a little helpful.
298. resonance - Sep. 12, 1998 - 2:33 PM PDT
"Actually, I overstated something in my previous
post, and Resonance is wrong on one thing:"
Why did I suspect that you'd change what you had previously said just to make it look as if I were wrong? Old schtick, PE.
You are honestly going to say that the 1950s German economy was no different than the 1938 German Economy?
I don't suppose that you've ever heard of the DDR, have you?
299. resonance - Sep. 12, 1998 - 2:37 PM PDT
Really, alex, use your head. I mean, you couldn't have thought at all about what you were saying, but you just wanted to contradict what I had said.
Learn some social skills, why don't you?
300. JustSayYo - Sep. 12, 1998 - 2:50 PM PDT
I'd like to be in a secure place and watch Custers last battle. I'd like to see Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse fighting those doomed cavalry. It makes sense that the arrogant colonel was wiped out. Tit for tat, he wiped out a couple of villages full of women, children and old men so he deserved what he got. Then I would have liked to have counceled those Dakota to stay as a massive army and build a stronghold from which to negotiate the treaties on their terms. If I could see all the plans of those dishonest manipulative native agents, U.S. government representatives and business tycoons bent on destroying the natives, maybe I could councel the natives to be stronger. Maybe not. Neolithic cultures would have had to take quite a few leaps of faith to believe that so much depended on their willingness to secure land at the title office and elect representatives to go to Washington. Who could that have been? None of them had a clue about the process and were belittled when they tried.