After lurking /His/ for several months I've seen serval times the association of Modern Britain with irrelevancy. This leads me to my question; what the hell even is a relevant country?
There's the US which is obviously undisputed, but then it gets vague and then vaguer. For example Russia is because of its military might, but is not because it's not the same as the USSR's. Secondly China which is the main rival of the US is, because of that reason but is not, for lack of global influence. Then from a historical context I've seen the likes of Italy (a major axis power) being considered un noteworthy and not of concern, for military failures, while the possed a serious military threat at the beginning of the war. Britain my original example possess one of the worlds largest GDPs, global naval and military deployment capabilities, and an enormous cultural hand fails to solidify its self on perceived sovereign relevance in the minds of many. Is there any solid benchmarks to define a nations relevance in the geopolitical game?
>>570511
>what the hell even is a relevant country?
France
>>570511
>and an enormous cultural hand fails to solidify its self on perceived sovereign relevance in the minds of many
Still trying to appropriate America's achievements I see
Back to /int/ Nigel
Nobody is relevant but nuke holders bexuse of muh mad.
We are in a meme phase of history, itll either end with a cataclysm, or more likely, a perma cucking
Why did the greeks and the romans worship gods that either hate them to death or don't give a shit about them ?
The great gods less or more familiar to us through mythology aren't the sole gods in Antiquity. You need to understand the historical process of invention and development of religion to approch the mentality of the men of yore.
In the age of cities, the god the must important to a citizen was the god protecting his own city. Of course such god was benevolent.
But, firstly, the relations with gods were conceived as a trade : the god will help you if you help him. It's the reason behind the sacrificial practices (and you can see that most often in a private context, they promised only to thanks the god, doing the sacrifice after the helpful act was realised).
Also, we may see that some still famous gods protected certain cities (by exemple Athena for Athenes or Apollon for Delphes). It's interesting to see that these gods are systematically associated with a surname, which is called an epiklesis. Here intervenes what I said previously about the process of development of religion as a political bound between men (becoming citizens) and cities (becoming alliances, federations, leagues, etc.) : in fact, most of these senior gods were distinct and particular to the isolated group that invented them. Religions of the past, being purely oral, were fluid to a point we have forgotten today. So the comparison between distinct gods and the fusions/assimilations were easy and politically meaningfull. The gods known today are the result of a later process of organisation parallele to the very history of the Mediterranean world.
That's why we may find today these gods cold or crual : in fact, they weren't good or bad, they were just similar to their models, id est the men that invented them. And they created them for a purpose that was entirely different of the one of the christian religion. Antique gods had nothing to do with good, bad, original sin, expiation or redemption. Their purpose was to symbolize the unity of the community, their cult the way to maintain it.
>>570510
It leads to amusing observations, like freshly conquered gallic places becoming allied cities of Rome and, thus, creating their own legend, of fondation, featuring by exemple the superstar of that time, Hercules himself. It was normal.
>>570510
I understand what you're saying but what about all the tragedies involving ancient gods ?
Stories like Prometheus getting eaten alive for giving men hope, Odysseus' life turning into a living hell because of Poseidon or the Trojan War.
Are they meant to be purely stories or do the people actually believe in them and still decide to worship those deities ?
![51RAJ80W76L._SX331_BO1,204,203,200_[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/KtDcU2L.jpg "51RAJ80W76L. SX331 BO1,204,203,200 [1]")
At what point in history did the reduction of manual labor via mechanization, automation, and productivity increases via technology stop benefiting the majority of the population and start negatively affecting the quality of life and opportunities for employment available to the average worker?
Will further automation result in massive unemployment for most of the world's population? If so how will corporations and governments deal with this situation caused by technological unemployment?
This is an issue dealing with both history and the humanities.
>>570359
There is no such tipping point. There is instead a long and complexe history of classes struggle.
>>570375
Thanks for the non-answer. Can you expand on that statement in a meaningful way?
>>570383
Not that anon, but he answered your question exactly as good as it can be answered. There is no "point in history". The most specific would be the legal institution of private property, in which case you could say it begins with liberalism and the rise of the capitalist class. And yes, further automation will result in global catastrophe as workers are pushed out of the economy as long as they can balance automation with employing enough humans to buy commodities once in a while.
What were, and are, the most strategic locations on Earth? Physical geography has not changed much over the course of human history (save for our structures and trash), but I imagine strategy is also a function of human agglomerations - where people were at the time, where they were after that, where they are today. Who hates whom, who is cousins of whom. In short, physical geography presents rather fixed (dis)advantages, while human geography renders this or that place more or less relevant at a particular time.
Feel free to take the prompt in any historical direction (commerce?), but I was thinking mostly in terms of conventional warfare.
Chile
>>570014
Some Chokepoints niqqa
>Panama
>Suez
>Bosporos
>Moluccas Strait
Whole fucking Southeast Asia actually
>Hormuz Strait
>Gibraltar.
As for overland chokepoints, only shit I know is Hindu Kus and Ferghana.
Great Britain
Isn't democracy just mob rule where the idiots get to decide the fate of a country? Isn't it just a big popularity contest where we choose whoever looks best on TV? Isn't it just a big lie where whoever can lie and promise the most or the best gets voted in and we hope that he (or she who gives a shit) keeps to their word?
Why do we have democracy when it's so flawed?
>>569877
They try to moderate with layers of bureaucracy so the people actually don't infuence the top decisions as much
>>569877
Is it that much worse than rule by a small elite of idiots?
Technocracy and meritocracy don't have enough checks and balances to make them stable in the long run.
>>569877
listen to le wise words of le churchill:
it has been le said that democracy is le worst form of le government, except all le others that have been tried
t. reddit
>>569818
The French scientific expedition in Egypt
The life of Heraclius
>>569818
Rhodesian bush war
the Scottish succession crisis
When chief Sitting Bull ran off the reservation (last of his people to lay down his gun)
the Nazi 11th army holding the Elbe corridor
and many more
ITT: People who are considered the most moral people in history but were actually the complete opposite.
posting a literal terrorist
>>569363
Fuck this guy.
>>569219
Was he a very violent person? A hateful person? A reckless person?
Ghandi is considered a saint of non-violence doctrines. He is also said to have self control and self reliance.
What did he do?
This book is complete trash, I don't understand how this won a Pulitzer Prize. Then again, Guns, Germs, and Steel did too so I shouldn't be surprised. It's well written but I'm only a couple chapters in an already it:
>falls for the ridiculous "hurr the Middle Ages were the Dark Ages" meme
>constantly talks about how the Renaissance was so enlightened and shit compared to the Middle Ages, like one day everybody woke up and was euphoric and educated
>repeatedly spits on the legacies of monks, saying that they only copied down books because they had to, not because they genuinely loved knowledge
>calls monks lazy idiots who blindly followed superstition
>takes repeated pot shots at the Church (while conveniently ignoring all the of knowledge the Muslims had destroyed at this time period)
>supports the idea that philosophy and curiosity was outlawed
The last one especially rustles my jimmies. Philosophy was well encouraged in the Middle Ages. Early Christianity is filled with theologians who went on to become saints because of their philosophies and their questioning of beliefs. The Ecumenical Councils were literally completely about discussing theology and dogma and debating which one should be correct. Well into the Middle Ages, there were even theologians who attacked St Augustine's beliefs on original sin and filloque. Not necessarily denouncing the dogma but rather the way he reached it.
Why is Stephen Greenblatt worshiped like he's an amazing historian? Not even 4 chapters into the book and he supports ridiculous, disproved ideas like "the Dark Ages," "the ebil Catholic Church," and "feudalism."
Oh, because he wrote this book for retarded high schoolers who can't or don't want to actually do research into the Middle Ages and find out just how progressive it actually was. When is this "Christianity destroys progress and knowledge and outlaws curiosity" meme going to die?
Oh and let's not forget passages where he claims monks actively refused to preserve ancient works of classical literature and philosophy because they believed "pagan beliefs" shouldn't be preserved. Great idea, Greenblatt. I wonder how we have literally thousands of medieval manuscripts of ancient texts, then.
I can't believe people eat this crap up. Somewhere out there, there are thousands of monks rolling over in their fucking graves as their ancestors spit on the legacy of Christianity and the hard work of thousands of people to hold onto and preserve the knowledge of the past. And now some angsty euphorics are equating scholars and men of piety to literal book-burning Nazis.
He also provides zero citations for his ridiculous anecdotal evidence of such events as "monks sticking their fingers in their mouths and gagging as a 'universally' accepted Christian sign for wishing to see a 'pagan' text"
Jesus H Christ, and this fucker calls himself an historian while writing books for adolescent fedoras to circle jerk to as it reinforces their stereotype of evil, ignorant Christians.
>>569186
We did actually lose massive, massive amounts of ancient knowledge. I don't doubt that a lot of it was because of the preference to transcribe shitty boring saints' lives instead of raunchy old Roman literature.
Would require strong sources to accept the claim of blatant refusal to preserve ancient literature because it was pagan. But I wouldn't find it too surprising if some/a lot of monks were that pigheaded.
Do you think Nanking was fabrication or true story?
It never happened.
>>569129
KOREAN LIES
whats some stupid bullshit about history you hear people say all the time that triggers you?
>America is a judeo-christian country!
>judeo-christian country!
>JUDEO
I dont really know when this shit started, but Im going to guess the 80s. Literally no american would ever refer to their country as "jewish" in the 50s, or 1800s or 1776.
>>569022
>Ancient people were barbaric, `patriarchal and oppressive`, backwards, etc.
No you fucktards. Ancient people built, developed and or refined nearly every damn thing we know about now. Did they know absolutely 100% everything no. But they knew what they knew and what they didn't know you can bet they were in their
way to knowing. Said fucktards don't know what their pulling out of their asses and immediately show their lack of knowledge on the subject at hand. I don't care how many degrees they have either, there are professors that do this as well and deserve to fired and barred from teaching ever again
>>569136
this.
I hate when people look down on people of the past as stupid simply because they didnt have our accumulated knowledge.
>>569136
They sure as hell are backwards and oppressive compared to the modern world, which is the point people try to make. "We like what we are like now, and should try not to be like our ancestors were."
>>569022
Yeah, it only happened after the great conservative flip from being anti-Jewish to being creepily enthusiastic about Jews and Israel. Almost certainly has to do with the change in US policy towards Israel, but Evangelicals legitimately shifted towards this fucked up view whereby modern Israel is going to play a role in the apocalypse, and we are therefore religiously obligated to help them in fucking everything. By extension, Jews are now good, even though the grandparents of the average Evangelical Israel-phile were most likely virulent anti-Semites.
Where did the idea of a dragon originate? It seems like just about every culture had their own version of a dragon
good question!! prepare to get your mind blown son!!!!!
>>568799
Tiamat is first notable dragon that I'm aware of, so like 5000 years ago?
>>568799
Early storytelling serves as a historiography (primary focus of myth) and pedagogy (primary focus of folklore) in the absence of scientific investigation. The reference point for all people is the world around us and in both myth and folklore elements of the world (trees, stars, humans, snakes, the elements, etc.) are stretched and squashed, mixed and dissected, to create fictions that are outrageous but help to carry some point across exactly because they're outrageous. The dragon, as such, is an exaggerated reptile, and because of the characteristics of reptiles (poisonous, skin shedding, scaled, can regrow limbs, etc.) the dragon is both dangerous and mystical, and can serve many purposes, whether it's cosmogony (as with the Jörmungandr or Leviathan) or moralistic (St. George's dragon) or simply heroic (Smaug or Vritra).
Is the European Union takeover of the UK unique in the way that a country has been taken over? Gradually, completely obvious to anyone who pays attention but with a mostly oblivious population?
>>568590
>the likes of "countries" like "greece" and "slovakia" have as equal a voice in European affairs as the UK
It's time to end this democratic experiment
>takeover
>implying we aren't leaving this year
>>568590
>You are now aware that de Gaulle vetoed for years the British entrance into the EU cause he knew that Brits gonna Brit.
OI! /his/
I´m writing a paper about founding states, and in one source I found the following quote:
> "Staatsgründung durch
Private ist zulässig (vergleiche: Israel)"
Meaning: The founding of states through private persons is legitimate (for example: Israel)
Can someone explain this to me? I thought Israel was founded by the Brits after giving up the mandate for Palestine?
it was founded by the eternal Anglo-J*w who invested in constructing Israel in order to destroy the Palestinian state
>>568369
IT WAS FOUNDED BY THE GOVERNMENT OF GREAT BRITAIN VIA PRIVATE ORGANIZATIONS.
When Zionists first started settling in what would become Israel, initially there was no legal mandate for a state. It was just people going over there, sometimes with the backing of private groups (this increased over time) and settling. Many of them bought land, but because of how land right worked in the Ottoman system, people question the morality of this now. This was all done with the intention of creating a state, but a state wasn't actually created until the British Mandates and eventual UN resolution.
So, that statement is sort of accurate.
Should I become Catholic only because I really, really, really like Aristotle?
Can't you just be Aristotelian or some sort of neo-Aristotelian in philosophy? What do you need the Catholicism for?
Read Aquinas, and if you can accept his synthesis of greek philosophy, then go for it.
Otherwise, there are various neo-Aristotelian thinkers who aren't religious.
Why would Semitic monotheism play any part in your love with Hellenic philosopher?
Friendly reminder that using the term "neo-liberal" in a serious academic discussion (or merely in one that aspires to a minimum of rigidity and consistency) is tantamount to using terms such as "cultural Marxist", "patriarchal" or "degenerate".
http://people.bu.edu/tboas/neoliberalism.pdf
personal.lse.ac.uk/venugopr/venugopal2014augneoliberalism.pdf
http://mro.massey.ac.nz/bitstream/handle/10179/6958/Phelan%20%282014%29.pdf?sequence=3
Picrelated: the worst fucking offender.
I fully agree and I cringe when it is used in an academic context which happens far too much in my own discipline of political science for my own comfort.
>>568214
>take sociology course at university
>talks about how neoliberalism caused 2008 financial crisis and is killing a bunch of third world countries
>constant use of the word without really giving a rigid definition
I felt so lost.
Why? It's the political equivalent of neoclassical economics and generally used in relation to the washington consensus.
![Parthenon_from_west[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/mqnPnoj.jpg "Parthenon from west[1]")
