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>solely because it was first. Why didn't Babylon industrialize? Or China or Egypt or Persia or India or Ethiopia or the Inca or the Greeks or Romans or Arabs o

>solely because it was first. Why didn't Babylon industrialize? Or China or Egypt or Persia or India or Ethiopia or the Inca or the Greeks or Romans or Arabs or Nubians or Zulu or Mississippians or Ottomans or or or or or. North-West Europeans did what we did because we chose to do the things necessary and others didn't. The only purpose of environmental determinism is to muddy the waters. If Africans had invented electricity and someone used specious arguments to belittle Africans by saying their accomplishment was nothing special because industrialization was inevitable in Africa because of how much rainfall they get you and I would recognize how racially motivated that is.

sudosysgen 5y ago
You're stopping way ahead. Things are done for reasons. Why did Africans not invent electricty? Turkic peoples invented basic steam engines, so did the Greeks, why didn't they use them for anything? Ultimately the reasons for this are going to come back to material reality, ie, your surroundings.
- deleted 5y ago
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- sthnblllII 5y ago
  Actually, the universe is a closed thermodynamic system so the course of history and all decisions ever made by humans in the past and the future were completely determined by the initial energy density fluctuations of the big bang. It logically follows that we should let all criminals out of prison immediately because their crimes were purely an inevitable consequence of their environment. No one can be "guilty" of a crime he did not chose to commit. Likewise everyone should be given the same amount of wealth because the amount of studying and hard work you do is not a virtue deserving of reward, but an inevitability. Time is an illusion. Volition does not exist for one may recursively ask "why" until time collapses into a simple parameter of the function describing the state of the universe. The fact that we experience time at all is a fluke, an irrelevant mystery.

sudosysgen 5y ago

You're stopping way ahead. Things are done for reasons. Why did Africans not invent electricty? Turkic peoples invented basic steam engines, so did the Greeks, why didn't they use them for anything? Ultimately the reasons for this are going to come back to material reality, ie, your surroundings.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
sthnblllII 5y ago
Actually, the universe is a closed thermodynamic system so the course of history and all decisions ever made by humans in the past and the future were completely determined by the initial energy density fluctuations of the big bang. It logically follows that we should let all criminals out of prison immediately because their crimes were purely an inevitable consequence of their environment. No one can be "guilty" of a crime he did not chose to commit. Likewise everyone should be given the same amount of wealth because the amount of studying and hard work you do is not a virtue deserving of reward, but an inevitability. Time is an illusion. Volition does not exist for one may recursively ask "why" until time collapses into a simple parameter of the function describing the state of the universe. The fact that we experience time at all is a fluke, an irrelevant mystery.