This idea is correct, but I am very puzzled it is presented as something knew. In 1964 William H. Mcneill won the National Book Award for The Rise of the West,

This idea is correct, but I am very puzzled it is presented as something knew. In 1964 William H. Mcneill won the National Book Award for The Rise of the West, and the first 2/3's of the book was about how for thousands of years there was an interconnected set of civilizations that spanned from the Pacific through Central Asia and the Middle East to the Mediterranean.