Nah.
Agrarian Revolution, hands down.
Actually, you’ll note I didn’t say it was valid or invalid. But what I do note that is that you should consider the source. Just because WWII scholars say their event is the most important doesn’t mean they’re right - what else would they say?
Miller’s choice of the Black Plague has an excellent case that can be made for it - for one not so small point, it effectively broke the back of feudalism and made way for the Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution.
Missed the edit window:
I wasn’t, in case this was your obtusely subtle point, offering their names as evidence that it’s true; the substance of my post–which you ignored–addressed that. I only mentioned that I’d basically plagiarized the notion by way of suggesting that I wasn’t pulling it out of my ass like a lone voice in the mixed-metaphor wilderness. The evidence for the statement stands on its own, but certainly Keegan and Ambrose count as citeable sources on the subject.
And dismissing someone simply because they’re an expert on a subject is just stupid. If a scholar of the Falkland Islands War stated unequivocally that it was the single greatest event in human history, the independent evidence would reveal him as an idiot. Simply making up an analogy doesn’t prove any kind of argument if the analogy is useless.
Uh, I did consider the source. I’ve read thousands of pages by those and other authors. You weren’t saying I should consider the source; you were saying I should dismiss the source because, what, being a widely acknowledged scholar on a subject somehow, you argue, disqualifies anything they’d have to say on the subject.
That’s just fucking retarded.
Consider the source indeed: if my Aunt Fannie had said this, I’d demand way more evidence on the subject before I’d accept it. If such a statement is made by one of the world’s most highly regarded scholars on a subject, then–considering the source–I’d give it some weight. You want to disprove the scholarship of John Keegan? Have at it, seriously, it would be a fascinating project to fact-check one of his books and mine it for flaws great enough to substantially undermine his scholarship. I’d love to see your work.
As ridiculous as shit gets around here? This argument? Is the most retarded ever.
Well, that’s good, because again, I wasn’t addressing whether WWII is or isn’t the most important event in history - I agree, there is plenty of evidence to make that case and I would expect WWII scholars to be able to make that case very strongly. I also wasn’t claiming that this was somehow a novel notion. It is not, however, inarguably true because WWII scholars say that’s so, which is where this hijack of the thread has gotten to.
Also, it’s 1 in the morning, and I enjoy making wisecracks to amuse myself.
Edit to add: Dismiss? I said no such thing.
Sorry, I was just thinking I’d gotten way to pissy on what’s essentially a dryly historical subject to do any further good discussing it. But wisecrack or not, your initial post in the hijack does, in fact, suggest that being an expert on something is somehow a disqualifying factor–which suggests dismissal, to me, very strongly, and on very shaky grounds. And I wasn’t, again, arguing that it’s inarguable BECAUSE scholars say so; I was saying it’s inarguable because of the simple factual nature of the other evidence I suggested (bomb, holocaust, radar, etc.). The “hypothesis,” if you will, I stole from historians; the evidence is there for all to see. I had no intention of conflating the two.
Sorry, but I don’t agree. WWII was, essentially, a defense of the Enlightenment ideals that had been taking root in Europe for two centuries. It didn’t alter the course of history, so much as prevent it from being altered by beating down and discrediting the aberration of fascism. The technological changes were not innovations of the war, although the pressures of the conflict certainly sped their development.
The Black Plague, on the other hand, utterly changed the course of history in ways that are hard to comprehend at this remove. It utterly destroyed the existing social order, necessitating that it be completely rebuilt. By cutting across all social barriers, and decimating them equally, it led to as radical a redistribution of wealth as has been seen since the invention of the concept. Without the Black Plague, there would be no middle class. The GI Bill made college accessible to everyone. The Black Plague made books accessible to everyone - the clothes of all those millions dead made paper, for the first time in history, cheap to produce. And the Plague was global - at least as global as WWII. It didn’t just decimate Europe, but raged across Asia and Northern Africa. True, it didn’t touch Australia or the Americas, but then, for the most part, neither did WWII, at least not directly.
That being said, the arguments in favor of WWII are plenty strong, and if the wind were Northerly, I might be arguing the other side. Point being, there isn’t a single, inarguable answer to this sort of question. It is, at the end of the day, largely a matter of opinion. WWII was obviously a matter of staggering importance, but it is hardly unique in this regard as human history goes, and we are still very, very close to it - I don’t think it’s possible to accurate judge the relative importance of any event, no matter how momentous, when it still exists within living memory. Everything looks bigger when you’re right up next to it. There are, in fact, very good arguments to be made in favor of a number of other events, and insulting someone simply for having a different view does very little to prove your position.
yet here we are, arguing with you.
No, he was just suggesting that WWII scholars might be biased as to the importance of their field, not that all their expertise is to be dismissed.
Personally, I vote for the Russian Revolution, without which I doubt you’d have had WWII, or else the use of the bomb on Japan, or a lot of other things I’m sure you’re just putting under the umbrella of WWII for convenience. For example, I’m sure women’s and other civil rights would have advanced anyway.
Cool. So this is just a lesson you’re teaching me, a scolding I get for using a word like “inarguably.” Read over my posting history, Miller. I tend to work pretty hard to stay away from such words, let alone hit the return key a couple times and retype it in its own paragraph.
Your calculated sophistry notwithstanding (WWII didn’t affect America? As vast as the body of works on such a subject might be, it’s nowhere near complete; the effects are still accumulating.), your case for the Black Plague being one of the greatest events in human history goes largely without saying. It still remains a distant second or third to WWII on global scale and world-changing effect. (Distant enough to admit a word of the size of “inarguably.”)
And yeah, Dibble, we get that you can literally *argue *the fact. By an equally literal (and useless) definition, monkeys can type.
You are obviously an idiot, but so much the more to educate. The WW-II was of course a very large event, and it might have been until then the event that had had a direct negative impact on the largest number of people – in that fashion it might be termed greatest event. It is still a very important event because many of those people and people who have known those people are still alive. But I do not believe it was in any way the greatest event in human history, because it does not appear to have caused any great lasting political change that would not have happened anyway. So much the worse. It was bloody useless pointless slaughter. The greatest consequences of WW-II seem to have been the demolition of European colonial empires. This would have happened anyway in the 20th century. The rise of the USA as the dominant power. Would have happened anyway in the 20th century. The Cold War. Would have happened anyway. Even Japan found its places as a dominant Asian power despite being first being turned to rubble. And the creation of Israel, which anti-Zionists keep saying was atonement by Europeans powers for the Holocaust, this would have happened anyway and was not in any way so tightly tied to the extermination of Jews as various dictators in the Middle East like to think. It might have been different if the other side had won WW-II. But probably not.
And all those inventions that was made during the war – with the possible exception of the atom bomb - would have been invented in the 20th century with or without the war. The war may have hastened the invention by a decade or two. Others it may have put back. And women’s rights had been happening long before WW-II and would have continued anyway. The GI Bill was such a global important event of historic consequences that I had to look it up in Wikipedia to see what it was. Turns out it was some sort of domestic US bill that provided college education to US veterans. Sounds a bit like Lex Servilia Glaucia. A massive five other language wikipedias found it important enough to translate.
Is it? Seems to be in character for you, but I’ll take your word at it if you feel otherwise.
Not what I said. I said it didn’t directly affect America, in that no American cities were bombed, no invaders set foot on our soil, and no American citizens were killed.
Well, that’s just wrong. Nothing to be ashamed about, there. Everyone’s wrong from time to time. No point in getting this angry about it.
Just answering what I didn’t see answered here: There are prefixes used for articles in hebrew. ‘Ha’ is indeed ‘the’. There’s also ‘Be’ or ‘B’’, which is ‘in’, and ‘ve’ or ‘v’’ for ‘with’.
The more you know…
Christianity? Pfft! Some other mystery religion surely would have filled the Romans needs for a meaningful religion and then provided a basis for European religion due to the widespreadness of the Roman Empire.
European discovery of America? While certainly having an impact on the Indians, they were too few to count as the greatest event, and for a century or so the only effect was to hasten the rise and decline of the spanish empire. After a century of hardly mattering in world affairs, the Americas would have certainly been discovered regardless due to technological advances.
How can you lump six years of world history together as a “single event”?
Get bent, Randal.
With a large three-ring binder?
Neolithic revolution is a good contender, but I’d argue it may not be considered an ‘event’.
Personally, a favorite of mine is the expansion of the Mongol Empire, which arguably put the kibosh on the other Eurasian civilizations and left the door open for the subsequent rise of Europe.
Perhaps. And you could make a case of it if you used the Mithraic religion. Though I doubt it, and emperors before Constantine had tried to make the Mithraic cult a state religion. Tried and failed.
Europeans discovered America in around 1000. But the Vikings at the time were too few and the distance too long for the ships for them to capitalize on it. As it were America appear to have been discovered by the Spanish at exactly the right time for it to have maximum impact.
Just curious: are we done with the original topic of this thread and have we moved on to “What event represents the end of history?” Because if so, I’m prepared to unsubscribe.
Thanks in advance!