# Why do people attempt to discredit the discovery of the New World? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 9, 2009, 3:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878 "2009-11-09T03:53:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/21 "2009-11-09T06:03:24Z")
What Taber said. The New World was not “discovered” but merely “uncovered” from existing groups. This makes them “Gerry and the Pacemakers,” not “The Beatles.” IOW, LOSERS in the battle to convince the world that “Ferry Across the Mersey” are stuck in their beers. Yes, I, in a rock-fan mention, felt they were sym-paths, a half a generation apart. Yeah, it was BS, but it was BS that tossed me a bone of not being completely made up. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/22 "2009-11-09T06:06:27Z")
Could you drink a pint for me? ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/23 "2009-11-09T06:15:19Z")
Did already, bro. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/24 "2009-11-09T06:23:25Z")
Note to others: Argent and I have disagreed over many things. Buying a pint is not one of them. There is truly a result of the net that people who disagree about so much (FTR, I disagree with my brother even more) but can still consider each other friends. This is probably a pub reaction: Have your disagreeable fun at night but you are still pals when the whistle blows tomorrow. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/25 "2009-11-09T06:52:03Z")
It’s fine to say that Columbus discovered America as long as there is a footnote to indicate that he wasn’t the first to do so and that he is among millions who have done so since. ---
**Author:** ![Argent\_Towers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e8c25b/32.png) [@Argent\_Towers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Argent_Towers)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/26 "2009-11-09T07:30:46Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > Note to others: Argent and I have disagreed over many things. For the life of me, I can’t remember anything we’ve disagreed on. I never thought of myself as that controversial a poster, except for guns, Rhodesia and _Hogg._ ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 8:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/27 "2009-11-09T08:47:14Z")
The Aztecs didn’t discover Europe. Why not? It was there all the time! ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 11:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/28 "2009-11-09T11:03:35Z")
A small point in ole Columbus favor. It was a discovery that took hard work and big brass balls. Yeah, he was an idiot and a jerk in many ways, but he and his crew did what very few would do back then…sail directly away from one land mass for months thinking/hoping you’ll run into another before you die of thirst or lack of food or a big storm gets you. A bit different from taking a morning hike from the campground and “discovering” that gigantic waterfall. ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 12:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/29 "2009-11-09T12:06:16Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > It is pretty clear that European civilization only discovered the Americas after Columbus returned, leading to the introduction of potatoes, chocolate, and syphilis to Europe. Tom, you’re a little bit off. The Breton, Basque, and Cornish fishermen all knew about America. Martin Pinzon, Columbus’ navigator, was Basque, and a veteran of Cousin’s ‘discovery’ of America in 1488. But the Cornish fishermen could have been there for up to two centuries earlier. … it was just really _good_ fishing and nobody wanted to tell anyone. Back then, you kept some stuff secret. ---
**Author:** ![pancakes3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba9def/32.png) [@pancakes3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pancakes3)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/30 "2009-11-09T12:27:30Z")
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with “discovering”. It doesn’t tell the full story but it’s damn near impossible to summarize such a sweeping historical act with a single word. I’m sure it would be more accurate to write “Columbus, though not the first person to discover America, was the original explorer responsible for the permanent establishment of transcontinental relations between Europe and the Americas.” However that doesn’t exactly make much sense to a 2nd grader. We use “discover” and let that 2nd grader fill in the details later. Is that so wrong? As for all the analogies of larceny… i say feh… The winners write the history books. Windows is now a powerhouse company and is known for developing MS-DOS. Well, actually they bought out QDOS and changed the name, signed a fat contract with IBM and made out like bandits. There are countless historical inaccuracies out there. Lincoln being a champion of the black man is another. Lincoln was actually a racist and part of the reason he wanted to end slavery was because he felt that large-scale farming (built on the backs of slaves) was hurting small family farms like the one he grew up on. so in the end it’s a catch 22. You have to simplify history because it’s the only way to fit in so much history into a kid’s education. however, when you simplify history, it changes the history, rendering it not history anymore. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/31 "2009-11-09T16:34:38Z")
> [@pancakes3](#): > > I don’t think there’s anything wrong with “discovering”. It doesn’t tell the full story but it’s damn near impossible to summarize such a sweeping historical act with a single word. I’m sure it would be more accurate to write “Columbus, though not the first person to discover America, was the original explorer responsible for the permanent establishment of transcontinental relations between Europe and the Americas.” However that doesn’t exactly make much sense to a 2nd grader. We use “discover” and let that 2nd grader fill in the details later. Is that so wrong? It’s especially wrong for 2nd graders. They don’t have the background to know that there were already civilizations in North America. There are many ways to state what Columbus did: First European to travel to North America First European to land in North America ---
**Author:** ![Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/malleus_incus_stapes/32/3293_2.png) [@Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malleus_Incus_Stapes)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/32 "2009-11-09T16:44:02Z")
Fine, so Columbus was the first European to find the Americas and have it _stay_ found. (Actually, I think I read somewhere that a lot of other people should share in the credit, but leaving that aside). He wasn’t the first European to have actually come to the New World, nor was he the first person to set foot there. The Vikings and Indians would like to have a word about that. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/33 "2009-11-09T17:09:45Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > Rant unassociated with, but inspired by, the OP: > > When I was studying Anthropology there was still a strong subcurrent of admiration of the Noble Savage, who worked with his environment to produce a land only slightly-filled with humans with a life expectancy of 25, and that we ruined these cultures by introducing such artefacts as aluminum pots and steel arrowheads. > > That was bullshit. While I admire the observation of a culture that has not been touched by modern ways, I also believe it is wrong to let young Tandaleo die at age 13 because to treat her with antibiotics would skew the experiment. But that’s not even what’s wrong with that viewpoint. There is no such pre-modern society that lived in harmony with its environment. The North and South-American natives wreaked havoc on their environments and bred as much as they could support just like everywhere else. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/34 "2009-11-09T17:13:03Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > The English physicist Isaac Newton and the German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz had a long, bitter and mutually discreditable feud over which of them had discovered calculus. Are you sure they didn’t invent it? ---
**Author:** ![athelas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@athelas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/athelas)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/35 "2009-11-09T17:18:57Z")
As with many of these quibbles over words and names, it’s really about people trying to raise the relative status of one group (natives and those affiliated with them) by lowering the status of the other (Europeans and their associates). ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/36 "2009-11-09T17:19:22Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > And weren’t many of the Native American warring against each other anyway? It’s not like the Europeans upset the Garden of Eden. IIRC, the groups subjugated under the Aztecs gleefully helped the Spaniards. There is also the fact that the Aztecs were completely ravaging the country-side in order to have their blood orgies. They lived in a pretty infertile area, made even more infertile by their cultural proclivities and depended upon the slave labor of the tribes they subjugated to import food to the capital. The Noble Savage myth is pernicious in the way it completely glosses over the actual reality and the way people really lived. The North American Indians which people like to point to as the archetypal noble savage were driving Buffalo herds off of cliffs. They didn’t eat everything they killed as they didn’t have the resources to save all the meat from the animals that went over. Then of course their are the Iroquois in the East who everyone likes to think of as being the poor oppressed souls that the English/Dutch conquerors betrayed. These guys were in the habit of raiding villages and stealing women and children to increase the numbers in their tribe. They did this to the early white settlers as well as to other local tribes. ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/37 "2009-11-09T17:49:10Z")
> [@Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](#): > > The Vikings and Indians would like to have a word about that. You don’t get much credit for making a discovery if you allow the knowledge to lapse into obscure legend, or forget past knowledge that would allow you to put your current into perspective. I think it’s safe enough to say that the body of knowledge available at the centers of learning in Europe was more complete than could be found anywhere else. It was the best stand-in for Human Knowledge in general. So the most significant sense of the word “discovery” is when knowledge is documented and made available to world-class centers of learning. AKA “Science”. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/38 "2009-11-09T18:01:06Z")
> [@Argent\_Towers](#): > > For the life of me, I can’t remember anything we’ve disagreed on. I never thought of myself as that controversial a poster, except for guns, Rhodesia and _Hogg._ It’s mostly the guns, though I am torn because, though a lefty and in favor of some gun control laws, I like guns. But just because I disagree with someone it doesn’t mean I have to say it. ---
**Author:** ![Raygun99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Raygun99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raygun99)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/39 "2009-11-09T18:51:17Z")
> [@sqweels](#): > > You don’t get much credit for making a discovery if you allow the knowledge to lapse into obscure legend, or forget past knowledge that would allow you to put your current into perspective. > > I think it’s safe enough to say that the body of knowledge available at the centers of learning in Europe was more complete than could be found anywhere else. It was the best stand-in for Human Knowledge in general. > > So the most significant sense of the word “discovery” is when knowledge is documented and made available to world-class centers of learning. > > AKA “Science”. If only the Vikings had known about “Publish or Perish”. ---
**Author:** ![robby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robby/32/11048_2.png) [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2009, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878/40 "2009-11-09T19:02:06Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > The English physicist Isaac Newton and the German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz had a long, bitter and mutually discreditable feud over which of them had discovered calculus. Historians now believe neither stole from the other, and each deserves equal credit for discovering it independently of the other. Leibniz probably had the idea before Newton, but did not publish until after Newton. > [@Contrapuntal](#): > > Are you sure they didn’t invent it? Beat me to it. However, I think this is a whole philosophical discussion that deserves its own thread. To get even more fundamental than calculus, was the concept of zero invented or discovered? What about the rest of mathematics? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-attempt-to-discredit-the-discovery-of-the-new-world/516878.md?page=3)