Re:How did Europe become the richest part of the world?
by jillesvangurp on Sunday March 20, 2022 @10:52AM
(#30743087)
That was maybe enabled by the thing that made several European nations rich to begin with. Also, it's hardly unique to European history. As long as humans have been around, they've been fighting with each other. The thing is that technology helped European nations to get much better at this than the rest of the world. And that in turn was enabled by a free flow of information.
Basically, 14th and 15th century Europe was when it started pulling away from the rest of the world economically and technically. At the time, other parts of the world would have rivaled it in terms of technology, science, philosophy, etc. For example Chinese, Japanese, Arab cultures were relatively advanced and arguably a lot more sophisticated at the time. That started changing around that time slowly bur surely. It's not so much that they declined but that they did not keep up with the pace of invention and development and were slow to adapt. By the time the British Empire reached its peak, the difference was huge. After that the gap started narrowing as the rest of the world caught up and educated itself.
Basically, 14th and 15th century Europe was when it started pulling away from the rest of the world economically and technically. At the time, other parts of the world would have rivaled it in terms of technology, science, philosophy, etc. For example Chinese, Japanese, Arab cultures were relatively advanced and arguably a lot more sophisticated at the time. That started changing around that time slowly bur surely. It's not so much that they declined but that they did not keep up with the pace of invention and development and were slow to adapt. By the time the British Empire reached its peak, the difference was huge. After that the gap started narrowing as the rest of the world caught up and educated itself.