Just saw a fascinating thing on TV, which I honestly had never thought of before. A quick Google search says it's already out there, but doesn't seem to be a major topic of discussion. It has to do with the age-old mystery of why the Old World (Europe and East Asia) civilizations developed so much faster than the New World (Americas, and perhaps sub-Saharan Africa). After all, civilization seems to have been relatively equally developed worldwide at one point, but then there was a major divergence.
Well, there are probably countless reasons, but this one reason they mentioned was so obvious, I can't believe I'd never heard it or thought of it. Basically, at the very earliest points in civilization, the development of society was driven almost entirely by the ability to make use of domesticate crops and animals. That was the height of technology. But, because they are living things, plants and animals migrate east-west much more easily than they do north-south, because climate and day-length changes are going to be much more mild. It's easier, therefore, to transplant an animal or crop from China to Europe than it is to transplant from Mexico to the Great Lakes (even to this day, your tomatoes in Indiana aren't going to grow very well if you don't start them in a greenhouse).
Well, Eurasia is situated east-to-west. The Americas, on the other hand, are laid out on a north-south axis. Crops developed in the Fertile Crescent can move rather easily into North Africa, Southern Europe and India. but crops developed in Mexico (say, corn), took many hundreds of years to be successfully adapted to the Great Plains.
No big lesson here. Just an interesting tidbit to think about.
Well, there are probably countless reasons, but this one reason they mentioned was so obvious, I can't believe I'd never heard it or thought of it. Basically, at the very earliest points in civilization, the development of society was driven almost entirely by the ability to make use of domesticate crops and animals. That was the height of technology. But, because they are living things, plants and animals migrate east-west much more easily than they do north-south, because climate and day-length changes are going to be much more mild. It's easier, therefore, to transplant an animal or crop from China to Europe than it is to transplant from Mexico to the Great Lakes (even to this day, your tomatoes in Indiana aren't going to grow very well if you don't start them in a greenhouse).
Well, Eurasia is situated east-to-west. The Americas, on the other hand, are laid out on a north-south axis. Crops developed in the Fertile Crescent can move rather easily into North Africa, Southern Europe and India. but crops developed in Mexico (say, corn), took many hundreds of years to be successfully adapted to the Great Plains.
No big lesson here. Just an interesting tidbit to think about.