I would submit that past glories are not necessarily indicative of future performance. Just as the Muslim world at one point enjoyed levels of science and culture that put Europe to shame, so, too, did China.This should stand as a warning to us. You can't stand still. You cannot rest on past glories. Each era is a new challenge. Most important, pulling up the drawbridge is not the answer. We need to be constantly challenging ourselves and reminding ourselves that we are not at the end of history and that not everything to be known has been identified, let alone learned.
Indeed, Geoffrey Parker, I believe, at one point in his book Military Revolution: Military Innovation and the Rise of the West, 1500-1800, suggested that, if an alien were to have visited earth in 1500, he'd have bet on the Muslim or Sinic worlds dominating for the foreseeable future, and would have been startled at the shape of the world in 1800.
I don't think there is necessarily a good single explanation for what happened in either case, but at the same time, I'm not sure that today's Muslim world necessarily reflects past realities, any more than today's China is an extension of Han or Ming China
Regards — Cliff
Well said.
ReplyDeleteSome of the "No-Fly Zone" talk I heard on the news today kinda scared me.
You got me into Kilcullen...from reading his stuff, I got this:
1. Stay out of civil wars.
2. If you've already broken rule number 1, pick a side and go "all-in."
Some of the sound bites I heard today, including those from one of our very own Senators, made me think they needed to dust off their Accidental Guerrilla copies.
I suspect that most members of Congress....if not all.....think that guerrillas are found at the zoo. So much for Kilcullen...who I absolutely think is right on the money.
ReplyDeleteIf history is any predictor, it is that it is not a good predictor...primarily because man..in his infinite wisdom...continues to not learn any of the lessons that history provides.....witness the sickening number of world powers who have squandered themselves trying to intervene in Middle East tribal business. Well...and trying to hustle the East.....we've done pretty badly at that too...
But "hey" a visionary such as Barack Obama who proclaimed today that he welcomes $4/gal gas prices as "good for America"...how can we go wrong??