One event made all these things possible: Roman civilization, Russian expansionism, Arab oil, European empires, the Industrial Revolution, and more. What was it?
This is fascinating. Maybe if the world was just all mountains everyone would have just lived in peace 😆 (Although trade would have been a real hindrance so maybe peace and poverty 😬)
Backup idea: A world of mountainous islands where maritime trade is easily facilitated through the ocean, but the mountains and sea keep people from attacking one another. (Oh wait, now I've created the setting of my utopian novel....😆)
Really cool post! Another interesting thing to add about the changing ocean sizes is the effects it had on the tides. When all the land was squished together, the tides weren't resonant with the size of the basin, so they were smaller. But nowadays, the Atlantic in particular has the correct spacing to naturally amplify the tides, meaning more intertidal area where plants and animals thrive, and where people can too.
That’s an interesting thought. If I’m not mistaken, deltas lend themselves better to farming because the soils deposited there are hydrated and nutrient-dense, which seems good for development. In your opinion, what makes estuaries more economical for development?
Hey Tomas, noticed another small typo in this post "Just look at Northern Africa the moment you move away from the Mediterranean and water doesn’t even temperature anymore ."
Aside from the extra space before the last period, this sounds a bit strange in English. Perhaps you meant something like "and water doesn't even out the temperature anymore"? or I would even put "and water doesn't regulate the temperature anymore" if that's the intended meaning
This was really an amazing read. I love exploring how geological processes have changed over time, but combining them this extensively and relating geologic changes to human behaviors was very well done.
I'd love to see you write something about the chain of development of organized religions, how they iterate off each other, since the time of Sumer/Babylon and up through modern religions
This is absolutely fascinating! In a related vein, I just pointed out to @ElleGriffin (who shared your post, which is how I came across it) that Kaplan's 'The Revenge of Geography' is a fascinating read into how geography has shaped us, and key driver of world conflicts.
Apparently my outlook on life and personality is *still* shaped by the fact of the existence of the Khyber Pass, even though I’m third generation Western. I can’t stop thinking about this … geography *is* destiny, in a sense.
Fantastic as usual. As a bible believer, I take the genealogy in Genesis and the account of Noah's flood as true history, and therefore the age of the earth as about 6000 years. What may surprise you is that I can still agree with and be fascinated by everything in your story - I simply have to make one little adjustment - to your timescale! When we imagine the whole world being flooded (the mountains were covered, but they may have been only a few thousand feet or so, before the upthrusts) the awesome forces of fluid dynamics, tons of moving water affecting plate tectonics makes sense. So do the inland seas make sense as remnants of the flood. All the earth and sea changes you describe wonderfully must have happened very quickly; not over millions of years. A column of water 5000' deep weighs about 156 tons! It's not hard to believe that pressure of that magnitude could move mountains and even continents, when combined with powerful earth movements (the "fountains of the deep burst forth".) And the forces of that water in motion would scour the earth's landscape. The Grand Canyon, for example was either formed by a little water over millions of years, or by a lot of water (during the runoff) perhaps in a few months. Where did all the water go? I'd like to see you do something on the Mariana Trench when you have time - 11 kilometers deep, 2550 km long, and 69 km wide.
Hi Al, thanks for sharing your thought process! I’m glad you can find value in the article despite our disagreements.
Of course, I disagree with your take, but I assume you take what you say as fact, and so it would be impossible to change your mind, hence I won’t try.
One question that emerges though: Do you take everything in the Bible as fact, or you make some interpretations? If you make interpretations, why is the 6,000 years not one of them?
The things in the bible that are open for interpretation are the things that are not stated as facts. For example, the Song of Solomon is poetry. But the ages of the patriarchs, which link together in a chain in Genesis 5 and 11 are stated as facts, not written like poetry or allegory. There’s no wiggle room. Genesis 1:1 is similar. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” It’s stated as a fact. In regards to the flood, for example, it says “All the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered. The water prevailed 15 cubits higher, and the mountains were covered.” You can choose to disbelieve it, but it’s so clear and so specific, there’s no room for interpretation. I love science and was an agnostic. It took a lot of investigation and a lot of evidence to convince me the bible is true. I wrote about it in https://alchristie.substack.com/p/how-i-became-convinced-the-bible?utm_source=publication-search
This entails you follow a process to differentiate facts from non-facts in the Bible, and that it comes from style. But who dictates that one style entails only facts and another only poetry? Who dictates that statements require no interpretation?
For example, when it says: "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth", it doesn't state how. The Big Bang is very consistent with that—which is why the Catholic Church accepts it as truth.
Similarly, when it says “All the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered. The water prevailed 15 cubits higher, and the mountains were covered”, who determines the extent of "everywhere"? Where the mountains of Mars covered by water? Certainly not. But they are covered by the heavens too, aren't they? So what is the specific meaning of "heaven" in this context? It can be simply the definition of heaven from the perspective of the writer, which then means "as far as eye could see".
Also, as you probably know, the Bible doesn't say the Earth is 6,000 years old. Archbishop James Ussher in the 17th century reached this conclusion based on several assumptions:
1. The Earth didn't exist before Adam and Eve. But why not consider Earth a paradise before Adam and Eve? God simply wouldn't have created humans by then. Also, why is the creation of the universe literal (one thing a day) rather than figurative (a sequence with interludes between them)?
2. Ussher assumed that the genealogies were complete and unbroken. Why would he make that assumption? Where in the Bible does it say that the genealogies are complete and unbroken? How is there full confidence that, in all these generations, there were no gaps?
1st, I appreciate your disagreeing without mocking, even though my position is considered extreme even by many theologians.
I'll try to keep it short. In differentiating between plain historical narrative and poetry and prophecy, I'm taking the simplest and most natural understanding of the text, not trying to 2nd guess everything or look for some far out interpretation.
"In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth", it doesn't state how. The Big Bang is very consistent with that"
The rest of the chapter sheds some light on 'how'. There are over 14 different theories for the 'Big Bang'. Bringing Mars into it seems silly. You need to read more than one verse to do an honest and impartial study. 'Heavens' here is indicated in Gen.1:20 "...birds fly above the earth in the...heavens." Eden was part of the creation week. You can question everything; I'm just pointing out what it says. If you actually read the text in chapter 5, there no broken links in the genealogy. Adam was 130 when Seth was born. Seth was105 when Enosh was born, and so on. This genealogy is complete up to Joseph. Adding up the ages, that's 2199 years from the creation of Adam, and by then we're getting into historical records, with only about 1800 more years to the birth of Christ. I'm in the minority on this. Most theologians are afraid to question the "science", so they compromise on the 1st 11 chapters of Genesis.
For serious investigation of these type questions, I recommend AnswersinGenesis, the Institute for Creation Research, and Creation Ministries International. All 3 of them have many PhD scientists well qualified in their fields and have excellent search fields for answering any questions you might have about these early chapters of Genesis and how they relate to real science.
By the way, the 'creation movement' was started in the 70s by Henry Morris, with a book on the Flood. He was a hydraulic engineer!
Awesome! I wanted to subscribe for a while, but this is what finally made me do it. Thanks!
Ah I’m glad to hear!! Welcome!
As soon as my own substack takes off, I'm going to subscribe to this one too, along with @MERothwell's. I can't get enough of geography, it seems :D
This is fascinating. Maybe if the world was just all mountains everyone would have just lived in peace 😆 (Although trade would have been a real hindrance so maybe peace and poverty 😬)
Backup idea: A world of mountainous islands where maritime trade is easily facilitated through the ocean, but the mountains and sea keep people from attacking one another. (Oh wait, now I've created the setting of my utopian novel....😆)
Oh they will find ways to kill each other! This is the model of the Greeks and Vikings…
So true.
Ha - humans always find a way to traverse even the rockiest mountains. We're crazy that way :D
That sounds like the title of a book: Peace and Poverty
So interesting! Great work. But I'm curious, how come there weren't Roman coins found in Mesopotamia or Persia, according to that picture?
Hm
Well Persia was the enemy (Parthians) and I think at the time they controlled Mesopotamia?
Really cool post! Another interesting thing to add about the changing ocean sizes is the effects it had on the tides. When all the land was squished together, the tides weren't resonant with the size of the basin, so they were smaller. But nowadays, the Atlantic in particular has the correct spacing to naturally amplify the tides, meaning more intertidal area where plants and animals thrive, and where people can too.
I have this hypothesis that more resonant places developed their economies faster because estuaries have such a better economic geography than deltas!
That’s an interesting thought. If I’m not mistaken, deltas lend themselves better to farming because the soils deposited there are hydrated and nutrient-dense, which seems good for development. In your opinion, what makes estuaries more economical for development?
Hey Tomas, noticed another small typo in this post "Just look at Northern Africa the moment you move away from the Mediterranean and water doesn’t even temperature anymore ."
Aside from the extra space before the last period, this sounds a bit strange in English. Perhaps you meant something like "and water doesn't even out the temperature anymore"? or I would even put "and water doesn't regulate the temperature anymore" if that's the intended meaning
And one more at the very end:
"As I get more information on the topic, I’ll update youl." extra "l" after "you"
I think "even" is a verb there, so it's right, but not clear. Just changed to your reco, and corrected the 2nd typo too. Thx!
This was really an amazing read. I love exploring how geological processes have changed over time, but combining them this extensively and relating geologic changes to human behaviors was very well done.
It fascinates me too! I’m glad you share the passion!
You've got an amazing mind for *connections*
I'd love to see you write something about the chain of development of organized religions, how they iterate off each other, since the time of Sumer/Babylon and up through modern religions
How the geography influenced them and the memetic influences on each other
I have on one of my open tabs right now a draft: “How to Design a Religion”
It’s 82 pages, and it’s so long it scares me away from tackling it…
Well done! I enjoyed it.
It would be difficult to conceive how that part of the world would have been with a different geography.
Nice article!
This is absolutely fascinating! In a related vein, I just pointed out to @ElleGriffin (who shared your post, which is how I came across it) that Kaplan's 'The Revenge of Geography' is a fascinating read into how geography has shaped us, and key driver of world conflicts.
Apparently my outlook on life and personality is *still* shaped by the fact of the existence of the Khyber Pass, even though I’m third generation Western. I can’t stop thinking about this … geography *is* destiny, in a sense.
I haven't read the book. Thanks for mentioning it!
This was a really great read - it would be awesome to hear about your research process for topics like this. Keep it up!
I'll think about publishing on it!
👍🤯
Amazing stuff. Thanks for connecting all those dots. So where was Atlantis ... ?
I concur with the comments about your connection of seemingly unrelated facts.
Typo nitpicking:
> I’ll update youl
Thanks! Corrected
Amazing post my friend!
Fine work.
Fantastic as usual. As a bible believer, I take the genealogy in Genesis and the account of Noah's flood as true history, and therefore the age of the earth as about 6000 years. What may surprise you is that I can still agree with and be fascinated by everything in your story - I simply have to make one little adjustment - to your timescale! When we imagine the whole world being flooded (the mountains were covered, but they may have been only a few thousand feet or so, before the upthrusts) the awesome forces of fluid dynamics, tons of moving water affecting plate tectonics makes sense. So do the inland seas make sense as remnants of the flood. All the earth and sea changes you describe wonderfully must have happened very quickly; not over millions of years. A column of water 5000' deep weighs about 156 tons! It's not hard to believe that pressure of that magnitude could move mountains and even continents, when combined with powerful earth movements (the "fountains of the deep burst forth".) And the forces of that water in motion would scour the earth's landscape. The Grand Canyon, for example was either formed by a little water over millions of years, or by a lot of water (during the runoff) perhaps in a few months. Where did all the water go? I'd like to see you do something on the Mariana Trench when you have time - 11 kilometers deep, 2550 km long, and 69 km wide.
Hi Al, thanks for sharing your thought process! I’m glad you can find value in the article despite our disagreements.
Of course, I disagree with your take, but I assume you take what you say as fact, and so it would be impossible to change your mind, hence I won’t try.
One question that emerges though: Do you take everything in the Bible as fact, or you make some interpretations? If you make interpretations, why is the 6,000 years not one of them?
Thanks!
The things in the bible that are open for interpretation are the things that are not stated as facts. For example, the Song of Solomon is poetry. But the ages of the patriarchs, which link together in a chain in Genesis 5 and 11 are stated as facts, not written like poetry or allegory. There’s no wiggle room. Genesis 1:1 is similar. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” It’s stated as a fact. In regards to the flood, for example, it says “All the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered. The water prevailed 15 cubits higher, and the mountains were covered.” You can choose to disbelieve it, but it’s so clear and so specific, there’s no room for interpretation. I love science and was an agnostic. It took a lot of investigation and a lot of evidence to convince me the bible is true. I wrote about it in https://alchristie.substack.com/p/how-i-became-convinced-the-bible?utm_source=publication-search
This entails you follow a process to differentiate facts from non-facts in the Bible, and that it comes from style. But who dictates that one style entails only facts and another only poetry? Who dictates that statements require no interpretation?
For example, when it says: "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth", it doesn't state how. The Big Bang is very consistent with that—which is why the Catholic Church accepts it as truth.
Similarly, when it says “All the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered. The water prevailed 15 cubits higher, and the mountains were covered”, who determines the extent of "everywhere"? Where the mountains of Mars covered by water? Certainly not. But they are covered by the heavens too, aren't they? So what is the specific meaning of "heaven" in this context? It can be simply the definition of heaven from the perspective of the writer, which then means "as far as eye could see".
Also, as you probably know, the Bible doesn't say the Earth is 6,000 years old. Archbishop James Ussher in the 17th century reached this conclusion based on several assumptions:
1. The Earth didn't exist before Adam and Eve. But why not consider Earth a paradise before Adam and Eve? God simply wouldn't have created humans by then. Also, why is the creation of the universe literal (one thing a day) rather than figurative (a sequence with interludes between them)?
2. Ussher assumed that the genealogies were complete and unbroken. Why would he make that assumption? Where in the Bible does it say that the genealogies are complete and unbroken? How is there full confidence that, in all these generations, there were no gaps?
1st, I appreciate your disagreeing without mocking, even though my position is considered extreme even by many theologians.
I'll try to keep it short. In differentiating between plain historical narrative and poetry and prophecy, I'm taking the simplest and most natural understanding of the text, not trying to 2nd guess everything or look for some far out interpretation.
"In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth", it doesn't state how. The Big Bang is very consistent with that"
The rest of the chapter sheds some light on 'how'. There are over 14 different theories for the 'Big Bang'. Bringing Mars into it seems silly. You need to read more than one verse to do an honest and impartial study. 'Heavens' here is indicated in Gen.1:20 "...birds fly above the earth in the...heavens." Eden was part of the creation week. You can question everything; I'm just pointing out what it says. If you actually read the text in chapter 5, there no broken links in the genealogy. Adam was 130 when Seth was born. Seth was105 when Enosh was born, and so on. This genealogy is complete up to Joseph. Adding up the ages, that's 2199 years from the creation of Adam, and by then we're getting into historical records, with only about 1800 more years to the birth of Christ. I'm in the minority on this. Most theologians are afraid to question the "science", so they compromise on the 1st 11 chapters of Genesis.
For serious investigation of these type questions, I recommend AnswersinGenesis, the Institute for Creation Research, and Creation Ministries International. All 3 of them have many PhD scientists well qualified in their fields and have excellent search fields for answering any questions you might have about these early chapters of Genesis and how they relate to real science.
By the way, the 'creation movement' was started in the 70s by Henry Morris, with a book on the Flood. He was a hydraulic engineer!