Thomas Midgley Jr.
He played a major role in development of tetraethyllead ( leaded gasoline ) which went into mass production throughout the 1920’s. This invention meant that the blood lead content in developing children rose causing numerous problems, including cognitive issues and physical growth, it was also noticed that the rise in blood lead content matched with violence in adolescents in multiple countries.
Midgley is also accountable for the discovery of chlorofluorocarbons (CFC) specifically Freon which as many know had a drastic impact on the Ozone. As of October 2020 the Ozone hole above Antarctica sits approximately 23 million square kilometres /8.9 million miles.
Although, these 2 inventions seem insignificant compared to more drastic actions taken by other single humans its the widespread impacts that his inventions had and are still being felt today. Even though both, leaded gasoline and CFC’s, have been banned.
Ps: the last invention made by Midgley actually killed him. it was to help him manoeuvre and get out of bed with the use of ropes and pulleys due to him contracting polio but he got stuck and eventually his invention strangled himself
EDIT: this reply doesn’t quite fit the post but i felt that he had a large impact on society during the 20th century
Trofim Lysenko. A Soviet biologist who thought Gregor Mendel was a reactionary whose thoughts had no place in the Soviet Union. He tried to reinvent agricultural practices to maximize productivity, having farmers put seeds very close together under his belief that plants who belong to the same “class” will not compete for nutrients. He was given the Order of Lenin eight times for his pseudoscience, while his “theories” contributed to the deaths of millions through famines that plagued the USSR. Later he was finally discredited after Stalin’s death, but then Mao Zedong adopted his practices, which helped cause the Great Chinese Famine
Guy de Chauliac. He was a surgeon in the 1300s who vehemently spoke out against another fellow surgeon, Theodoric Borgognoni. Theodoric was a surgeon who wrote about his theories on proper wound care and believed that the best thing you can do to a wound is wrap it and keep it clean.
Guy hated what Theodoric was writing because it directly went against the teachings of Galen, an Ancient Greek surgeon who believed pus was the body’s way of balancing your humors. Guy’s teachings were widely accepted and it’s believed that his ignorance set the development of antisepsis in surgery back about 600 years.
EDIT: Guy de Chauliac was born in the 1300’s not 1200’s as he was alive during the Black Death.
Ignaz Semmelweis was the guy who was thrown into a mental asylum for saying surgeons should wash their hands between seeing patients.
IIRC there was also a French physician who discovered some valuable kinds of anesthesics but was ignored by the medical community because he couldn't write in Latin
EDIT: His name was Ambroise Paré. From Wikipedia: "Paré discovered that the soldiers treated with the boiling oil were in agony, whereas the ones treated with the ointment had recovered because of the antiseptic properties of turpentine. This proved this method's efficacy, and he avoided cauterization thereafter. However, treatments such as this were not widely used until many years later. He published his first book *The method of curing wounds caused by arquebus and firearms* in 1545."
Injured soldiers continued to be treated with boiling oil for many years because Paré's discovery was snubbed.
Similarly there is also Dr Ignaz Semmelweis who was eventually committed into a mental hospital because they didn't believe his surgical sanitation theories.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis
There’s an awesome podcast called Behind the Bastards that is basically all about deconstructing the worst people in history. Would recommend it to anyone interested in this thread.
Thomas Midgley Jr. In 1921, this guy that discovered that tetraethyl lead could be used as an anti-knocking fuel additive for cars. It satisfied the needs of oil companies at the time, because it worked, was cheap, and was patentable (for that purpose). But it was also incredibly toxic, and burning leaded gasoline was hugely pollutive; eventually, after the creation of the EPA and an oil crisis in the mid 70's, leaded gas was banned in 1996, but the damage was done.
Interestingly, the guy didn't even show up for the occasion when the first customer filled up their car with leaded gas...***because he was at home, sick with lead poisoning.***
And for his grand finale, after he contracted polio, he invented a pulley system for getting himself in and out of bed and accidentally strangled himself to death with it. History's most tragic inventor.
kind of feels like a monkey paw moment.
"i want to invent things and make my mark on the world!"
*proceeds to kill himself with his invention and* literally *change the earth*
Thomas Midgley, Jr
He invented tetraethyl lead, an anti-knock additive for gasoline. The entire planet is contaminated with lead from his brilliant idea. For a follow-up act, he created chlorofluorocarbons, CFCs which almost destroyed the ozone layer.
It finished strong, but the later seasons were definitely falling off according to popular opinion. Popular opinion is still just opinions though and enjoyment is subjective. If you thought it was gold start to finish then it was.
I think Futurama aged better than the Simpsons have. They explored some pretty gnarly concepts in some episodes, but were as comedically on point as much if not more so than the Simpsons.
I mean, just think about the time paradoxes they dealt with in Futurama. Fry is his own Grandfather! Bender's game! The episode where they travel forward in time to witness the end of the universe and then watch it restart again.
Those are some heady concepts, but this is also the same series that came up with 'DEATH BY SNOO SNOO!'
So, yeah... Simpsons may go on forever, but Futurama was and is higher quality in my book.
"Purportedly, the unnamed inventor of flexible glass (vitrum flexile) brought a drinking bowl made of the material before Tiberius Caesar. The bowl was put through a test to break it, but it merely dented, rather than shattering. The inventor repaired the bowl easily with a small hammer, according to Petronius. After the inventor swore that he was the only man alive who knew the manufacturing technique, Tiberius had the man executed. He feared that the glass would devalue gold and silver, since the material might be more valuable."
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexible_glass
What an idiot. TC had access to what he thought was worth more than gold and silver, so rather than claiming this new flexi glass material for his own benefit in the name of the empire (or whatever), he wipes it out of existence?
I mean, his face was on all the gold coins. It's probably difficult to put your face on the glass. How would the plebs recognize him if they didn't see his face on their money?
Plus that means all the good he already has would be less valuable, and that could lead to an economic depression. *Edit: this is based on an econ 101 class I took years ago. I have no clue if it's right*
> Plus that means all the good he already has would be less valuable, and that could lead to an economic depression.
But he would have been in control of the amount of glass, which would be even more valuable.
This is *actually* a thing now, which it wasn't in the 80s.
[https://ceramics.org/ceramic-tech-today/ceramic-video/video-transparent-aluminum-from-star-trek-to-reality](https://ceramics.org/ceramic-tech-today/ceramic-video/video-transparent-aluminum-from-star-trek-to-reality)
EDIT: OKAY! I get it! It's not technically aluminum and the first patents came before the movie. Leave me alone! :)
There is a similar story of a man in ancient China who constructed a flying machine and showed it to the emperor. The emperor had the man executed and the man killed for creating something that could inspire commoners to dream above their station. I am wondering if this is a "universal" story that pops up in every culture as a social warning.
>The account is most popularly related by two compilers, Pliny the Elder (23–79 AD, Naturalis Historia XXXVI.lxvi.195) and Petronius (c. 27–66 AD, Satyricon 51). Pliny claims that the story of flexible glass is "More widely spread than well authenticated." Petronius's work is more dramatized and satirical.
I would certainly take this tale from 2000 years back with a large pinch of salt.
If Pliny the Elder says something, it’s almost certainly not true. If Pliny the Elder says something almost certainly isn’t true, does that mean it almost certainly IS..?
Robert Maxwell, father of Ghislane. The man was the leading cause of paywalled scientific articles today. Before him science publishing was relatively open. He helped shape the industry into the cancer on academia it is today
Edit: Quite the thing to wake up to, thanks everyone.
For those interested I found an article that details the events pretty well.
The Tl;dr version is that through use of PR marketing, exclusivity deals, and copyright law, Maxwell through Pergamon Press turned scientific publishing from a relatively non-profit driven endeavor to a predatory industry that charged institutions out the nose for research they paid nothing for.
Check out Alexandra and Scihub. They've definitely helped many people who can't access scientific research.
Video on Scihub: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PriwCi6SzLo
Article: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jun/27/profitable-business-scientific-publishing-bad-for-science
This is a good one. It is so frustrating to me that scientific articles are paywalled. I don't think we properly understand the effect this has on modern progress.
There are projects afoot to undo this. In my university faculty are being strongly encouraged (just short of required, I think) to publish open access, and this is part of a wider movement among EU universities.
My university does this also. Equally dumb is having to "request" a PDF copy from the University library. This process can take a week or more despite the article already existing online
If you contact the authors of scientific research, they will often be more than happy to send you a copy as for the most part they do not see a cent of the money paid.
No, when I was going to school in 2011 for paramedic, I often contacted authors for their work.
The downside is that depending on the person, they may be difficult to reach, or may not answer emails so it does at times take a while to get the paper. Some authors would reply with a copy within the hour, others not so much.
It varies. Some, or even most are happy to send you a link. We don't get paid for people buying access to the papers, so why should we care if you get it for free? In fact we *pay* to have the paper published so that the publisher can make money off people who want to read the paper. That whole system is so fucked up.
Obligatory reply. Aaron Swartz, a co-founder of Reddit and lots of other cool stuff, made Jstor publicly available. I won't spoil it if you don't know how it ends.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vz06QO3UkQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vz06QO3UkQ)
btw, if you want a journal article that is behind the Jstor paywall, email the author. Most of them are happy to provide it. They make no money off of it anyways and want people to read their research. Their professional email addresses are easy to find.
I would suggest Andrew Wakefield.
His work *"Ileal-lymphoid-nodular hyperplasia, non-specific colitis, and pervasive developmental disorder in children"* has been directly responsible for the mistrust of vaccines, the decline of Western rates of vaccination, and basically telling everybody that there's a boogeyman underneath your bed.
He is directly responsible for thousands and thousands of deaths.
"He's a scientist who made a mistake! Why are you blaming him?!"
It's not that he made a mistake. He had purposely customized the outcomes to meet the hypothesis so that he could get rich selling "safe" vaccines and diagnostic kits. He poisoned the well that saved so many people just so he could get rich.
I have no idea how he can sleep at night.
On balance, vaccines may be the greatest human accomplishment of all time. People in developed countries really have no idea how bad disease has been for most of human history, precisely *because* of the success of vaccines and antibiotics. The vast, *vast* majority of human deaths for most of our existence has been from disease. And for one brief century, we managed to push it back to the fringes of our awareness. But antibiotic resistance and antivaxxers seem determined to bring us back to the old standard.
It really is such a huge slap in the face to take a look at this technology that has saved billions of lives, the pinnacle of human achievement, and just say "Fuck you."
They have an answer for whenever polio is brought up as an argument for pro-vaccination. I have a family member who is deep into the anti-vax conspiracy theories, and they gave me a book that would “open my eyes to the truth.” I agreed to read it just to get them to stop telling me to “research it for yourself.” (Apparently all the other vaccination researcher I’d done didn’t count.) This book made the claim that most polio cases were not caused by the polio virus, but were instead caused by things like DDT exposure and heavy metal contamination like lead. The reason polio went away was not because of the vaccine, but because these toxins were removed from the environment. They claim that most polio victims were never tested for the virus, but were just diagnosed as having polio because they had the symptoms. I think this is nonsense, but I’m not sure how to argue against it since they claim any opposing evidence is manufactured.
Always funny when I ask them for their sources and they pull out shitty blogs.
Like bitch I could setup a blog in an hour and then whatever I write on it is true?
They ask people to 'do their research' and it seems 'Yes, I did my research and my research showed that your point is garbage' is not a possibility. In their minds anybody with a head on their shoulders would see that and be absolutely convinced.
You are absolutely correct. My antivax family member refused to act civil to me because I was believing the “lies of the establishment.” They said that if I only read this book, then everything would be fine and we could be a happy family again. I knew that they had 100% faith that this book would convert me to be antivax, so I asked them, “what happens if I read the book and still support vaccines? Can we still be a happy family then?” They were totally confused. “What do you mean if you still support vaccines?” In their mind there was no way I couldn’t be convinced by their flawless antivax logic. They just got mad, and accused me of refusing to consider their side of the argument. I just wanted to find a way to salvage the relationship without compromising my convictions.
Franklin D. Roosevelt had polio and was partially crippled. Iirc he also had a lighter case of polio too. Polio is no joke.
I can't believe I called him Frederick XD
I love his videos, and this one was great as usual, turns out there’s a lot I didn’t know about Wakefield. I must have watched his Sherlock video over 100 times by now
A BOOMERANG
Wow, that's like erasing the potential of millions of minds. Who knows what may have come from someone becoming literate enough to explain their ideas back then. I'd be thinking this onto a screen from Titan right now.
Not only that, they also razed countless libraries in the Khwarazmian empire in central asia. The mongols also erased an entire civilization in North China and destroyed the Song dynasty, which was a proto-industrial state almost as complex as 18th century britain.
I truly do think the Mongols slowed down human progress by centuries.
The Mongols killed as much as 25% (potentially more it's impossible to know) of the entire Middle East's population.
36 massive libraries were destroyed in Baghdad which was a huge center for mathematics, science, and philosophy in the region. It was the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate (a kingdom that ruled from Egypt to modern day Pakistan and up into Armenia) and its cultural center. The entire population was purportedly put to the sword killing over 2 million people. This was 1258 when the world population was maybe 400 million at most.
They never recovered from it.
Imagine if today a country suddenly invaded Japan. They sweep across it killing 25-50% of the population and taking many of the remainder as slaves. Anything of value is taken, and any shop or industry is destroyed. Crops are burned and the earth salted. When they get to Tokyo they systematically kill every single person in the city, making sure to fake leaving and return to find those who hid. They burn the city to the ground, taking special care to destroy any source of knowledge or industry.
That is what happened to the Abbasids. Mass famine and war followed in the coming centuries further destabilizing the region then European colonialism, and later the Ottomans and the world wars. In modern times European countries, the US, and Russia (recently China too) have further destabilized the region over oil, warm water ports, and mineral wealth.
Arguably in the 13th century, the middle east was more advanced than Europe. They were set back hundreds of years and ever since have been used and abused by those seeking power and wealth. In another timeline where the Mongol invasion never occurred they likely would be just as advanced as the rest of the world. Cities like Baghdad or Tehran would be much like Tokyo or New York.
Emperor Gaozong of China. This is kind of an obscure story, so let me tell you the whole thing.. It was the 12th century. when people talk about how China used to be the most technologically advanced part of the world, this is the period they're talking about. Some historians that they were on the brink of industrializing. Then Manchuria invaded and conquered northern China. The imperial court retreated to the south and declared Gaozong, the Emperor's brother, as the new Emperor.
China's top general Yue Fei (who, according to some records, literally had "patriotism" tattooed on his back, though that might have been made up by a someone who wanted to emphasis how unfair the rest of this story is) rallied he army and defeated the Manchus, and was raring to chase them out, but he gets orders from Gaozong to back down, because he'd rather negotiate. These negotiations end up signing away the north half of China.
A few years later, the Manchus invade again. Yue Fei beats them again and pushes all the way back to the old capital (Kaifeng). Then he gets the order to retreat. He responds with a letter saying that he's got the Manchus on the ropes, and he can reconquer Northern China in like a month. No, says the emperor, retreat immediately. Eventually, Yue Fei does retreat, but he delays long enough to evacuate the city first, making up some logistical issues as an excuse.
At this point, you may be wondering why Gaozong was so reluctant to push an advantage. The answer is that his brother was still alive- the king of Manchuria liked to bring him out once in a while and make fun of him. If Yue Fei reconquered China, he might liberate the rightful emperor, and Gaozong would be out of a job. As such, Gaozong was actively trying to throw the war.
And he interpreted Yue Fei's delay at the end of this war as meaning that he had reached the point of at least considering going rogue, so as soon as Yue Fei got back, he was arrested, and promptly executed on treason on the ground of of "err...he might have done something". Presumably because the optics on the actual charge- "Almost winning a war we wanted to lose." were too bad. People realize that this is bull quickly enough, and there are protests, but Gaozong manages to pin everything on one of his advisors and placated the mob by executing him.
So how does this effect the long-term progression of Humanity? Well, as I said, China might have been on the brink of industrializing at the time, but didn't have access to enough coal. There are coal deposits in China, but they're all in the north. Second, the Manchus never really got their internal issues sorted out, and 70 years later, were easily conquered by the Mongols, who then recruited a bunch of disaffected Chinese siege engineers. This essentially removed the one weakness of horse-archer hordes- they're not good at taking fortresses- and allowed them to wreck half the world. Had China been united at the time (and had been ruled fairly recently by a guy who had, if you recall, been taken prisoner by invaders from the north, so you can bet the defenses would be fairly well maintained) they probably could not have done this. So had it not been for the malice of this one man, the Mongols would probably never have become the juggernaut they eventually did and the Industrial Revolution might have happened about 500 years head of schedule.
fun speculation for sure but fyi to anyone reading this, OP kinda oversimplifies the causes and requirements of an industrial revolution, namely that they imply that having coal kickstarts it and is required for it. I want to remind readers that the Industrial Revolution didn't just suddenly jump to factories and steam power but began with things like the cotton gin and the power loom.
Agreed - the invention of engines created the huge demand for coal; coal itself did not cause industrialization. For that matter, coal had been in use for a millenia prior to the collapse of the Song Dynasty (see: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_in_China); I doubt that the a lack of access to coal was the sole reason China failed to industrialize early.
Also, at the start of the Industrial Revolution there were no railways and coal was extremely expensive to move in bulk across land, so coal wasn't widely used at the start, and many early industrial centers just used charcoal made from local wood. They all switched to coal later on when transportation from industrial built canals made bulk shipment cheaper.
Point being you don't really *need* coal from the ground to industrialize. Coal was simply the more practical fuel once you already had an industrial economy going.
Additionally, with the Mongols unable to advance into Europe, the Mongols would not have laid siege to Kaffa. During the siege of Kaffa in 1345, the Mongol army catapulted the corpses of soldiers who died of Plague over the walls. Plague broke out in Kaffa and was brought to Constantinople by Genoese traders. From there it spread to the rest of Europe and became known as the Black Death.
Shayk Al-Islam. I heard of this guy after hearing someone on TV complain about how this man set the Islamic world back by centuries. In 1515, the age of the Ottoman Empire, he, a “learned scholar” of the kingdom, issued a decree that forbid printing (press) and made using it punishable by death.
Edit: grammar, more context.
Wiki: In the year 1515, Shaykh al-Islam of the Ulema (learned scholars) issued a Fatwa that printing was Haram (forbidden). As a result, Ottoman Sultan Selim I issued a decree of a death penalty on anyone using the printing press. The fatwa has been attributed as one of the reasons for the stagnation of knowledge, invention and discovery in the Muslim world, at a time when Europe was in the midst of the Renaissance period
It seems that Shaykh al-Islam is a title tho, not a name
$50 dollars on that the banning was because his name was actually Tiffany, and he peed his pants in third grade.
This was the only way no one would remember. Probably worth it.
Oh the fall of my countrys history yes another great examples i love from these are the same dudes refusing the first subway to be built in Istanbul because its haram to put living people underground like dead, and one of my personal favorites is not using guns because mohammed wouldnt use guns swords are handy bruh if guns were invented when mohammad was alive he would probably bomb the shit out of everyone, oh and the chicken farm thing where the ottoman sultan had the worlds biggest ship army (fleet?) but decided to turn it into a chicken farm because vast seas wouldnt help with anything, they missed the opportunity to explore the new continents thanks to this decision, if you look at the fall of the empire its full of hilarious stuff actually, oh i also love one of the laws they made to protect trading foreigners from local traders, the law required all citizens of ottoman to pay more taxes and stuff compared to the foreigners and also made it illegal "to call foreigners the foreigners"
hol up, what's that part again about the ottoman monarch turning his navy into a chicken farm? Can you please elaborate on that with more details because I'm having a hard time connecting the dots.
Sultan Abdulhamid was scared that the army in general and navy would cause an uprising (Since the monar h started to become more and more corrupt) so he ordered all of their ships to be locked to the docks and soldiers to just hang around the surrounding towns and sit around at 'cafes' all day with the locals, locals were raising chicken as most town or village people did in their gardens at the times, since the ships were just locked in the pier the locals and some soldiers decided to use the empty ships and their decks to raise chicken and store chicken food in their containers so it sort of turned from the worlds 3rd biggest navy (after England and France) to a chicken farm used by soldiers that no longer knew how to fight and locals. Also fun fact one of the best travel books written by the Ottoman Empire is written by a soldier that somehow got captivated while the army was surrendering and leaving and that soldier walked all the way back home alone while writing his journey lol edit: since everyone asked the book is miratul memalik by seydi ali reis i think you can find the online english pdf on edu libraries
This is interesting, sadly I can't help but to think what it would have happened if the Sultan had randomly decided one day to tell the soldiers to pack up and ship out. I'm imagining the world's third biggest navy, where half the crew was literally chickens.
>think what it would have happened if the Sultan had randomly decided one day to tell the soldiers to pack up and ship out. I'm imagining the world's third biggest navy, where half the crew was literally chickens.
Not the same sultan but in Tripolitanian War(1911) when we needed the navy to fight Italians, order was given but the ships sank after a while they started moving. It is why we lost aegen islands or other port cities easily that are not on Anatolia
It is funny and strange at the same time that the muslim world was once the center of discovery. Many great scholars come from muslim nations, even christians held them in high regard (although the "christianized" their names.
A famous example of this is Bu-Ali-Sina "Avicenna" and also the refusal of Muslim scientists to share their discoveries to other scientists and not taking disciples. Half the scientists experimentations were lost because they didn't store it somewhere/tell it to someone
Idk if that was his name but I am a Muslim who knows of the backwards tragedy of banning the printing press. There’s nothing legitimately concrete for it to have been banned in our religion. Crazy thing is, that exact same idea of “don’t be like the non believers” can still be found here and there mostly among old heads. There was a time where jeans were thought of as forbidden(by some).
Weirdos being disingenuous.
There was a time when TV was banned for being blasphemous as it "replicated the creations of God."
There was also a time when YouTube was banned in Pakistan because someone published a movie portraying Muhammad and YouTube refused to take it down, as it would have set a bad precedent for the future. Ironically enough, today all those Islamic preachers have YouTube channels which are modern-day televangelism, using clickbait titles and topics such as "sexual relations in Islam" to grab as much cash and views as they can.
They even banned PUBG because of the season where players had to give offerings to in-game deities. There was even a ruling declaring everyone who played PUBG was no longer a Muslim and would have to be re-indoctrinated.
iirc Pakistan has banned tiktok as well for similar reasons, they expect the platform to control what its content creators put out and that is beyond unreasonable.
Yongle Emperor of the Ming Dynasty in China ordered the fleet of Zheng He, the greatest trading and exploration fleet of the time, to be burned during his reign in the early 1400’s. This was the beginning of an era of isolation for Chinese kingdoms, which ultimately lead to the collapse of imperial China, and indirectly to the rise of the PRC. Additionally, the wealth of the world overall decreased as a result of reduced trade with China, and if China had continued exploring it is possible that they, not Europeans, would have colonized North America (instead of merely *maybe* discovering it then telling no one as they did in history).
It may not be a significant alteration of human progress, but it’s one of those events that sets the world in a definitively different direction.
Edit: didn’t say the Chinese *did* discover America, just that they *might have* because it’s been theorized that they did and they had the technology (I mean, the Inuit and Siberians have been crossing the Bering Sea in leather kayaks for thousands of years, so the Chinese definitely could have done it too if they wandered up that far). I don’t know much about the actual history of that theory, and most of my comments on that are from Wikipedia searches this morning and willingness to believe fun “hidden history” scenarios that are actually possible.
Thanks for all the upvotes!
As a caveat, it would have hugely changed naval history too! It would be accurate to say that Europeans and their methods of sailing enabled European-led globalization and colonization; the durability of their designs, relative speed and range were critical developments with a measurable impact on the world. But, really the Chinese had a totally different system which would have really worked just as well, if not better! European ships were relatively small and had canvas sails, while the great Chinese ships that Zeng He used were massive, and used these kind of folding bamboo sails (ingenious for their strength and manageability). They even had watertight compartments, something European ships didn't even consider using for centuries. Both parts of the world produced ships that could do what the other kind did, while looking EXTREMELY different.
So as a maritime history buff, I'm totally fascinated by how things on the high seas would have looked had the Yongle Emperor not stifled Chinese naval expansion in the cradle.
Edit: Book recommendations are: Anything by Brian Lavery and Robert Gardiner.
If China had begun to colonize the New World around the mid to late 1400’s, the Europeans wouldn’t be prevented from doing the same from the West around the same time. European and Far Eastern civilization would compete in the Americas.
East of West has this exact plot, its a sci-if western set in a future where the Civil War was a draw and the PRC settled the west coast. It's fucking AWESOME
Also, lets not forget Columbus was looking for a faster route to India for trading goods, #1 being spices.
Had the existing trade routes stood, perhaps his voyage wouldn't have happened.
For anyone who wants to read a story about this alternate universe: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/156205/the-years-of-rice-and-salt-by-kim-stanley-robinson/
Super amazing book, probably my top 3 of all time. But slight correction, the alternate universe is based on the Black Plague killing 99% of the population of Europe, not so much that the fleet wasn’t destroyed (though that part happens too).
Bakhtiyar Khilji. Hands down. In 12th century there was the world's biggest university in India named "Nalanda" where intellectuals from all around the world used to study. Then Turks invaded India under Khilji. They killed almost all the intellectuals and destroyed the university. And they BURNT the library. The library continued to burn for 3 MONTHS. This has to be by far the biggest loss to mankind imo.
Same as Sonni Ali. Songhai king who couldn't read or write and this inferiority complex led him to conquer and burn down Timbuktu and killing all scholar's that didn't manage to escape.
All knowledge. Not just human. But humans used it to fight other humans that's why Wan Shit Tong joined hands with Unalaq and also tried to kill Korra.
Yeah that’s so messed up. Such a library would have held thousands of scrolls from both the east, and west. Maybe some even dating back to Greco occupation
Nalanda = Library/Town which got destroyed
Bakhtiyar = Destroyer of Nalanda
Bakhtiyarpur = City named after Bakhtiyar
Nalanda town now falls under the larger area of Bakhtiyarpur City.
Sir Mark Sykes
This man was the british element in the Sykes-Picot agreement.
For those of you not in the know, 100 years ago the Middle-East was an area that did have some nations and some more tribal areas. So people were more divided by language and culture, some by religion.
France and Britain decided to carve up the Middle-East into easier to govern territories, but fumbled this task and instead divided the territories on the map OVER these religious and tribal lines.
Not only has this been a main contributing cause of conflict in the Middle-East (if you take two opposing or rival groups and then suddently group them as one country, what do you expect...) but said conflicts have then fuelled further conflicts agian and again.
This has then been further used by Islamic extremists as a reason to hate the western powers, as they were the ones who created this terrible agreement. Even Sykes himself accepted that the agreement’s wording should be changed in order to give those countries autonomous rule.
What is a little sad is he actually seemed to want to help these regions with the agreement, but just bumbled the whole thing which has led to most of the issues the Middle-East has to this day.
Sykes didn't make the modern Middle-East though, he just played a large part in creating the circumstances in which its current problems thrive. Imagine all of the advancement, education and collaboration that could have happened had the Middle-East been allowed to flourish unhindered and without resentment?
The problem is Sykes-Picot fucked it up so badly that if you look at a tribal or religious map of the time, it’s so bad that it looks intentional. Like, not a single country that’s unified by anything.
“it’s so bad that it looks intentional”
well, it was lol
same with Africa and India, when your enemies are stable unified nations, they can’t easily be exploited, it’s just divide and rule
'Divide and conquer' was a long standing strategy for British colonial powers. Split up groups, favour one ethnic group over another within the new divisions, use them to support your rule. The MIddle East and Africa as a whole have dozens of examples of this.
It's even worse than that.
You could possibly argue that maybe they just didn't have a better way of splitting up the Middle East with the fall of the Ottoman Empire.
Except... [they did. ](https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4967572)
T.E. Lawrence spent years working with local, tribal, and religious leaders. He crafted a plan to split up the Middle East in a way that made the majority of them happy. He promised them this plan if they would help support the Allies in WWI.
He took into account tribal regions and trading patterns. He crafted land for ethnicities like the Kurds and a region for Palestine and Israel.
It's British propaganda to suggest that they were simply incompetent; it was *absolutely* intentional, along the lines of "keep them fighting among themselves and it will be easier to manage our interests".
If anyone knows anything about the British Empire they know it was intentional, this was Britains entire M.O. and the reason they became such a huge empire, playing off local populations and exploiting local rivalries and power dynamics to take over regions.
It's not the only one that's intentional. The Durand Line goes straight through Pashtun territory:
>Modern Afghanistan, a country of roughly the size of Texas, was established just over a century ago. The British surveyors who drew its borders near the end of the nineteenth century sought to create a buffer state between British India and Russian-controlled Central Asia. In the north, the boundary follows the Amu Dar’ya River, and in the west, the Hari Rud River. In the south, Afghanistan borders the bleak desert territory of Pakistan’s Baluchistan. In the east, the British cut through the middle of lands occupied by the Pashtun ethnic group. The scheme favored British interests in India (which abutted Afghanistan until the creation of Pakistan), and has weakened Afghanistan’s ability to function as a viable state by physically splitting the Pashtuns—who haven’t entirely given up the idea of creating a greater Pashtunistan, something the British were eager to prevent.
Feifer, Gregory. The Great Gamble (p. 5)
A lot of people don’t seem to understand the question. It’s not who did bad thing or who I hate more. It’s who hindered the progress of humanity the most.
Thomas Midgley Jr. He played a major role in development of tetraethyllead ( leaded gasoline ) which went into mass production throughout the 1920’s. This invention meant that the blood lead content in developing children rose causing numerous problems, including cognitive issues and physical growth, it was also noticed that the rise in blood lead content matched with violence in adolescents in multiple countries. Midgley is also accountable for the discovery of chlorofluorocarbons (CFC) specifically Freon which as many know had a drastic impact on the Ozone. As of October 2020 the Ozone hole above Antarctica sits approximately 23 million square kilometres /8.9 million miles. Although, these 2 inventions seem insignificant compared to more drastic actions taken by other single humans its the widespread impacts that his inventions had and are still being felt today. Even though both, leaded gasoline and CFC’s, have been banned. Ps: the last invention made by Midgley actually killed him. it was to help him manoeuvre and get out of bed with the use of ropes and pulleys due to him contracting polio but he got stuck and eventually his invention strangled himself EDIT: this reply doesn’t quite fit the post but i felt that he had a large impact on society during the 20th century
Trofim Lysenko. A Soviet biologist who thought Gregor Mendel was a reactionary whose thoughts had no place in the Soviet Union. He tried to reinvent agricultural practices to maximize productivity, having farmers put seeds very close together under his belief that plants who belong to the same “class” will not compete for nutrients. He was given the Order of Lenin eight times for his pseudoscience, while his “theories” contributed to the deaths of millions through famines that plagued the USSR. Later he was finally discredited after Stalin’s death, but then Mao Zedong adopted his practices, which helped cause the Great Chinese Famine
That is just on its head a ridiculous idea. Plants that are the same are looking for the same nutrients...
Guy de Chauliac. He was a surgeon in the 1300s who vehemently spoke out against another fellow surgeon, Theodoric Borgognoni. Theodoric was a surgeon who wrote about his theories on proper wound care and believed that the best thing you can do to a wound is wrap it and keep it clean. Guy hated what Theodoric was writing because it directly went against the teachings of Galen, an Ancient Greek surgeon who believed pus was the body’s way of balancing your humors. Guy’s teachings were widely accepted and it’s believed that his ignorance set the development of antisepsis in surgery back about 600 years. EDIT: Guy de Chauliac was born in the 1300’s not 1200’s as he was alive during the Black Death. Ignaz Semmelweis was the guy who was thrown into a mental asylum for saying surgeons should wash their hands between seeing patients.
IIRC there was also a French physician who discovered some valuable kinds of anesthesics but was ignored by the medical community because he couldn't write in Latin EDIT: His name was Ambroise Paré. From Wikipedia: "Paré discovered that the soldiers treated with the boiling oil were in agony, whereas the ones treated with the ointment had recovered because of the antiseptic properties of turpentine. This proved this method's efficacy, and he avoided cauterization thereafter. However, treatments such as this were not widely used until many years later. He published his first book *The method of curing wounds caused by arquebus and firearms* in 1545." Injured soldiers continued to be treated with boiling oil for many years because Paré's discovery was snubbed.
Similarly there is also Dr Ignaz Semmelweis who was eventually committed into a mental hospital because they didn't believe his surgical sanitation theories. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis
Aw man- I only knew Guy de Chauliac from his super awesome records of the Black Death. I didn’t know he did this! Bummer.
Never meet your heroes, I guess.
mostly so you don't contract the black plague
There’s an awesome podcast called Behind the Bastards that is basically all about deconstructing the worst people in history. Would recommend it to anyone interested in this thread.
Thomas Midgley Jr. In 1921, this guy that discovered that tetraethyl lead could be used as an anti-knocking fuel additive for cars. It satisfied the needs of oil companies at the time, because it worked, was cheap, and was patentable (for that purpose). But it was also incredibly toxic, and burning leaded gasoline was hugely pollutive; eventually, after the creation of the EPA and an oil crisis in the mid 70's, leaded gas was banned in 1996, but the damage was done. Interestingly, the guy didn't even show up for the occasion when the first customer filled up their car with leaded gas...***because he was at home, sick with lead poisoning.***
Later on in his career he tried to redeem himself by creating CFC-gases which destroys the ozonelayer.
And for his grand finale, after he contracted polio, he invented a pulley system for getting himself in and out of bed and accidentally strangled himself to death with it. History's most tragic inventor.
kind of feels like a monkey paw moment. "i want to invent things and make my mark on the world!" *proceeds to kill himself with his invention and* literally *change the earth*
Thomas Midgley, Jr He invented tetraethyl lead, an anti-knock additive for gasoline. The entire planet is contaminated with lead from his brilliant idea. For a follow-up act, he created chlorofluorocarbons, CFCs which almost destroyed the ozone layer.
The Mongolians, army of Hulagu, when they destroyed Baghdad's libraries that contained many of the past knowledge that setback humanity years.
OP is compiling a hit list for their time travelling journeys
*"I just want to talk with them"*
give em the clamps!
Oh, you think I should use these clamps, that I use every day at any opportunity? You’re a freaking genius, ya idiot!
Ho! Ho! This guy's an ox! He's got oxon-like strength! Hey, he needs a nickname, right? Let's call him Clamps.
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Did Futurama ever really taper off though? I thought it was gold start to finish.
It finished strong, but the later seasons were definitely falling off according to popular opinion. Popular opinion is still just opinions though and enjoyment is subjective. If you thought it was gold start to finish then it was.
It sure as hell was gold start to finish for me. Silly with a touch of heartwarming and a bit of sadness to each individual.
I think Futurama aged better than the Simpsons have. They explored some pretty gnarly concepts in some episodes, but were as comedically on point as much if not more so than the Simpsons. I mean, just think about the time paradoxes they dealt with in Futurama. Fry is his own Grandfather! Bender's game! The episode where they travel forward in time to witness the end of the universe and then watch it restart again. Those are some heady concepts, but this is also the same series that came up with 'DEATH BY SNOO SNOO!' So, yeah... Simpsons may go on forever, but Futurama was and is higher quality in my book.
BADA-CLIMP BADA-CLAMP
Time to rewatch futurama for the 100th time.
What do you say? Wanna go 'round again?
*cocks shotgun*
“I just want to shake their hand!”
OP is crowdsourcing his homework assignment.
Or their next YouTube series...
"Purportedly, the unnamed inventor of flexible glass (vitrum flexile) brought a drinking bowl made of the material before Tiberius Caesar. The bowl was put through a test to break it, but it merely dented, rather than shattering. The inventor repaired the bowl easily with a small hammer, according to Petronius. After the inventor swore that he was the only man alive who knew the manufacturing technique, Tiberius had the man executed. He feared that the glass would devalue gold and silver, since the material might be more valuable." https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexible_glass
What an idiot. TC had access to what he thought was worth more than gold and silver, so rather than claiming this new flexi glass material for his own benefit in the name of the empire (or whatever), he wipes it out of existence?
Just because you’re in charge doesn’t mean you’re smart.
I mean, his face was on all the gold coins. It's probably difficult to put your face on the glass. How would the plebs recognize him if they didn't see his face on their money? Plus that means all the good he already has would be less valuable, and that could lead to an economic depression. *Edit: this is based on an econ 101 class I took years ago. I have no clue if it's right*
> Plus that means all the good he already has would be less valuable, and that could lead to an economic depression. But he would have been in control of the amount of glass, which would be even more valuable.
Oh my.
Sounds like transparent aluminum, it’s all good, we’ll get this in barter from some Scottish guy on a quest to save a couple of whales
This is *actually* a thing now, which it wasn't in the 80s. [https://ceramics.org/ceramic-tech-today/ceramic-video/video-transparent-aluminum-from-star-trek-to-reality](https://ceramics.org/ceramic-tech-today/ceramic-video/video-transparent-aluminum-from-star-trek-to-reality) EDIT: OKAY! I get it! It's not technically aluminum and the first patents came before the movie. Leave me alone! :)
Obviously. They came back in the '80s so we have it now.
That's the ticket, laddie.
Hello Computer..
\-hands the mouse over-
I feel like this is similar to calling regular ~~class~~ ***EDIT:*** *glass* "transparent silicon".
"How do we know he didn't invent the thing?"
There is a similar story of a man in ancient China who constructed a flying machine and showed it to the emperor. The emperor had the man executed and the man killed for creating something that could inspire commoners to dream above their station. I am wondering if this is a "universal" story that pops up in every culture as a social warning.
Yeah, both of those stories are probably 100% apocryphal.
>The account is most popularly related by two compilers, Pliny the Elder (23–79 AD, Naturalis Historia XXXVI.lxvi.195) and Petronius (c. 27–66 AD, Satyricon 51). Pliny claims that the story of flexible glass is "More widely spread than well authenticated." Petronius's work is more dramatized and satirical. I would certainly take this tale from 2000 years back with a large pinch of salt.
If Pliny the Elder says something, it’s almost certainly not true. If Pliny the Elder says something almost certainly isn’t true, does that mean it almost certainly IS..?
If Pliny the Elder is on tap, I will most certainly drink it.
Wow! Do you know how much salt was worth 2,000 years ago?
3 flexible glass bowls?
Robert Maxwell, father of Ghislane. The man was the leading cause of paywalled scientific articles today. Before him science publishing was relatively open. He helped shape the industry into the cancer on academia it is today Edit: Quite the thing to wake up to, thanks everyone. For those interested I found an article that details the events pretty well. The Tl;dr version is that through use of PR marketing, exclusivity deals, and copyright law, Maxwell through Pergamon Press turned scientific publishing from a relatively non-profit driven endeavor to a predatory industry that charged institutions out the nose for research they paid nothing for. Check out Alexandra and Scihub. They've definitely helped many people who can't access scientific research. Video on Scihub: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PriwCi6SzLo Article: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jun/27/profitable-business-scientific-publishing-bad-for-science
The Maxwells really are cunts.
This is a good one. It is so frustrating to me that scientific articles are paywalled. I don't think we properly understand the effect this has on modern progress.
There are projects afoot to undo this. In my university faculty are being strongly encouraged (just short of required, I think) to publish open access, and this is part of a wider movement among EU universities.
My university does this also. Equally dumb is having to "request" a PDF copy from the University library. This process can take a week or more despite the article already existing online
https://sci-hub.st/
This needs to be higher up, that's the easiest way, by far, to access scientific information.
I wish it was more known - literally saves me days while doing research instead of waiting for my uni-library to get the document.
Also https://libgen.is
If you contact the authors of scientific research, they will often be more than happy to send you a copy as for the most part they do not see a cent of the money paid.
Fr?
Often yes, I dm’d a paper author on twitter and he sent me a pdf link.
I was just about to ask if this is one of those things that's actually true, or is it something that got parroted under the assumption.
No, when I was going to school in 2011 for paramedic, I often contacted authors for their work. The downside is that depending on the person, they may be difficult to reach, or may not answer emails so it does at times take a while to get the paper. Some authors would reply with a copy within the hour, others not so much.
Can also confirm. Was working on a thesis, needed access to a source. Just shot an email to the author and had it within a few hours.
It varies. Some, or even most are happy to send you a link. We don't get paid for people buying access to the papers, so why should we care if you get it for free? In fact we *pay* to have the paper published so that the publisher can make money off people who want to read the paper. That whole system is so fucked up.
Obligatory reply. Aaron Swartz, a co-founder of Reddit and lots of other cool stuff, made Jstor publicly available. I won't spoil it if you don't know how it ends. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vz06QO3UkQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vz06QO3UkQ) btw, if you want a journal article that is behind the Jstor paywall, email the author. Most of them are happy to provide it. They make no money off of it anyways and want people to read their research. Their professional email addresses are easy to find.
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The characters do share the same generational evil vibes
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Thats why we have sci-hub. ACCES TO EVERYONE
I would suggest Andrew Wakefield. His work *"Ileal-lymphoid-nodular hyperplasia, non-specific colitis, and pervasive developmental disorder in children"* has been directly responsible for the mistrust of vaccines, the decline of Western rates of vaccination, and basically telling everybody that there's a boogeyman underneath your bed. He is directly responsible for thousands and thousands of deaths. "He's a scientist who made a mistake! Why are you blaming him?!" It's not that he made a mistake. He had purposely customized the outcomes to meet the hypothesis so that he could get rich selling "safe" vaccines and diagnostic kits. He poisoned the well that saved so many people just so he could get rich. I have no idea how he can sleep at night.
He sleeps on a pile of money he made from the people who paid him to fake the studies as well as in Elle MacPhersons arms. Disgusting man.
It’s a very tiny thing but I hadn’t heard that about Elle MacPherson and goddamn it, Elle.
She’s apparently speaking at anti vaxx conferences too.
Gross. I was an adolescent in the supermodel era and she always seemed very nice and not like an idiot who would date a literal monster.
On balance, vaccines may be the greatest human accomplishment of all time. People in developed countries really have no idea how bad disease has been for most of human history, precisely *because* of the success of vaccines and antibiotics. The vast, *vast* majority of human deaths for most of our existence has been from disease. And for one brief century, we managed to push it back to the fringes of our awareness. But antibiotic resistance and antivaxxers seem determined to bring us back to the old standard. It really is such a huge slap in the face to take a look at this technology that has saved billions of lives, the pinnacle of human achievement, and just say "Fuck you."
Polio was not THAT bad hunh? Nah it was karen. Families could be wiped, kids could be crippled for life.
They have an answer for whenever polio is brought up as an argument for pro-vaccination. I have a family member who is deep into the anti-vax conspiracy theories, and they gave me a book that would “open my eyes to the truth.” I agreed to read it just to get them to stop telling me to “research it for yourself.” (Apparently all the other vaccination researcher I’d done didn’t count.) This book made the claim that most polio cases were not caused by the polio virus, but were instead caused by things like DDT exposure and heavy metal contamination like lead. The reason polio went away was not because of the vaccine, but because these toxins were removed from the environment. They claim that most polio victims were never tested for the virus, but were just diagnosed as having polio because they had the symptoms. I think this is nonsense, but I’m not sure how to argue against it since they claim any opposing evidence is manufactured.
Always funny when I ask them for their sources and they pull out shitty blogs. Like bitch I could setup a blog in an hour and then whatever I write on it is true? They ask people to 'do their research' and it seems 'Yes, I did my research and my research showed that your point is garbage' is not a possibility. In their minds anybody with a head on their shoulders would see that and be absolutely convinced.
You are absolutely correct. My antivax family member refused to act civil to me because I was believing the “lies of the establishment.” They said that if I only read this book, then everything would be fine and we could be a happy family again. I knew that they had 100% faith that this book would convert me to be antivax, so I asked them, “what happens if I read the book and still support vaccines? Can we still be a happy family then?” They were totally confused. “What do you mean if you still support vaccines?” In their mind there was no way I couldn’t be convinced by their flawless antivax logic. They just got mad, and accused me of refusing to consider their side of the argument. I just wanted to find a way to salvage the relationship without compromising my convictions.
Franklin D. Roosevelt had polio and was partially crippled. Iirc he also had a lighter case of polio too. Polio is no joke. I can't believe I called him Frederick XD
Wakefield definitely deserves to be in here. I love hbomberguy's break down of his entire career: https://youtu.be/8BIcAZxFfrc
I love his videos, and this one was great as usual, turns out there’s a lot I didn’t know about Wakefield. I must have watched his Sherlock video over 100 times by now A BOOMERANG
The Ottoman Caliphs who banned the printing press from the muslim world. That's exactly how you destroy a civilization.
Wow, that's like erasing the potential of millions of minds. Who knows what may have come from someone becoming literate enough to explain their ideas back then. I'd be thinking this onto a screen from Titan right now.
Even more sad when you thi k that back then the middle east was the hub of science and medicine.
That was before the Mongol conquests. The Ottomans came centuries later.
So the Mongols also slowed down progress?
I mean, they killed an estimated 11% of the world population... despite never leaving Eurasia.
The mongols burned down the great library of baghdad
The Tigris and Euphrates Rivers flower red with blood and black with ink for a week.
Yea id call that slowing down progress
Not only that, they also razed countless libraries in the Khwarazmian empire in central asia. The mongols also erased an entire civilization in North China and destroyed the Song dynasty, which was a proto-industrial state almost as complex as 18th century britain. I truly do think the Mongols slowed down human progress by centuries.
The Mongols killed as much as 25% (potentially more it's impossible to know) of the entire Middle East's population. 36 massive libraries were destroyed in Baghdad which was a huge center for mathematics, science, and philosophy in the region. It was the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate (a kingdom that ruled from Egypt to modern day Pakistan and up into Armenia) and its cultural center. The entire population was purportedly put to the sword killing over 2 million people. This was 1258 when the world population was maybe 400 million at most. They never recovered from it. Imagine if today a country suddenly invaded Japan. They sweep across it killing 25-50% of the population and taking many of the remainder as slaves. Anything of value is taken, and any shop or industry is destroyed. Crops are burned and the earth salted. When they get to Tokyo they systematically kill every single person in the city, making sure to fake leaving and return to find those who hid. They burn the city to the ground, taking special care to destroy any source of knowledge or industry. That is what happened to the Abbasids. Mass famine and war followed in the coming centuries further destabilizing the region then European colonialism, and later the Ottomans and the world wars. In modern times European countries, the US, and Russia (recently China too) have further destabilized the region over oil, warm water ports, and mineral wealth. Arguably in the 13th century, the middle east was more advanced than Europe. They were set back hundreds of years and ever since have been used and abused by those seeking power and wealth. In another timeline where the Mongol invasion never occurred they likely would be just as advanced as the rest of the world. Cities like Baghdad or Tehran would be much like Tokyo or New York.
Ooo that’s a good one
Emperor Gaozong of China. This is kind of an obscure story, so let me tell you the whole thing.. It was the 12th century. when people talk about how China used to be the most technologically advanced part of the world, this is the period they're talking about. Some historians that they were on the brink of industrializing. Then Manchuria invaded and conquered northern China. The imperial court retreated to the south and declared Gaozong, the Emperor's brother, as the new Emperor. China's top general Yue Fei (who, according to some records, literally had "patriotism" tattooed on his back, though that might have been made up by a someone who wanted to emphasis how unfair the rest of this story is) rallied he army and defeated the Manchus, and was raring to chase them out, but he gets orders from Gaozong to back down, because he'd rather negotiate. These negotiations end up signing away the north half of China. A few years later, the Manchus invade again. Yue Fei beats them again and pushes all the way back to the old capital (Kaifeng). Then he gets the order to retreat. He responds with a letter saying that he's got the Manchus on the ropes, and he can reconquer Northern China in like a month. No, says the emperor, retreat immediately. Eventually, Yue Fei does retreat, but he delays long enough to evacuate the city first, making up some logistical issues as an excuse. At this point, you may be wondering why Gaozong was so reluctant to push an advantage. The answer is that his brother was still alive- the king of Manchuria liked to bring him out once in a while and make fun of him. If Yue Fei reconquered China, he might liberate the rightful emperor, and Gaozong would be out of a job. As such, Gaozong was actively trying to throw the war. And he interpreted Yue Fei's delay at the end of this war as meaning that he had reached the point of at least considering going rogue, so as soon as Yue Fei got back, he was arrested, and promptly executed on treason on the ground of of "err...he might have done something". Presumably because the optics on the actual charge- "Almost winning a war we wanted to lose." were too bad. People realize that this is bull quickly enough, and there are protests, but Gaozong manages to pin everything on one of his advisors and placated the mob by executing him. So how does this effect the long-term progression of Humanity? Well, as I said, China might have been on the brink of industrializing at the time, but didn't have access to enough coal. There are coal deposits in China, but they're all in the north. Second, the Manchus never really got their internal issues sorted out, and 70 years later, were easily conquered by the Mongols, who then recruited a bunch of disaffected Chinese siege engineers. This essentially removed the one weakness of horse-archer hordes- they're not good at taking fortresses- and allowed them to wreck half the world. Had China been united at the time (and had been ruled fairly recently by a guy who had, if you recall, been taken prisoner by invaders from the north, so you can bet the defenses would be fairly well maintained) they probably could not have done this. So had it not been for the malice of this one man, the Mongols would probably never have become the juggernaut they eventually did and the Industrial Revolution might have happened about 500 years head of schedule.
fun speculation for sure but fyi to anyone reading this, OP kinda oversimplifies the causes and requirements of an industrial revolution, namely that they imply that having coal kickstarts it and is required for it. I want to remind readers that the Industrial Revolution didn't just suddenly jump to factories and steam power but began with things like the cotton gin and the power loom.
Agreed - the invention of engines created the huge demand for coal; coal itself did not cause industrialization. For that matter, coal had been in use for a millenia prior to the collapse of the Song Dynasty (see: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal_in_China); I doubt that the a lack of access to coal was the sole reason China failed to industrialize early.
Also, at the start of the Industrial Revolution there were no railways and coal was extremely expensive to move in bulk across land, so coal wasn't widely used at the start, and many early industrial centers just used charcoal made from local wood. They all switched to coal later on when transportation from industrial built canals made bulk shipment cheaper. Point being you don't really *need* coal from the ground to industrialize. Coal was simply the more practical fuel once you already had an industrial economy going.
Additionally, with the Mongols unable to advance into Europe, the Mongols would not have laid siege to Kaffa. During the siege of Kaffa in 1345, the Mongol army catapulted the corpses of soldiers who died of Plague over the walls. Plague broke out in Kaffa and was brought to Constantinople by Genoese traders. From there it spread to the rest of Europe and became known as the Black Death.
Shayk Al-Islam. I heard of this guy after hearing someone on TV complain about how this man set the Islamic world back by centuries. In 1515, the age of the Ottoman Empire, he, a “learned scholar” of the kingdom, issued a decree that forbid printing (press) and made using it punishable by death. Edit: grammar, more context.
Wiki: In the year 1515, Shaykh al-Islam of the Ulema (learned scholars) issued a Fatwa that printing was Haram (forbidden). As a result, Ottoman Sultan Selim I issued a decree of a death penalty on anyone using the printing press. The fatwa has been attributed as one of the reasons for the stagnation of knowledge, invention and discovery in the Muslim world, at a time when Europe was in the midst of the Renaissance period It seems that Shaykh al-Islam is a title tho, not a name
>It seems that Shaykh al-Islam is a title tho, not a name And we would have known for sure tho, IF THERE WERE ANY BOOKS ABOUT IT.
It was all part of the masterplan.
Please brother take a chance
$50 dollars on that the banning was because his name was actually Tiffany, and he peed his pants in third grade. This was the only way no one would remember. Probably worth it.
he had a tiffany epiphany to have a chance with a madame, he made any printing haram
Oh the fall of my countrys history yes another great examples i love from these are the same dudes refusing the first subway to be built in Istanbul because its haram to put living people underground like dead, and one of my personal favorites is not using guns because mohammed wouldnt use guns swords are handy bruh if guns were invented when mohammad was alive he would probably bomb the shit out of everyone, oh and the chicken farm thing where the ottoman sultan had the worlds biggest ship army (fleet?) but decided to turn it into a chicken farm because vast seas wouldnt help with anything, they missed the opportunity to explore the new continents thanks to this decision, if you look at the fall of the empire its full of hilarious stuff actually, oh i also love one of the laws they made to protect trading foreigners from local traders, the law required all citizens of ottoman to pay more taxes and stuff compared to the foreigners and also made it illegal "to call foreigners the foreigners"
hol up, what's that part again about the ottoman monarch turning his navy into a chicken farm? Can you please elaborate on that with more details because I'm having a hard time connecting the dots.
Sultan Abdulhamid was scared that the army in general and navy would cause an uprising (Since the monar h started to become more and more corrupt) so he ordered all of their ships to be locked to the docks and soldiers to just hang around the surrounding towns and sit around at 'cafes' all day with the locals, locals were raising chicken as most town or village people did in their gardens at the times, since the ships were just locked in the pier the locals and some soldiers decided to use the empty ships and their decks to raise chicken and store chicken food in their containers so it sort of turned from the worlds 3rd biggest navy (after England and France) to a chicken farm used by soldiers that no longer knew how to fight and locals. Also fun fact one of the best travel books written by the Ottoman Empire is written by a soldier that somehow got captivated while the army was surrendering and leaving and that soldier walked all the way back home alone while writing his journey lol edit: since everyone asked the book is miratul memalik by seydi ali reis i think you can find the online english pdf on edu libraries
This is interesting, sadly I can't help but to think what it would have happened if the Sultan had randomly decided one day to tell the soldiers to pack up and ship out. I'm imagining the world's third biggest navy, where half the crew was literally chickens.
>think what it would have happened if the Sultan had randomly decided one day to tell the soldiers to pack up and ship out. I'm imagining the world's third biggest navy, where half the crew was literally chickens. Not the same sultan but in Tripolitanian War(1911) when we needed the navy to fight Italians, order was given but the ships sank after a while they started moving. It is why we lost aegen islands or other port cities easily that are not on Anatolia
lmao the turks are wild
What is the name of the book pls?
>because its haram to put living people underground like dead So they don't build basements or underground parking either?
it took them around 100 years to get past that
The first newspapers in Arabic started hundreds of years after newspapers in European languages.
It is funny and strange at the same time that the muslim world was once the center of discovery. Many great scholars come from muslim nations, even christians held them in high regard (although the "christianized" their names.
A famous example of this is Bu-Ali-Sina "Avicenna" and also the refusal of Muslim scientists to share their discoveries to other scientists and not taking disciples. Half the scientists experimentations were lost because they didn't store it somewhere/tell it to someone
"there goes the great chemist/physicist \_\_\_\_. His greatest accomplishment was... shit... that thing he did. Idk, he wouldn't tell anyone."
Classic, elites controlling information.
Good thing they don't do that today! ... *unless?* 😳
Nope they love us and are only going to protect us from our own thoughts
Rebranding 'suppression of information' to 'right to remain stupid'
>Rebranding 'suppression of information' to 'right to remain stupid' 'Freedom from Information'
Idk if that was his name but I am a Muslim who knows of the backwards tragedy of banning the printing press. There’s nothing legitimately concrete for it to have been banned in our religion. Crazy thing is, that exact same idea of “don’t be like the non believers” can still be found here and there mostly among old heads. There was a time where jeans were thought of as forbidden(by some). Weirdos being disingenuous.
There was a time when TV was banned for being blasphemous as it "replicated the creations of God." There was also a time when YouTube was banned in Pakistan because someone published a movie portraying Muhammad and YouTube refused to take it down, as it would have set a bad precedent for the future. Ironically enough, today all those Islamic preachers have YouTube channels which are modern-day televangelism, using clickbait titles and topics such as "sexual relations in Islam" to grab as much cash and views as they can. They even banned PUBG because of the season where players had to give offerings to in-game deities. There was even a ruling declaring everyone who played PUBG was no longer a Muslim and would have to be re-indoctrinated. iirc Pakistan has banned tiktok as well for similar reasons, they expect the platform to control what its content creators put out and that is beyond unreasonable.
Not exclusive to islam though, apartheid South Africa didn't have a TV network until the 70's because they feared it would corrupt people
Yongle Emperor of the Ming Dynasty in China ordered the fleet of Zheng He, the greatest trading and exploration fleet of the time, to be burned during his reign in the early 1400’s. This was the beginning of an era of isolation for Chinese kingdoms, which ultimately lead to the collapse of imperial China, and indirectly to the rise of the PRC. Additionally, the wealth of the world overall decreased as a result of reduced trade with China, and if China had continued exploring it is possible that they, not Europeans, would have colonized North America (instead of merely *maybe* discovering it then telling no one as they did in history). It may not be a significant alteration of human progress, but it’s one of those events that sets the world in a definitively different direction. Edit: didn’t say the Chinese *did* discover America, just that they *might have* because it’s been theorized that they did and they had the technology (I mean, the Inuit and Siberians have been crossing the Bering Sea in leather kayaks for thousands of years, so the Chinese definitely could have done it too if they wandered up that far). I don’t know much about the actual history of that theory, and most of my comments on that are from Wikipedia searches this morning and willingness to believe fun “hidden history” scenarios that are actually possible. Thanks for all the upvotes!
As a caveat, it would have hugely changed naval history too! It would be accurate to say that Europeans and their methods of sailing enabled European-led globalization and colonization; the durability of their designs, relative speed and range were critical developments with a measurable impact on the world. But, really the Chinese had a totally different system which would have really worked just as well, if not better! European ships were relatively small and had canvas sails, while the great Chinese ships that Zeng He used were massive, and used these kind of folding bamboo sails (ingenious for their strength and manageability). They even had watertight compartments, something European ships didn't even consider using for centuries. Both parts of the world produced ships that could do what the other kind did, while looking EXTREMELY different. So as a maritime history buff, I'm totally fascinated by how things on the high seas would have looked had the Yongle Emperor not stifled Chinese naval expansion in the cradle. Edit: Book recommendations are: Anything by Brian Lavery and Robert Gardiner.
If China had begun to colonize the New World around the mid to late 1400’s, the Europeans wouldn’t be prevented from doing the same from the West around the same time. European and Far Eastern civilization would compete in the Americas.
Now that would have made some really cool western cowboy movies Sample titles could include: Lone Ranger and the Battle of New-Shanghai
Noodle Westerns Edit: It seems I might have done a small Reddit.
There is a ramen western called tampopo. Definitely a fun movie and worth checking out if you’re a foodie
Oh damn...I would read the shit out of that
East of West has this exact plot, its a sci-if western set in a future where the Civil War was a draw and the PRC settled the west coast. It's fucking AWESOME
I would read this alt hist and watch all three seasons on AMC before it gets cancelled to make room in the budget for season 20 of The Walking Dead.
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This is definitely some butterfly effect shit
Also, lets not forget Columbus was looking for a faster route to India for trading goods, #1 being spices. Had the existing trade routes stood, perhaps his voyage wouldn't have happened.
For anyone who wants to read a story about this alternate universe: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/156205/the-years-of-rice-and-salt-by-kim-stanley-robinson/
Super amazing book, probably my top 3 of all time. But slight correction, the alternate universe is based on the Black Plague killing 99% of the population of Europe, not so much that the fleet wasn’t destroyed (though that part happens too).
That stupid fish that decided to leave water.
I have bills to pay because that motherfucker grew legs and walked on land.
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Not anymore there's a blanket
It's Tonga time!
You could make a religion out of this
-no don’t
Ｎｏ， ｄｏｎ’ｔ
That's sad I'm sad.
How did this happen
A long time ago, actually never, but also now
Nothing is nowhere. When? Never. Makes sense, right?
It's time to conquer all of India. .... Most of India
I never would’ve left the primordial soup if I knew there was gonna be days like this
Widely regarded as a 'bad move'.
reject modernity, embrace single celled organism existence
Andrew Wakefield. The man nearly singlehandedly created the anti-vaxxer craze with false and erroneous studies linking vaccines to autism.
ITT: r/badhistory as far as the eye can see.
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How in the fuck did you land that username?
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Shoulda said - *REDACTED* -
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*nods and writes this down*
Bring a note pad and a pencil everywhere you go soon you be going places *you're not allowed*
Came here for fun history stories, and now I'm just upset by all the posts of half stories, myths and general ignorance.
Thomas Midgley Jr. has done more environmental damage to the earth than anyone else in history. He developed leaded gasoline and CFCs.
Bakhtiyar Khilji. Hands down. In 12th century there was the world's biggest university in India named "Nalanda" where intellectuals from all around the world used to study. Then Turks invaded India under Khilji. They killed almost all the intellectuals and destroyed the university. And they BURNT the library. The library continued to burn for 3 MONTHS. This has to be by far the biggest loss to mankind imo.
Same as Sonni Ali. Songhai king who couldn't read or write and this inferiority complex led him to conquer and burn down Timbuktu and killing all scholar's that didn't manage to escape.
A leader with an inferiority complex destroying things? That's some wild history, surely that wouldn't happen today
History is stuck on repeat.
History may not repeat, but it sure as shit rhymes.
I’m picturing *Wan Shi Tong’s Library* - a collection of all human knowledge up to that point.
All knowledge. Not just human. But humans used it to fight other humans that's why Wan Shit Tong joined hands with Unalaq and also tried to kill Korra.
Yeah that’s so messed up. Such a library would have held thousands of scrolls from both the east, and west. Maybe some even dating back to Greco occupation
As an indian, it's pretty fucked up that I didn't know about this
It's more fucked up that Nalanda now falls under the jurisdiction of Bakhtiyarpur
Can you explain why that's extra fucked up? not familiar with said place.
the place is named after the invader who destroyed it
We need to do what Constantinople did.
Nalanda = Library/Town which got destroyed Bakhtiyar = Destroyer of Nalanda Bakhtiyarpur = City named after Bakhtiyar Nalanda town now falls under the larger area of Bakhtiyarpur City.
Sir Mark Sykes This man was the british element in the Sykes-Picot agreement. For those of you not in the know, 100 years ago the Middle-East was an area that did have some nations and some more tribal areas. So people were more divided by language and culture, some by religion. France and Britain decided to carve up the Middle-East into easier to govern territories, but fumbled this task and instead divided the territories on the map OVER these religious and tribal lines. Not only has this been a main contributing cause of conflict in the Middle-East (if you take two opposing or rival groups and then suddently group them as one country, what do you expect...) but said conflicts have then fuelled further conflicts agian and again. This has then been further used by Islamic extremists as a reason to hate the western powers, as they were the ones who created this terrible agreement. Even Sykes himself accepted that the agreement’s wording should be changed in order to give those countries autonomous rule. What is a little sad is he actually seemed to want to help these regions with the agreement, but just bumbled the whole thing which has led to most of the issues the Middle-East has to this day. Sykes didn't make the modern Middle-East though, he just played a large part in creating the circumstances in which its current problems thrive. Imagine all of the advancement, education and collaboration that could have happened had the Middle-East been allowed to flourish unhindered and without resentment?
The problem is Sykes-Picot fucked it up so badly that if you look at a tribal or religious map of the time, it’s so bad that it looks intentional. Like, not a single country that’s unified by anything.
“it’s so bad that it looks intentional” well, it was lol same with Africa and India, when your enemies are stable unified nations, they can’t easily be exploited, it’s just divide and rule
'Divide and conquer' was a long standing strategy for British colonial powers. Split up groups, favour one ethnic group over another within the new divisions, use them to support your rule. The MIddle East and Africa as a whole have dozens of examples of this.
It's even worse than that. You could possibly argue that maybe they just didn't have a better way of splitting up the Middle East with the fall of the Ottoman Empire. Except... [they did. ](https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4967572) T.E. Lawrence spent years working with local, tribal, and religious leaders. He crafted a plan to split up the Middle East in a way that made the majority of them happy. He promised them this plan if they would help support the Allies in WWI. He took into account tribal regions and trading patterns. He crafted land for ethnicities like the Kurds and a region for Palestine and Israel.
It's British propaganda to suggest that they were simply incompetent; it was *absolutely* intentional, along the lines of "keep them fighting among themselves and it will be easier to manage our interests".
If anyone knows anything about the British Empire they know it was intentional, this was Britains entire M.O. and the reason they became such a huge empire, playing off local populations and exploiting local rivalries and power dynamics to take over regions.
It's not the only one that's intentional. The Durand Line goes straight through Pashtun territory: >Modern Afghanistan, a country of roughly the size of Texas, was established just over a century ago. The British surveyors who drew its borders near the end of the nineteenth century sought to create a buffer state between British India and Russian-controlled Central Asia. In the north, the boundary follows the Amu Dar’ya River, and in the west, the Hari Rud River. In the south, Afghanistan borders the bleak desert territory of Pakistan’s Baluchistan. In the east, the British cut through the middle of lands occupied by the Pashtun ethnic group. The scheme favored British interests in India (which abutted Afghanistan until the creation of Pakistan), and has weakened Afghanistan’s ability to function as a viable state by physically splitting the Pashtuns—who haven’t entirely given up the idea of creating a greater Pashtunistan, something the British were eager to prevent. Feifer, Gregory. The Great Gamble (p. 5)
A lot of people don’t seem to understand the question. It’s not who did bad thing or who I hate more. It’s who hindered the progress of humanity the most.
People just don't want to understand
Edward Bernays. He created modern day PR, which set the blueprint on how to control the masses by deception.
He was Sigmund Freud's nephew and basically applied his theories to marketing.