Ukraine's European Revolution?

[garbon]

The article points out that contrary to your claims - many such technologies were not widespread until the 20th century. That is quite some time after initial contact with Europeans.

Odd that you used Europe as the example in not overstating connections given that you were the one divided contact in to precolonial and not.

Besides, as that article also notes, adopting technology isn't that important if population doesn't need / you aren't trying to exploit every last resource (as Europeans did in colonial Africa). I don't think you can use that then to prove isolation as it could just point to it not being considered important at the time.

[alfred russel]

The article points out that contrary to your claims - many such technologies were not widespread until the 20th century. That is quite some time after initial contact with Europeans.

Odd that you used Europe as the example in not overstating connections given that you were the one divided contact in to precolonial and not.

Besides, as that article also notes, adopting technology isn't that important if population doesn't need / you aren't trying to exploit every last resource (as Europeans did in colonial Africa). I don't think you can use that then to prove isolation as it could just point to it not being considered important at the time.

Garbon, isolation does not have to end with a half dead Dr. Livingstone wandering into your village. That isn't going to magically teach you how to implement an array of technologies that he knows about and are useful. Or a group of Portuguese soldiers on a quest to rescue a legendary Prester John.

People have a general interest in reducing backbreaking labor, increasing food production, reducing child mortality, etc. I find it hard to believe the technologies just weren't important. If they weren't, the population of Africa wouldn't explode after colonialization, and technologies would not spread into regions that Europeans did not come in force.

[garbon]

I don't think you are understanding my posts or the articles I posted* - so I think I'm done.

*as well as the fact that I disagreed with your unified theory on development from the start so this tangent was always just a bit of amusement.

[Neil]

People have a general interest in reducing backbreaking labor, increasing food production, reducing child mortality, etc. I find it hard to believe the technologies just weren't important. If they weren't, the population of Africa wouldn't explode after colonialization, and technologies would not spread into regions that Europeans did not come in force.

Slave societies aren't especially interested in reducing backbreaking labour, and simple machines don't reduce child mortality.  Even increasing food production if you don't have to constantly be fighting total wars.  And where was there in Africa where Europeans did not come?  I think you're making an elementary mistake by trying to act as if the only way to determine if a group is isolated or not is by what technologies they use.  I don't think that anything fruitful is likely to come out of this discussion.

[Ed Anger]

AR, I really think you'd enjoy Acemoglu's Why Nations Fail.  Acemoglu's one of the hottest, most cited economists around, and it makes some really interesting contrasts with the pseudo-Diamondy stuff you are talking about.  Also, he's an ethnic Armenian from Turkey. 

*takes a drink*

[alfred russel]

I don't think you are understanding my posts or the articles I posted* - so I think I'm done.

*as well as the fact that I disagreed with your unified theory on development from the start so this tangent was always just a bit of amusement.

I understood the article--well enough to know it turned into a giant circular reference.

Critical in the article is that Africa lacked the population density to need animal power and wheeled transport. The article cites as the critical factor increased population density after colonialization--improved health care. I'm skeptical of the improved health car rationale (there is still a tremendous lack of doctors in Africa, I doubt they made a critical difference in population density over 100 years ago)--but it still comes back to the same point--Africa was lagging behind in a technology.

The question is raised: Why was Africa late adopting the wheel?
I say: It was isolated.
You say: No, it wasn't isolated, here is an article saying it didn't have the population because it didn't have good health care.
Which begs the question: Why didn't Africa have good health care?
I say: it was isolated.

And around we go.

[alfred russel]

I don't think that anything fruitful is likely to come out of this discussion.

Better to focus on all the languish threads where fruit is likely to come from the discussions.

[garbon]

There are other more reasonable posters, yes. They don't all make bizarre summaries of discussions.

[The Brain]

At least one poster is into bizarre mammaries.

[citizen k]

 Ruh roh.

Leaked Ukraine recording reveals US exasperation with EU

By Roman Olearchyk in Kiev and Neil Buckley in London


The White House pointed the finger at Moscow after leaked recordings of its top diplomats discussing Ukraine emerged on Thursday in an episode that threatens to embarrass Washington and inject fresh tension into already-strained relations with Russia.

In an audio clip posted on YouTube, voices resembling those of Victoria Nuland, a US assistant secretary of state, and Geoffrey Pyatt, ambassador to Ukraine, are heard talking by telephone about how to resolve the stand-off in Kiev after two months of anti-government protests.

In apparent frustration with the EU – which has failed to join the US in threatening sanctions against Ukraine's leaders if they violently crush the protests – the voice resembling Ms Nuland at one point exclaims "F**k the EU".

The two voices suggest Arseny Yatseniuk, an opposition leader and former foreign minister, should be in a new government in Kiev. But Vitali Klitschko, a former heavyweight boxer identified as "top dog" among opposition leaders, is described as inexperienced and needing to "do his political homework".

The voice resembling Ms Nuland refers to the two men as "Yats" and "Klitsch".

The authenticity or otherwise of the recording could not be immediately confirmed. But a White House spokesman blamed Moscow. "The video was first noted and tweeted out by the Russian government. I think it says something about Russia's role," said Jay Carney, suggesting it was an old-fashioned dirty-tricks campaign with a new-media twist.

Jennifer Psaki, a State department spokeswoman, said the incident represented a "new low in Russian tradecraft".

Moscow has for weeks accused the west of pulling the strings behind a Ukraine protest movement that threatens to unseat the country's Russia-friendly president, Viktor Yanukovich – an allegation that Washington and Brussels have roundly rejected.

The recordings appeared to coincide with a stepped-up Kremlin public relations offensive. Sergei Glaziev, an adviser to President Vladimir Putin, told Kommersant Ukraine newspaper on Thursday that the US was "spending $20m a week" on financing Ukraine's opposition. This included providing weapons, he said.

Mr Glaziev repeated comments he made last week suggesting Mr Yanukovich should use force to end an "attempted coup" in Ukraine. The Putin adviser also reiterated Moscow's call to join three-way talks on future trade and economic relations with Ukraine.

The EU has declined that invitation, but has worked with the US in recent days to mediate a potential compromise in Ukraine including a new technocratic government led by opposition figures, and constitutional changes reducing the president's powers.

The alleged US diplomatic conversation may have been leaked in an attempt to undermine those efforts. It came while Ms Nuland was in Kiev on Thursday for talks with Mr Yanukovich.

Another audio clip later appeared on YouTube of a conversation apparently between Helga Schmid, deputy secretary-general of the EU's External Action Service (EAS), talking to the EU ambassador to Ukraine. The two voices bemoan how the EU is seen by the US as "soft" on Ukraine.

"It's disturbing and smells like Belarus, when sensitive conversations of high-level diplomats are secretively recorded and revealed," said one western diplomat working in Kiev, referring to Ukraine's autocratic ex-Soviet neighbour. "They knew this would be an issue of high confrontation . . . it's an attempt to split the unity of the west and opposition."

The recorded conversation between the US diplomats appears to have taken place after Mr Yanukovich offered Mr Yatseniuk and Mr Klitschko top jobs in a new government on January 25, though they have so far turned them down.

"The Klitschko piece is obviously the most complicated electron here," a voice resembling Mr Pyatt is heard saying. The two conclude that Mr Yatseniuk, who has also served as economy minister, is better equipped for government.

The voice resembling Ms Nuland refers to the prospect of UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon sending an envoy to Ukraine to "help glue this thing", adding: "And you know, f**k the EU."

The male voice replies: "Exactly . . . And I think we got to do something to make it stick together, because you can be sure that if it does start to gain altitude the Russians will be working behind the scenes to torpedo it."

Additional reporting by Geoff Dyer in Washington

[jimmy olsen]

The coast of east Africa was pretty well-known by all kinds of mariners in the Indian Ocean.  But it wasn't run over by the continental conquerors that bound Eurasia together (not that they would have been able to engage in a long campaign of conquest in Africa anyways).  Not isolated, but distant.

If large parts of sub saharan africa are so distant they don't have writing or the wheel until colonialization, that is fairly isolated.

Sub-Saharan Africa made a very early transition straight from the Neolithic to the Iron Age, they weren't that far behind.

[alfred russel]

The coast of east Africa was pretty well-known by all kinds of mariners in the Indian Ocean.  But it wasn't run over by the continental conquerors that bound Eurasia together (not that they would have been able to engage in a long campaign of conquest in Africa anyways).  Not isolated, but distant.

If large parts of sub saharan africa are so distant they don't have writing or the wheel until colonialization, that is fairly isolated.

Sub-Saharan Africa made a very early transition straight from the Neolithic to the Iron Age, they weren't that far behind.

Damn it Tim, if you are going to argue something from a week ago at least read the rest of the thread. See post 414 for wikipedia's summary of sub-saharan african history supporting what I posted.

[Tamas]

Round 2 has begun!

Governing party's HQ ransacked, protesters getting into Parliament, beating up communist MPs, both side accusing the other of using firearms, and allegedly pro-government protesters joining the police, next escalation step toward civil war seems well under way.

[Valmy]

Round 2 has begun!

Governing party's HQ ransacked, protesters getting into Parliament, beating up communist MPs, both side accusing the other of using firearms, and allegedly pro-government protesters joining the police, next escalation step toward civil war seems well under way.

How soon until the Russian Army arrives?

[Malthus]

Round 2 has begun!

Governing party's HQ ransacked, protesters getting into Parliament, beating up communist MPs, both side accusing the other of using firearms, and allegedly pro-government protesters joining the police, next escalation step toward civil war seems well under way.

How soon until the Russian Army arrives?

When is the closing ceremonies at the Olympics?