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MadArchitect
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 Posted: Wed May 04, 2005 1:02 am Post subject: Re: *** Chapter 3 ***- The Last People Alive
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Loricat: Oh, Mad! Give the rest of us, who don't have your stunning intellect, a break!!
There should be a different measure for what I've got. Egollect, maybe.
That's true -- but I think there is a distinction between a true collapse and, shall we say, a transfer of power?
Well, Diamond and I are likely talking about two different things. He's talking about the collapse of a civilization, and from what I understand, he's talking specifically about the collapse of population as seen from an ecological point of view. In talking about ancient to modern China, I'm talking more along the lines of political collapse. In most cases those have been transfer of power, which we're using euphemistically to mean usurpation and conquest, but those transfers likely could not have taken place without a great deal of internal corrosion.
I wish that I had a decent reference on Chinese history available so that I could cross-reference our discussion with some actual fact. The best I have are the major Confucian works, which aren't exactly thorough as historical texts. I may be able to pick up something more explicitly historical next week (I'm abstaining from buying any books until the college library sale starting this Saturday), so if we want to get more detail oriented we may want to switch the venue to Rome or medieval Europe until that time.
Mangareva's collapse was pure desperation -- and the dependence of the other two islands further out (Pitcairn and Henderson) on the trade from Mangareva caused their devastating collapse when trade stopped.
This, from what I gather of the reviews I've read, is one of the significant differences between Diamond's study and the discussion passing between wwdimmitt and I. Diamond's book is, for the most part, scrutinizing rather isolated, contained societies, particularly island nations, whereas we've ventured into the realm of mainland civilizations. I could be wrong on that point -- my information is somewhat second hand. (The review from which that comparison is gleaned treated Diamond's focus on small civilizations limited to a limited resource pool as a crucial flaw in his larger argument.)
Incidentally, wwdimmitt, how would you prefer that I and others refer to you? W.W.? Dimmitt? Something else? |
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