Why Early Globalization Matters: Crash Course Big History #206

Summary

This episode of Crash Course Big History explores globalization's impact on collective learning, highlighting three key elements: printing, potatoes, and plagues. Printing revolutionized knowledge dissemination, while potatoes boosted agricultural productivity and population growth. However, plagues like the Black Death and diseases introduced to the Americas led to catastrophic population declines, affecting cultural diversity and collective innovation. The video underscores globalization's dual-edged sword, fostering progress while also bringing about significant challenges.

Takeaways

• 🌐 Globalization is an ancient process that has significantly impacted collective human learning by connecting previously separate world zones.
• 📚 The printing press revolutionized collective learning by making written knowledge widely available, fueling the scientific revolution and enhancing the connectivity of information.
• 🥔 The potato, first domesticated in Mesoamerica, played a crucial role in feeding agrarian societies and contributed to the agricultural revolution in Europe and East Asia.
• 🦠 The spread of plagues, such as the Black Death, had devastating effects on populations, illustrating the double-edged sword of increased connectivity through globalization.
• 🌱 Collective learning is vital for the complexity of human societies, allowing for the accumulation of innovations across generations.
• 🌍 The world zones of Afro-Eurasia, the Americas, Australasia, and the Pacific Island Societies developed independently before the first wave of globalization.
• 📖 Writing was a significant advancement in collective learning, allowing for the communication of complex ideas and the preservation of knowledge.
• 🚢 The colonization of the Americas and other regions led to the unification of humanity into a single global system, accelerating the pace of collective learning.
• 🌾 Agricultural surplus in Afro-Eurasia led to the rise of agrarian states and the development of monumental architecture, such as pyramids.
• 🌿 The introduction of the potato in Europe and East Asia helped to delay famines and increase the carrying capacity of the population, contributing to collective learning.
• 🏛️ The spread of diseases like smallpox and measles in the Americas, where people had no immunity, resulted in massive population declines and a significant loss to collective learning.

Q & A

What is globalization and how far back does it go?

Globalization is a process that has been going on for hundreds of years, bringing previously separate world zones together with both positive and negative impacts.

How does collective learning relate to the complexity of human societies?

Collective learning is the process that has raised the complexity of human societies by accumulating more innovation with each generation than is lost by the next.

What are the vital ingredients for collective learning?

The vital ingredients for collective learning are the number of potential innovators and the connectivity of information flows between them.

How did the Americas develop independently before Columbus?

The Americas developed independently for over 10,000 years, giving rise to agrarian states in Mesoamerica and various cultures, without regular contact with other world zones.

What was the significance of the silk roads in Afro-Eurasia?

The silk roads enabled trade from China to the West of Africa and Europe, allowing for the transference of collective learning, even if it was halting and rarely traversed long distances.

How did printing revolutionize collective learning?

Printing allowed for the capture and communication of complex ideas in text, leading to increased circulation of written works and accelerating the pace of collective learning.

What were the key developments in the history of printing?

Key developments in printing include the invention of woodblock printing in China around 200 BCE, movable type in China around 1050 CE, and the printing press in Europe by Gutenberg around 1450.

What is the significance of the potato in the context of globalization?

The potato, first domesticated in Mesoamerica, played a significant role in feeding agrarian societies and contributed to the agricultural revolution in Europe and East Asia.

How did the potato help delay famines in Asia?

The introduction of the potato in East Asia helped raise the carrying capacity of the growing population, which some historians assert helped delay some of the worst famines in Asia by a century.

What were the catastrophic impacts of plagues on global populations?

Plagues, such as the Black Death, spread rapidly due to higher population densities and the connectivity provided by the silk roads, killing millions and having a profound impact on collective learning.

How did diseases impact the pre-Columbian population of the Americas?

Diseases like measles and smallpox, to which the Americas had no natural immunity, killed an estimated 50 million people within a hundred years, devastating cultures and crippling their ability to contribute to humanity.