why europe

[Emperor Harkonnen]

could anyone explain to me why europe is the dominant continent on the earth. the richest and most advanced continent.

what is your opinion? only a short opinion, not several pages! are we for example more greedy and aggressice than others?

[Shiroko]

High concentration of men living there from early on let for a faster development in a lot of stuff. With a contest only from China, which later on couldn't keep with Europian progress. The important result was colonialism during 1400-1600 which resulted in Europian countries exploting resources from around the globe for thier progress, and in fact raising the differences. Today the effect is slowly decaying though.

-Shiroko

[Emperor Harkonnen]

but how did it become so high concentrations of people in europe then?

[Dante]

It's nicer on 'the continent,' as we call mainland Europe here in Britain. And there have been developing cities in Europe for centuries, while America, for example, caught on quite late. That and Europe, as opposed to China or the US, is not a single entity but a collection of seperate countries. The weaknesses of one are complemented by the strengths of another. The downside to this is that any disagreements will weaken Europe as a whole.

I wouldn't call it greed. Remember that no individual country in Europe is as strong as the whole. The collective effect is not a single economy but many economies, some of which are very strong. Britain and France, for example. Or Germany. That's one of our advantages.

[Emperor Harkonnen]

think u missunderstood. I meant why europe has become the richest continent... and the european waged wars at each other only 60 years ago so that's not it,.

[Dante]

Not really. It's because there's more than one country. An amalgamation of strong economies that are working together. There's no other place quite like it.

[Emperor Harkonnen]

there are more countries on all continents...why would europe benefit from this and not other places?

[Dante]

Because Europe is the only one where they're attempting to work together!

[Dragoon Knight]

You're overlooking the simple answer...

We're just better. :D

[exatreide]

in your wolkswagon driving dreams.... :P

[Dragoon Knight]

I'm sorry... I fail to see the link between Scotland and Volkswagens.  Oh... perhaps you were referring to Europe as a whole.  Possibly even to Germany, and an overused and outdated stereotype!

I APOLOGISE!  I was referring to numerical figures and historical facts!

*Slaps self*  :D

[exatreide]

better? yea sure...and im a portuges man of war...

[Dragoon Knight]

Acho que n

[EWS]

I hate Europe.

(another thought out post from EWS!)

[Dragoon Knight]

Then you hate yourself.  That's right, we're part of Europe, too.  Not mainland Europe... but that's just because we're special. ;)

[EWS]

It's because of plate tectonics that we aint a part of Europe (learned that in Earth Sciences).  You know me anyway mate, I want Scottish Independence!

[nemafakei]

Greatest ratio of coastline to land. (Possible exception: SE Asia, but fragmentation there is, I think, too great).

Consequent naval development, trade, and shared technological innovation.

Colonialism then became possible, and all the while, scientific advantage is funded.

[Caid Ivik]

Well, why, simply there lived people, which worked much, hardly and with some ratio, and so. Ora et labora.

[nemafakei]

vero ora labuntur.

[Emperor Harkonnen]

Greatest ratio of coastline to land. (Possible exception: SE Asia, but fragmentation there is, I think, too great).

Consequent naval development, trade, and shared technological innovation.

Colonialism then became possible, and all the while, scientific advantage is funded.

I agree. It was undoubtly the ships the europeans made, which were superior to all other, which gave them a huge advantage. and in time resultet in imperialism, which made them gain an even greater position.

But I do not think the imperialism alone is the reason, we did have all the major inventions. so I agree with Shiroko as well, that the density of the population has something to do with people working more together.

could it have something to do with culture as well?? just speculation

[nemafakei]

Coastline made the continent better able to support a larger, more mobile population who can therefore cooperate. Culturally... well, it's certainly fair to say that colonisation is a cultural phenomenon which had been going on in Europe for about 4000 years.

[Shiroko]

Europe has an excellent weather for men, as well as plenty of water and without to harsh winters. Because of that it was popular for settling early on. After colonialism started at 1400 (Not before that) Europe made all its colonies feel is if Europe is the motherland, and influenced education all around the globe. So instead of learning about other empires of the times. France, England and Germany are important more than a lot of different empires. This resulted in a euro-centrical world. In fact the world map is usually distorted making Europe look bigger, and other continents smaller. I'll look for images that show this.

Edit:

There you go, the older map, and the newer, which fits the real sizes of continents in reality.

-Shiroko

[Dante]

It's because of plate tectonics that we aint a part of Europe (learned that in Earth Sciences).  You know me anyway mate, I want Scottish Independence!

We'd still be part of Europe. Even if were become politically seperate from England, we remain politically European. And even if we split from that (incredibly unlikely), we will be geographically European for many thousands of years yet. You're in Europe, boy. Live with it. :P

[nemafakei]

I'd like to point out that you can't depict a sphere's surface perfectly on a plane. The right hand map gets the shape roughly right, but the sizes are worse (larger than reality) the further you go from the equator (I think it's an equatorial projection). The left hand map is pretty useless for visualising things, distorting shapes very badly far from the equator. The rough size of the areas are closer to that of reality.

I doubt it's a case of european propaganda.

[SpiceGuid]

believe it or not, the explaination is pig farming :)

pig is much more economical compared to any other animal.

so any civilisation that uses pig farming during centuries has a great competitive advantage.

pig is why no continent is as developped as North-america and Europe.