Without the concept of empire, where would the world be?

[The2ndWheel]

Would you want a world without empire?

To answer, you have to take the good with the bad. No cherrypicking the advances of expanding centers of power without what made those advances possible. For example, America has been/is/will be the world's stage for progress. However, without slavery, genocide, and theft, America never gets off the ground.

[itsmesgd]

1. happy, little agrarian tribes of hunters, gatherers, and nomads.

much like North America was before the whites invaded, I mean landed on Plymouth Rock.

[Totallybushed]

3. Yep.

gotta love the thirty year lifespans, the every man that is not a member of my tribe is my enemy worldview. No empires.

But what about the Aztecs? Mass human sacrifice. "Flower" wars to get captives to sacrifice. Slavery. Intense stratification between social classes.


C'mon. Human nature is what it is. What makes us human is that we can choose to fight it.

[itsmesgd]

4. all natives are not savages.

I am decendent from a native american tribe that, to the best of my knowledge never engaged in mass sacrifice or slavery. Life spans were shorter, but many lived beyond 30.
There is more to human nature than greed. Some people are advanced enough to know that greater good is when the community thrives versus individual gains. Many tribes did just fine before the introduction of the european settlers.

[Totallybushed]

5. Nobody said that

they were.

Life spans are average. In primitive societies, if you can make it past childhood, You're pretty much immune to everything but violence or accidents. But so many children die before they're one, it brings it down.

True there is more to human nature than greed But it's a factor that has to be dealt with. How did you ancestors do when they came up against the Iroquois, the Apache, or the Aztecs?

[leveymg]

2. No European conquest of America? The natives would have WMDs and we'd have to invade!

Er . . .If there hadn't been a United States, there would have been no Manhattan Project, without the Manhattan Project there would have been no working atomic bomb . . . with no nukes in the world, whatever would they use to justify invasions these days?

Just a thought.