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America (the Americas, North and South) without European influence would look pretty much like it did in 1491.
Domestication (of both plants and animals), language, technology - these were all several thousands years behind the advances made in various areas of the Old World. The further back along the timeline of such advances one goes, the slower and more gradual change occurs. It has barely been 500 years since Columbus sailed - that simply is not enough time for much substantive change to have occurred.
The dominance of certain groups would have changed, but that's about it.
On a side note, for an excellent discussion on why Eurasia (and not the Americas or sub-Saharan Africa or Australia) gained advanced technology first, I recommend Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel.
Was at the UNC botanical gardens recently and they had a hut local Indians lived in 500 years ago. To call it primitive would be generous. It was small, maybe 6 feet in diameter and 3 feet high. It was made of branches, moss, grass and leaves.
North American Indians were stone age people. They had no metal tools or weapons. They had no domesticated animals. They had not thought of the wheel. Many bands were in states of constant warfare with their neighbors, a state called mourning war. In the Northeast, the Iroquois Confederation had been established precisely to stop the constant inter-tribal warfare.
I'm not sure the environment was better off, either. Whole forests were burned. Woodlands were cleared of undergrowth to establish hunting grounds. Open burning was the rule and wood the only fuel.
It's not an exaggeration to say they lived in Hobbes' state of nature, the war of all against all.
When French and English colonists arrived, Indians had no choice but to trade with them to obtain the weapons that would give them dominance over their rivals. Even the English longbow would have been a leap forward in weapon technology.
It can be speculated that they might have advanced on their own, but they had't for 10,000 years. European history, even in the Dark Ages, is a story or continual advance.
Was at the UNC botanical gardens recently and they had a hut local Indians lived in 500 years ago. To call it primitive would be generous. It was small, maybe 6 feet in diameter and 3 feet high. It was made of branches, moss, grass and leaves.
North American Indians were stone age people. They had no metal tools or weapons. They had no domesticated animals. They had not thought of the wheel. Many bands were in states of constant warfare with their neighbors, a state called mourning war. In the Northeast, the Iroquois Confederation had been established precisely to stop the constant inter-tribal warfare.
Native Americans in the region of the Great Lakes were working native copper into weapons and tools as early as 4000 BC.
The turkey was domesticated by ancient Mesoamericans.
The Olmecs had wheels, but apparently did not extend their use beyond that of toys. This is not due to a lack of thought but a lack of utility - they had no suitable animals to pull wheeled carts.
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I'm not sure the environment was better off, either. Whole forests were burned. Woodlands were cleared of undergrowth to establish hunting grounds. Open burning was the rule and wood the only fuel.
In other words, much like today - except to a far lesser degree.
Yeah - the environment was indeed better off. Much better off. Not because they were more environmental or superior, but simply because they had neither the numbers nor the technology to have the impact that we have today. But it is utterly ludicrous to suggest that the environment of the time was not as negatively impacted by the presence of people as it is now.
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It's not an exaggeration to say they lived in Hobbes' state of nature, the war of all against all.
When French and English colonists arrived, Indians had no choice but to trade with them to obtain the weapons that would give them dominance over their rivals. Even the English longbow would have been a leap forward in weapon technology.
It can be speculated that they might have advanced on their own, but they had't for 10,000 years. European history, even in the Dark Ages, is a story or continual advance.
Complete nonsense - the Native Americans did indeed advance. They domesticated animals. They developed metallurgy. They developed writing systems. They domesticated numerous plants (does the Three Sisters ring a bell?) and developed agriculture such as crop rotation. They engineered pyramids and developed irrigation and undertook urban planning. They created calendars out of complex mathematics that they also developed.
Their advance was slow, just as the advances in the Old World were slow in the Chalcolithic (the Copper Age, before tin was added to copper to make the much-superior bronze). But the history of the pre-Columbian Americas is most certainly one of the same general advance in technologies as that of the Old World during that hemisphere's same transition from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age.
There would be no Rap music, no NASCAR, no American Football, no Ford Mustangs or Chevy Camaros. Also, since the US produces almost 1/3 of the worlds garbage and is so heavily dependent on petroleum products our planet would be substantially better in terms of environmental issues. There would also be a lot fewer overweight people and a lot less diabetes.
Here's the premise...what if North America (including Canada, of course) had never seen the arrival of Europeans. The sole inhabitants of the continent remained indigenous people.
Given that, how would our world differ from today? How would it be the same?
Let's see. No cars, no air conditioning, no buildings, no paved roads, no trains, no computers, no public transportation of any sort, no modern medicine, no universities, no engineers, no...
Are most of you unfamiliar with the concept of globalization? It's not just the physical colonizing of a land, but also the spread of ideas. Europeans never settled into China, but there was enough communication for the Chinese to pick up on the technological advancements of the Europeans (and vice versa). The same would have been true of the inhabitants of the Americas.
To suggest that American Indians would still live today like they did centuries ago just because the Europeans didn't "enlighten" them is just plain silly. And maybe a bit offensive, too. The different tribes had their own technologies and their own social and physical organizational structures, some more advanced than others. Progress is something that happens with time, so it's highly unlikely that the natives would live as if forgotten by time.
A more thoughtful question would be "what would the world look like if Europeans had simply traded with other nations rather than full-on colonized them?" Unlike primitive tribes that exist today, the inhabitants of the Americas had a wealth of resources at their feet. So, the savviest native societies would have taken advantage of all the resources here and used it to expand their own economies via trade with other nations. The relatively few populations that still live primitively today are like that because the rest of the world has no real interest in communicating with them (i.e. there's nothing we'll gain from a relationship with them). But that wouldn't be true for America's natives.
As the societies progressed, some faster than others, you'd probably see expansion of the strongest ones. And eventually enough communication among the different native societies (and likely warring, too) would lead to definitive sovereign states forming.
Here's the premise...what if North America (including Canada, of course) had never seen the arrival of Europeans. The sole inhabitants of the continent remained indigenous people.
Given that, how would our world differ from today? How would it be the same?
Why pick on Europeans?
There are no "indigenous" Americans. All humans in the Americas are descendants of migrants. Migrants who arrived very recently in terms of natural history.
There are no "indigenous" Americans. All humans in the Americas are descendants of migrants. Migrants who arrived very recently in terms of natural history.
Not picking on Europeans.. .the debate centers on how their arrival influenced great changes in the continent (and whether those changes were positive or negative--or a mixture)..is there another group that had such an influence on North America and its earlier main population?
Not picking on Europeans.. .the debate centers on how their arrival influenced great changes in the continent (and whether those changes were positive or negative--or a mixture)..is there another group that had such an influence on North America and its earlier main population?
The earlier migration of humans from Siberia had a rather dramatic effect on the native fauna, according to researchers.
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