In light of this past Columbus day

[Brian37]

No, even if he is valued for absolutely nothing else, he should still be valued for precisely the much maligned "invasion". Putting America on the map doesn't mean jack shit without the invasion. The invasion of America by Europe is the seminal event in human history that made modernity possible.

You can't make omelets without breaking eggs. Thanks to columbus, the world had the opportunity to break the eggs. So we now have omelets.

The alternative inevitably meant by the course dear to revisionists is it is good to have useless knowledge that a few, theoretically nice in some head in cloud romantic sense but essentially untouchable, eggs exist, while the world, figuratively speaking, starves.

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The essential fact is Columbus was a skilled seat of the pants navigator but hopeless cartographer. If he had good cartographic skills he would not have made the huge mistake in his estimate of the size of the earth to start with. So were it not for this cartographic ineptitude, he wouldn't have ever embarked on his voyages of discover. China would have been seen, entirely correctly, to lie way too far to the west to be reached by sailing ships of the era.

Bullshit. Even on an individal level, individuals in their collective entire lives are neither all good or all bad. Good people can do bad things and bad people can do good things.

Back then when the land was being taken from the people that lived there, you would not be able to convince them that Europeans had that right to do that, or the right to murder the natives and steal their resources.

No one today can say they should make amends for that, but we shouldn't sugar coat reality either.

Tomas Jefferson owned slaves. Just because we have a nation now never made slavery good.

Colubus was a map maker and I refuse to ignore the harm that came because of that. You have to take the good and bad in human history objectively, otherwise the very things we do to harm each other WILL be repeated in the future.

Eienstien as well, we have lots of good technology now stemming from his formula. But it does not change that BOMBS were used to murder unarmed people. EVEN the people in the manhatten project hated what they had created and were aware of the future implications of it, which we are still dealing with today.

[Anomalocaris]

It's nice that you indignantly refuse to credit the person from whom you benefited so much. Your indignation would count nearly as much as the the much more justifiable annoyance of the indians who are about to be overrun by the spaniards.

The good that came out of the Colombian exchange dwarfs the harm. The concept of right is trivially insignificant when a society is so unable to defend it itself or gather the allies needed to defend it. Ultimately whether a right has a "right" to exist depends on whether it could be defended. If it could not, then it is vapor, a trivial wishthinking assertion signifying nothing.

[Brian37]

It's nice that you indignantly refuse to credit the person from whom you benefited so much. Your indignation would count nearly as much as the the much more justifiable annoyance of the indians who are about to be overrun by the spaniards.

The good that came out of the Colombian exchange dwarfs the harm. The concept of right is trivially insignificant when a society is so unable to defend it itself or gather the allies needed to defend it. Ultimately whether a right has a "right" to exist depends on whether it could be defended. If it could not, then it is vapor, a trivial wishthinking assertion signifying nothing.

I DID give him credit ONLY for what he deserved credit for. What I refuse to do is worship him like a god as if nothing bad ever resulted from what he did. He was a map maker NOTHING MORE!

I give credit to Thomas Jefferson too, BUT HE STILL OWNED OTHER HUMAN BEINGS.

I give credit to Einstein for E=MC2 BUT because of the inventions of nuclear weapons we still have to deal with countries like North Korea and Iran.

HISTORY is never a fucking halmark card so stop trying to paint it as such.

Columbus does not pay my fucking bills right now nor is he alive to lend support to Malala. And if he had discovered Pakistan instead of the Americas it would be higlely likely Malala wouldn't be arround to stand up to bullies.

[Anomalocaris]

Columbus may not be paying your bills, but the fact that you actually live in an advanced economy where you have any money to pay your bills at all,or indeed actually have had enough to eat all your life,is very likely thanks in large part to the consequences of the invasion, made possible by Columbus, that you revile.

Do some real research on the full impact of the invasion as it has developed in the last 500 years, how the invasion promoted trade, communication, the massive impetus it gave to agricultural progress, its vital role in growth of economies with capital to invest in it's own advancement, instead of dwelling in some airy flakiland of shallow morality.

Columban exchange was initally very hard on the Indians. But it laid the foundation for a fundamentally better and more progressive world that would probably carry on benefiting mankind the entire rest of humanity's tenure on earth, and whose benefits would ultimately be enjoyed by the descendants of the same indians as well. no contest.

[Brian37]

Columbus may not be paying your bills, but the fact that you actually live in an advanced economy where you have any money to pay your bills at all,or indeed actually have had enough to eat all your life,is very likely thanks in large part to the consequences of the invasion, made possible by Columbus, that you revile.

Do some real research on the full impact of the invasion as it has developed in the last 500 years, how the invasion promoted trade, communication, the massive impetus it gave to agricultural progress, its vital role in growth of economies with capital to invest in it's own advancement, instead of dwelling in some airy flakiland of shallow morality.

Columban exchange was initally very hard on the Indians. But it laid the foundation for a fundamentally better and more progressive world that would probably carry on benefiting mankind the entire rest of humanity's tenure on earth, and whose benefits would ultimately be enjoyed by the descendants of the same indians as well. no contest.

Bullshit it did. If what he did was fostering good treatment then why did the contenent get invaded and Natives chased of their land and or murderd for their land?



You still miss my point every single time.. Humans are not a utopia nor do we always do good things even if we do some good things. Good people can do bad things and bad people can do good things.

You are tying to make history into a Halmark card and life is NEVER black and white. Columbus got way more credit than he deserved. He opened the gates to Europe to do harm to the inabitiants of the Americas who were almost wiped off the planet.

I am not forgetting that what is now is built off the past, you are pretending that the past was always rosey. It was good for some and bad for others. Columbus was merely a map maker and that is ALL he deserves credit for.

[JohnDG]

Few things you should know chuck, the constitution of the united states is actually just a slightly changed version of a native american constitution. America credits rome for allot of its values and ideal but in reality besides the structure of the senate most was taken from Native Americans. The only reason the colonist won the war to begin with was a massive pre-emptive strike. The Native Americans would have won if they too massed tens of thousands of men bent on the complete destruction of an entire people. I have a hard time believing that the colonist would have won against a superior force of Mad-Max, stealthy, gorilla warriors who could shoot up to 5 arrows in the time it take's to load a musket and be accurate. In fact it seems to be a common trend in Aryan rich nations to premtively strike people who do not seem to be posing a threat. At a time when they are absolutely no threat.

You can admire Columbus if you want to, but I won't, because he should not be, just like the land stealing, rapist, murderers the poineers became during their manifest destiny.