Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution?
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Re: Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution?
#2Rome was still primarily a slave/servant based economy, and one based on expansion and conquest. They lacked the mathematical and scientific foundations to radically change metallurgy, chemistry, and the other basics of industry. This article focuses a lot on economic possibilities and social change necessary for a revolution, while largely ignoring larger issues.
You cant have an industrial revolution without then revolutionary power of modern industry. Good concrete and slaves fanning fires to heat water isn’t that.
Re: Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution?
#3Rome was still primarily a slave/servant based economy, and one based on expansion and conquest. They lacked the mathematical and scientific foundations to radically change metallurgy, chemistry, and the other basics of industry. This article focuses a lot on economic possibilities and social change necessary for a revolution, while largely ignoring larger issues. You cant have an industrial revolution without then r…
It says there's a few key technological innovations that the novel posits.
Re: Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution?
#4Rome was still primarily a slave/servant based economy, and one based on expansion and conquest. They lacked the mathematical and scientific foundations to radically change metallurgy, chemistry, and the other basics of industry. This article focuses a lot on economic possibilities and social change necessary for a revolution, while largely ignoring larger issues. You cant have an industrial revolution without then r…
In the three-segment documentary "Meet the Romans: Citizens of the Empire" (by Mary Beard, historian, available in Amazon Prime Video ... see also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meet_the_Romans_with_Mary_Bear...) I was struck by:
+ ... how frequently the enslavement of the remnants of conquered peoples (slavery wasn't so much race-based as what "naturally" happened to loser-nations/cultures) led to large numbers of those people eventually being emancipated by their owners and becoming full-fledged Roman citizens
+ ... how seemingly everyone in Rome defined themselves by their industry, by their profession. Most epitaphs on graves and tombs identified occupants by name, place of origin, some brief and sometimes humorous quip about their circumstances, where applicable mentioned their former owners pre-emancipation, and then >>> mentioned what they did for a living While not germane to the larger arguments that probably will happen in these threads here, I was struck by social mobility beyond slavery, and what was core to people's identity. (I'm sure you've heard people complaining about modern society and industry with " ... people are human BEings not human DOings " -- Romans were all about the DOing).
While the Romans may not have had the conditions for a scientific/engineering/tinkering revolution to be a force multiplier in industry, they had a hard-working mindset.
EDIT: added Wikipedia link, corrections based on OP
Re: Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution?
#5Rome was still primarily a slave/servant based economy, and one based on expansion and conquest. They lacked the mathematical and scientific foundations to radically change metallurgy, chemistry, and the other basics of industry. This article focuses a lot on economic possibilities and social change necessary for a revolution, while largely ignoring larger issues. You cant have an industrial revolution without then r…
Are you arguing slavery prevents industrial resolutions?
Didn't they coexist in some parts of the world?
Or is it the way slaves were used?
Can you clarify to contrast Roman and US experiences?
Re: Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution?
#6Rome was still primarily a slave/servant based economy, and one based on expansion and conquest. They lacked the mathematical and scientific foundations to radically change metallurgy, chemistry, and the other basics of industry. This article focuses a lot on economic possibilities and social change necessary for a revolution, while largely ignoring larger issues. You cant have an industrial revolution without then r…
Are you arguing slavery prevents industrial resolutions? Didn't they coexist in some parts of the world? Or is it the way slaves were used? Can you clarify to contrast Roman and US experiences?
I’m saying that in Rome, slaves/servants were used the way we use machines and conveniences. A lot of their impressive
“Tech” amounted to The Turk... brute force and a person working it all. They had hot baths because they had genuinely impressive concrete and because they had humans tending fires to heat them. There was no drive to move past that, there was no cotton gin, no real science to work with either.
Re: Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution?
#7Has anyone read a good book on why the Industrial Revolution did happen? What were the necessary precursors, politically, economically, technologically, scientifically, culturally, before you start trying to automate all the things?
Re: Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution?
#8Rome was still primarily a slave/servant based economy, and one based on expansion and conquest. They lacked the mathematical and scientific foundations to radically change metallurgy, chemistry, and the other basics of industry. This article focuses a lot on economic possibilities and social change necessary for a revolution, while largely ignoring larger issues. You cant have an industrial revolution without then r…
Could such advances have been possible if fueled by an extremely wealthy family? It only takes one person w/ resources & ambition to say "I want " to kickstart a movement.
Say Marcus Licinius Crassus [1], Roman bajillionaire, dreams of a steam-powered engine in 73 BC, 20-ish years before his death. And instead of duking it out with Spartacus, Crassus decides to make building a steam engine his singular focus in life. In the best of cases, could he have meaningfully invested in R&D that would make meaningful progress towards building a steam engine? Was R&D even a thing in that era?
Re: Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution?
#9Has anyone read a good book on why the Industrial Revolution did happen? What were the necessary precursors, politically, economically, technologically, scientifically, culturally, before you start trying to automate all the things?
1) Outlaw slavery
2) There is no step two
Re: Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution?
#10Rome was still primarily a slave/servant based economy, and one based on expansion and conquest. They lacked the mathematical and scientific foundations to radically change metallurgy, chemistry, and the other basics of industry. This article focuses a lot on economic possibilities and social change necessary for a revolution, while largely ignoring larger issues. You cant have an industrial revolution without then r…
Are you arguing slavery prevents industrial resolutions? Didn't they coexist in some parts of the world? Or is it the way slaves were used? Can you clarify to contrast Roman and US experiences?
> Are you arguing slavery prevents industrial resolutions?
> Didn't they coexist in some parts of the world?
The American Civil War is an example of the two coexisting in the same country