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How transportation technologies shaped empires

unchartedterritories.tomaspueyo.com

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Re: How transportation technologies shaped empires

#121

Post by carapace »

aj7 wrote: post #56

Somebody calculate a light month.

Kind of a tangent, but uh, this is my personal favorite argument for why Bitcoin et. al. aren't needed (yet): the diameter of the Earth is small compared to the speed of light. Maybe when we colonize interstellar space we will need blockchain.

Re: How transportation technologies shaped empires

#122

Post by macspoofing »

i_love_cookies wrote: post #112
macspoofing wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>we forget about the existence of the control case: Canada. Is it though? England did lose Canada to home-rule. In fact, I contend that a major reason why a newly independent (but also broke and fledgling) Canada was not annexed by the US was mainly because of the American preoccupation with civil war and Reconstruction, and the diplomatic efforts of John A. Macdonald.

wasn't the war of 1812 partly/mostly driven by a US desire to annex canada?

The American state by the mid-1800s was not that same as the one in the early 1800s. America grew into a major economic and military power by then, the point where it was untenable for Britain to maintain direct control over Canada, or to even maintain a major military presence there. The British were ostensibly kicked out of North America by America.

Re: How transportation technologies shaped empires

#123

Post by notahacker »

Beltalowda wrote: post #59
082349872349872 wrote: post #2

My understanding is that the British Raj was several months away from London?

From what I can find: In 1858 – when the British Raj was established – it took about half a year since you had to go around cape the good hope. After the Suez canal opened in 1869 it took only ~2 months. In the following two decades expansion of the train network and faster steamboats further reduced it to about 2 weeks. So it really depends a bit on which period you're talking about as there were lots of things goin…

The British Raj succeeded the East India Company, a London-headquartered enterprise that had effectively ruled most of India for the previous 100 years, and fought numerous wars - usually successfully - in India in the century before that. The Raj was actually a reaction to Indian rebels failing to achieve independence and more power being transferred to the British Crown as a result.

Re: How transportation technologies shaped empires

#124

Post by RodgerTheGreat »

layer8 wrote: post #58
kybernetyk wrote: post #41

So no Mars province?

Another relevant factor is self-sufficiency regarding basic needs. But yes, if/when a Mars colony becomes self-sufficient, secession probably isn’t far off.

Put another way, a mars colony that is not mostly self-sufficient is a death trap, because the lead time on any supply shipments or rescue attempts is monumental even if funding is unlimited. There will be ever-present pressure to increase self-sufficiency. If complete self-sufficiency is technologically achieved (and there aren't inherent, unavoidable issues with propagating humans on mars or obtaining resources/energy), earth-based corporations and governments have virtually zero leverage over mars, so independence follows naturally.

Re: How transportation technologies shaped empires

#125

Post by humanistbot »

cs702 wrote: post #3

The logic seems sound to me, with a few obvious caveats: * The number of samples is small. There aren't a lot of empires throughout history. * The definition of "empire" is somewhat subjective, because empire sizes exhibit a Zipf distribution, and the cutoff is arbitrary. * Surely there have been other factors at play besides time to travel from the capital. One implication is that empires that span the globe are muc…

The "logic" or lack thereof is in trying to find a universal "hidden rule" in large-scale human behavior across literally all of recorded history. This is pure physics envy, and it never ends well.

Re: How transportation technologies shaped empires

#126

Post by hammock »

tarentel wrote: post #72
lkrubner wrote: post #61

Portugal conquered Goa in 1510 -- that's more than a month of travel. The Netherlands conquering Java in 1619? A lot more than a month. And these conquests lasted for centuries.

I'm not sure capturing and holding an island would constitute an empire.

Britain? Sardinia?

Java is the world's most populous island, by the way, and was roughly as populated as England in the 1600's

Re: How transportation technologies shaped empires

#127

Post by paxys »

The rise and fall of empires is a way more complex topic than the author paints it to be in this post. Yes distance to the outer reaches is an important factor, but so are a hundred others. Economics, religion, trade, climate, technological progress, and above all leadership – all play an important role in the shaping of civilization.

Re: How transportation technologies shaped empires

#128

Post by hammock »

The article's conclusion is validated by the deployment times of US aircraft carrier groups around the world... To deploy from the Pacific to the Persian Gulf is approximately one month.

Historical data backing that up: https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-7633a527c8e2a2228fcdd...

Re: How transportation technologies shaped empires

#129

Post by AnimalMuppet »

tarentel wrote: post #72
lkrubner wrote: post #61

Portugal conquered Goa in 1510 -- that's more than a month of travel. The Netherlands conquering Java in 1619? A lot more than a month. And these conquests lasted for centuries.

I'm not sure capturing and holding an island would constitute an empire.

Fine. How about New Spain? And the Philippines?
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