DSMatticus wrote:The Early Middle Ages as a period feature deurbanization, a plummeting population, a rise in the percentage of that population engaged in subsistence farming, and the complete domination of the academic realm by deeply nonsecular institutions who in turn do very little original work and instead almost exclusively rediscover and translate Greek and Roman writings - and occasionally erasing some from existence for heresy. It is simply true that the conditions of the Middle Ages are not suitable for human progress. Less population means less scholars. More farmers means less scholars. Less urban centers means less coordination. Less secularity means more corruption.
Does he say anything in his rant to contradict this? No, he completely 100% admits it and then tries to spin it as a positive: "But in many ways this decline held the seeds of its own revival. With the collapse of long distance trade, transport infrastructure and large scale economies when the Empire collapsed, local communities were forced to become more self-sufficient. Technologies and farming techniques which reduced labour and increased yields became increasingly required and saw an adoption of changes in the period between 500 and 1200 AD that revolutionised agrarian production." And of course, that's bullshit. Because Rome had better agricultural yields and less of its population was dedicated to subsistence farming
because specialization is fucking magic!
Look, it is just a fact that certain parts of the world are better suited to growing food than other parts of the world. There is nothing you can do to make growing crops in Antarctica as productive as growing crops in Iowa, and while that is an extreme example the underlying principle is true for any region large enough to have noticeably different climates within it. If region A is more suited to growing food than region B, then it is objectively more productive to have region A grow food for region B. You will get more food for less labor, and that means you will have more labor available for other things. Specialization is objectively superior to self-sufficiency.
DSMatticus wrote:The High Middle Ages are little better; sure, you start to see the reemergence of large, dedicated centers of learning, but those centers of learning still focus almost exclusively on teaching people all the shit they've managed to preserve and recover from lost civilizations. We are very genuinely talking about a recovering post-apocalyptic society that is finally marshalling the resources to pour over ancient tomes and relics in an organized and comprehensive fashion. Yes, that's a step forward from the Early Middle Ages when individual monasteries either preserved or failed to preserve the writings that passed through their hands. Yes, some genuinely new developments occur. But the vast majority of what happens during this period is simply catch up.
Does he say anything to contradict this? No, not really. He mentions that because the fundamental model of their agricultural industry sucked so fucking much they were driven to invent a bunch of cheap, easily produced tools that made it slightly less terrible. And as a result (he doesn't really say this, but it's true), you start seeing some small reurbanization, which in turn means we see the return of the university. But hey, guess what; Rome still fucking wins, because it still fed more people and had better universities, in that the universities of the High Middle Ages are seriously just incomplete collections of materials from Greek and Roman universities. Seriously, they are playing catch-up!
So basically his conclusion is that because farmers eventually adapted methods and tools more suitable to the totally collapsed society in which they lived and because there was
eventually some form of higher education
at all the Dark Ages weren't so dark. That is fucking fuckity fuck stupid. Basically, it's the exact thing I ranted about in my first post:
DSMatticus wrote:The beginning and end of this conversation is that Rome was better than post-Rome. Food, water, sanitation, construction, education; all of these took a massive step backwards during the period in which Rome fell. It is called the Dark Ages because it begins with Europe "unlearning" the solutions to a bunch of already solved problems and as a result tens of millions of people die at a point in history when the population of Europe is measured in tens of millions to begin with.
Did technological progress happen during the Dark Ages? Yes. Has the GDP of the United States grown each year for the past four years? Yes. If you look at the latter of those and declare that the past four years haven't been a period of stifled development and unnecessary human suffering "because growth", then you are a moron. If you look at the former of those and declare that the "so-called Dark Ages" weren't a period of stifled development and unnecessary human suffering "because progress", then you are a moron.
It is very important that everyone understands this: progress is the natural state of human affairs. That is bolded, italicized, and underlined, because you need to read it and you need to understand it and you need to internalize it and take that very important fact with you everywhere you go, especially if the place you are going is a place you are likely to discuss either politics, economics, technology, or history. This is not rhetorical flair. Understanding that simple fact is simply a prerequisite for doing any meaningful analysis in these fields. Lots of people don't understand that fact and still do analysis in these fields, and those people are either idiots or charlatans. Don't be an idiot or a charlatan. Those are both bad things. Down that road lies "it doesn't matter who you vote for, anyway" and "see, austerity is working" and "[my religion] totally isn't hostile to science, promise!"
It is simultaneously true that last year the United States GDP went up by more than the inflation rate and that the United States' failure to adequately respond to the crisis has prolonged and is still prolonging economic hardship for tens of millions of people. Progress is the natural state of affairs, so even as we make mistakes that ruin countless lives as a whole we manage to march forward.
It is simultaneously true that developments happen during the Dark Ages and that the Dark Ages are almost literally the Mad Max remnants of the Roman Empire which preceded them. Progress is the natural state of affairs, so even after things have fallen completely to pieces and brutal and totalitarian regimes (compared to Rome that's saying something) seize and cripple Europe as a whole we managed to march forward.
Because progress is the natural state of affairs, "has progress occurred?" is never a meaningful benchmark. Take my pet video game project for example. I am being lazy, and as a result I am substantially behind where I want to be. But I still have more done today than I did last week. Progress has happened, and at this rate progress will still be happening all the way until I die of old age with a half-finished Terraria clone.
The correct observation is not "what about the wheelbarrow?" The correct observation is "why is it that when you ask people to name inventions out of the Middle Ages they almost universally name things that China invented hundreds of years earlier?"
