Great Britain

[Aperio]

How much did Britain's scientific achievements during the 1700-1900 period contribute to it's greatness?

[sandyRoe]

A great deal.

[Postdog]

Homework?

[murraymints]

got a spare week or two ??...

[Togo]

1% inspiration 99% perspiration.

[fiction-factory]

Is this a year 7 homework question requiring a one page answer or a university dissertation?

[jourdain2]

Two words - Industrial Revolution. Now, that deserves about another 10,000 words per word. You are joking with this post, aren't you?

[Tilly2]

I have just answered this and the thread disappeared!

Whassgoinon?

[Aperio]

I am in my 60's and my friend is in his 70's. We both went to IC. We were talking about the EU referendum and my friend said what made Britain grea.

To which I replied it was it's scientific achievements. We also talkked about Germany's scientific prowess, particularly in Chemistry during the 1700's.

[Hymie]

I think a large part of what made Great Britain ‘great’ was what it stole from the rest of the world.

[Togo]

What all that coal and iron, the canals and railways, and sailing vessels before that, Isaac Newton and the Royal Observatory, the social and legal innovations, the English language, and the men and women who worked hard and long were all "stolen". Well I never. If I didn't know better Hymie I would guess that you are not of these parts. Perhaps it was aliens.

[DTCwordfan]

and all pre-immigrant? No, the immigrants came from the land......

[Hymie]

Most British people seem to think that the British Empire was some sort of benevolent enterprise – whereby our forefathers engaged in assisting far-flung parts of the world in our ways, which would improve their lives.

In reality, Britain was engaged in little short of pillaging those countries, taking what it wanted; and I’m not even going to mention the part we played in the slave-trade.

All of this proves the old adage; those who win the war, get to write the history.

[jourdain2]

We invented things. We used every raw material available and exploited it to the good of the modern world. We had 'slavery' in our mills to do it. My ancestors were white slaves, so don't give me any rubbish about exploiting black slavery in the USA. It was a time of greatness, it was a time of shameful deprivation. We ventured forth, risking life, money and goods, into the then unknown. We turned the unknown into an Empire, which we ruled to the best of our ability (admitted abuses at times, but also great benefits given) and which we voluntarily gave up last century. Not many Empires can say that.

It is always a mixed bag - but what made us great was our energy and our courage and our vision and faith.

Will that do for starters? I should add 'stickability'.

[Old_Geezer]

Britain is called great because it is larger than Brittany in France. It is just coincidence thst the country and people live up to the name.

[Togo]

//In reality, Britain was engaged in little short of pillaging those countries, taking what it wanted; and I’m not even going to mention the part we played in the slave-trade. //

Here we go, the echo chamber is switched on. Perhaps the Dutch, French, Spanish, Portuguese, German, maybe even the Africans or Arabic (the original slavers and slave traders) people would have been preferable as a dominant world force. Just to let you into a secret Hymie, the people of Devon and Cornwall were being taken as slaves by African pirates, long before we had a naval force to protect them. You are looking through the wrong end of the telescope. Of course we could always say sorry, but you now need to pay us for the infrastructure we left behind. I wonder why they all want to be in the bosom of such a heinous people. Perhaps they will see the light and escape our devious clutches.

[Hymie]

Well, I wasn’t going to mention our shameful involvement in the slave trade – but since you asked; our ships sailed with trinkets and other goods they could exchange for slaves on the African West-coast. The ships full of slaves (many of whom died on route) then travelled across the Atlantic to the Caribbean/Southern States – where the slaves were exchanged for cotton (and other local produce). This slave traded cotton supplied the mills which were an important part of Britain’s industrial revolution. The cotton was traded for trinkets and other goods they could exchange for slaves…(repeat ad nauseam).

[Togo]

// and I’m not even going to mention the part we played in the slave-trade.//

Errr you posted this @ 21:21. Do you perhaps have a selective memory? My recollection says that you have "mentioned" it twice whilst insisting that you aren't. Don't mention the war Fawlty. Haha.

[jourdain2]

We know all that (ad nauseum quite frankly). Arabs started the slave trade and profited therefrom many, many years before; it was perfectly respectable at the time. I repeat that there were millions of white slaves (our countrymen) toiling in the mills in the industrial north - to which I belong- so don't give me that! I feel no guilt whatsoever although I deprecate the practice, given historical perspective.

Bad History and thinking comes of trying to apply modern thinking and ideas to the past.

We lived at that point in History, we used what was around to survive and become strong and conquer a huge empire. Does that answer your question?
(I will never apologise for the slave trade, horrible though it was, because it was the norm for the times and it led, as I have said, to 'white slavery' in the industrial mills -almost equally horrible.)

[Hymie]

Next, you’ll be telling me that the British subjugation of India was good for the country – after all, look at the railways we left them.

[jourdain2]

It's a consideration. :)