tarheel91 said:
Slimebeast said:
tarheel91 said:
Rath said:
tarheel91 said:
Rath said:
ManusJustus said:
Greek civilzation influenced the Romans, so Greeks should most of the credit for Western Civilization and Western ideals (democracy, language, monogamy, and so forth).
Other than the obvious Middle Eastern Empires (Egypt, Babylon), we should also consider Chinese and Indian civilizations. They made huge contributions to civilization, from gunpowder to mathematics, but if you live in the West you probably didn't cover that much in school, so you think they weren't as important.
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But the Romans took the Greek philosophy (by brute force as it happens) and spread it, essentially creating todays developed world. The developed world today is essentially based on where the romans conquered and where those countries managed to outnumber the natives (ie. America, Australia, New Zealand).
The ideals of Western civilization came from the Greeks, but without the Romans it would never have spread.
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We're talking about influence here, not importance.
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Can you explain what you mean please?
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The Romans are undeniably one of the most important civilizations in history. However, that does not make them one of the most influential. You yourself describe them as taking Greek culture and spreading it. THEY are not influencing anyone. The Greeks are. The messenger has no influence over the message he delivers.
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That's just totally ridiculous, man.
It almost sounds like you think ideas are magical entities.
Application and realization of ideas is just as important as coming up with ideas.
If a mafia boss tells his thug to murder someone, the thug still influenced the murdered person. Clearly they both influenced the victim. And in the case of Romans versus Greeks it's even more complicated since the Romans didn't just passively take orders from the Greek.
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Agreed. However, again, we're talking about influence, not importance. The two concepts are very distinct. Your use of the word influence in your example is just terrible. You can't just substitute influence for any old verb (in this case, killed).
Rath admits that the ideals of Western civilization came from the Greeks. THAT is influence. THEIR ideas are the ones that influence us today. The Romans spreading those ideas is very important, but it doesn't magically mean they're the ones influencing Western cultures with those beliefs. It's still the Greeks beliefs that are influencing cultures. I guess you could argue that the Romans basically decided that Greek beliefs were best, and then imposed that decision on Western culture, but it's still the Greeks who influenced the Romans who influenced everyone, so my point still stands even if you look at it from that perspective.
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Now I'm not one who underrates the Greek. I'm borderline putting them first before the Romans.
I understand what you mean, but I think we define influence differently. I may be wrong, but in my book influence simply means that something affects something else. It could be an idea, it could be a physical action. Both bear weight, and that's why it's so hard at least for me to decide if the Greeks or the Romans were the most influential.
