Unit 2: The Renaissance and the Roots of the Modern World

What does it mean to be modern?

What, if anything, is modern in particular about the Renaissance & Reformation?

To what extent is the Renaissance &

Reformation not modern?

Is the Renaissance & Reformation a logical beginning for the story of the modern world?

Invented Traditions

“Traditions’ which appear or claim to be old are often quite recent in origin and sometimes invented…”

First modern man?

“What else, then, is all history, if not the praise of Rome?”

Petrarch, 1304-1374

“Let fate do her worst, there are relics of joy, Bright dreams of the past, which she cannot destroy;Which come in the night-time of sorrow and care,And bring back the features that joy used to wear.

Long, long be my heart with such memories fill’d!Like the vase, in which roses have once been distill’d-You may break, you may shatter the vase if you willBut the scent of the roses will hang round it still.”

Farewell…. By Thomas Moore,

1779-1852

Tools of torture, 1508

Scaffold,

Stake,

Decapitator,

Sword,

Stock,

Thumbscrews,

Whipping post,

Rack,

Flesh pincers

Theodoric of York, Medieval Barber

Witch Craft

Rise of Renaissance Humanism

Middle Age--Divine Law Renaissance-Natural Law

Humanism

Emphasis more on here and now instead

Role of individual

Rights of Man vs. Rights of Men

Exploration of wider world

Fairbanks, Alaska 12,000 years ago-

Modern times or not—

—depends entirely on perspective!

“Big History” Years before Present

• 14 BILLION (universe)• 4.6 billion (solar system)

• 2.5 billion (photosynthesis oxygen)

• 1.5 billon (first complex cells)

• 600 MILLION (first fossils)• 500 million (vertebrates)

• 325 million (reptiles)

• 250 million (mammals)

• 240 million (dinosaurs)

• 200 million (birds)

• 65 million (extinction of dinosaurs)

7 million (first hominines, bipeds) 250,000 (Homo sapiens,

language)

“Big History” Three Eras of Big Human History

ERA NO. 1 FORAGING250,000 to 10,000 Years Ago - “Paleolithic” (Old

Stone Age)

Energy use 2,000 to 5,000 calories per day per cap

ERA NO. 2 AGRICULTURE 10,000 to 250 Years Ago - “Neolithic” (New Stone

Age) to Bronze and Iron Ages

Energy use 12,000 to 26,000 calories per day per cap

ERA NO. 3 INDUSTRIAL 250 years to present - The Steam and Electric Age

Energy use 77,000 to 230,000 calories per day per cap

14 billion years in 14 14 years ago (Big Bang)

4.5 years (solar system) 4 years (first life on

earth)

7 months (multi-celled life)

3 weeks (dinosaurs extinct)

3 days (first hominines)

50 minutes (Homo sapiens)

6 minutes (in Alaska)

5 minutes (agriculture)

3 minutes (writing)

1 minute (China, Persia, India, Mediterranean civilizations)

24 seconds Mongols, Black Death

15 seconds Renaissance & Reformation

6 seconds (Industrial Revolution)

2 seconds (WWI)

1 second (WWII to present)

Gross World Product since One Million Years B.C.

The Big Story?

2000 years of world history “…everything to the left of 1800 is an approximation of population distribution around the world and everything to the right of 1800 is a demonstration of productivity divergences around the world -- the mastering of means of manufacturing, production and supply chains by steam, electricity, and ultimately software…” Derek Thompson, The Atlantichttp://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/06/the-economic-history-of-the-last-2-000-years-in-1-little-graph/258676/

Hans Rosling 3d Visualization from Poor & Sick to Rich & Healthy in last 200 years

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbkSRLYSojo

“The Anthropocene,”

The Age of Man

More change in past six seconds—250 years—than in the previous 250,000 years.

Carbon Dioxide Emissions

Climate Change

Science is never completely certain!

“The doubters are right that uncertainties are rife in climate science. They are wrong when they present that as a reason for inaction.” (Economist, March 18, 2010)

The Great Mystery of Modern History

The great mystery of the modern world is how and why the so-called “continent” of Europe, which in the 15th century, was an economic, cultural and political backwater, would come to dominate every sphere of human activity on the planet by the end of the 19h century.

7 Revolutionary Factors

1. Science

2. Liberalism

3. Energy

4. Market economy

5. Factory production

6. Nationalism

7. War