oriented in a north-south direction rather than east-west, as Eurasia is. This orientation in itself impeded development, relatively speaking, by slowing down the rate at which plants – and therefore animals and civilisation – can spread. This was not wholly bad, of course. It meant that in particular localities many species evolved. (The tropical rainforest, for example, occupies 7 per cent of the land surface of Earth but nurtures well over 50 per cent of the animal and plant species. Because there are so many insects and small mammals in the rainforest, energy is lost along the food chain, with the result that large mammals are relatively rare – and large mammals have played a vital role in our story.) 6 But the north-south orientation of the New World, in conjunction with other factors to be considered shortly, did undoubtedly slow down the development of humanity in the Americas. It was more a technical limit before anything else, but it had a knock-on effect too, as we shall see.
Alongside the general geographical alignment of the continents went an associated climatic variation, of which the most important elements were the Monsoon, the El Niño Southern Oscillation (enso), and the violent activity caused by volcanoes, earthquakes, winds and storms. The importance of the monsoon lies in the fact that, for the last 8,000 years, since the time of the last great flood, outlined in chapter two, the monsoon has been decreasing in strength. The varying strength of the monsoon and its temporal relation to the emergence (and subsequent collapse) of Old World civilisations was described in chapter five. All we need add here is that, given the domestication of cereal grasses in the Old World at about 10,000 years ago, the major environmental/ideological issue in Eurasia over that time has been fertility . The landmass, bit by bit, has been drying.
In the New World, on the other hand, the major factor affecting weather has been the increasing frequency of enso, from a few times a century about six thousand years ago, to every few years now. Besides the occurrences of enso itself, its relationship with volcanic activity, given the make-up of the Pacific Ocean (an enormous body of water over a relatively thin crust), also appears to have been important. We saw in chapter five that Meso- and South America are the most volcanically active mainland areas of the world where major civilisations have formed. Put all this together and the most important environmental issue in the Americas over the past few thousand years, which has had fundamental ideological consequences, has been the increasing frequency of destructive weather .
We cannot say with certainty that these differences were definitive, or that they ultimately account for the systematic ideological variations we shall be discussing shortly. We have already noted that in our natural experiment there are too many variables to satisfy purists. What we can say is that these systematic differences in climate across the hemispheres dovetail plausibly with the historical patterns that are observable between the New World and the Old World and to that extent may help us understand the different trajectories.
H OW AND W HY THE G ODS S MILED ON THE O LD W ORLD
After the geographical and climatological factors that determined basic and long-term differences between the two hemispheres, the next most important factors lay in the realm of biology – plants and animals. In the plants realm, we may say that, again, there were two main differences between the hemispheres. The first concerned cereals: grain. In Eurasia in particuar there was a naturally occurring range of grasses – wheat, barley, rye, millet, sorghum, rice – susceptible of domestication and, because of the east-west configuration of the landmass, they were able to spread relatively rapidly once domestication was achieved. Surpluses were therefore built up relatively quickly and it was on this basis that
Alongside the general geographical alignment of the continents went an associated climatic variation, of which the most important elements were the Monsoon, the El Niño Southern Oscillation (enso), and the violent activity caused by volcanoes, earthquakes, winds and storms. The importance of the monsoon lies in the fact that, for the last 8,000 years, since the time of the last great flood, outlined in chapter two, the monsoon has been decreasing in strength. The varying strength of the monsoon and its temporal relation to the emergence (and subsequent collapse) of Old World civilisations was described in chapter five. All we need add here is that, given the domestication of cereal grasses in the Old World at about 10,000 years ago, the major environmental/ideological issue in Eurasia over that time has been fertility . The landmass, bit by bit, has been drying.
In the New World, on the other hand, the major factor affecting weather has been the increasing frequency of enso, from a few times a century about six thousand years ago, to every few years now. Besides the occurrences of enso itself, its relationship with volcanic activity, given the make-up of the Pacific Ocean (an enormous body of water over a relatively thin crust), also appears to have been important. We saw in chapter five that Meso- and South America are the most volcanically active mainland areas of the world where major civilisations have formed. Put all this together and the most important environmental issue in the Americas over the past few thousand years, which has had fundamental ideological consequences, has been the increasing frequency of destructive weather .
We cannot say with certainty that these differences were definitive, or that they ultimately account for the systematic ideological variations we shall be discussing shortly. We have already noted that in our natural experiment there are too many variables to satisfy purists. What we can say is that these systematic differences in climate across the hemispheres dovetail plausibly with the historical patterns that are observable between the New World and the Old World and to that extent may help us understand the different trajectories.
H OW AND W HY THE G ODS S MILED ON THE O LD W ORLD
After the geographical and climatological factors that determined basic and long-term differences between the two hemispheres, the next most important factors lay in the realm of biology – plants and animals. In the plants realm, we may say that, again, there were two main differences between the hemispheres. The first concerned cereals: grain. In Eurasia in particuar there was a naturally occurring range of grasses – wheat, barley, rye, millet, sorghum, rice – susceptible of domestication and, because of the east-west configuration of the landmass, they were able to spread relatively rapidly once domestication was achieved. Surpluses were therefore built up relatively quickly and it was on this basis that
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