
Could Rome Have Had an Industrial Revolution? - stablemap
https://medium.com/@MarkKoyama/could-rome-have-had-an-industrial-revolution-4126717370a2
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WalterBright
The article doesn't mention the printing press. The invention of the press
fueled explosive growth, because printers printed handbooks on anything and
everything, and so knowledge became cheap and widely available. My personal
view is the IR started with the printing press.

We're in the middle of a second IR caused by the internet, for analogous
reasons.

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Houshalter
I heard a great argument once, that I can no longer find on the internet. That
it was the cannon that lead to the industrial revolution. The first cannons
were awful. Short range, extraordinarily expensive to build, and just as
likely to kill you as the enemy. There was an arms race in Europe to develop
much stronger and cheaper metal. And once that exists, steam engines are much
more practical.

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mercer
I'm curious to hear if people can confirm this, but it sounds like a
'Gladwellian' type of argument, for lack of a better way of putting it.

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jacques_chester
So to explain the background:

1\. Helen Dale, a novelist, has written a novel, _Kingdom of the Wicked_ , of
which the first book has recently been released[0].

2\. It's set in an alternative history, during the time of Augustus.

3\. Helen Dale believes an author's intepretation of her work is more
meaningful, in a critical or literary sense, than a critic's. So she included
an "Author's Note" in her novel, explaining the background leading to its
creation.

4\. The Author's Note was republished by the Cato Institute on their
libertarianism.org website[1].

5\. This essay is a reply to the Author's Note.

I've been hosting Helen's website for more than a decade. She is very, very,
_very_ smart and a damn good writer. She's also the right person for the right
story.

I think you're going to hear a lot about this book in the coming year.

[0] [https://www.amazon.com/Kingdom-Wicked-Book-One-
Rules/dp/0994...](https://www.amazon.com/Kingdom-Wicked-Book-One-
Rules/dp/0994384092)

[1]
[https://www.libertarianism.org/publications/essays/authors-n...](https://www.libertarianism.org/publications/essays/authors-
note-kingdom-wicked)

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saalweachter
Has anyone read a good book on why the Industrial Revolution _did_ happen?
What were the necessary precursors, politically, economically,
technologically, scientifically, culturally, before you start trying to
automate all the things?

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glibgil
1) Outlaw slavery

2) There is no step two

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caio1982
That's a very simplistic (bit naive IMHO) POV.

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jychang
I agree it's simplistic, but that's not particularly overly naive. The
kickstart of the industrial revolution very much benefited from the
disappearance of a large "free" labor source, and it was probably one of the
primary social factors that worked in conjunction with the technological
foundations at the time.

~~~
saalweachter
When & where do you think the Industrial Revolution happened?

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orbat
Started late 18th century, after several decades of European countries and US
states abolishing slavery
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_abolition_of_slave...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_abolition_of_slavery_and_serfdom#1701.E2.80.931799_.28Late_Modern.29)).
Why, when do you think it happened?

~~~
saalweachter
Serfdom was completely ended in England 200 years before the Industrial
Revolution, and while slaves were still present in England, they were never a
significant part of the labor pool. What _other_ conditions had to be met, or
is it simply a matter of waiting two centuries after eliminating slaves/serfs
from the labor pool?

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orbat
My point was that it sounds likely that something like the industrial
revolution would happen _after_ the abolishment of slavery, when there's more
pressure on people to be inventive. Not that it has to happen immediately

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louthy
Why then did it not happen after the Black Death decimated Europe?

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pmoriarty
Ancient Rome could have had hot air balloons:

[https://web.archive.org/web/20110306091458/http://chronopaus...](https://web.archive.org/web/20110306091458/http://chronopause.com/index.php/2011/02/07/67/)

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QAPereo
Rome was still primarily a slave/servant based economy, and one based on
expansion and conquest. They lacked the mathematical and scientific
foundations to radically change metallurgy, chemistry, and the other basics of
_industry._ This article focuses a lot on economic possibilities and social
change necessary for a revolution, while largely ignoring larger issues.

You cant have an industrial revolution without then revolutionary power of
modern industry. Good concrete and slaves fanning fires to heat water isn’t
that.

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amorphid
Could such advances have been possible if fueled by an extremely wealthy
family? It only takes one person w/ resources & ambition to say "I want
<something>" to kickstart a movement.

Say Marcus Licinius Crassus [1], Roman bajillionaire, dreams of a steam-
powered engine in 73 BC, 20-ish years before his death. And instead of duking
it out with Spartacus, Crassus decides to make building a steam engine his
singular focus in life. In the best of cases, could he have meaningfully
invested in R&D that would make meaningful progress towards building a steam
engine? Was R&D even a thing in that era?

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Licinius_Crassus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Licinius_Crassus)

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empath75
One guy building a steam engine isn’t a revolution. One guy building a steam
engine and publishing a book on steam engines and having a university to train
steam engine builders is.

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WalterBright
More than that. It took a while for the telegraph to take hold because Morse
couldn't explain why fast communication was necessary, and people thought his
demonstrations were a scam.

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exratione
Related topic: could the Romans have usefully practiced public key encryption,
say for very small key sizes?

