The climatic advantages that mid latitude regions have
over tropical regions. The world's largest continuous zone of "temperate" climates lies
in a belt stretching across Eurasia from southern Europe in the west to China in the
east. Rather persistently neglecting the fact that much of this zone is inhospitable
desert and high mountains east-west-trending mid latitude zone of Eurasia as the world
region that possessed the very best environment for the invention and development of
agriculture and, consequently, for historical dynamism.Its east-west major axis
permitted many inventions adopted in one part of Eurasia to spread relatively rapidly to
societies at similar latitudes and climates elsewhere in Eurasia...It lacks the severe
ecological barriers transecting the major axes of the Americas and Africa. Thus,
geographic and ecological barriers to diffusion of technology were less severe in
Eurasia than in other continents.
This means that if you
migrate east/west, the odds are better that the crops and animals you bring with you
will be able to survive in your new home. if you migrate north/south, you've got to
rebuild civilization every time you move. this of course gives a huge advantage to
continents like Eurasia where the east-west axis is much longer than the north-south
access because civilization will be able to develop faster if it doesn't have to keep
starting over.
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