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M. Porcius Cato

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Blog Entries posted by M. Porcius Cato

  2. M. Porcius Cato
    This was an interesting article, and I'm always very thrilled to see quantitative analyses of Roman history. That said, it seems like the article ignores an important insight gained from the many previous attempts to understand what caused the changes that occurred in the late Roman empire. That insight is that the variables that appear to explain change in one part of empire (e.g., the Western empire) fail to accurately predict what happens in another part of the empire (e.g., the Eastern empire).
     
    So suppose the authors' theory is right: climactic change causes disease, famine and war. If so, the theory explains their observations of climactic change occurring with the Germanic migrations in Central Europe. So far, so good. But what about the rest of the empire? The theory predicts that there would be much less climactic change occurring in North Africa and the Levant, which were relatively healthy, prosperous and peaceful during this period. But that prediction seems highly unlikely to be right. In North Africa, for example, there was massive desertification and shortages of water, leading the agricultural frontiers of the empire to move back toward the coasts. Yet, the empire was fine in North Africa throughout this period of climactic change, and it only began to decline when the same Germanic people that invaded central and western Europe made it to North Africa, where they busied themselves impaling babies and butchering children (which I'm sure the authors would argue is just a rational response to climate change....)
     
    The history of North Africa, then, presents a real problem for the theory. That is, given climactic change, we have an equal likelihood of experiencing disease/famine/war (like Central Europe) or continuing health/prosperity/peace (like North Africa). Framed that way, the article totally loses its Cassandra-like punch regarding modern climate change. Framed another way, however, we could observe this: given massive migrations of violent, anti-GrecoRoman foreigners, we have a much greater likelihood of experiencing disease/famine/war (like *both* Central Europe and North Africa).
     
    When you look at the *whole empire*, and not just a fragment of it, you come away with a very different historical lesson. Namely, the most likely threat to civilization isn't climate change but cultural change, specifically people starting to act like those early Germanic hordes. Of course, I'm sure no one in New York, London, Madrid, and Moscow could possibly imagine that there's a group of armed fanatics who hate the Greco-Roman way of life....
     
    Anyway, that's my two cents.
     
    Source: Roman rise and fall 'recorded in trees'
  4. M. Porcius Cato
    Marius is infamous (perhaps to a degree that is unwarranted) for opening up the ranks of the Roman legions to the landless, propertyless "head-count" of Rome. The result: an army that unquestioningly obeyed its commanding officers, even when the officers threatened to topple the republic (and finally did).
     
    The widely-vaunted alternative to this ever-present threat--in the US, most recently revived by Douglas MacArthur; elsewhere, seen in military coups from Venezuela to Pakistan--is "civilian control," with military officers accepting the implict charge to accomplish the civilian mission no-questions-asked.
     
    Is this the best alternative? A recent piece in NYT Magazine suggests that civilian control--at least as it is currently practiced--has its own problems, especially the problem of rewarding generals who fail to give frank advice to civilian leadership. It's a fascinating article, and well worth reading.
     
    My first impression is that "private armies" versus "civilian control" is a false alternative--the real alternative to private armies are armies that uphold the laws--that would be the real Anti-Marian Reform. Beyond that, generals who fail to give frank assessments of what can be realistically accomplished are guilty of a derliction of duty--not just to their commander in chief, but to their country.
  7. M. Porcius Cato
    First, Yahoo! cravenly handed over user records to Chinese auhoritarians authorities. Then, "Don't be Evil" Google promptly complied with Chinese demands to censor results from web searches. What next? The censorship of No-MSG recipes on Epicurious.com? Will the whole internet be forced to kowtow to the brownshirts in Beijing?
     
    Not on Jimbo Wales' watch! Wikipedia, the ultimate source of truthiness on the internet, will not yield to Chinese demands to censor their content. Read the whole story here.
  9. M. Porcius Cato
    American religious broadcaster and all-around wacko Pat Robertson was talking to God recently (or at least stopped taking his meds), when Robertson learned that Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon's stroke was caused by the Vengeance of God. Apparently God is none-too-pleased about the Likud-founder/bolting prime minister
    "dividing God's land" .  
    No word from Robertson yet about why God was OK with Saladin and his little capture of Jerusalem. Maybe God just likes turbans. Or maybe Pat Robertson isn't really the question-asking type.


     

  10. M. Porcius Cato
    According to this Voice of America piece,
    The wife of a Chinese dissident jailed for publishing articles on the Internet says she plans to sue U.S.-based Internet company Yahoo for allegedly helping to put her husband in jail in China.
     
    I hope she wins her case against those unprincipled yahoos, who are resuscitating the old Stalinist claim that capitalists would sell the Soviets the rope with which to hang them. Good on VoA for covering this heroic woman.
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