200 Countries 200 Years 4 Minutes

[MA-Caver]

This video is remarkable and deserves some discussion because it concerns our past and more importantly... our future.
Watch as this man explains the changes that have occurred in the last 200 years economically and in terms of life-spans.
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He stops the clock at certain key points like the World Wars. Afterwards it seems that the poorer countries still manage to "catch up" ... yet not all of them. But life expectancy has increased all around.
We still may have another World War to go through... but imagine how much it will change the dynamics of those statistics.

Thoughts/comments/discuss please.

 

[Ken Morgan]

I seriously doubt we’ll see a world war, but we are seeing not just a redistribution of wealth, but an expansion of all wealth. We need to get use to the fact that we no longer live in a world where the western world is the supreme power.

Economic freedom tends to bring with it democracy. Within a short period of time, China will be a full democracy, India will no longer be a bureaucratic nightmare, Russia will become truly democratic and the satellite countries that rely on these three will be pulled into the modern world too.

No true democratic countries have ever gone to war with each other.

 

[billc]

Good point about democracies. I agree with your point so I am not being antagonisitc here, bear with me. Would the Faukland Island war count, or is it too small? What about the war of 1812? England had a parlimentary form of government and the newly formed U.S. had a representative republic. Is the democracy rule something that applies to more recent times? Your thoughts or opinions.

 

[Sukerkin]

That was really good :tup:. As an ex-economist I was perhaps particularly intrgued with the flows of data (having done some very similar number crunching myself in decades gone by) but that was a wonderfully clear visualisation of statistical data.

Well done that man .

 

[Rich Parsons]

In another 200 years one could do the same thing and the scales may have more money and longer health, but it will as showed by the arrow go out to the right and up.

So could one not also say that today is bottom left hand corner of the future graph?

 

[SensibleManiac]

Yes, but let's not forget that it's important to note the difference between the countries in placement as well.
Will the world be closer together in prosperity?

In other words will all the countries escape this graph to the right and higher?

I believe with the coming of solar, wind and expanding tidal, electric energy, (abundant) sustainable energy could help take the world there.

I believe this is one of the most important improvements we can make, so it's one of the most important ideas for us to promote and educate people on.

 

[Ken Morgan]

Good points.

The UK - Argentina war over the Falklands was between a democracy and a dictatorship. Argentina was not even close to being a democracy at the time.

As for the UK/Canada – US war of 1812, that is a great question.

Perhaps it has to do with the time period? While the UK was a parliamentary democracy, that did not mean universal franchise, the vast majority of UK subjects could not vote. The US was also allied with a dictator, Napoleon, and attacked Canada to try and punish the UK and steal land.

 

[billc]

Ken Morgan, those two are about the closest I could come up with that might be exceptions. I didn't really study the Fauklands and do not know about the government back then. I guess so far the theory holds. I had once heard a speech by Benjamin Netenyahu where he made the same argument about democracies not going to war. Do you know if this idea came from a source before Netenyahu, did it come from someone else originally?

 

[Ken Morgan]

Ken Morgan, those two are about the closest I could come up with that might be exceptions. I didn't really study the Fauklands and do not know about the government back then. I guess so far the theory holds. I had once heard a speech by Benjamin Netenyahu where he made the same argument about democracies not going to war. Do you know if this idea came from a source before Netenyahu, did it come from someone else originally?

No idea where it came from. Though I recall talking about it when I started my political science/strategic studies degree back in 1984. I would guess it goes back quite a ways though.

“do not know about the government back then”, BACK THEN????? Dude!!! I was in High School!!!! BACK THEN????? It really wasn't that long ago......honest......

 

[billc]

Hey, I just looked up the year of the falklands war, 1982, man, that's like caveman days. They didn't even have Ipods back then. How did we exist?

Just to be clear, I meant I didn't know about the government of Argentina back then.