fact). But what could Darwin have done had he been born in 910 in Saxony? The question is absurd. And you don't seriously maintain, do you, that Genghis could have united fractiousd nomadic tribes had he been born in Harlem in 1920?
Your example simply demonstrates vividly what Miles has been arguing.
Carrol ----
Having jumped into the middle of this, I have to confess I don't know what Miles was arguing. :-)
I'm not sure what your intention was in listing Genghis, Lenin and Darwin as "contingencies". If you exclude remarkable individuals from the argument, then you've created an argument that's true by definition.
I don't disagree with you that Harlem in 1920 would have been a tough place from which to conquer the world, lol, but I do think that any study of society must take into account that no society is eternally static. And when change comes, it'll be because of remarkable individuals.
How to actually make use of that information, I can't say for sure. But to ignore it -- to assume, in the 1970s for instance, that the Shah of Iran would be on the throne for decades and that the personality of the Ayatollah Khomeini should not be studied -- that was a fatal mistake.
I don't know if that's in agreement or disagreement with what's been said before. Just my 2 cents, relevant or not.
- Eric Balkan
http://ibrakefortrees.wordpress.com