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“Even the smallest person can change the course of the future,” is a line that I absolutely love from The Lord of the Rings movies. It’s inspirational because it makes us feel like our actions really do matter and that we always have a purpose in life (even if we’re not always aware of it). However, this is a double-edged sword and works both ways: tiny events have the potential to change things for the better or to create a chain reaction that causes a catastrophe.
The Bored Panda team has collected a list of internet users’ opinions about the biggest butterfly effects in history. From who accidentally caused the First World War to theories about what caused the fall of the Berlin Wall, Brexit, the rise of Lego, and beyond. Check out the most intriguing theories below and upvote the ones that you enjoyed the most. We also can’t wait to hear what you think of them. Got any butterfly effect theories yourselves, dear Pandas? Be sure to share your hypothetical scenarios in the comments.
TikTok video content creator and photographer Haythamj, from London, shared with Bored Panda his takes on historical butterfly effects. The teenager is a huge fan of these butterfly (aka domino) effects and has previously gone viral for his videos about them. Check out our interview with him below, Pandas.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
Ole Kirk Christiansen was a carpenter in Denmark who was struggling to make ends meet during the Great Depression. After his wife died, he was trying to take care of his kids by himself and they loved this duck toy that he made. He started to manufacture the ducks in a factory, but the factory burned down because his kids were playing with fire and wood shavings. He was basically destitute for a while, but continued making little models of houses, vehicles, and small toys. After a while, they grew in popularity, and Christiansen decided to move on to making them in plastic instead.
And now we have Lego.
hyperunknown 4 years ago
What do most Lego-figurines have? Separation anxiety. I tried to make a joke but I think we'll have to piece it together.
Martin Kaine 4 years ago
Those puns are so good, I couldn't block them out if I tried.
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Sue Lynn Chan 4 years ago
Here's a video for story of Lego: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdDU_BBJW9Y
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Dave P 4 years ago (edited)
What we know as Legos were originally a knock off of a British Doctors child development toy, which Lego later sued him into bankruptcy (even though he won every case because he had the patents), where Christiansen then bought the patents and became very lawsuit happy to anyone who had any product similar. This version of events did not exist until the 1960s in an attempt to restore his image after some damning expose's He did have a wood toy based company before that, that part is true
Tee Witt 4 years ago
That is an awful story and does not say much for the Danish
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Ellen Light 4 years ago
I had these when I was little back in the 60s. city-block...034f8b.jpg 
RELATED:
#2
A German bureaucrat messing up on live TV led to the Berlin Wall falling.
This East German guy, Gunter Schabowski, was set to announce new travel being allowed outside of East Germany- in a few days from the announcement, and one had to wait days to get and have the special travel visa authorized. He was to announce on live government TV.
He was rushed and tired, going to the press conference, and had not read the official government press release before coming on live TV. An aide just handed him the paper, which he read on camera.
But, like I said, he was unprepared, tired, and rushed. So he read the first part of the release, which said "the government now authorizes travel freedom" on live TV. A reporter then asked "so when does this take effect?" He had not had the chance to read about the travel limits and visa requirements yet, and had had a long day. So instead of taking several live minutes to read the whole thing, Schabowski just mumbled "as far as I know...right away."
This led to thousands of East Germans massing at the Wall and border checkpoints. People got angrier and angrier as they were refused passage. Finally, to avoid a riot or getting hurt themselves, one guard let some people on through. This led to a chain reaction...and so bye-bye, Berlin Wall.
TL;DR: Tired, unprepared East German bureaucrat misreads press release relating to travel permissions on live TV, leads to Berlin Wall falling.
MauKini 4 years ago
I remember that day vividly. My westgerman family sat in front of the TV in disbeliev. Mum started crying. After such a long time we were finaly able to see friends that lived in east germany again. I was four years old, its one of my earliest memories. To this day we have a smal stone of the Berlin wall in my parents livingroom. We were gifted it by our east german friends.
The Sarcastic Witch 4 years ago
I’m so glad for you! It must have been a truly wonderful feeling.
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Kona Pake 4 years ago
What is the guard at the border crossing executed for failing to shoot the crowd?
SirWriteALot 4 years ago
What a day that was. As a kid I didn't fully realize it, not being german or even in the country, but our school got us all together and we watched something on TV and the principal talked about stuff ... many years later the gravity revealed itself. To think of all the people that died on that border, or even any other border in Europe, and now we just blast through and barely notice. We've come a long way, and it's a good thing!
Stefan Scheiben 4 years ago
There is an old Chinese proverb: "May you live in interesting times!". Those times were interesting. All these stories sound kind of dry if you hear them today. But I can assure you: when they were happening, and we just sat there, staring at the tv, watching history unfold, while every day something new happened, it was anything but. Those were emotional days.
#3
The role that this beautiful, virtually unknown and completely innocent woman would have in putting into motion the two World Wars of the 20th century.
This is Sophie Chotek. Duchess of Hohenberg.
And I bet that virtually none of you has ever heard of her.
She was the woman that the Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the Austro-Hungarian empire, fell in love with and then married.
So what?
She wasn’t royalty. A mere Duchess.
Which meant that in the unbelievably snobbish norms of the day, even the future monarch of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, could not have her, his own wife, accompany him in official royal ceremonies. And he hated that. Can you blame him?
The Archduke was an autocrat, but he had one redeeming quality— he loved his wife deeply.
There was but one exception to that stupid rule. Which is that she could be by his side in public while he was acting in his military capacity as Inspector-General of the Austro-Hungarian Army.
Which was the main reason why the Archduke decided to go inspect the army in Bosnia (an entirely unnecessary and optional choice), so that his wife could ride by his side in public.
And he rode quite foolishly in an open car so that everyone could see the two of them together.
And he then got assassinated by a Serbian nationalist, Gavrilo Princip who literally ran up to the open-top car and shot both of them at point blank range, killing them instantly.
Austria demanded an unconditional apology from Serbia and was determined to humiliate her.
Serbia considered the assassination to be awful, but had no real official hand in it. So she refused to apologize.
Austria then declared war on Serbia.
Russia as Serbia’s biggest ally, then declared war on Austria.
Germany then as Austria’s ally declared war on Russia.
France and Great Britain then as Russia’s allies declared war on Germany.
It is imperative to note here that except for Austria declaring war on tiny Serbia (which she never imagined would spiral completely out of hand in such spectacular fashion!)…
All of these other declarations of war between these nations weren't “choices” — they were bound by security treaties to come to the rescue of each other in the event of an aggression against their allies.
Great Britain, France and Russia on the one hand as the Triple Entente, Germany and Austria-Hungary on the other as the Central Powers.
Talk about a chain reaction!
And then ladies and gentlemen, you had World War 1.
Followed by the collapse of the German economy. (No, the Treaty of Versailles was not as punitive as people think.)
The collapse of the German economy brought that lovely SOB, Adolf Hitler to power.
And the rest as they say, is history.
Arguably one of the greatest instances of the “butterfly effect” in all of history. Try topping that.
And it all started with the marriage of an emperor to a relative commoner.
For the sake of love.
J. F. 4 years ago (edited)
It can all be narrowed down to a sandwich - Gavrilo Princip ate a sandwich the day after his first (failed) attempt. And right infront of the shop stopped the car of Archduke Franz Ferdinand because the driver wasn't informed about a change in the route
Serial pacifist 4 years ago (edited)
Actually, this is a myth. Take it from the guy who lives just down the street from the place and who has done research (professionally) on the matter. The first attempt happened on the same day. Later on, upon the return from a nearby mansion, the driver failed to make the sharp turn from the first attempt leading to the car stopping and providing a perfect opportunity for Gavrilo Princip. The bomb they threw didn't go off, Gavrilo actually closed his eyes taking the shot, but managed to hit the archduke.
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Łukasz Markuszewski 4 years ago
Well, killing of archduke and his wife was the casus belli but not the reason of the war. European powers were heading to it for many years as rivalry between them was more and more harsh. It was just a matter of time, it was just a matter of finding any good casus belli to start it.
Adriana Loborec 4 years ago
Yes. The difference between the cause and the trigger.
Load More Replies... Kari Panda 4 years ago
It’s great to see someone point out that the subsequent war declarations weren‘t free choices but due to treaties. Most people don’t seem to be aware of that.
Katinka Min 4 years ago
WWI would have happened one way or the other. It was about power and money. What triggered it was relatively unimportant.
Analyn Lahr 4 years ago
Wait. Who was this "she" you kept talking about? If Sophie was killed to...Oh. Wait. Were you referring to Serbia as a "she"?
Stannous Flouride 4 years ago
American author Barbara Tuchman was an amateur historian working in a small library in 1960-61 when she wrote a book about the series of events that led to World War I called "The Guns of August." It was a war that no one wanted, benefitted none of the participant countries, and cost millions of lives that was mostly caused by a lack of communication. She was stunned that it won a Pulitzer Prize. The book was one of many that the voracious reader, President John F Kennedy read while in office. He made his entire staff read it. He stated, after the Cuban Missile Crisis, that the book had had a serious impact on his actions during those tense times. After things died down he invited her to a dinner at the White House in her honor. Ms Tuchman wrote several other best sellers (A Distant Mirror, about the impact of the Black Plague on civilization is amazing) but when your first book wins a Pulitzer and prevents World War III it's pretty hard to top it.
Seán Baron 4 years ago
Also, the Treaty of Versailles was punitive, the amount of money that the French demanded in reparations was astronomical and the UK and the US disagreed with France massively over this.
jimmy pop 4 years ago
This leaves out a lot of other influences leading up to WWI. For one, German Kaiser Wilhelm II. gave Austria-Hungary a carte blanche for support in case of war, i.e. without any conditions, otherwise things might have turned out quite differently. Second, German military leadership (Wilhelm II. as well) feared an arms buildup of Russia and consequently getting overpowered, thus was looking for a reason to start a war anyway and simply couldn't pass on this opportunity (though Wilhelm II. was ambivalent, sort of still wanting peace). Third, Germany's rising power left the dominating empires France and Great Britian cautious against the new might, Wilhelm II.'s ambition for power (and lack of diplomatic skills) forced their rivalry to fade; especially since Wilhelm II. was an extraordinary admirer of naval power and strongly pushed the expansion of the German naval fleet to rival that of the British, courting their resentment and laying the foundation on which the triple entente was set.
jimmy pop 4 years ago
There was a long build-up of political tension between the rising power Germany and the still leading world powers France and Great Britain, as well as a decline of Austrian power - giving Hungary more power and forming Austria-Hungary - and internal struggles due to the many different cultures within the country's borders in order for the powderkeg the world was to blow up in the massive bloodfest that was WWI. The assassination of Franz Ferdinand was just the spark.
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Linda Roy 4 years ago
I've always wondered if WW1 could've been stopped if the driver had taken a different turn.
jimmy pop 4 years ago
Probably not. German military leadership feared the Russian empire to overpower the German military in the coming years so they desired to find a reason to declare war while their military was still the superior one. I'm sure they would have found a different one, though whether that would have escalated into a whole world war ... who knows.
Load More Replies...According to Haythamj, the butterfly effect resonates with a lot of people because we're constantly curious about the causes of, well, pretty much everything! "I think it resonates with people because we’re always obsessed with why things happen. It’s the backbone of all education. so naturally, when this can relate to people’s personal interests, such as pop culture or history, it will grip people," he told Bored Panda.
The TikToker remains skeptical that even extremely powerful computers would be able to predict future events with certainty. "I really doubt it because like the butterfly effects all note, the smallest things, such as the Austro-Hungarian throne heir's car taking a wrong turn in Sarajevo in 1914, can have huge consequences that completely shape our world today," he said that some things will always remain unpredictable, no matter how capable at forecasting we might feel we are.
#4
On the night of September 26, 1983, the Soviet orbital missile early warning system (SPRN), code-named Oko, reported a single intercontinental ballistic missile launch from the territory of the United States.[27] Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Petrov, who was on duty during the incident, correctly dismissed the warning as a computer error when ground early warning radars did not detect any launches. Part of his reasoning was that the system was new and known to have malfunctioned previously; also, a full-scale nuclear attack from the United States would involve thousands of simultaneous launches, not a single missile.
Later, the system reported four more ICBM launches headed to the Soviet Union, but Petrov again dismissed the reports as false. The investigation that followed revealed that the system indeed malfunctioned and false alarms were caused by a rare alignment of sunlight on high-altitude clouds underneath the satellites' orbits.
And thus we are all now living in a world not destroyed by nuclear war.
WilvanderHeijden 4 years ago
One man had the courage to doubt computers. We need to remind people now and then that it's totally ok to think for yourself instead of mindlessly echoing all sorts of conspiracy theories. Mandatory vaccinations are not the beginning of communism and mind control, the pandemic is real. You may think that it is your right to drill a hole in the boat, but don't be surprised when other people kick you off the boat.
Nadine Bamberger 4 years ago
And please don't forget Vasily Arkhipov who, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, refused to launch a nuclear weapon and thus prevented World War III.
Linda Roy 4 years ago
Many people know about Petrov but not Arkhipov and being a history buff, I scrolled down the comments section to see if anyone else knew that! The two close calls makes me wonder what would've happened if the situation were reversed and those two men were American, not Russian.
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Freya the Wanderer 4 years ago
His birthday should be an international holiday.
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Analyn Lahr 4 years ago
Has he been given A Nobel Peace Prize yet? I feel like something like this deserves one. Or at least a special award for being smart and not impulsive.
#5
A guy left his lab for a month. He came back and found mold growing in a Petri dish and decided to keep it rather than throw it out.
The man? Alexander Fleming. The mold? Penicillum, which produces penicillin; among the most important drugs ever discovered. If he'd just thrown out the contaminated culture, who knows where we'd be in terms of medicine?
Susie Elle 4 years ago
An addition: he kept it because he found it interesting that around the mold, nothing else grew. The mold kept a perimiter around itself, and he wondered how the mold did that. Turns out the mold secreted penicillin into the agar, which kept any other contaminant growing on the agar at bay.
Wilf 4 years ago
And it was a WOMAN, Dorothy Hodgkin, who actually understood the significance of it, and used pioneering techniques in X-ray crystallography to uunderstand its 3d structure in order to make it into a viable medicine. She deservedly got a Nobel Prize for her work, but was almost entirely forgotten about- the British press ran a headline in 1946 "British Housewife gets Nobel Prize". There is no mention of her at all in my daughter's school textbook- It only mentions Fleming. About time we wrote women back in to the history of science.
Caro Caro 4 years ago
Thanks Wilf and you're right, many women's achievements have been overlooked.
Load More Replies... Serial pacifist 4 years ago (edited)
Ok, I always twitch when I hear the same idea about numerous scientific discoveries, how "accidental" they were. This is very disrespectful of the people who devoted their lives to uncovering the scientific truths and principles that help humanity. Fleming was doing research for years. Had he not been doing so, he never would have observed and realized the potential benefit of the mold. He wasn't a random guy who just stumbled upon the idea that it could be useful. The purpose of scientific work is precisely investing hours and years of work in reaching probably just one single breakthrough that can be life-changing. The breakthrough is therefore never an accident, but a matter of having found the answer (the needle) after spending years building knowledge, going through the information, evidence, research (haystack).
Tesla Sulu 4 years ago
And how did Fleming acquire that mold to begin with? A Woman! assistant found an interesting mold on a melon and brought it to him.
Giles McArdell 4 years ago
He failed to find a way to mass produce it though and it was another 16 years odd before it began to be used significantly in medicine.
#6
Hitler was responsible for creation of anime.
Well, it's WW2 actually. After the bombing on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan was economically weak and people didn't even have enough food meanwhile in 1952 a Japanese artist named Osamu Tezuka who created a comic to entertain and inspire the public and help them cope with daily life. After sometime when Japan came out of economic depression then a lot of new artist started to create a lot of such comics and the world of manga and anime came into existence.
Serial pacifist 4 years ago
If you read it carefully, you can notice that it had nothing to do with Hitler. You could as well have said that it was Truman and it would have been more accurate (he decided to throw the nukes).
Fabio Ribeiro 4 years ago
Those nukes would never been launched by Truman if hitler didnt cause WW2 tho....
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Yort 4 years ago
Wow that’s a terrible post. Comics already existed, and anime is literally just the Japanese word for animation. Osamu Tezuka was heavily influenced by the large, expressive eyes of Bambi - from the Disney movie, not the book. Walt Disney has more to do with Japanese animation existing than Hitler, as do the people responsible for movies in general.
Gabriele Alfredo Pini 4 years ago
Anime has its roots in the painted books and other materials of the XVII century.
Twodogsandapicnictable 4 years ago (edited)
So... Hitler had nothing to do with it? Wasn't he already dead by the time Japan got nuked on the entire other side of the globe? There's really no reason to use a click bait opening line on a scrolling page.
Fabio Ribeiro 4 years ago
Why were the nukes launched? WW2 Who caused WW2? Hitler....
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Akalvin 4 years ago
Friendly reminder: Hitler did not bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Truman did.
Yort 4 years ago
Yes that Hitler was an upstanding bloke and is not responsible for any deaths at all, not the 6+ million concentration camp deaths, not the deaths of millions of Europeans and North Americans who weren’t in camps, and not the Japanese people who teamed up with Hitler’s Germany, and not the Koreans who were brutally attacked and raped by the Japanese. Only Truman is a bad boy who just killed all those people for laughs, Hitler is totally innocent of everything.
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Finally, I was curious to find out which historical butterfly/domino effect is Haythamj's favorite one. "The one that I always see in the videos is how 9/11, and before that, the Cold War, led to 50 Shades of Gray, mainly because part of the effect is related to My Chemical Romance, a band who I quite like who formed as a direct result of 9/11," he explained. It’s the perfect example of how two seemingly unrelated things can be directly correlated, and perfectly sums up the butterfly effect, in my opinion."
The butterfly effect is a part of chaos theory. It essentially means that small changes can lead to very large differences later on. It’s what gave rise to the example that plenty of us Pandas know that if you traveled back in time and accidentally stepped on a leaf, you’d likely end up changing the entire course of history.
#7
Invention of the printing press lead to very fine type that people often found they could not read without the aid of glasses. Increased glass productions meant a rise in quality and a drop in price. As a result telescopes and microscopes also became better quality and more accessible. This lead to people like Isaac Newton or Gregor Mendel making new discoveries in the sciences eventually leading to the enlightenment period.
Hannah Hudson-Lee 4 years ago
Additional: About the same time as these developments in printing and glass making, they had folding reading glasses. I always wondered if this also helped lead to the invention of microscopes and telescopes, as people noticed what happens when you look through two lenses.
Prashant Karnath 4 years ago
There is a theory that because of China's obsession with porcelain, the use of glass never caught on which held back various advancements in science in that region. Not sure how true that is...
Hannah Hudson-Lee 4 years ago
I have heard that about the porcelain before too. There is also a theory, often discussed by Prof Alan Chapman, that part of the reason why glass making took off so strongly in Europe was that Europeans like wine and beer. The colour and clarity or cloudiness of the wine or beer is one way to judge its quality. Therefore, people liked to drink out of glasses so that they could see that what they were drinking was of an acceptable quality. Cue a high demand fir glassware.
Load More Replies... KatHat 4 years ago
A very minor note that when used as a past tense, it's spelled "led". It's confusing because "lead" can also be pronounced like "led", but when it is, it always means the metal. English is annoying ;)
Hannah Hudson-Lee 4 years ago
However annoying the English language may be, it's not as annoying as people who try to correct my grammar when I haven't made a mistake.
Load More Replies... #8
A little Cuban boy being rescued at sea on his way to Florida created the world we now live in. In 1999, Elian Gonzalez was picked up by a fisherman, floating in the ocean after the boat he and his mother were on sank. His mother died, but he survived and was taken to Miami where he had relatives. His father still lived in Cuba, and obviously he wanted the boy back. There was a long custody battle between the Miami relatives and the boys father, in which the Clinton administration backed sending him back to Cuba. In April of 2000, federal agents stormed the home the boy was staying in and took him into custody, and returned him to Cuba.
There was absolute outrage from the Cuban-American population in Miami. This all took place in an election year in which Clinton's Vice President was running for President. The Cuban-American voters did not forget what happened when they went to the polls that November. George W. Bush won the state by 500 votes.
If that whole saga had not taken place, Al Gore most certainly would have been able to get at least 500 more votes among the Cuban-American voters. And had he become president instead of Bush, there is really no way to calculate just how different the world of today would be.
Mazer 4 years ago
I remember this, the entire incident on tv. Not certain I would agree this had such a negative impact on the general election especially given Florida’s being a Republican favored State and Jeb Bush being Governor of Florida at the time.
Alex Boyd 4 years ago
If we were talking about any other election year, I'd agree with you, but in 2000, the whole thing came down to a relative handful of votes in Florida--where the biggest concentration of Cuban-Americans live.
Load More Replies... KatHat 4 years ago
It is unequivocal that Al Gore won Florida and the election was stolen from him through a mixture of disenfranchising thousands of Black voters, some other count chicanery, and the Brooks Brothers Riots, led by none other than Roger Stone (yes, that asshole who's still criming), which led to the count being stopped and SCOTUS handing the win to GWB. Republicans have been cheating for a very long time and to try to deflect, they claim others are doing so, Problem is, there's tons of evidence for their cheating and none for what they claim.
Yvonne Riggs 4 years ago
I watched the whole thing on TV and was horrified that that boy was sent back to Cuba. His mother died trying to ensure his freedom. Whatever happened to "send us your tired your poor your huddled masses yearning to breathe free"
Vicky Z 4 years ago
However what happens there does affect the world... the terrorist attack at the world trade center for example affected the whole world and all the security regulations changed everywhere after that day!
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Analyn Lahr 4 years ago
I was in Jr. High at the time so all I remember is Florida taking so long counting votes. I didn't know about this story.
Leodavinci 4 years ago
This is not even remotely accurate. Biden won by a greater percentage than Trump did in 2016.
Load More Replies... #9
The reason French Classic cuisine dominates is because they were the first ones to get wide spread fancy restaurants.
This happened because they overthrew their nobility and all these out of work private cooks decided to make their own restaurants. By the time everyone else caught up all the masters were french and then taught everyone else french classical cuisine.
Seán Baron 4 years ago
Before everyone had a French chef cooking for them, all the Royal Houses would have a Portuguese chef cooking their food.
Strahd Ivarius 4 years ago
Unfortunately the first restaurants in Paris opened well before the French Revolution... La Tour d'Argent dates back to the XVIth century for example...
Imagine your shock when you travel back to the present and you can hardly recognize anything at all. You might have accidentally given rise to a Dinosaur Dystopia. Or created a species of incredibly angry walking trees that protect their leaves with their lives. Or… you may have accidentally started the chain of events that lead you to travel back in time in the first place, creating an endless loop.
#10
King Henry VIII, introducer of state protestantism, serial divorcee, dissolver of the monasteries and father of Queen Elizabeth I, herself a hugely influential monarch, was not supposed to be king.
Henry was the 'spare' and his elder brother Arthur was heir to Henry VII's throne.
Had Arthur not died of a mystery illness - which nearly also killed Catherine of Aragon - Henry would have occupied a place in history similar to other second sons. Compare the current Prince Harry and whatever his role will be presuming William accedes to the throne.
Britain would have likely remained Catholic, very much a European country. Relations with Ireland and the continent would have played very differently, and it's very likely America as we know it would be entirely different as a result.
Not to mention that since Catherine of Aragon was first married to Arthur, she would not wed Henry, and so Queen Mary would have never existed.
Henry wouldn't have married Anne Boleyn, as it is unlikely that he would have been divorced and on the rebound looking for a new queen. Anne was also intending to marry another, and Wolsey wouldn't have had any need to step in to stop it. Elizabeth I is thus not born.
English history pivots on Arthur's death. Who knows what the world would be like if he hadn't died.
𝖊𝖆 4 years ago (edited)
Think as well of Sir Frances Drake - he had so many naval campaigns and brought in many new foods to England. He was very close friends with Elizabeth I. Things would be very different today! If Mary hadn’t have been born, she wouldn’t have married a Spanish King, so Britain’s relationship with Spain and Europe would be different. Henry always wanted a war with France, just too many possibilities.
Seán Baron 4 years ago
Henry only converted to Protestantism because it suited his needs. Prior to his conversion he wrote a published essay that denounced Martin Luther and the rise of the Protestant version of Christianity. So impressed was Pope Clement VII that he gave Henry the title of Fidei Defensor - Defender of the Faith. There was a fa tips of the English population who liked the new Protestant faith, and Anne Boleyn was a notable figure. She was the one who encouraged Henry as she would not sleep with him u til they were married. Ow the title Fidei Defensor was meant to cease after Henry's death, but after being excommunicated by the Pope - which privately Henry was concerned with - Wolsey then makes Henry head of the Church of England, and He Fy! Makes sure his son would continue that title. Which is why you always see the initials F.D. on the back of all British coins.
Seán Baron 4 years ago
On a side note, when it was certain Queen Anne wasn't going to have a child survive her, when they were looking round as to who could succeed her, they settled on Sophia, of Hannover. She was 57th on the list. The previous 56 people were all Catholic and wouldn't convert to Protestantism to claim the British throne.
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Carol Emory 4 years ago
He wasn't a serial divorcee...he was a serial widower. He executed all but one of his wives. The one he didn't execute was out of touch for him because she was related to King Charles I. If he had executed her..he would have been squashed like a bug. Instead, he formed the Church of England with the aim at divorcing his first wife so he could remarry. His driving force behind this...to have a son to rule after he was gone. Little did he know that the gene that determines sex comes from men. Thus he could have married a 100 women, as long as he kept producing X chromosomes, he wasn't getting any sons.
OhForSmegSake 4 years ago
No the order of his wives goes: divorced, beheaded, died (post-childbirth complications) , divorced, beheaded, survived. Jane Seymour, his third wife, had a son who survived but never lived past childhood.
Load More Replies... aubergine10003 4 years ago
Catherine of Aragon did NOT fall ill with the sweating sickness. Only Arthur did.
AndThenICommented 4 years ago
I think about Henry’s impact on the world often. Nothing would be the same. Exponential stories from those who wouldnt have been slaughtered in the name of Protestant or Catholic could have shaped the world even further. It’s mind boggling to think of
AndThenICommented 4 years ago
I also wonder if the Pope that refused that annulment looked back on everything that happened afterwards and pulled a ‘my bad’ face
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François Carré 4 years ago
Well, this is quite spectacular but it is just one among many "what if..." questions you can ask about the history of monarchies, really. Since their own continuity relies entirely on random things like the birth and the survival of valid heirs. The destiny of the whole country could change from one day to another. And second sons replacing their older brother on the throne and becoming great kings... you really can find a lot of them. See Alfred the Great, just to stay with English History. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_the_Great
NotMe 4 years ago
"it's very likely America as we know it would be entirely different". Is that the USA or the whole continent...? Honest question.
Yort 4 years ago
The country. When people mean the continent they usually say North America, which is what the continent is called.
Load More Replies... Serial pacifist 4 years ago
Also, previous to him breaking away from Catholicism, the pope gave him the title of "Fidei defensor" (defender of the faith) which was even engraved on British coins of the time. Pope obviously regretted it later on.
Analyn Lahr 4 years ago
Mysterious illness or poisoned by scheming younger brother? We'll never know.
Ivy la Sangrienta 4 years ago
Oh please. Arthur died of the sweating sickness (an epidemic at the time) when Henry was only 10 years old when his brother died.
Load More Replies... #11
Isaac Newton caused the rise of communism in China.
In the later years of his life, Isaac Newton was promoted to "the master of the Royal Mint". This was suppose to be a ceremonial position, but Newton took the job seriously. One of the biggest changes he set about was altering Britain's silver standard. He put a fixed exchange rate on Gold and Silver within the country, and that exchange rate made silver worth less than it's metal value on the open market. So, Gold became the defacto reserve currency of Britain itself while silver was used extensively as an export in trade.
Fast forward about a century, and Britain is still using a version of Isaac Newton's exchange rate, so silver still is effectively the trade metal of the mighty British Empire. Britain's Empire starts to extensively trade with China, particularly for Chinese tea. The English were positively addicted to Chinese tea. Ten percent of the government's revenue at that time
However, the Chinese would only accept one good, silver. The Chinese Emperor refused to accept ANY other trade good except silver. So all of Britain's silver reserves were flowing East to China. Eventually, however, the British found a good the Chinese would accept, Opium. They grew Opium in India, let the smugglers take it to China, and get their precious silver back.
This led to the Opium wars. China lost BADLY, and was forced to sign horribly one sided treaties with the West. The nation was a shadow of a it's former glory, split along political and ethnic tensions that had been previously suppressed by the strong central government.
The Chinese empire fell in 1912, replaced by a Republic. This Republic... was not very democratic, to say the least. This eventually dragged China back into civil war, which made it weak enough to be invaded by Japan.
While the Japanese were driven back, China was still in political/economic ruin. Mao was able to seize control of the Chinese Mainland and founded the People's Republic of China.
Samantha Lomb 4 years ago
Newton oversaw the execution of counterfeiters, so that seems a bit more than "ceremonial"
Load More Replies... Analyn Lahr 4 years ago
Another historical event where the British love of tea plays a role. If there isn't a book called How Tea Changed the World, there should be.
Seán Baron 4 years ago
The Opium wars was so Britain could try and take over China's tea business. They may have won the war but they never got to control the tea. Back in India, whilst exploring the country, they came across a hill covered in tea bushes. Britain finally had its tea business.
Yugan Talovich 4 years ago
The Qing ended in 1911, not 1912. Saying the following government was not democratic is like saying somebody just recovered from cancer but can't do a triathlon. Do you think Mao brought democracy?
Samantha Lomb 4 years ago
Literally no one said that. The post says the lack of democracy resulted in a civil war which weakened the country, making it easier for the Japanese to invade.
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#12
A virus caused world War 2:
Woodrow Wilson was sick with the epic flu of 1918 during the negotiation process for the treaty of Versailles after the first world War. He would have pushed for less punitive provisions on Germany but he was largely absent from the process due to his illness. Instead the treaty imposed incredibly destructive restrictions on Germany, leading to a collapsed economy, resentment, and a nation clamoring for a strong leader to make things right again in Germany. Enter Hitler stage right.
Shelp 4 years ago
That's a bit of an oversimplification. German militarism and its eastern expansionism has existed from the beginning of the 20th century, and that's a well documented fact. And Hitler was initially elected because of the economic crisis of 1929, not because of the treaty of Versailles (if it wasn't for the economy he would've been elected as soon as 1923, the year he made his first coup). So maybe the war would have looked different if it wasn't for the treaty of Versailles, but I don't think it could have avoided it.
lara 4 years ago
There are so many over-simplifications in both statements, both yours and the original that it would take a book to examine it. Oh, wait THERE are MANY books on this one subject and all of them are incomplete because, except for Barry's "The Great Influenza" they ignore Wilson being sick with the flu.
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Nicola Dimigen 4 years ago
Actually, if Hitlers brother hadn't run away, then hitler never would have been the person he was in history. But as e all know, WW2is actually Austrailia's fault, as they had the chance to kill Hitler, and didn't.
Kiara Eagar 4 years ago
That's not entirely true. South African president/war genural Jan Smutts said the exact same thing at the treaty. He said you will have a revolt if you punish them to harsly. And the rest of the treaty members ignored him and basically said the war didnt destroy a lot of your infrastructure so you cant talk about what is fair for us to expect back from Germany. So viruses or not. He Woodrow Wilson probably would have been ignored too
The butterfly effect is a common trope in movies, books, and the media, often standing in for the idea that tiny changes can have huge consequences. It’s great when it comes to getting all of us thinking about hypotheticals and ‘what if’ scenarios. Personally, I spend a sizeable chunk of my time thinking about what would’ve happened differently in history if even a few small changes could’ve been introduced.
Previously, Haythamj told Bored Panda about historical domino effects. "Everything is interlinked. You can track WW2 and therefore the Cold War and 9/11 back to Christopher Columbus, so it’s just really interesting," Haythamj told us just how connected everything really is.
#13
When Japan and Germany finally lost World War 2 they had tons of manufacturing ability, yet were banned from building a military for however long. They looked at Detroit's success in the auto industry and approached the market each in their own way. To this day we have luxury and economy cars from across two different oceans competing with our domestic vehicles because they lost the war.
Robert T 4 years ago
Not only that but it was aeroplane manufacturers that turned to building cars - the blue and white of the BMW logo actually represents an aeroplane propeller against the sky. Heinkel and Messerschmitt started building bubble cars and particularly the Messerschmitt bears an uncanny resemblance to an aeroplane fusilage.
Lucky 4 years ago
As BMW means Bayrische Motoren Werke (Bavarian Motor Works), the blue-white comes from the bavarian flag.
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Seán Baron 4 years ago
The domestic vehicles were tiny initially. Which is why Japan has the Kei cats, which must comply with rules over size, weight, power etc. Volkswagen though was saved by a British Army officer, Major Ivan Hirst got the factory running again, a prototype of the car Hitler helped design had survived the bombing of the factory and got to making the car. It hardly sold at first but Major Hirst managed to persuade people to put orders in. Four years later he tried to sell the company to Rover, Renault and Peugeot, but they refused p. So he gave it to the German Government. It's now the largest car company in the world.
Michael Isaacson 4 years ago
But it did take 25 years for them to begin to sell in the US in numbers and they won because the products were better made than US vehicles. The VW Beetle got traction earlier because it was cheap.
#14
Science historian James Burke's brilliant 10-part BBC TV series Connections is composed of dozens of examples of this phenomenon.
It primarily explores the surprising checker-jumps that occur within science and technology itself, but it also frequently touches on the unexpected, often profound political and social consequences of someone, somewhere, discovering or inventing something that at first sight seems inconsequential.
For example, the second episode begins with the bronze age discovery that sheepskins could be used to collect the tiny specks of gold suspended in the Turkish rivers of Pactolus and Hermus (the "Golden Fleece"), and traces a direct line from that insight, to the dropping of the bombs that exploded over Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.
It's a highly watchable and entertaining series, available on Amazon and (I think) YouTube. Highly recommended to people who want to learn of some practical examples of the Butterfly Effect.
The series was also condensed into a well-illustrated companion book that makes for fascinating bedtime reading. No longer in print, but readily available both online and in many community libraries.
Burke went on to produce The Day the Universe Changed (a little more linear), then Connections 2 and Connections 3, which continued to explore the surprisingly profound and seemingly far-flung effects of small changes and discoveries.
tuzdayschild 4 years ago
I used to watch this when I was little. I didn't understand a lot if it but was fascinated anyway.
Azure Adams 4 years ago
My history teacher used to make us watch these in 10th grade. They were such bad quality because his VHS tapes were so old and this dude speaks with such a lisp that I never could understand what was going on
Jill Hojnacki 4 years ago
Thank you. The book does not appear to be out of print. It’s available on Amazon. I just bought the Kindle version.
#15
Duct tape. The Watergate burglars put a piece of duct tape on a lock on a door at the Watergate apartments so the door would not lock shut. The security guard noticed that tape, opened the door and caught the burglars-the rest is history. Brought down an American president and changed history forever
Dave P 4 years ago
Interesting note, the man Nixon hired had been a former CIA agent who while at the CIA did illegal dirty work for President Johnson in bugging the Goldwater HQ in 1964 and bugging journalists critical of Johnson. He later resigned from the CIA over what he felt was the moral issue if using official govt employees and funds to do these things. Later he made himself a "investigator" for hire, using these skills for Politicians, Corporations, and more.
Kathryn Baylis 4 years ago
Had they used tape the same color as the door frame, maybe they would’ve succeeded. Imagine if Nixon hadn’t resigned.
Rez Fidel 4 years ago
Wasn´t there a guy seeing the flashlights of the burglars from another building who called the cops?
Seán Baron 4 years ago
Eisenhower was asked in 1960 "of which of the policies put forward by your administration has the Vice President (Nixon) participated in." Ike replied " give me a week and I'll think of one".
#16
One of the worst movies ever made directly led to rise of one of the most beloved actors of our generation - and he wasn't even in the film. When Cannon Films bought the rights to the Superman movie series, they really wanted Christopher Reeve to play the part one more time. He reluctantly agreed, but only on condition that Cannon make his pet project, Street Smart, about a reporter who becomes famous after faking a story. Superman IV, needless to say, was a disaster of legendary proportions, in no small part because Cannon slashed the budget by more than half just before filming started. They did make Street Smart, which got decent reviews but fizzled at the box office. Critics generally agreed that there was one standout performer in Street Smart, playing a violent, murderous pimp. This actor was best known, if at all, for having been on the kids' show The Electric Company in the seventies, but his performance in Street Smart was a revelation and earned him his first Oscar nomination. And that's why MORGAN FREEMAN probably wouldn't have a career today if not for Superman IV.
Mazer 4 years ago
Over simplification, Morgan has been acting since he was 12 and recognized when performing on Broadway. I love the guys work.
Kathryn Baylis 4 years ago (edited)
Yes, but there are lots of steadily working actors we never hear about, because they never get that one breakout role that gets them noticed by the right people who can make them a household name. Morgan Freeman could very well have ended up as one of that vast number of working unknowns, instead of the icon he is today.
Load More Replies... #17
There was a Greek man named Nicholas who sold all he had to help orphans and also preformed many miracles. Nick was a man who loved Jesus. He was very well known and very popular throughout Europe. In the Netherlands they called him ‘Sinterklaas’… a translation of Saint Nicholas.
In the 1823 Clement Clark Moore wrote the poem ‘A visit from St. Nicholas’ which later became ’Twas the Night Before Christmas’ after it’s first line. The greedy toy sellers jumped all over this and ‘Santa Claus’ was born.
Everything we do has ripple effects through time.
tiari 4 years ago (edited)
Saint Nicholas brought presents to children LONG before the Americans invented Santa Claus. It's documented since the 15th century.
WilvanderHeijden 4 years ago
It's documented since the 13th century when they set his nameday ( the day that he died) on December 6. Since than his role has changed from matchmaker to the old dude with a beard riding a white horse who gives presents to good children.
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Trillian 4 years ago
Der heilige Nikolaus (German for Saint Nicholas) still comes to give little presents to German kids on the night of his name day (Dec 6th). He was from Myra, which is in today's Turkey.
SoozeeQ 4 years ago
Yes, I thought he was from Turkey, not from Greece. I came here to say that, then saw your comment.
Load More Replies... Katinka Min 4 years ago
Martin Luther is also responsible for the gifting at Christmas and the lights in trees. And St Nicholaus still exists, in Europe. he visits on the 6th od December. Santa Claus is just an extra figure, here.
Kusotare 4 years ago
There's considerable doubt that Clement Clark Moore actually wrote "A Visit from St. Nicholas". He never claimed to have written it, but later in life had no problem with others attributing it to him. The work, though, bears absolutely no resemblance to anything else known to have been written by him, and is in many respects anathema to his expressed opinions and values.
Stannous Flouride 4 years ago
He was born in what is now Turkey when it was part of the Roman Empire.
Kira Okah 4 years ago
St Nicholas? Greek. Born in Asia Minor, Roman Empire.
Load More Replies... #18
Laki. The biggest volcano in iceland erupted in 1783. This resulted in a year without a summer as the earth was blanketed by sulfur particles in the stratosphere, and poisonous fumes drifting all across europe, killing people and livestock. A perpetual fog and haze was noted in both europe and north america. This resulted in widespread famine, exacerbating the ongoing social grievances in france, triggering what would come to be called the french revolution. Famine weakened other regions as well, aiding Napoleon's invasion of egypt. The napoleanic wars set europe on the course towards german and itialian unification, setting the stage for WWI. The conclusion of that war made WWII essentially inevitable. Which in turn made the cold war essentially inevitable. All of modern history was set in motion by a rising plume of magma under a sparsely populated island in the north atlantic.
Kathryn Baylis 4 years ago
Now this is an example of the devastation a minor, and temporary, climate change can bring. Now imagine what will happen when the major, and long term, climate change we’re now on the brink of is allowed to happen. We are fast approaching the point of no return, and must enact sweeping changes now, because I don’t know about you, but I do not want to live in that world.
Sue Knerl 4 years ago
I don't either and no one is really doing anything about it. Look at the weather this year, drought, floods, hurricanes, tornados in NJ fer-chris-sakes!
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Katinka Min 4 years ago
A 'nuclear winter' ist not exactly a small thing, though. Most people have no idea what we'll be dealing with due to the climate crisis. The fight for survival of billions of people will lead to lots of wars
David Butler 4 years ago
The "Year Without a Summer" also lead to Mary Shelley writing "Frankenstein".
#19
You can sorta trace 9/11 and the origins of ISIS back to a dog getting killed in 1950's texas.
Dog enters City Councillor Charles Hazard's yard. Hazard feeds it food mixed with glass. Spoiler: Dog doesn't make it. We're all sad.
In a way-less-cool-than-John-Wick moment, young ex-dog owner Charlie Wilson decided he's going to ruin Hazard's career.
He organises people to vote against Hazard's re-election and succeeds. Bolstered by his success he begins a career in politics, eventually becoming a state senator at the age of 27.
As a member of the House appropriations committee, Wilson lobbies for funds to bolster a group called the Taliban, fighting for the soviet-occupied Afghanistan.
Look, doesn't he look happy with his Taliban friends?
The US pushed the money through Pakistan, so as to not be directly linked with actions against the Soviets.
Pakistan became the common training ground of all kinds of rebels and fighters, arming and training them to fight in Afghanistan. One of the people trained in Pakistan is a civil engineer, son of a Saudi billionaire, Osama Bin Laden.
Taliban forces beat the soviets out of Afghanistan, creating their theocratic religious state. Pakistan is just kinda happy that they 'won'.
Al Quaeda plans and carries out 9/11, pushing their religious and political agenda in new and interesting ways. Apparently not interesting enough though, as two Al Quaeda members decide that flying planes into civilian cities isn't a bad enough thing they can do, so they break off and begin ISI, later renamed ISIL and ISIS.
TLDR; Charles Hazard: Responsible for dog murder and ISIS.
Samantha Lomb 4 years ago
Someone should have feed Charles food mixed with glass. But it was certainly more than one law maker who was responsible for supporting the Taliban. And the US has a LONG history of supporting horrible regimes if they were anti-communist.
Frank Ropen 4 years ago
Mujahideen != Taliban The Taliban emerged from parts of the Mujahideen, while the rest formed the Northern Alliance. The Taliban are based on an islamic movement from Deoband, India.
Dave P 4 years ago
Actually part of this is a myth, the US never actually funded the Taliban. There were many groups in Afghanistan, of the 8 the US funded, 7 became the Northern Alliance which stood against the Taliban and helped the US invade in 2001. One of them did join the Taliban...in 1994. Renown award winning Investigative Journalist Richard Miniter, debunked these claims in his book "Disinformation: 22 Media Myths That Undermine the War on Terror" where he addressed Right-Wing myths, Left-Wing myths, and General Myths.
Katinka Min 4 years ago
I think it's safer to sy that American foreign politics in general led to 9/11
#20
I hope this counts. The day that Reagan was shot, Russia had been planning to invade Poland. But when he was shot, the Kremlin thought the world would blame them for an assassination attempt to disrupt the US so that Russia could seize Poland, they backed out. Probably saved many lives/averted WWIII
Samantha Lomb 4 years ago
I'd love to see a source on this because it sounds like bunk. First Russia was not an independent nation at the time and Poland was a Soviet satellite state.
Robin Roper 4 years ago
Not on the day Reagan was shot but around that time the USSR was concerned about the rise of the Polish United Workers' Party but you are right, there is no evidence the USSR was going to actually intervene in these matters in Poland. At the time, there was some fear/concern that the USSR may take advantage of Reagan's shooting to possibly intervene but there is no supporting evidence they actually were or would have. The post in inaccurate.
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Łukasz Markuszewski 4 years ago
According to Viktor Kulikov, who was commander in chief of Warsaw Pact, Poland did ask USSR for help to cope with Solidarity movement, but soviets refused as they had a lot of problems in Afganistan, and they were afraid that invasion on Poland may cause much more damage and make opposition even stronger that it was at the moment. Polish communist government had to tackle independent unions alone.
#21
This is going to get buried, but Ron Goldman was murdered because Nicole Brown Simpson's Mom dropped a pair of sunglasses. Nicole and Ron didn't know each other that well. They did not have plans to be together the night someone (OJ) committed the murders. But Nicole and her Mom had lunch at the restaurant where Ron Goldman was a waiter and Nicole's Mom dropped her sunglasses. Ron noticed them after the women had left, contacted Nicole, and she arranged for him to drop off the sunglasses at her house after he got off work. This extra errand put him at Nicole's house when she was murdered and led to him being murdered as well. All because some lady dropped her sunglasses.
Keri Bladi 4 years ago
I wonder how much that trial helped Robert Kardashian and his family in gaining enough: money, connections and social status. But sure as hell gave them publicity. We can certainly find a moment that could affect OJ's sports career, if it was played the other way. And that moment would lead to a world without Kardashians.
Monkey Love 4 years ago
I recently heard someone declare that it was OJ's oldest son. That's why the gloves didn't fit, etc. That OJ was taking the fall to cover for him because he knew the evidence wouldn't convict him. Which, in the end it didn't.
Dodo 4 years ago
That would make sense. Though it's not like OJ was a great person, he definitely could have done it.
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#22
At the first major battle of his historic campaign to establish the largest empire the world had ever known, the Battle of the Granicus, Alexander the Great was hit by a Persian battle axe and stunned. A Persian noble raise his sword to bury it in Alexander's head from behind, when Cleitus the Black (who Alexander would later kill in a drunken fit of rage) swooped in and severed the Persian's sword arm at the shoulder. If Cleitus had swung a second later, Alexander would have gone down in history not as Alexander the Great, but as the foolish, impudent young son of Philip who tried to take on an enemy that vastly outnumbered his own forces, and paid with his life. There would have been no Hellenistic age, no Ptolemic dynasty in Egypt, no Cleopatra. There would have been no Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, and probably no Jesus, since the civil wars in Judea were instigated by Hellenistic influence. The entire course of Western Civilization was changed forever by Cleitus's well-timed strike.
Kathryn Baylis 4 years ago
Too bad Alexander forgot about that later on, and not gotten drunk and belligerent, and killed Cleitus.
Stannous Flouride 4 years ago
And no Rosetta Stone that made the translations of Egyptian hieroglyphics possible.
Azure Adams 4 years ago
I know what I want to go back to in a time machine once those get invented...
thefaithfulspouse 4 years ago
There would have been no Jesus? No, he would just have lived in a different atmosphere. He was always going to be born.
Steve Riddle 4 years ago
Jesus was invented by the Roman royalty to make the Hebrews passive. The Roman Piso family wrote the New Testament. Yeshua (Jesus) meant "Servant" 2,000 years ago.
Load More Replies... #23
the Chinese inventing porcelain.
the Chinese were technologically more advanced than Europe pretty much all throughout the time between the fall of the Roman Empire and the Renaissance. but they invented porcelain.
Europe was envious of porcelain and it was something Kings and rich people sought to posses. so naturally a lot of people tried recreating it.
this led to the invention and refining of working glass.
glass is the single most important material basically all modern science is based on, it allows to create lenses.
lenses are used in microscopy leading to us discovering bacteria and basing modern medicine and the effects of longer life spans the ability to treat and eradicate whole diseases that previously were lethal.
lenses are used in astronomy and navigation, which enabled European Nations like England Spain France the Netherlands and Portugal (and a few others like Belgium Italy and later Germany) to spread all over the globe colonizing the planet, securing vast amounts of resources and spreading their culture.
So if the Chinese didn't have porcelain they'd probably would have invented glass, and that a few centuries earlier than Europe, the world would have looked vastly different today.
Kira Okah 4 years ago
It's way older than that. 6th century BC for early synthetic glassmaking, developing into true glassmaking around 2000 BC. To date porcelain - porcelain creation began in the Shang Dynasty (c 1600-1046 BC), developing into high fired porcelainware in the Han Dynasty (25-220 AD).
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Nadja Lambacher 4 years ago
There is a story that an alchemist was locked up in Germany, not to be released until he produced gold. He instead was able to figure out how porcelain was made, which until then only the Chinese were able to do. And so Meissner Porzellan came to be.
Peter Hughes 4 years ago
Arguably just as important was glass allowed for spectacles. Older Chinese experts retired early, European experts went on til they died inventing more and passing on their skills to younger apprentices...
AndThenICommented 4 years ago
OP forgot to give a nod to fibre optics (glass). The strands have their own butterfly effect which kinda starts with a professor trying to prove a point, shooting heated glass like an arrow and creating thin filaments. Our world has been running on them b**ches for decades now.
#24
How about Pope Julius II asking Michelangelo to design his tomb? Michelangelo comes up with a massive design involving 40 statues. Julius II sees the design, realizes it would require more than a mere renovation of Old St. Peter’s to accommodate the tomb, decides to raze the old and to erect a totally new St. Peter’s Basilica. Funding of the new basilica leads to the selling of indulgences, which leads to Martin Luther opposing the selling of indulgences, which leads to the 95 Theses and the start of the Protestant Reformation. Which leads to numerous wars, displacements of people, migrations, to the New World, et cetera.
lara 4 years ago
One point, YES religion and religious freedom played a huge role in the founding of America, but the single MOST important reason for the colonization of America was land. Because in American a commoner COULD OWN LAND. Something that was not possible in Europe. Because in Europe the king own all the land and "allowed" his nobles the "use" of the land either in perpetuity or for length of service. The only "free air" were cities. Private ownership of land is the basis for a free nation.
Steve Riddle 4 years ago
All the best land was owned by the Wealthy. Land stolen from the Indigenous people.
Load More Replies... #25
Glasnost/Perestroika, the fall of the USSR and the Berlin Wall were accelerated by an Ukrainian power plant night shift team deliberately turning the safety systems off, causing an explosion that irradiated vast swathes of Ukraine and Belarus.
The ensuing poopstorm and attempted cover up by the government, the mass evacuation of hundreds of thousands of people and a load of people dying from health issues relating to radiation caused confidence in the Soviet government to plummet further. It gave satellite states confidence to start declaring independence, led to Nicolae Ceausescu being executed and a reunified Germany.
If the disaster at Chernobyl hadn't happened* who knows how long the Cold War would have continued for?
Not saying it was a good thing.
Robert T 4 years ago (edited)
Chernobyl dumped radioactive material over a large proportion of the whole of Europe. Many countries were subject to farming restrictions because of it, including the UK. It was however a steam/pressure explosion and not a nuclear one - it released otherwise contained radioactive material into the atmosphere.
Linda Roy 4 years ago
If the radioactive material had been blown to the eastern part of the USSR instead of the west, would they had even admitted what happened?
Load More Replies... Seán Baron 4 years ago
The Soviet system would have crashed anyway. They realised that their system was broken in the early 1970s. But they pretended it was all okay and normal. This is the invention of the term 'HyperNormalisation'. But their industry was years behind the West, technology was lagging. Pretty much anything that was powered by electricity had to be patched up every now and then. The safety systems at Chernobyl were way out of date and it was only a matter of when not if for something to happen.
Faith Love-robertson 4 years ago
That would be vast swaths not swathes. You can swathe a woman in diamonds and pearls or swathe a wound with bandages, swathe is a verb. But when talking about areas of land or narrow strips of just about anything it is a swath and plural is swaths, swath is a noun.
Patrick Reolon 4 years ago (edited)
ohhhh if the cold war just had ended with the fall of the soviet republic... i can tie some more knots: chernobyl lead to the breakdown of the soviet republic, but not other comunist regimes, so technically the cold war is still going on. it just shifted from nuclear weapons to economic influence... and chernobly eventually just added a big portion of realism to that fear of buclear weapons... Neoliberalism, capitalistic models, "democracy", etc. became just the surrogates for nuclear weapons... So I would say that Chernobyl produced a shift in how things were handled. Aditionally the cold war lead also to USAs activities in arabic countries: Hello Al Kaeda, Bin Laden, Irak, Afghanistan, Taliban and ISIS, etc. etc. etc. So no, the cold war isn't really over... Comunist is still being an insult nowadays... And probably the shift away from nuclear weapons to economic influence is probably also partially a consequence of chernobyl... becuase nuclear became kind of too dirty, nuclear weapons became partially banned, and the menace from distance became partially obsolete, the US began to use democratization as a weapon leading to enhance the political raise of islamic extremists
#26
I'm not American, nor am I a huge history buff, but I recall reading that the events of the Vietnam war could have been drastically different if JFK had not been assassinated.
Dave P 4 years ago
JFK was the one who first put US boots on the ground with 3000 in 1961 and committed the US to protecting 'Nam. JFK was very supportive of getting involved his 1960 election rhetoric. It was Nixon who he ran against who opposed US troops in Vietnam and Nixon would later get US troops out of Nam
Son of Philosoraptor 4 years ago
Kissinger and Nixon delayed exiting Viet Nam to increase his re-election chances. Literally killing American kids for political power.
Load More Replies... Monkey Love 4 years ago
I know how this sounds but....I knew a guy about 15 years ago. He was dorm mates with a Kennedy offspring and they became great friends. After a few years, he'd been invited to events at Kennedy compounds, he felt comfortable enough to ask. He asked if Lee Harvey Oswald was the shooter and did he act alone. He said "yes. Believe me when I say, if it was anyone else do you really think my family wouldn't have taken care of it." I know that's not what this post is about but I felt like it needed to be said because I 100% believe it.
Pungent Sauce 4 years ago
JFK was going to dissolve the Federal Reserve. He died shortly thereafter, and Johnson reversed the order.Yes, we would live in a very different country…
Davis the Greatest 4 years ago (edited)
No shite Sherlock, if he was alive he would have continued making changes. That’s what people do.
Mazer 4 years ago
There is an excellent film on who really was response for the shooting, all signs point to George Hickey, a secret service member riding in a car behind the Presidents limo, accidentally shot the president when the car he was riding in suddenly lurched.
Steve Riddle 4 years ago
There's even a video of him standing up when the car lurches forward and he accidently shoots JFK. But what about the other bullets found and the second wound?
Load More Replies... BrooklynJoe 4 years ago
well, the assassination of the president of the USA is not really a flapping butterfly
lara 4 years ago
Yes, because Kennedy realized the futility of the war. When Johnson became President, he was "bullied" by Kennedy's "advisors" who told Johnson it was his "sacred" duty to follow what Kennedy would have wanted. And so the acceleration of a conflict that Kennedy had decided was a waste of American life. Robert McNamara was the worst of these with regard to stupid decisions. LBJ knew that the Vietnam conflict was a bad "idea" and counseled JFK that an Asian land war was the height of stupid moves. BUT Kennedy was wrapped up in the idea of "saving" France and de Gaulle and so Vietnam.
#27
We exist because an asteroid deviated an inch from it's orbit 4.5 billion years ago.
Arctic Fox Lover 4 years ago
According to scientists, anything and everything exists because of the big bang. Although, also according to scientists, the big bang was silent 🤫
BrooklynJoe 4 years ago (edited)
Yes, 4,5 billion years ago the earth was still in the development phase: extremely hot and liquid. An asterioid hit the earth, bringing iron with it which sank to the middle and is the inner core today. Also with the impact of the asteroid, two big parts were thrown out of the luquid earth. These two parts came back together, forming our moon
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#28
In the last 200 years of the Ran Empire before the split between East and West, there was an invading force coming in from the Middle East and if they were to invade, they would have crushed the Romans. But there was a city-state in the way, it was called Palmyra. The leader at the time, Odenaithus was promised his right to rule over Plamyra by the Invaders if he let them through, and the Roman begged for Palmyra's support. Eventhough the Romans were weaker than the Invaders, Odenaithus decided to help Rome and he ended up saving Rome for 200 more years. And those 200 years were important to the development of our world as it caused the split of the Byzantine Empire and West Rome. Also in that time, Christianity became really popular and would become the dominant religion. If the Invaders had succeeded in their plans, that all wouldn't have happened
#29
The 2016 South Korean political scandal. Ignited from an apprehension of a small crime organization in South Asia, it blew up to multiple organized massive political protests, and ultimately the impeachment of current South Korea president.
#30
Back in 4th century Europe, some guy named Constantine was fighting with some other guy for the throne of the Roman Empire.
Constantine was fighting another battle with the guy, but this time he was failing, outnumbered, losing.
Until, in the beautiful blue sky, came an object which coursed through gracefully and beautifully.
A comet.
Constantine took this as message of God, and beat back the offender.
Then he passed the Edict of Milan.
And that's why Christianity is so widespread today.
Giovanni 4 years ago
The Edict of Milan was signed 3 years before that battle. The conversion of Constantine to christianity was largely mityzed by catholic scholars, he was probably not even catholic himself, he probably followed what is now called the Arian heresy (not to be confused with the aryan ideology)
Serial pacifist 4 years ago
Precisely, Arianism didn't presuppose the godly position of Jesus, although they accepted him as a holy man and messenger. This concept prevailed later on. Arians also had a more "naturalistic" outlook and were not exactly fans of official religious structure (Church).
Load More Replies... Steve Riddle 4 years ago
If the Catholic church hadn't stopped all scientific studies Humans would have probably been on the Moon by 1000 CE.
Steve Riddle 4 years ago (edited)
And the Roman Church became a cult that had so much power it could abuse Men, women, & Children. Half a Billion Indigenous people have been Murdered, Enslaved, & Exploited in the name of Jesus over the last 1700 years.
#31
The lady who fought and legalised abortion in 1970 throughout the US. Read on to find out how she ‘fought’ crimes !!! In 1995, criminologist James Alan Fox and hundreds of statisticians wrote a report for the U.S attorney general that predicted the increase in crime by 15% to 100% over the next decade un-till 2005. The year 1995 saw one of the highest teenage murder rates and homicides. It potentially meant that the country would have a whole generation of violent people in the next decade. It had become a matter of national concern and Bill Clinton addressed it as an important challenge. Year 2000’s crime reports shocked all the statisticians. The crime rates dropped to less than half of that in 1995. The number of murders in the New York city fell from 2,262 in 1990 to 540 in 2005. Now, this decade had seen a great economy, proliferation of gun control laws and several new policing strategies. They are directly related since they happened in the same decade but the government had always made huge efforts on these changes through out the history of the country and that decade was no special. However, another factor was overlooked. Decades of studies showed that a child born into an adverse family environment is far more likely to become a criminal. And the millions of women who wanted to have an abortion were teenage mothers for whom illegal abortions had been too expensive. They were the very women whose children if born, would have been much more likely than average to become criminals. But thanks to Norma that most of these kids weren’t being born after 1970. This powerful cause would have a drastic, distant effect : years later, just as these unborn children would have entered their criminal primes, the rate of crime began to plummet. The reality that the pool of potential criminals had dramatically shrunk by 2005 has been understood only later. The government’s initiatives on policing in that decade were nothing new to the previous ones but the abortion policy changed the game significantly. A butterfly effect I would say.
WilvanderHeijden 4 years ago
Remember this when in 22 years the crime rate in Texas is rocketing and all those criminals walk the streets open carrying guns without any control, without any training, without any background check. "Child in time" will be the song of the year: "You better bow your head, and wait for the ricochet...."
Katrina Ladesic 4 years ago
First comment and this should be way higher. Thank you for this insight.
#32
In 1798 a man called William Jennens went to sign his will, but forgot his glasses behind, so he took the will home and planned to sign it later. William Jennens was thought to be the richest commoner in England at the time of his death, worth an estimated two million pounds (250 million pounds today). He lived in Acton Place in Suffolk, in a very grand house, but only in two tiny little rooms in the cellar, so that the other rooms could be kept grand because he charged visitors to see them. Unfortunately he died before signing the will and the rest of his family started a case to get their hands on the fortune (Jennens vs. Jennens) in 1798 and which did not end until 1915 because the entire estate ran out of money. It was all eaten up by the lawyers.
#33
In my opinion one of the most extreme butterfly effects in human history happened, when Henry VIII. fancied a woman who wouldn’t agree to be his mistress. Normally, this little infatuation would have been less than a footnote of history. But we all know that’s not what happened. Instead Henry, a man the Pope had declared Defender of the Faith for his opposition to Luther, decided to break away from the Catholic Church, and founded his own church, thereby changing history forever. Of course, conflicts between the crown, and the Church weren’t invented by Henry. (Just think of the Road to Canossa.) But what Henry did was qualitatively different. Henry destroyed the limit between state and Church. Or put differently, he put the state in the place of God which essentially made him the original totalitarian. And totalitarians don’t like competition for the people’s loyality, so Henry took big steps against the Catholic Church. Among other things, he dissolved, and nationalized many monasteries and stole as much Church property as he could. But Henry was too weak to keep the stolen goods. So instead of becoming unimaginably rich himself, the real profiteers were his aristocrats. They grabbed as much of the stolen goods as they could, and became super-rich plutocrats. (That’s why from that era onwards, the English aristocrats would live in veritable palaces. Before the dissolution of the monasteries they were nowhere as rich as they became, and they would live in relatively modest mansions.) But this is only the start of this butterfly effect. Over the next couple of centuries, the aristocrats increased their power, and stole more and more land from the common people by a process called enclosure. (And, of course, the aristocrats from the continent soon did the same.) As a result of this, poverty had grown to record levels, when the industrial revolution started, and many erroneously attributed the huge numbers of the poor to the industrial revolution, and free market capitalism. This led to the rise of marxism, which led to the October Revolution. If there had been no October Revolution, the outcome of World War 1 would have been different. If the outcome of WW1 had been different, WW2 wouldn’t have happened as it did. Perhaps, it wouldn’t have happened at all. The same goes for the Cold War, the so-called war on terror, and everything else. Long story short, forget Helen of Troy, and her thousand ships. Compared to Anne Boleyn she was an amateur.
DuchessDegu 4 years ago
The whole Boleyn family rose as spectacularly as they've fallen. There's a great BBC series about it called The Boleyns: A Scandalous Family. Extremely interesting viewing!
#34
It's easy to forget, but back in 2004 Barack Obama was a virtual unknown. That year, he joined the race for Illinois' open Senate seat which was vacated by a retiring Republican. His opponent after the GOP primary was Jack Ryan. Ryan was the ex-husband of Jeri Ryan, the actress famous for playing Seven of Nine on Star Trek Voyager. The two had split up years prior to the election, and had their divorce records sealed. However, during the spring of that year, the Chicago Tribune successfully sued to have the records unsealed. They included allegations that Jack had tried to convince Jeri to have sex in public at swingers' clubs in multiple cities. Naturally, this immediately cratered Ryan's campaign and Obama - who was now running virtually unopposed - was rewarded with a prime speaking slot at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. There he gave a particularly compelling speech that made him a political celebrity overnight. The Illinois GOP then tried to recruit Mike Ditka to replace Ryan, possibly the only man in Illinois with the name recognition to actually win with a handicap like that, but he declined. They instead brought in Alan Keyes, a pointless sacrifice who was completely stomped in November. Obama wins and eventually rides the success of his overwhelming senate victory into 2008 and the White House. To recap: If Jack Ryan doesn't perv out and try to bang Seven of Nine in public, Obama possibly loses his first public campaign and returns to local politics. If Mike Ditka comes in, he might get elected instead. If Obama doesn't have that momentum in 2008, the election is likely Clinton vs. McCain - one that McCain is much more capable of winning. But in either case, the birther issue never appears for Donald Trump to latch onto.
Analyn Lahr 4 years ago
I guess when it came to keeping those divorce records sealed, resistance was futile. ;)
#35
*American War of Independence *France, hating their mortal enemy Britain so much, funnel money into assisting the colonists' own Brexit *Silly France, now bankrupt *"Let them eat bread. Oh no, there goes my head." *Enter Napoleon, (France would have ultimately had the revolution at some point, but their bankruptcy triggering it at that time is what enabled Napoleon's rise) *German states defeated in Napoleonic conquest and organised into larger groups *Germany states, seeing their vulnerability, are ultimately united under Prussian rule. *1871 - Franco/German rule. germany victors capture Alsasce Lorraine *France not happy, tensions rise in Europe *WW1 *Treaty of Versailles destroys Germany - Weimar Republic established (widely unpopular) *"This isn't fair," said the starving German. "You know what we need? Strong, stable leadership." *Seig Heil
#36
If a foiled assassin hadn't stopped to eat a sandwich, 9/11 wouldn't have happened. The sandwich-eating put the young man in position for Archduke Ferdinand, post assassination-attempt, to drive by. The second time, the assassination was successful. This lead to WWI WWI lead to the Communist Revolution in Russia, the breaking up of the Ottoman Empire (into, among other things, Turkey, Israel, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan.... you see where I'm going), and obviously WWII. WWII lead to an international power vacuum, that became filled by the Cold War. One of the myriad of fronts in the Cold War was in the former Ottoman Empire, where Americans armed religious figures against the Soviets. The fall of the USSR lead to these men, who had been empowered to combat an enemy, realizing that their positions of power were based on having a great enemy to fight. As America was the only great power left... The sandwich was apparently pretty tasty, though.
Lightningstar 4 years ago
uh i don't know where that came from but i think it's the most wrong thing i've ever heard
Load More Replies... #37
A medical student on summer break went to visit his girlfriend on her family's estate. Her dad told him that once he graduated, and if he married his girlfriend, he would be brought into the dad's prestigious allergy practice as a doctor. The father said, one day the business would be his, and he'd have a nice huge home, children, money, respect - its all in front you, young man.
Student flips out over the commitment and responsibility. He decided to take off on a motorbike with his buddy and drive around South America on one last adventure before they settle down.
Hint - they don't come back to his home country of Argentina and he proceeds to promote communism across Latin America.
Che Guevara had a butterfly moment (or at least, that's the story we are told)
#38
Some guy was walking around with a pot he made out of some hard mud and picked a bunch of wild seeds to eat. He was a lazy a**hole though and left it out in the rain, and forgot about his pot full of wet seeds for weeks until the seeds and water turned into this weird tasting stuff that makes you feel funny when you drink it. Not being a selfish bastard, he shares this weird stuff with his friends, who all agree they need more of this stuff. They start building permanent housing(Architecture), learn to domesticate the grains that they used(Farming), and invent a system to fairly trade this drink for other goods like food(Math). all so they could get as much of the stuff as possible. There is a distinct possibility that we are only so advanced as a species because some lazy a**hole left his pot full of wheat/rye in the rain and left it there long enough to turn into beer.(and decided to try drinking the stuff) TLDR:we probably owe modern civilization to the guy who accidentally discovered alcohol.
Mazer 4 years ago
Chemical analyses recently confirmed that the earliest alcoholic beverage in the world was a mixed fermented drink of rice, honey, and hawthorn fruit and/or grape. The residues of the beverage, dated ca. 7000–6600 BCE, were recovered from early pottery from Jiahu, a Neolithic village in the Yellow River Valley. This beverage currently predates the earliest evidence of grape wine from the Middle East by more than 500 years
#39
The French get Corsica from the Genoese in 1767, but the island is technically operating as an independent nation. The French invade in 1768 and establish control in 1769. Napoleon is born the same year, a subject of the French crown. Think of how different history would be if Napoleon was Corsican or Genoese instead of a striving French officer when the revolution started.
#40
When these United States won our independence from the British we had a debt to pay to the French for their involvement in the war and the money we borrowed. In order to pay that debt we shipped and sold goods to the Mediterranean. Very soon after the war we had reports of pirates from the coast of northern Africa taking our ships, plundering our goods, and enslaving our sailors. A few effects came from this pirating: 1: These United States were introduced to Islam. Thomas Jefferson and John Adams went to Briton to meet with the leader of these pirates and found that they didn't do it because of any action taken by our country (as we were very young and hadn't had a chance to really DO anything yet). They stole and enslaved simply because their holy text said they could and should. Thomas Jefferson got his Koran after that meeting in order to better understand these people. 2: These United States created a standing Navy. After being elected president, Jefferson created a Navy to protect and escort our merchants in pirate infested areas. Eventually the Marine Corp. was also created and our first "war" as a young nation was won. We showed we would not pay tribute to any "Dey" for the right of passage through free waters. 3: These United States were clearly defined as "not a christian nation" in the treaty of Tripoli. The extension of the first amendment and the wall of separation between church and state may not be as distinct if the treaty was worded differently. 4: We had a Navy ready for the war of 1812, and it worked. 5: The basic idea of slavery was acceptable until we noticed other countries enslaving our sailors/merchants. It is argued that this whole situation may have promoted the start of the emancipation of coloured people in the new world.
#42
A schoolboy from 500 pupils was selected to deliver a speech to the recently crowned king. The king arrived in the middle of a rain storm and then refused to leave his carriage to enter the auditorium where the young man waited in vain, with all his family in attendance, to make his presentation. The student had to kneel in the rain and make his brief speech in Latin, while the king and Queen listened under the cover of their royal carriage. The year was 1775, Maximillian DeRobespierre speech to the french King Louis XVI and his Queen Marie-Antoinette.
#43
Alexander the Great's death of either illness or poisoning. He was only 32 at the time and could have reigned for decades more. Probably wouldn't have conquered much more (there wasn't much more to conquer), and it's iffy whether he would actually have been a strong administrator, but for sure history would have been very different one way or another. Potentially he could have lived long enough to ensure his empire wasn't quartered after he died, giving the Romans an easier way to divide and conquer the eastern Mediterranean.
#44
A general who was not power hungry was picked to be top banana for once, we don't have an emperor but this newfangled thing called a president. Just remember and be glad, we were one George Washington away from being ruled by a despotic ruler for life.
Analyn Lahr 4 years ago
They wanted him to be king but he was like "we just got away from a King George, do you see the issue here?"
#45
While WW1 was raging, Germany decided to put Lenin and Stalin on a train back to Russia with a suitcase full of money, hoping they stirred up some trouble that hurt Russia's war effort. Not a bad strategy. The last eighty years of world history would be very different if this had not happened though. Even if Lenin did not get on that train alone, r/reseph would probably still be a contemptibly obnoxious person though.
Fred L. 4 years ago
Some errors. Lenin was on a train, right, together with several other revolutionaries (and eventually more trains with more people were sent). However Lenin and others, being in Switzerland, had tried to negotiate travel with Britain and France before (both declining). Then they negotiated with Germany, which agreed. However that was after the February Revolution, the monarchy already ended, so Russia was already extremely hurt. Stalin, however, was in Russia at that time, his exile having been in Siberia.
#46
Some guy got kicked out of art school and we got WWII
#47
The Swiss Guard of the Vatican inadvertently caused the Church of England to be founded. In brief, some bored mercenaries working for the Holy Roman Empire decided to invade Rome. 189 of the Swiss Guard held off thousands of troops long enough for Pope Clement VII to retreat to the Castel Sant'Angelo. Pope Clement VII survives the attack and later refuses to grant a divorce to Henry VIII, and the rest is history.
Laura Mende (Human) 4 years ago
"Then the 189, in the service of heaven, protecting the holy line, it was 1527!" Sabaton, The Last Stand. Worth listening!!!
#48
Archduke Frans Ferdinand's assassination eventually leading to the Holocaust Austro-Hungary declares war on Serbia, who is an ally of Russia, so Russia declares war on Austro-Hungary, who is and ally of Germany, so Germany declares war on Russia, who is an ally of France, so France declares war on Germany and Austro-Hungary Germany invades France through Belgium, who is an ally of Great Britain, so Great Britain declares war on Germany when the war ends in Armistice , Germany gets laid with chief blame for the war that started between Serbia and Austro-Hungary, and they pay most of the War Reparations, as well as having their government replaced with the Weimar Republic. Weimar is fairly ineffective, so economic decay and inflation set in For reason i don't understand, anti-semitism is pervasive throughout history and nations, so preexisting prejudices are in place to be exploited. Hitler and the National Socialist Workers Party are elected into the government (and proceed to make sure they can't be elected out) and i guess you people know the rest.
#49
The British Empire was started by pirates. Britain is a seafaring nation Due to its reliance on ships for fishing, trading, exploring, etc. it had the most advanced marine technology, and trained seamen When pirates captured merchant chips they used them for trading and set up trading posts abroad Pirates were also sponsored by the Monarchy if they captured ‘Enemy’ ships (those of the Spanish, French, and Dutch) Buccaneer - Wikipedia The Trading Posts set up abroad were commonly then set up as companies, and became ‘Legal’ in their dealings To a large extent, this is how English became the accepted language of trading In effect, the British ‘Conquered’ lands by trading, as against conquering by war It happened that the period of the first Industrial Revolution, started in Britain, opened the way for global trading, and the world was ready International trade
#50
That even though a few presidents and politicians are blamed, it was President Woodrow Wilson (in office from 1914 to 1921) who was responsible for the Vietnam War. In 1919 a young Ho Chi Minh was living in France and approached the delegations at Versailles to consider an independent Vietnam. In particular he sent a letter to president Wilson (who advocated for the sovereign independence of nations following WWI) explaining that he wished to create his new country based on the US Democratic model, citing the Declaration of Independence as an influential document. Wilson and other Western leaders flat out rejected the notion (since France was an ally but also largely considered because of racism since Wilson was a segregationist and noted racist) and rejected an audience for Ho Chi Minh. Later the Vietnamese revolutionary would court the Communist ideology, and the rest is history.
lara 4 years ago
Well, actually, no. During WWII, OSS agents contacted Ho and told him if he would help fight against the Japanese in Indochina, the US would recognize an independent Vietnam after WWII and support their independence from France as a French colony. FDR was so wrapped up in being FDR that he failed to bring Truman into his confidence. After WWII, Truman, who had no idea that FDR had ok Vietnam independence from France, was persuaded to continue supporting our "brave" allies, the French in regaining their colonies. And thus, the Vietnam war. Yalta was more about destroying US alliances with our allies than ending the war. Stalin and FDR, literally, excluded both England and France from any discussions on post-war Europe and the world.
#51
A few: • Adolf Hitler being denied by the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna. This forced him to join the military in World War I and his experience in the military drastically shaped his views. • Franz Ferdinand visiting Sarajevo on the 28th of June, which is Vivdovan, a Serbian nationalist holiday. Serbian nationalists such as the 19 year old Gavrilo Princep (who assassinated Ferdinand) believed that a symbol of foreign imperialism such as their Archduke visiting Sarajevo was an unacceptable insult. • When Mark Sykes of the British Empire and Francois George-Picot of France drew a straight line putting various extremely polarized ethnic, political, and religious factions all in the same country, and forcing them to get along. Guess the country(ies) • In 1347, a single ship from Caffa traveled to Sicily and infected rats, fleas, and people spread the plague all across Europe, causing as many as a third of Europe’s population to succumb to the disease. This paved the way to the end of Feudalism and eventually the rise of industrialism, as lower populations did allow the social order to be slightly more egalitarian. There was more land to be owned (Because everyone was too dead to farm it) so poorer farmers became estate owners over time. This also reformed European notions of disease, paving the way to the European Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution. • Constantine I’s conversion to Christianity after his vision at the Battle of Milvian Bridge caused Christianity to become the most influential religion in the world, and also inadvertently caused the collapse of the Western Roman Empire. • (Note: This is the most far out one) Julius Caesar, created the Roman Empire. Rome conquered several parts of Asia Minor and unified the southern-most territories and Northern Africa, which made the region ripe for conquest for the Caliphates of the Middle East. Fast forward a millennia or two and then you have the Ottomans, which quasi-started World War I, which triggered World War II, jumping the US and USSR to superpower status, and created the turmoil in the region today (Told ya it was far out).
What do you think ?
Kenny Kulbiski 4 years ago
Interesting but most are a real stretch. If cavemen hadn't used fire for cooking we wouldn't have blast furnaces therefore no steel therefore no automobiles and we'd still be using horses.
Monjur Hasan 5 months ago
"Cavemen and fire aren’t an example of the butterfly effect, because it wasn’t a single event that triggered everything else. Rather, thousands of people observed this use of fire and acted accordingly."
Load More Replies...
Susan Trevaskis-Owen 4 years ago
The butterfly effect can be a fun rabbit hole to go down in one's own life. For example, my husband & I doing cosplay together can be traced back to property taxes being raised on my parents' home (but not on that of their neighbor friends) in 1972.
Steve Barnett 4 years ago (edited)
Aspergic. I never realised that The Butterfly Effect is a metaphor. I literally thought that a butterfly flapping its wings could cause a storm ½ way across the world. But every action causes a reaction and so forth. Do you remember that band that was as good as The Beatles? No, because the main song writers never met. But they did, Jaggers/Richards. It took a chance meeting at a train station. [Edit] Okay, this is weird. But I was actually at Cheltenham Cemetery and Crematorium earlier today trying to locate Brian Jones’ grave.
Sean Harrison 4 years ago
The Butterfly Effect was named after a book called A Sound of Thunder. It involved time travel. When some of the characters went back in time, they were told not to step off a pathway. But one did (after a series of events) and when they went back to their own time, all the writing was changed and unreadable. The main character looked down at his shoe, a saw that he had stepped on a small, blue butterfly back in the past. That small thing, changed the future. So basically, none of these are examples of the Butterfly Effect.
Load More Replies... Amelia Lewin 4 years ago
Hulk not liking stairs led to the collapse of all time, existence, and reality
Robert Bailey 4 years ago
It's amazing how many different 'one little thing(s)' caused WWII. Maybe each of those things isn't that important on its own.
Orion C. 4 years ago
I have a story for you. My parents, when I was 3, would turn the television onto educational programs for me to watch and fun, entertaining things. This would happen every day and switch to Nick Junior for me to watch. But one day, my dad sat on the remote, and it switched over to a Lexus commercial which showed the cars drifting and shredding tires. I was entertained and looked at lots of car pictures, played with Hot Wheels a lot, etc, etc. Fast forward a couple of years, and I'm enamored with cars, can name literally every car on the street, and am saving money for a Miata drift build. All because my dad sat on the remote.
Kenny Kulbiski 4 years ago
Interesting but most are a real stretch. If cavemen hadn't used fire for cooking we wouldn't have blast furnaces therefore no steel therefore no automobiles and we'd still be using horses.
Monjur Hasan 5 months ago
"Cavemen and fire aren’t an example of the butterfly effect, because it wasn’t a single event that triggered everything else. Rather, thousands of people observed this use of fire and acted accordingly."
Load More Replies... Susan Trevaskis-Owen 4 years ago
The butterfly effect can be a fun rabbit hole to go down in one's own life. For example, my husband & I doing cosplay together can be traced back to property taxes being raised on my parents' home (but not on that of their neighbor friends) in 1972.
Steve Barnett 4 years ago (edited)
Aspergic. I never realised that The Butterfly Effect is a metaphor. I literally thought that a butterfly flapping its wings could cause a storm ½ way across the world. But every action causes a reaction and so forth. Do you remember that band that was as good as The Beatles? No, because the main song writers never met. But they did, Jaggers/Richards. It took a chance meeting at a train station. [Edit] Okay, this is weird. But I was actually at Cheltenham Cemetery and Crematorium earlier today trying to locate Brian Jones’ grave.
Sean Harrison 4 years ago
The Butterfly Effect was named after a book called A Sound of Thunder. It involved time travel. When some of the characters went back in time, they were told not to step off a pathway. But one did (after a series of events) and when they went back to their own time, all the writing was changed and unreadable. The main character looked down at his shoe, a saw that he had stepped on a small, blue butterfly back in the past. That small thing, changed the future. So basically, none of these are examples of the Butterfly Effect.
Load More Replies... Amelia Lewin 4 years ago
Hulk not liking stairs led to the collapse of all time, existence, and reality
Robert Bailey 4 years ago
It's amazing how many different 'one little thing(s)' caused WWII. Maybe each of those things isn't that important on its own.
Orion C. 4 years ago
I have a story for you. My parents, when I was 3, would turn the television onto educational programs for me to watch and fun, entertaining things. This would happen every day and switch to Nick Junior for me to watch. But one day, my dad sat on the remote, and it switched over to a Lexus commercial which showed the cars drifting and shredding tires. I was entertained and looked at lots of car pictures, played with Hot Wheels a lot, etc, etc. Fast forward a couple of years, and I'm enamored with cars, can name literally every car on the street, and am saving money for a Miata drift build. All because my dad sat on the remote.
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