I was looking through some MIT data and I realised that in almost every field, be it in arts or politics or science and technology, the historically most important city is always the same by a clear margin: Paris.
Why is that? What made Paris so ridiculously relevant? And why is it usually forgotten today?
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London.
Many cities have held that position in different eras.
This is based on a dataset going back to 4000 BC.
Pic related, one example, for most important artists.
Who knows. They have talented people by the truckload.
Musicians.
If that's a terrorism joke you got the wrong city.
Philosophers.
Because they managed to stole some of the most known art pieces and archeological artifacts and place them there.
Sounds like simple matter of urbanization. Paris just had more people since France was centralized as fuck.
Engineers.
This is about birthplaces of relevant people, although I bet Paris also tops the chart for archaeology.
Nah, London has been much bigger since the 1600s or so, and there are plenty of other cities of comparable or larger sizes.
Inventors.
Medicine.
French Academy of Sciences was a juggernaut, for one.
Mathematics.
>New Damascus is the world capital
Is this a Veeky Forums humor thread?
I still feel like there is a connection with centralization there somehow.
other reasons i can come up with
>French king being one of most powerful figures
>Paris being traditionally considered center of culture
>French being lingua franca so lot of "international" high-class people moved there (and where else but the capital)
Physicists.
>Posting a French statue while dissing France
Chemists.
lmao, even that statue was created in Paris.
>Yet another French Arrogance thread.
Why not throw in LE ETERNAL ANGLO or >H>R>E while you're at it.
I would assume that back then France was more important because it was that place that everybody has to cross through to get anywhere in Europe.
And then we get to the modern, post-WWII age where people have cars and planes and travel becomes a lot easier.
>of the 390,480 of its enterprises, 80.6 percent are engaged in commerce, transportation, and diverse services, 6.5 percent in construction, and just 3.8 percent in industry
ROFL
Writers.
what?
>has to cross through to get anywhere in Europe
Unless you're going to Spain, I don't see why you'd have to cross France to get anywhere.
where's this from?
Rome
Ironically, those graphs actually underrate the importance of Paris, for three reasons:
- They only count people by birthplace, but historically Paris has mostly attracted talented and relevant people from all over France, and in fact from all over Europe probably more than any other city.
- They rank personalities based on how globally famous they are, which will necessarily carry an Anglo bias.
- Going by famous names will exclude many achievements, medieval in particular, of which the authors are unknown today.
Rome produced almost nothing of value m8. Certainly not in arts or sciences.
>a dataset going back to 4000 BC.
Well then it's not very useful. Look at similar data over more constrained time periods (e.g., by century) and you'll get a better picture.
These datasets probably miss the fact that half the Europeans in them studied and worked in Paris even if they were born somewhere else.
Lol I bet you're this guy boards.Veeky Forums.org/his/thread/1426713/
Look at the title, it goes by birthplace.
If they went by place of residence Paris would probably double in every category. Which isn't exactly an argument against the ridiculous relevance of Paris.
Nope, but I'm glad people are starting to realise how overrated Rome is. Literally the only field in which it achieved anything of note is civil engineering.
There is a famous saying about Frenchmen. "We are a great generalists and proud of it" or something like that. They may have a lot of great engineers, or mathematicians, or scientists, but they're all pretty general.
Germany, while according to your data has less of them, they are by far the brightest stars. For example, while France has a lot of mathematicians, there is no French mathematician that can compare to Gauss. Same goes for giants and physicists, such Plank or Heisenberg.
While I enjoy French literature, there is none that can deny the influence of English literature giants, such as Shakespeare, Chaucer, Dickens.
TL;DR quality > quantity
All in all, don't get me wrong. I think France is a great country, with great history, and Paris is the most beautiful city I've ever visited.
>mathematicians
Fourrier, Descartes, de Fermat and Poincarré would beg to differ. Although I can concede that Gauss outshines them all, but Gauss was a once-in-a-millennia genius.
>physicists (and chemist while we're at it, since the french are more chemist than they are physicists)
Pierre Curie, Becquerel, and de Broglie would have a word with you. And so would Lavoisier and Pasteur.
>Shakespeare, Chaucer, Dickens.
And on here, you merely know their names, and associate them more worth because you were furnished with an english education. Racine is a more than apt counter to Shakespeare, as is Zola to Dickens, and Rabelais to Chaucer.
Not that it is very sensical to compare authors.
>Paris is the most beautiful city I've ever visited.
Thank you
>68 invdividuals in 6000 years
literally nothing
>there is no French mathematician that can compare to Gauss.
Dude, ever heard of Descartes, Galois, Fermat?
>there is none that can deny the influence of English literature giants, such as Shakespeare, Chaucer, Dickens
That's skewed by the fact English is the global lingua franca. And despite that, everyone in the world knows the stories of Chretien of Troyes, Perrault, La Fontaine, Alexandre Dumas, or Jules Verne, and authors such as Proust or Stendhal.
>Paris is the most beautiful city I've ever visited.
Sounds like you didn't go to Rome.
Sounds like you didn't, Rome is crap.
Should have posted this one.
still, your first picture doesnt even have Rome
something must be wrong there
i love it how all these end in 1900, a century alone that probably had more of all these people than the las 6000 years and im pretty sure new york or some american city had moved paris. also aplies to any kind of city that had an extreme growth in the begining of the century. france was more busy that century being invaded by germans
also, hail satan
Enormous city, always had much importance.
I think the most compelling argument for Paris's importance and number of achievments is the presence of both the Sorbonne, the intellectual center of Europe, and later the french court for its artistic importance.
The Sorbonne attracted people like St Bonaventura, Thomas Aequinus etc, and this was a matter of prestige to many fortunate people, who would sends their sons studying there. The Sorbonne wasn't only a religious center, as it was also comprised of schools of geometry, mathematics and such, thus the artists blooming in this milieu.
i think he meant western europe wich is where all these people along all these years used to travel the most. until the 16th century, it would be not totally normal to see a western in eastern europe
Are you retarded? Name one Roman artist.
>What made Paris so ridiculously relevant?
It's in Central Western Europe.
Chaucer stole everything to Rutebeuf. I'm semi-serious, and in 20 years time this will be common truth for academics
>a century alone that probably had more of all these people than the las 6000 years
hurr
>produced an empire so important it not only defined western world and civilization in its culture and philosophy but also that even eastern civilization tried to relate themselves to rome for honour and calling themselves "rome"
>produced a goverment and social organization so important that it's still aplied today
>produced some innovations so important that are still being used today
>is the home of the most important western religion
>produced a language so important that not only heavily influenced most indo-european languages but is also still spoken today
>even it's alphabet is still used in most of the world
>it's fall is so important in our history it literally defines the end of an age
>even in modern history, empires try to relate themselves to it to gain legitimacy over europe
>founded a shitload of cities that are still cities today (and some of the most populated)
>rome produced almost nothing of value m8.
I agree. Paris is much more better.
>the home of the most important western religion
So, mithraïsm, then ?
Paris is a brown welfare state shithole today, so say goodbye to all your innovation
The criteria for being a "globally known" person.
1. Having biographies that are present in more than 25 different language editions of Wikipedia.
2. Being included in the book Human Accomplishment: The pursuit of excellence in the Arts and Sciences, 800BC to 1950 by Charles Murray (2003).
Human Accomplishment is a book and a data compilation effort containing information on 3,896 eminent individuals from the arts and sciences who made a significant contribution prior to 1950. The inventories were constructed by Charles Murray using linguistic records—such as encyclopedia entries—from a number of different languages and sources.
>Fourrier, Descartes, de Fermat and Poincarré would beg to differ. Although I can concede that Gauss outshines them all, but Gauss was a once-in-a-millennia genius.
While I am well aware of them, and they are great, that was my point exactly. France has more of them, while those born in Germany were these off-hand geniuses, that really shake the foundations. Grothendieck was one of these genius. His work in algebraic geometry is legendary(a field started by Descartes). He was born In Germany, though he spent most of his life In France...so I guess both countries get a point for this one. FYI Grothendieck was a modern mathematician 1928 - 2014, so you can't say there weren't great Frenchmen post 19th century.
Just to give you a little sometime to show you that I am not biased in any way, and because you said you wanted to remember them. I'll add in a few more French mathematicians that I know off. We have Pascal. He and Fermat were actually correspondents, and are responsible for starting research into a whole new field of mathematics, probability. We have Laplace. Probably most famous for Laplace transform. Galois, who is know for Galois theory, though he was probably more famous for dying in a duel when he was 20.
>Physicists and chemists
While I am sure that German physicists are more infuential, I'll concede as well, since my knowledge of chemists is lacking, that French are probably the better chemists.
Part 1/2
>Not that it is very sensical to compare authors.
Indeed. It's best to split them by genre. I will once again try to prove that I am not biased, nor too much influence by the dominance of the English language(which is largely influence by France, so who wins here?).While I am certain I can say that Shakespeare is the most influential playwright. Jules Verne was one of the most influential science fiction writers of all time. Both France and English have great literature giants, and it would indeed be pointless to rank them against each other. Also, Alexandre Dumas is probably my favorite author.
>Thank you
Who is this semen demon?
What we know of as our modern fields of art, politics, science, and technology all originate in Early Modern Western Europe. Now, this is not to say no one else had any art, political theory, science, or technology, just that our modern traditions come down to us from that origin point.
This skews our knowledge of these fields beyond the history of that tradition because we are simply unaware of them or their influences on ours. Important insights, cultural works, and developments existed throughout the world, but they're not regarded as important mostly because we don't know how they relate to the development or foundation of our own tradition. This isn't even limited to European vs non-European, but across time itself. There are some Medieval thinkers who were not recognized until very recently for developing some very advanced ideas, and so don't normally get counted among the Renaissance or Enlightenment thinkers that dominate the history of modern art and science.
So the question you should be asking is why Paris was so relevant for the past 500 years, and why so many other cities that were also very prosperous and productive before Paris were similarly forgotten once Paris rose to prominence.
>frogs buttblasted that there's a French statue in the most important city in the world
>buttblasted that the statue arrived from the french sucking American dick in the 19th century
Paris WAS France for much of its history. You see, most of "France" wasn't even France, and all of France beyond Paris was mostly irreverent.
Rome produced no art, no music, no science, no inventions, no medicine, no mathematics, and barely any literature. It doesn't have a place in any of those charts.
>Rome produced no art, no music, no science, no inventions, no medicine, no mathematics, and barely any literature
I'm offended at how awful this bait is.
Paris is actually increasingly white and rich, the latter of which is killing it.
>Paris was so relevant for the past 500 years
More like 1000. 500 years ago Paris was actually just reemerging from a bit of a slump, after being the capital of Western Europe for most of the Middle Ages.
Are you a butthurt WEWUZ Italian or something, or why do you find it so hard to strain your brain enough to try to name a single relevant Roman artist or scientist or mathematician, and realise there are none?
Forgot an important one.
Is it that hard for you people to understand that powerful wealthy states tend to have a lot of scientific and cultural advancements? France was the big shit for a time and thus had that. At other times other countries have had that, like post WWII America, Victorian England, certain Chinese Dynasties, Baghdad in the Islamic Golden Age, etc.
Except this isn't about "a time", it's about all times.
It is about "a time", a fairly lengthy one yes, but a limited one all the same. It is not after WWII. You cannot seriously tell me Paris is the center of learning and culture it once was today. Other places have replaced it. Just the same, Paris replaced earlier centers such as the Italian city-states and they Rome.
That's not Nice.
Nigga it's all of history until a century ago.
>name a single relevant Roman artist
Ovid
Virgil
Catullus
Horace
Seneca
Tibullus
Propertius
Cicero
Apulieus
Petronius
Lucan
Plautus
Those are writers you stupid fuck.
Bullshit. Paris doesn't become hegemonic until the 1400's and even then that only includes the western world, pre-globalization other parts of the world had their own centers. In the west other places start to overtake Paris in the 1800's so thats only around 400 years. Centers like Rome, Alexandria and Constantinople lasted longer yet no one says they lasted "all of history".
Patriotic French people are intolerable
writing is an art
>French people are intolerable
FTFY
Take it up with MIT, these charts are for 4000 BC to 1900 AD, and as you can see Paris outshines Rome, Alexandria, and Constantinople tenfold.
You seem to be a bit confused about dates though. 1400 is actually the time when Paris (temporarily) lost a lot of relevance, after having been the most important city in Western Europe for science, art, politics etc since around 1100. And it definitely still was the culturally most important city in the West or in Europe at the turn of the 20th century, probably until WW2.
>French people
>liking Paris.
Only the Parisians living in the center of the city like Paris. Most of the agglomeration is a shithole sprawling in an even more disorganized and ugly manner than Suburbia.
>someone posts charts made by an American university and seems to be surprised Paris isn't a piece of shit
>boohoo French people
Add Stendhal, Maupassant, Voltaire, Vernes, Diderot, Céline, Proust, Corneille, ... to the writers list
No, a writer is never referred to as an artist. You can keep your autistic bait.
>Parisians
>liking Paris
lmao
Paris wasnt even part of the French Kingdom in 1400
You never knew of a writer that you would consider an artists?
Stop being purposely autistic, you know what he meant
Of course it was, but France was in a state of civil war, hence the big drop in relevance.
And finally all categories combined (although this includes a lot of meme categories).
So fucking what?
Are you willfully ignorant?
So see
Are you saying it's the magical artefacts that give Paris its power?
Paris was literally a non-entity until under a millennium ago.
That just makes it even more impressive.
Dublin stronk.
>sun prairie
Is this some kind of meme image?
It did produce art. If you deny that you are ignorant.
It is, I think that category is only for artists who don't fit into either the painter, sculptor, or photographer category, so the sample is small. Sun Prairie is the home of Georgia O'Keefe.
The one I meant to post is here: , it includes all fine arts.