Quote from Jack
Again, I think that those leaders and business men operated under the Protestant work ethic and Christianity was the driving force behind the Industrial Revolution.
Wait, what? Did he just say
Quote from Jack
Christianity was the driving force behind the Industrial Revolution.
Last time I checked my 10th grade history book, I don't remember it listing Christianity as a catalyst of industrialism. But, of course, I am an open-minded person, and I may have forgotten some world history since I was in 10th grade. So I ask you all this: What do you think is the cause of the Industrial Revolution?
I think there were many factors that caused the Industrial Revolution to occur.
In eighteenth-century England, these factors included:
1. Cheap labor (and lots of it, too)
2. Mechanization (e.g. Spinning Jenny, steam engine)
3. Specialization encouraged via fewer domestic trade barriers (e.g. less taxes on toll roads)
4. Good transportation system (England has many natural waterways and harbors)
5. Mobility in English society (businessmen were not stifled by the government)
6. Abundance of fossil fuels (especially coal)
In Gilded Age America, factors 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and pro-capitalist and pro-industrialist programs were implemented by the American Congress, leading to rapid industrialization.
Not every Christian country industrialized in the eighteenth century. Furthermore, non-Christian China almost had an Industrial Revolution of their own before the Mongols invaded. They were producing more iron per year during the Song dynasty than the British were producing every year during the early part of the nineteenth century.
I'm sure some businessmen operated under the Protestant work ethic, especially in Massachusetts. But I think the main motivation was profit.
Win by luck, lose by skill.