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No, Plato and the Bolsheviks did not have much in common besides being ideologues. If you really want to learn about ancient ideologues, look at king Cleomenes III of Sparta who was influenced by the stoic Sphairos. Look at Blossius of Cumae who influenced Tiberius Grassus (not coincidentally...

Oswald Spengler stated about this question: Mecca (which was pagan) was rather an exception, most of Arabia was either Christian or Jewish. Christians and Jews had made conversions in Arabia centuries before Mohammed.

In 1616 Venice had concluded an alliance with France, Switzerland, and the Netherlands against the Habsburgs. So the Spanish ambassador in Venice, the Marquis de Bedmar, started a conspiracy to prepare a naval invasion of the city. The French saved Venice by uncovering the conspiracy though, and...

Consider this: At this time, the Earl Philip Stanhope was ruling in Ireland. "Short as it was, January 1745 to November 1746, [his] appointment as Viceroy of Ireland was effective; he repressed the jobbery traditional to the office, and established schools and manufactures. He conciliated and...

You have a point there. The only optimist groups I can think of are the transhumanists, singularitarians and extropians (and there is some overlap). And parts of the objectivists.

The problem with this idea: People who aren't misanthropists, enjoy life and have many friends usually won't retreat from society to write a book or sculpt a statue. They will rather found a family, do business, have a career. Also, for most of the past, works of art were bought, if not...

At first, I want to apologize to start a second discussion which is almost identical to another one, save for the country in question. There are, I think, some timelines on this forum which consider what could have happened if Napoleon Bonaparte had fought for Britain. However, I have not found...

There are, I think, some timelines on this forum which consider what could have happened if Napoleon Bonaparte had fought for Britain. However, I have not found any where he fights for Spain. Under which circumstances could he have chosen Spanish services? What could he have achieved as the...

Voltaire wrote famously: "Monsieur l'abbé, I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write." Now he died before the French Revolution started, let alone the terror regime of Robespierre. But what if he had witnessed it? How would his most...

And these historians, I guess, defend Phocas?

I take this as a compliment.

A good question. Let me try to answer it. - Prussia would stay rather conservative, for tradition, and because the anti-conservative block will be split into Socialists and non-Socialists. - If history lacks a great man, the changes he brought to the world can be achieved by a generation of...

The 19th century was the age of materialism. One cannot expect that an ideology invented then would be very close to true religion.

Easier said than done. At the time of Commodus, the Roman spirit (as they had demonstrated best after Cannae) has been dead for long. At this time, there was no Roman people anymore, only a Romanized population of apathetic citizens who only cared for their private problems and soldiers who...

But nobody likes having to pay a credit back. And besides: How capable would the Christians be for banking? This is not a business you learn overnight. Also, the Pope and others will have a say. And even if all these points were no problem: From what business would the Jews live off instead...

The Soviet Union would certainly lose in some areas. Jews were overproportionally represented in various intellectual occupations. Russia having less successful chess players would be a footnote of history, of course, but what about doctors and professors? And we have our history to compare...

And it explains why she wrote some of her most famous books.

This would create a precedent: If Roosevelt could do it, every other president will also do so, once he is in power. Who would stop him? The border between executive and judicative would be weakened. The US would be somewhat closer to a dictature, for better or for worse.

If the Habsburgs won the Thirty-Year War, it might be possible. Of course, they would have to win against practically everyone else for this scenario.

The area is cut off from the rest of the world, as mountainous as it is, very divided (also because of the terrain), and inhabited by quite resilient people. It is unlikely that a strong empire will emerge there, but a greater power will also have a hard time there. Areas like these are more...