I have more important things to do and prefer to not waste time over verbose Gish galloping. I'm not misapplying the term ASB, in which there are historical impossibles that can only be done through supernatural aid, here because the medicine of the time was not saving Alexander from a punctured lung. It was pure luck he didn't die from it the first time. It's also part of the reason why when he returned from his Indian campaign he rested for about a year and a half. So yes, him surviving is impossible without ASB.
Alexander vs Chandragupta
- Thread starter walmart
- Start date
I'm saying that the topic has been discussed to death and that there have been people who have conclusively refuted arguments in favour of Alexander conquering the Nanda or defeating Chandragupta, when the former is outright impossible and the latter ends in a stalemate at best but with the far higher probability of Alexander losing Bactria and all of his Indian satrapies just like it happened to Seleucus. If you want to continue debating, then do so, but address the arguments given there.
And yes, you can prove or refute AH scenarios, as my example of the Egyptian vs Tang army shows that you ignored. Not always but in certain cases you can. Alexander died because of his wounds in the end. He was still human, not a god. His body was overexhausted and punished to its limits by the time he returned to Susa. Wanting him to survive requires ASB intervention to do so.
Skallagrim
Banned
A man has a wound - of which it is not even exactly certain whether it was in his throat or his chest, by the way - doesn't die for two years afterwards, doesn't seem to have died of complications of said wound, but somehow could no have survived longer without "supernatural aid".
Like i said, you're just a determinist, and one who is (ha ha) determined to constantly brush aside all arguments to push through some pre-conceived dogma. Well, I gave you a long list of reading tips that might help you get over all that. I'd say: get to it. There's something useful to do with your time.
It wasn't two years - which is important as even a difference of months is a significant amount of time medicinally speaking - and yes, complications can accumulate and form several months afterwards. The fact that he died when he was just 32 years old, when similar mass conquerors like Ramesess II, Cyrus the Great, Qin Shi Huangdi or Genghis Khan lived for decades longer than him, is telling and confirms how a punctured long can cut short the careers of mass conquerors like Alexander.
Skallagrim
Banned
Your logical fallacy of the day is called post hoc ergo propter hoc.
Considering his downward spiral after the death of Hephaistion, this is indeed a far more likely explanation for what happened. (It is also why I consider "Hephaistion survives" to be the most credible POD to get an "Alexander lives longer" timeline.)
Derek Pullem
Donor
I'm not sure you understand what refute means. It means prove beyond all reasonable doubt. So you need to know all the facts.
So you are saying that a Tang army will 100% of the time defeat an Egyptian army. What kind of Egyptian army. What battlefield. What are the supply situations. Is the tang army operating on home ground or far afield. What is the morale of each army. Most importantly what are the relative sizes of each army.
I could go on but history is not a 1500 points a side wargame.
Skallagrim
Banned
To address the actual topic of the thread for a change: simply supposing for a moment that the premise holds, and that Alexander lives long enough for a confrontation between him and Chandragupta to become possible....
Would this happen? I personally rather doubt it. Regardless of what certain overly deterministic minds like to imagine, the very presence of Alexander (and the continued existence of his Empire that follows from that fact) would influence Chandragupta's decision-making process. In OTL, it was highly opportune for him to drive West into the outlying regions of the Seleukid Empire— which was distracted due to the Wars of the Successors being fought mainly to the far West. This allowed Chandragupta to gain what he wanted, and then to make a peace on his terms. Very profitable indeed.
If Alexander is still around, such an invasion would very simply be less tempting. In fact, it would be a big gamble, and Chandragupta was a man of planned and deliberate actions. As I have argued before, the logical step for him would be to demand that Alexander's vassals east of the Indos simply start paying tribute to him, too. No Western expedition beyond that. Instead, he'd do well to subdue the entire Indian subcontinent. That was his plan in OTL, but the opportunity presented due to the Wars of the Successors was just too good to pass up. In this ATL, he very likely sticks to his original plan. when done, he'll realise that no action is forthcoming regarding his leaning on Alexander's Indian vassals, so he may annex those, too. Still no moves beyond the Indos, though.
Why not? Because while Chandragupta has been campaigning in India, Alexander has been campaigning in the West. Again, there are determinists who maintain this could never succeed— but again, they are wrong. The end result is that we have Alexander and Chandragupta, both having conquered all they wanted except anything the other has, and now consolidated in their positions. The option they both have is to start a direct war with the only real rival in the immediate vicinity, in a war that may well prove to be an existential threat to both. Would either be so stupid as to invade the other? I have my doubts.
If either one starts an invasion, that's very likely the one who loses. There is always the risk of the defending party just dying by chance during the war, which then scatters his followers, allowing the invader to win... but the likeliest outcome is that the invader (suffering from immensely stretched logistics, being very far from the other's imperial core) loses to the defender (who has the home advantage). No matter what, it would be a spectacular clash... but it would also be a contender for "most pointless war ever".
As we all learned from that one film: the only way to win is not to play...
Would this happen? I personally rather doubt it. Regardless of what certain overly deterministic minds like to imagine, the very presence of Alexander (and the continued existence of his Empire that follows from that fact) would influence Chandragupta's decision-making process. In OTL, it was highly opportune for him to drive West into the outlying regions of the Seleukid Empire— which was distracted due to the Wars of the Successors being fought mainly to the far West. This allowed Chandragupta to gain what he wanted, and then to make a peace on his terms. Very profitable indeed.
If Alexander is still around, such an invasion would very simply be less tempting. In fact, it would be a big gamble, and Chandragupta was a man of planned and deliberate actions. As I have argued before, the logical step for him would be to demand that Alexander's vassals east of the Indos simply start paying tribute to him, too. No Western expedition beyond that. Instead, he'd do well to subdue the entire Indian subcontinent. That was his plan in OTL, but the opportunity presented due to the Wars of the Successors was just too good to pass up. In this ATL, he very likely sticks to his original plan. when done, he'll realise that no action is forthcoming regarding his leaning on Alexander's Indian vassals, so he may annex those, too. Still no moves beyond the Indos, though.
Why not? Because while Chandragupta has been campaigning in India, Alexander has been campaigning in the West. Again, there are determinists who maintain this could never succeed— but again, they are wrong. The end result is that we have Alexander and Chandragupta, both having conquered all they wanted except anything the other has, and now consolidated in their positions. The option they both have is to start a direct war with the only real rival in the immediate vicinity, in a war that may well prove to be an existential threat to both. Would either be so stupid as to invade the other? I have my doubts.
If either one starts an invasion, that's very likely the one who loses. There is always the risk of the defending party just dying by chance during the war, which then scatters his followers, allowing the invader to win... but the likeliest outcome is that the invader (suffering from immensely stretched logistics, being very far from the other's imperial core) loses to the defender (who has the home advantage). No matter what, it would be a spectacular clash... but it would also be a contender for "most pointless war ever".
As we all learned from that one film: the only way to win is not to play...
If you think it wasn't refuted in the thread I put, then debate their arguments and show they didn't prove anything "beyond all reasonable doubt". Since you want to debate that a Middle Egyptian army can actually stand a chance against a Tang army of 2,000 years later instad of getting steamrolled, then I just made a thread to debate it, otherwise we're derailing since my basic point is that there are indeed AH scenarios you can demonstrate or refute.
Why is it a far more likely explanation? At most, Hephaistion's death just sped up the inevitable. If anything, it shows just why Alexander wasn't surviving. No one dies merely because of a severe depression. You have to have a prior medical condition, and the various wounds, including a punctured lung, are the only explanation.
With no argument to accompany this? Alexander is not the first binge drinking king in history. He had already had its bouts of binge drinking before (like when he killed Cleitus in a drunken fit). Of course, historians like to pretend Alexander was some god, and can't stand that backwards Indians were the ones who killed him in the long run, so they keep insisting that the arrow at Multan wasn't what killed him, but given that they also haven't reached a consensus of what else killed him, the punctured lung from said arrow should by now have been the conclusive cause.
Skallagrim
Banned
This is objectively wrong. Someone can completely collapse due to grief, the mind and body do not exist in isolation from one another, and... oh, there's also the fact that Alexander dramatically escalated his drinking, leading to a spiral of self-destruction. The night before he fell ill, he drank hard for the whole night, and at the end of it, drank another huge chalice of wine. (Which, by the way, the Macedonians drank undiluted.) That's the kind of radfical binge drinking that can and does kill people.
You just claim that your hypothesis is "the only explanation" because you're a total determinist and you can't admit to being wrong.
Seraphiel
Banned
The last part is especially out there and requires information that we simply can never have about his physique. What we do have is a long history of
Well binge drinking is clinically proven to be more harmful the older you get. I'm somewhat dumbfounded that you cling to that, after a year a punctured lung should not kill an otherwise healthy man in the prime of his life. Drinking too much... well there is just too much documentation of that killing thousands every year even today.
You go against the grain because of an extreme anti-Alexander bias and favor an obscure hard to prove theory for his eventual death rather than accept a reason that is entirely well.... reasonable.
When has someone ever collapsed from grief? Why don't you back up your assertion that such deppressions can kill someone instead of just stating "it's objectively wrong"? And like I said, that wasn't the first time Alexander had binge drank. And there are certain historical events that couldn't go other way. At best, you get Alexander surviving a few months afterwards.
The arrow shouldn't be obscure in the first place. It's what almost killed him. And yes, binge drinking can kill, but most of the time it's because of something accompanying it or an extreme case of drinking to cause intoxication. At most the binge drinking from Hephaistion's death only accelerated his already deteriorated condition, but he definitely wasn't lasting more than a year.
Seraphiel
Banned
Sorry dude but there is just no proof whatsoever of that, you cant exactly back that theory up with any historical data. His return from India should have killed him if the wound was that bad and his health deteriorated so far.
Skallagrim
Banned
Well, you see, there is something we call science, and it has something to say about your claims...
You are clearly in the wrong place. Seriously: why are you here? Why aren't you on deterministhistory dot com? This site is based on the exact opposite of what you claim to believe.
It was that bad since he lied in a state of near death for days, and since you bring me the all-powerful science, a punctured lung is an incredibly severe wound that will leave complications for the rest of your life unless you do surgery that didn't exist back then. In the desert, he had his attendants take him and be with him to prevent further harm. He wasn't actually marching, and even then, he still only lived for a year and a half afterwards, with no major campaigns for months after he returned to Susa. As for grief, the article you cited said that is older people of 70 and older that are more likely to have health complications from mourning. Those that are 30 or younger indeed show signs of deterioration but not nearly to the same extent. If grief combined with binge drinking killed Alexander, then it would be precisely because his body had been so maltreated from his campaign wounds and especially from his punctured lung at Multan, that his health would be close to someone far older than 32 years. Take away his wounds, and he most likely would have survived grieving Hephaistion.
Skallagrim
Banned
You seem not to realise that you're "debating" two different people. You also seem to be incorrigible in your dogmatic approach. I for one do not wish to engage with you any further, unless and until you show some signs of being reasonable.
