Summary of 183. History's Biggest Questions with Dan Carlin (Part 1)

00:00:00 - 00:55:00

In the video, Dan Carlin discusses some of the biggest questions in history with a focus on the 20th century. He interviews Alexander the Great and Adolf Hitler, discussing the differences between the two leaders. He also discusses the role of World War I in leading to communism and the effect the first world war would have had on the United States if it hadn't happened.

• 00:00:00 Dan Carlin interviews Alexander the Great and Adolf Hitler, discussing the differences between the two leaders.
• 00:05:00 The 10 biggest questions in history according to Dan Carlin are: 1) Who would you least like to be besieged by, 2) University Challenge, 3) Who would you least like to be an enemy of, 4) What's the Roman practice when they sack a city, 5) What is the difference between slavery and death, 6) If you're not a leader, what is the alternative to surrendering, 7) Would you choose the Mongol's or the Romans if you were in a situation where you had to choose, 8) Would you rather be a woman with children or dead, 9) Would you rather be a slave or dead, and 10) What is the Roman practice when they saca sit.
• 00:10:00 The video discusses two questions: which world leader made the biggest difference to the course of the 20th century, and what would have happened if the Germans had not marched into Belgium in 1914. Both of these questions are complicated, and it is difficult to say definitively who made the biggest difference.
• 00:15:00 Dan Carlin discusses the biggest questions in history, including the role of World War I in leading to communism and the effect the first world war would have had on the United States if it hadn't happened.
• 00:20:00 Dan Carlin discusses the history of big questions, such as "Who was more influential, Adolf Hitler or Mao Zedong?" and "Could the United States have overtaken Britain, and what would have happened if Russia didn't go communist?" He also asks his viewers what they think about the decision to send Lenin back to Russia to start the Russian Revolution, and whether a white Russian government would have been more humane.
• 00:25:00 In this YouTube video, renowned historian and podcast host Dan Carlin discusses some of the biggest questions that historians have about the 20th century. He specifically focuses on the role of political leaders in the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
• 00:30:00 Unheard's foreign editor, Aris Russo, has written an article about how the organization is using social media to help spread the word about important events. In particular, Russo discusses how they've been using Twitter to promote the Flashman books by George MacDonald Fraser.
• 00:35:00 This YouTube video is about the history of big questions and Dan Carlin's favorite one is "What would have happened if the Romans had not conquered Greece?" The answer is that the Greeks would have written more biographies of Persian kings, because the Persians were going to be the inheritors of all of the earlier civilizations' knowledge.
• 00:40:00 Dan Carlin discusses the idea of "counterfactuals," which are hypothetical situations in which events play out differently. He discusses the possibility that the American Civil War could have ended differently, and the potential consequences of this.
• 00:45:00 Dan Carlin discusses the idea of a "cold civil war" in the U.S., in which the Union would have broken apart but for the sacrifices made during the Civil War. He also discusses the idea of a "reconstruction light" in which Reconstruction was done mostly in a hurry, opening the door for later problems.
• 00:50:00 The video discusses the idea that the north may have eventually restarted the American Civil War if it weren't for the abolition movement in the north. It also discusses how racism was a nationwide problem and how even if slavery itself was something that was reviled by many in the north, they still tolerated sharecropping, segregation, and other issues after the Reconstruction.
• 00:55:00 In this video, Dan Carlin discusses some of history's most difficult questions, such as whether the West could have lost the Cold War and whether the Confederacy could have won the American Civil War.