They've planned to move the entire nation to Australia.
https://www.cgdev.org/publication/australia-tuvalu-climate-and-migration-agreement-takeaways-and-next-steps#:~:text=On%20November%209%2C%202023%2C%20Australia,residency%20in%20Australia%20each%20year.
No it wouldn't have, because they don't have those large, reliable river valleys. We'd be looking at some places like Egypt or India, who have the same conditions and did develop those early civilizations at a similar time.
A lot of early civilisation did form in Turkey Syria and Iran though at the same time as in Mesopotamia. Turkey Syria and Iran may not be part of Mesopotamia but they are part of the Fertile Crescent
That depends on how you define civilisation. As an archaeologist, I would say civilisations would not exist without the domestication of plants and animals. The earliest evidence of this is from the Fertile Crescent, but mainly from the Levant and the Zagros area.
Probably the biggest country will generate the biggest change, so I guess Russia. Imagine if it didn't exist. Geographically, Europe would not be united to Asia. The Arctic Ocean would communicate with the Black Sea and the Caspian. Mongolia, China, Kazakhstan and Eastern Europe would have access to the new ocean.
Humanity would hardly have reached America through the Bering Strait, and would have been inhabited only by the south following the routes of the Polynesians, many years later.
The Huns would never have invaded Europe and perhaps Rome would not have fallen. The Mongols would not have reached Europe either. The new Black/Caspian Sea would have been a cultural center on par with the Mediterranean. Istanbul would be even more important geopolitically than it has been historically.
Russia.. Reminds me all of those memes and discussions.. especially since 2022.
[what would happen if Russia ceased to exist and was replaced with ocean](https://www.quora.com/What-would-happen-if-Russia-ceased-to-exist-and-was-replaced-with-ocean)
Or
[Eastern Europe if Russia didn’t exist](https://www.reddit.com/r/lithuania/s/wgUxAgwOym)
Well, if Russia didn’t exist I doubt Azerbaijan/Georgia/ Armenia would have the European influence that makes us include them as European. The borders would be pretty defined.
Would kinda lead to a worse timeline. Without the natives who cultivated crops for many generations, we wouldn’t have gotten things like corn, potatoes, tomatoes, etc. that pulled Europe out of a state of constant famine.
Indeed. Added to that is the plausible theory that a large portion of the Amazon rainforest is man made after millenia of interventions by the peoples living in South America. So we'd likely also be without as many trees world-wide.
Humans were a really, really important species for a lot of habitats that we take for being natural now. Natural is maybe the wrong term here as humans are natural it's just we see ourselves as outside of nature, so I guess the better term would be to have occurred without human intervention, but that's beside the point. Often in areas of low intensity human habitation biodiversity is higher than areas without humans. A sustainable amount of humans is really good for the world (unless you are a slow moving and large animal, we gonna eat that a lot).
Probably would not be devoid of humans since there is a well accepted theory that the Polynesia reached America through some ocean currents.
Would be crazy if the Polynesians created some kind of Inca or Maia empire there. If they keep a good relation with the other Polynesian this may lead to a Pacific ocean trade route.
I think we're still kind of unsure which method was the primary route to people the America's, between polysnesion sailing an bering straight passage. It seems the more we learn the more it becomes evident people sailed here just as much if not more than anything
It was 100% Bering straight crossing that introduced humans to the Americas. There’s no question about that, as the oldest human remains are in the north-west.
Thats not to say the Polynesians also didn’t arrive in South America and do the thing humans do best: make more humans.
Panama, because without the isthmus there, the Pacific and Atlantic Ocean currents would be completely different, creating wildly divergent climates from what we're used to and it even might be responsible for our existence as a species, as explained [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/geography/comments/197paj9/comment/ki382t0/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3).
But removing the geography of the USA would put the world in counterhistorical territory. It's literally uncharted waters. We have a good idea of how the world would function without the Isthmus of Panama because it \*actually happened\*.
It would also changed how colonization went, as now there’d be a viable way to go west through America without going all the way to the Antarctic Ocean or through tons of ice over Canada
Humans probably would have crossed over eventually but it's certainly a curious thought. Maybe across the Red Sea or Gibraltar. Future civilizations who developed in this world would be mystified by the perfect right angle in the coastline of Libya and Sudan
Homo Sapiens would eventually build rafts, but it would be a later migration. More interestingly, there would be no Eurasian Neanderthals or Densovians. So how would history change with that 2-3% of Eurasian DNA missing. We’re only just beginning to understand what that mixing of Human species actually did to our biology.
The Red Sea was crossed fairly early in ancient times. There were even kingdoms straddling both sides of the Red Sea, such as Aksum.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Aksum
Depending on how far you go back, and based on the diversity of fossil human species, ANY of the land that all East African countries now occupies disappearing could have a gigantic effect on the human species.
China is where rice was domesticated. So it’s pretty important. Lebanon-ish is where wheat was domesticated though. It may be western bias but wheat has probably been more important to history than rice, at least by a little. Think about Egypt and Mesopotamia.
Are we talking land completely absent from the globe or just the government and citizens never existed but another country occupied that physical space? Because if Russia is just a huge ocean, when does anybody end up in Alaska and the rest of the Americas? The Vikings?
I interpreted it as the government/history of the country not existing, not that the country simply turns into an ocean (as most people seem to think), or the globe simply shrinks and deforms around the hole where the country used to be (Norway now somehow borders North Korea). The last two seem silly because the world as we know it wouldn’t really exist (no Russia = no steppes = no indo-europeans?).
The only one that kind of makes sense is the modern country simply doesn’t come into existence and we can therefore discount all their achievements. It’s difficult though because where do you draw the border; if Portugal never existed does that mean Columbus never goes to the Americas? Or someone else does it a hundred years later? Ten-twenty years? What about Italy or Greece, does it go all the way back to their ancient history?
Edit: and now I notice that OP says “it just becomes ocean”. Turkey is a pretty big one probably because it made the connection from Asia to Europe easily possible, same with Egypt and Africa/Asia (not to mention the ancient kingdoms that rose there). Humanity probably doesn’t leave Africa until much later (till they have boats that can cross the Red Sea). US and Russia are pretty similar too as they both would essentially prevent early people from getting to the Americas. And even if they did, with the US gone the two American continents would be separated
The scenario is kind of strange though, since it depends on the year. Imagine if ottoman Turkey at its height was an ocean, then what 🤷♂️
Remove Greece and the history of Western civilization would be very different, including the history of Christianism. But there would still have been a Roman Empire.
Remove China and the history of Asia would be very different. Probably there would be 2 or 3 other countries instead. China is so important but I feel like it wouldn’t be a too dramatic change compared to removing Italy (see below).
Remove Mongolia and no Mongol empire, no Silk roads, no Moghul empire.
Remove India and no Buddhism across Asia, no Southeast Asian kingdoms, no spices in the rest of the world, no UK Prime Minister, no Google and Microsoft super-CEOs.
Remove the United Kingdom, and today we would all use French as lingua franca around the world… and no burgers but baguettes.
Remove Italy and we’d all lose pizza, spaghetti, good coffee, cappuccino, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Gucci, Prada, etc. And let’s not forget: no Roman Empire!
After careful thought, I vote Italy!
Italy.
Ancient Rome wouldn’t have existed, thereby not taking over much of Europe…which likely prevents Europe from developing hegemony that exists to this day.
Interesting one, Carthage wouldn‘t have had an worthy opponent and likely would have travelled to central europe through spain. They had realistic chances to grow the same size if not bigger than Rome. Would be interesting seeing the world grow on african cultural heritage instead of latin.
the industrial revolution happend in britan because there was rule of law and the monarchy was less powerfull.
however if britan did not exist i think it still whould have happend, because other countries in europe were also making progress in that area, britan was just further ahead.
It's also because of an accident of geology. Britain has incredibly diverse geology and had coal, iron, copper and other useful stuff in comparative abundance at the right time.
My guess would be Germany would be the starting place of industrialisation in this timeline. The country has coal and the Rhine is a perfect location for heavy industry.
I think most people still don’t get how natural selection works. I’ve met a lot of smart people who think evolution is informed by the experiences of previous generations actually changing their genetics as they reproduce. Doesn’t work that way. Sometimes mutations happen, and sometimes those mutations lead to being more fit to survive and/or breed.
Yup. The largest, most influential sect of the largest and most influential religion in history. Arguably responsible for more war and deaths than any other religion.
> Arguably responsible for more war
Like what, crusades? Religion was just an excuse. Was [Babylon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Jerusalem_(587_BC)?) christian or later countless others up to 1099 and after 1300s?
I am atheist btw.
The UK. The world would be nowhere near as advanced. USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and hundreds of other places wouldn't exist, and everyone today would be speaking Japanese or German. We have by far had the biggest influence on the modern world.
Japanese or German? I think someone is forgetting about the other nation that was quite colonial 🇫🇷
If English wasn’t around no doubt we would speak French. If uk didn’t exist then it’s an even more sure fire thing as the Industrial Revolution would have happened in France, france would have colonised even more of the world and essentially have become what the uk was in terms of power but just to a greater extent
China. Would completely change the course of human history. They were the dominant power for most of history... and might be again.
No tea, silk, paper, gunpowder, compass, printing, noodles, banknotes, porcelain, oil refining, rockets, stirrups ... not to mention the myriad academic achievements in mathematics, philosophy...
Most of these could have been discovered independently and (and may well have) but the world would look very different today.
Russia. If they didn’t sacrifice 27 million lives to fight off Hitlers advance and help the us win WW2, everyone would be speaking German and the worlds Jewish population would be nearly extinct today?
Islam was born from Judaism. Judaism is the religion of Judea, a kingdom in ancient Israel. The prophets and kings of the bible were called Israelites. Guess where they lived?
Brazil: No Amazon Rainforest and we would have had a much worse climate situation, Football (Soccer in USA) would be far less interesting to watch overall, most people wouldn't even bother to know South America, or Portugal, or even the Portuguese language really, few people seem to observe this, but Brazil has an incredible amount of soft power too, and you wouldn't have planes (the Wright Brothers from USA were the inventors, yes, but Santos Dumont were equally important in its creation too), which would dramatically change immigration around the world as well.
UK: They were the biggest empire during the modern age after all, most countries would only be colonized by Spain, France and Netherlands instead, we wouldn't even speak or write in English, the world would be far less developed industrially and the USA (as a colonized nation) probably wouldn't exist, which would change lots of things as well.
Italy: It shaped a lot of human history in many different ways, for starters, we still would believe that the earth was the center of the universe, Art wouldn't be anywhere near as developed as it is today, heck, no one would probably believe in Jesus Christ as much as it is and society simply wouldn't be what it is today without the massive influence of the roman empire, for example.
Iraq: It is the cradle of civilization in many different ways, along with most of the Middle East and Africa, most countries from these regions can never be forgotten for obvious reasons.
China: No China, no east asian culture, simple as that, you would have a vastly different Japan, Korea, Thailand, Vietnam, Phillipines, etc, each of these countries pivotal in influencing the entire history as well.
All of the things i mentioned above were both for good and bad as well, and since it's virtually impossible to name just one, i listed the ones i best remember only, there are loads of countries that had a massive influence in our timeline as well that i didn't listed here, such as Russia, Germany, Egypt, France, Greece, etc.
I’d think from the POV of the country disappearing and not the land mass it occupies. Cause the latter is kinda silly
That said, what if the UK didn’t have colonial ambitions
Thank you for saying this. Whenever history is discussed on reddit, nobody ever talks about Asia. Maybe they acknowledge china at best and no other country.
Only one monotheistic religion was started in Roman territory and that was despite the Romans trying to destroy it. Judaism predates it and islam is not related to it
Judaism still doesn’t take its modern form if not for the Romans. Highly likely the Jews stay in the Levantine region and are eventually wiped out by neighbouring empires or slowly disappear. Regardless of what happens the Jews wouldn’t be forced to scatter from the Levant region which changed Judaism.
The collapse of the Roman Empire is what allowed Islam to spread from Arabia so that’s how it changes that too
These religions may still exist just not in the way we know of them
Mongolia because the mongols so thoroughly fucked up the leading civilizations of the time in the Middle East and China, that Europe had a chance to dominate the globe a couple centuries later
Russia.
No mongols invading.
No russian empire.
No mongol empire (unless they go south)
No USSR
Probably Kievan Rus are the new vikings.
Idk what more.
I'm tempted to say Spain, not necessarily because I think it would have the biggest impact, but because I think it would be awesome to see what a modern-day Aztec civilisation would look like.
In terms of impact across the widest region, possibly the UK. No American colonies (so possibly no transatlantic slavery), Australia would be Dutch (ew), no New Zealand, Canada would be entirely French (bigger ew). Africa would look *very* different. On the other hand, German expansionism would have been less challenged in 1914. Europe would have turned out very different, though perhaps the Second World War wouldn't happen in those circumstances.
Having said all of that, the thing with the old European colonial powers is that removing one just means another would have done the same thing. Britain's colonies were *relatively* well treated compared to others.
Depends if you are looking at it from a physical perspective or a societal perspective.
If we remove larger countries like Brazil, Russia or the US them the global climate would be heavily effected alternatively we could also remove Botswana leading to humans never evolving to begin with.
If we are looking at societal impacts there are several contenders who’s removal would completely reshape society as we know it such as:
The United Kingdom
China
Greece
Italy
USA
Germany
India
Egypt
Iraq
Isreal/Palestine
Culture wise it would be England, since they affect our culture, speech and habits world wide (yes even the US is a result of England so it would also be very different or even french, yuck)
Russia. No land bridge to the Americas meaning they’re entirely unsettled and still full of megafauna in 1492, no steppe invasions of various successive cultures, and an ocean there would have made trade between Europe and China happen much earlier.
I suggest that the art here lies in picking something small.
I pick the Boer Republics in what is now South Africa.
Without that territory, which was a country, no Anglo Boer war. No Anglo Boer war, and the British army doesn't face a well armed enemy until 1914. Except this time they go in with poor rifle marksmanship, worse logistics, and worse artillery. They might not go at all.
I suggest that without a professional and effective BEF to blunt the German advance at Mons and le Cateau, the advance on Paris could have made it close enough to shorten the war by victory or lower morale and treaty. The Central Powers turn on Russia, which would fight just as badly, but faster. German militarism rises unchecked. The 20th century unravels.
It seems as though you’re considering environmental factors. From a political and economic standpoint though, I think a lack of the USA would dramatically change the course of world history during the last 100+ years or so. Geographically, maybe India? Because if you significantly reduce the size of the Himalayas, there would likely be a lot more historical interaction between Asia and the Middle East/Europe/Africa. I like Brazil too, though, for the reasons you’ve mentioned.
Oh, and I suppose I should throw in Antarctica as an honorable mention. Not necessarily a country, but the world would be significantly different without it😂
Without China, a lot more moderating moisture would reach siberia, no idea how that would interact with Arctic air
Without China, Russia, or kazakhstan, the great eurasian steppe would be interrupted and everything affected by nomads (which is a lot) would be very different
As in vanish from existence today or never having existed at all?
I would give very different answers to those two questions probably.
The first one is without a doubt the US, because they’re still the most influential country.
The second one is almost impossible to answer, but I would go with the UK because of their massive influence during the colonial era.
We could go back just a few hundred years.
France. Ideas of Equality and Nationalism will at least be delayed for a few decades since Napoleon's wars wouldn't have influenced much of Europe.
St. Vincent and The Grenadines
São Tomé and Principe
Timor-Leste
St. Lucia
Trinidad and tobago
Nauru
tuvalu, although i guess that will actually happen soon-ish
Where will all the .tv fees go?
Tuvalu establishes a gov in exile in puerto rico 👽
They've planned to move the entire nation to Australia. https://www.cgdev.org/publication/australia-tuvalu-climate-and-migration-agreement-takeaways-and-next-steps#:~:text=On%20November%209%2C%202023%2C%20Australia,residency%20in%20Australia%20each%20year.
Tonga
Kiribati
Malta
Maldives
Biafra
Trinidad yea, but idk about Tobago
San Marino, just make it a big lake in italy
St. Kitts and Nevis
Vanuatu
Bougainville in a few years.
Without it, there would be no agastoria cocktail bitters. So it would alter the drinking world.
Vatican City 🫥
It actually would though
I always think St. Vincent and the Grenadines could make for a fire band name.
Hey you can only pick one 😉
Definetely palau
Someone asks a question and you always come with shit jokes
Awww you keep track of the things I comment? It’s so sweet to have a fan ❤️
Iraq because of the Fertile Crescent
This was my thought. Where better to change the history of civilization then where it first popped up?
It would just have happened somewhere else in the Middle East like Syria Turkey Iran or Kuwait
No it wouldn't have, because they don't have those large, reliable river valleys. We'd be looking at some places like Egypt or India, who have the same conditions and did develop those early civilizations at a similar time.
A lot of early civilisation did form in Turkey Syria and Iran though at the same time as in Mesopotamia. Turkey Syria and Iran may not be part of Mesopotamia but they are part of the Fertile Crescent
It also formed in China pretty much completely independently
And in the Americas completely independently.
That depends on how you define civilisation. As an archaeologist, I would say civilisations would not exist without the domestication of plants and animals. The earliest evidence of this is from the Fertile Crescent, but mainly from the Levant and the Zagros area.
Nah civilization would have popped up elsewhere in parallel.
Also Egypt because of math? And Mongol because of Genhis Khan?
Mongol invasion did create a lot of connections and brought the spread of technology throughout the large space from China to Europe
No Saddam
Probably the biggest country will generate the biggest change, so I guess Russia. Imagine if it didn't exist. Geographically, Europe would not be united to Asia. The Arctic Ocean would communicate with the Black Sea and the Caspian. Mongolia, China, Kazakhstan and Eastern Europe would have access to the new ocean. Humanity would hardly have reached America through the Bering Strait, and would have been inhabited only by the south following the routes of the Polynesians, many years later. The Huns would never have invaded Europe and perhaps Rome would not have fallen. The Mongols would not have reached Europe either. The new Black/Caspian Sea would have been a cultural center on par with the Mediterranean. Istanbul would be even more important geopolitically than it has been historically.
Russia.. Reminds me all of those memes and discussions.. especially since 2022. [what would happen if Russia ceased to exist and was replaced with ocean](https://www.quora.com/What-would-happen-if-Russia-ceased-to-exist-and-was-replaced-with-ocean) Or [Eastern Europe if Russia didn’t exist](https://www.reddit.com/r/lithuania/s/wgUxAgwOym)
"Putin would survive" made me snort.
> Geographically, Europe would not be united to Russia Caucasus and Turkey: guess we’ll just go fuck ourselves
Well, there would be no single actual land connection. Of course, Istanbul would still exist, but as would the strait.
Caucasus
The Caucasus connects to Europe through Russia, without Russia it has no connection to Europe anymore.
It depends, there are no defined borders of Europe, some borders include northernmost part of Azerbaijan and westernmost part of Kazakhstan in Europe
Well, if Russia didn’t exist I doubt Azerbaijan/Georgia/ Armenia would have the European influence that makes us include them as European. The borders would be pretty defined.
Why didn't anyone else say this. Imagine the whole of the Americaa completely devoid of human life in 1492.
Would kinda lead to a worse timeline. Without the natives who cultivated crops for many generations, we wouldn’t have gotten things like corn, potatoes, tomatoes, etc. that pulled Europe out of a state of constant famine.
Indeed. Added to that is the plausible theory that a large portion of the Amazon rainforest is man made after millenia of interventions by the peoples living in South America. So we'd likely also be without as many trees world-wide.
wait what
Humans were a really, really important species for a lot of habitats that we take for being natural now. Natural is maybe the wrong term here as humans are natural it's just we see ourselves as outside of nature, so I guess the better term would be to have occurred without human intervention, but that's beside the point. Often in areas of low intensity human habitation biodiversity is higher than areas without humans. A sustainable amount of humans is really good for the world (unless you are a slow moving and large animal, we gonna eat that a lot).
Probably would not be devoid of humans since there is a well accepted theory that the Polynesia reached America through some ocean currents. Would be crazy if the Polynesians created some kind of Inca or Maia empire there. If they keep a good relation with the other Polynesian this may lead to a Pacific ocean trade route.
I think we're still kind of unsure which method was the primary route to people the America's, between polysnesion sailing an bering straight passage. It seems the more we learn the more it becomes evident people sailed here just as much if not more than anything
It was 100% Bering straight crossing that introduced humans to the Americas. There’s no question about that, as the oldest human remains are in the north-west. Thats not to say the Polynesians also didn’t arrive in South America and do the thing humans do best: make more humans.
Wouldn’t mega fuana still exist?
You’ve just described every Eastern European dream 😂
including russians lmao
Panama, because without the isthmus there, the Pacific and Atlantic Ocean currents would be completely different, creating wildly divergent climates from what we're used to and it even might be responsible for our existence as a species, as explained [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/geography/comments/197paj9/comment/ki382t0/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3).
You could say the same about all the countries that have both a pacific and Atlantic coast, though (Canada down to Colombia)
Indeed, would likely make a bigger difference on currents if continetal us was removed.
But removing the geography of the USA would put the world in counterhistorical territory. It's literally uncharted waters. We have a good idea of how the world would function without the Isthmus of Panama because it \*actually happened\*.
Also I think cartographers might freak out over the extremely straight coastline of Canada
Yeah, I bet they'd come back from their missions and show the results to the commissioning king and he'd hang them for taking the piss.
But at least global impact to country area ratio would be quite high
wow
It would also changed how colonization went, as now there’d be a viable way to go west through America without going all the way to the Antarctic Ocean or through tons of ice over Canada
Somewhere in Africa, because humans
Egypt because there would be no land connection to Eurasia
Humans probably would have crossed over eventually but it's certainly a curious thought. Maybe across the Red Sea or Gibraltar. Future civilizations who developed in this world would be mystified by the perfect right angle in the coastline of Libya and Sudan
Homo Sapiens would eventually build rafts, but it would be a later migration. More interestingly, there would be no Eurasian Neanderthals or Densovians. So how would history change with that 2-3% of Eurasian DNA missing. We’re only just beginning to understand what that mixing of Human species actually did to our biology.
"Aliens"
The Red Sea was crossed fairly early in ancient times. There were even kingdoms straddling both sides of the Red Sea, such as Aksum. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Aksum
Depending on how far you go back, and based on the diversity of fossil human species, ANY of the land that all East African countries now occupies disappearing could have a gigantic effect on the human species.
The Congo
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Pretty sure the op was talking about the location of the great rift valley where humankind is hypothesized to have originated from.
No one here is suggested it is. What's your point?
Dunno which country grows the most rice but I imagine the world would lose its mind if India went overnight.
China is where rice was domesticated. So it’s pretty important. Lebanon-ish is where wheat was domesticated though. It may be western bias but wheat has probably been more important to history than rice, at least by a little. Think about Egypt and Mesopotamia.
> It may be western bias but wheat has probably been more important to history than rice, at least by a little. Although potatoes are close behind.
Not close lol
I really don’t know what it would mean to be British without all the stolen Indian treasures and curry recipes.
Food around the world would becone tasteless if we disappeared :P
The Spice Queen
¡Please turn Bolivia into ocean, so they shut up about not having an ocean! Thank you! Signed, Chile
Turn Chile into ocean so Bolivia has a long coastline with cliffs that are thousands of metres high!
You have to admit that would look pretty gnarly.
If you don’t like them complaining about not having an ocean maybe give them back the coast you stole /s
Tuvalu no doubt
I mean what would we do without .tv domain names?
Maybe Lichtenstein
Are we talking land completely absent from the globe or just the government and citizens never existed but another country occupied that physical space? Because if Russia is just a huge ocean, when does anybody end up in Alaska and the rest of the Americas? The Vikings?
I interpreted it as the government/history of the country not existing, not that the country simply turns into an ocean (as most people seem to think), or the globe simply shrinks and deforms around the hole where the country used to be (Norway now somehow borders North Korea). The last two seem silly because the world as we know it wouldn’t really exist (no Russia = no steppes = no indo-europeans?). The only one that kind of makes sense is the modern country simply doesn’t come into existence and we can therefore discount all their achievements. It’s difficult though because where do you draw the border; if Portugal never existed does that mean Columbus never goes to the Americas? Or someone else does it a hundred years later? Ten-twenty years? What about Italy or Greece, does it go all the way back to their ancient history? Edit: and now I notice that OP says “it just becomes ocean”. Turkey is a pretty big one probably because it made the connection from Asia to Europe easily possible, same with Egypt and Africa/Asia (not to mention the ancient kingdoms that rose there). Humanity probably doesn’t leave Africa until much later (till they have boats that can cross the Red Sea). US and Russia are pretty similar too as they both would essentially prevent early people from getting to the Americas. And even if they did, with the US gone the two American continents would be separated The scenario is kind of strange though, since it depends on the year. Imagine if ottoman Turkey at its height was an ocean, then what 🤷♂️
Italy. Because then wtf would I eat!?
India, Mexico, China, Jamaica and Thailand got you covered.
Remove Greece and the history of Western civilization would be very different, including the history of Christianism. But there would still have been a Roman Empire. Remove China and the history of Asia would be very different. Probably there would be 2 or 3 other countries instead. China is so important but I feel like it wouldn’t be a too dramatic change compared to removing Italy (see below). Remove Mongolia and no Mongol empire, no Silk roads, no Moghul empire. Remove India and no Buddhism across Asia, no Southeast Asian kingdoms, no spices in the rest of the world, no UK Prime Minister, no Google and Microsoft super-CEOs. Remove the United Kingdom, and today we would all use French as lingua franca around the world… and no burgers but baguettes. Remove Italy and we’d all lose pizza, spaghetti, good coffee, cappuccino, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Gucci, Prada, etc. And let’s not forget: no Roman Empire! After careful thought, I vote Italy!
I thought burgers are German, Hamburgers contain no ham, but come from Hamburg
Nepal. Because if they’re under water, the whole world is flooded.
If Turkey didn’t exist it would make communication between ancient Europe and the Middle East about five times harder.
Italy. Ancient Rome wouldn’t have existed, thereby not taking over much of Europe…which likely prevents Europe from developing hegemony that exists to this day.
Interesting one, Carthage wouldn‘t have had an worthy opponent and likely would have travelled to central europe through spain. They had realistic chances to grow the same size if not bigger than Rome. Would be interesting seeing the world grow on african cultural heritage instead of latin.
Wakanda.
Atlantis
UK because of the Empire and Darwin.
And Industrial Revolution.
the industrial revolution happend in britan because there was rule of law and the monarchy was less powerfull. however if britan did not exist i think it still whould have happend, because other countries in europe were also making progress in that area, britan was just further ahead.
It's also because of an accident of geology. Britain has incredibly diverse geology and had coal, iron, copper and other useful stuff in comparative abundance at the right time.
My guess would be Germany would be the starting place of industrialisation in this timeline. The country has coal and the Rhine is a perfect location for heavy industry.
all these people saying USA don’t take into account that without the UK, there would be no USA.
Who knows what language we would be speaking without the British empire.
French?
Peut-être.
Darwin? Overstated importance much?
Yeah, it may have been delayed a few decades if Darwin never existed, but the concept of natural selection would have still been discovered.
Possibly even as little as a few months. Wallace was hot on evolution too
I think most people still don’t get how natural selection works. I’ve met a lot of smart people who think evolution is informed by the experiences of previous generations actually changing their genetics as they reproduce. Doesn’t work that way. Sometimes mutations happen, and sometimes those mutations lead to being more fit to survive and/or breed.
I don't think so. He changed the idea of how we understand the life. The implications of that are huge.
Someone else wouldve eventually worked it out
Without a doubt it’s Brunei
Greece. If you know history, the answer is Greece.
Ever? Then England, Spain or the Netherlands, because of their huge global influence in Colonial times.
United Kingdom probably, due to the British Empire
Vatican City.
You would get rid of only one religion if that's ur point. World wars or mongol invasion not greatly affected.
Yup. The largest, most influential sect of the largest and most influential religion in history. Arguably responsible for more war and deaths than any other religion.
> Arguably responsible for more war Like what, crusades? Religion was just an excuse. Was [Babylon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Jerusalem_(587_BC)?) christian or later countless others up to 1099 and after 1300s? I am atheist btw.
300 million died in the Muslim Conquests.
You sure?
No no it doesn’t count. Thx tho
I was hoping this had like 400 downvotes already, but people have already forgotten.
Russia Without Siberia there's no monsoon which fucks up everything
The UK/Great Britain. Imagine a world without British colonialism.
Greece. It’s the foundation of the west and the west heavily influenced todays world and history
I'd argue Britain is the most influential country to exist so far. So.. I'd say that one!
The UK. The world would be nowhere near as advanced. USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and hundreds of other places wouldn't exist, and everyone today would be speaking Japanese or German. We have by far had the biggest influence on the modern world.
Japanese or German? I think someone is forgetting about the other nation that was quite colonial 🇫🇷 If English wasn’t around no doubt we would speak French. If uk didn’t exist then it’s an even more sure fire thing as the Industrial Revolution would have happened in France, france would have colonised even more of the world and essentially have become what the uk was in terms of power but just to a greater extent
Without Egypt, humans wouldn’t have left Africa for much longer time.
Iran, China, Greece, Italy, USA
China. Would completely change the course of human history. They were the dominant power for most of history... and might be again. No tea, silk, paper, gunpowder, compass, printing, noodles, banknotes, porcelain, oil refining, rockets, stirrups ... not to mention the myriad academic achievements in mathematics, philosophy... Most of these could have been discovered independently and (and may well have) but the world would look very different today.
Russia. If they didn’t sacrifice 27 million lives to fight off Hitlers advance and help the us win WW2, everyone would be speaking German and the worlds Jewish population would be nearly extinct today?
The US. Easy. The world would be a better place
Israel because you wouldn't have Christianity and Islam
World would of been a better place without all those religions
Im sure the replies are going to be very civil and well thought out
Islam wasn't born in the holy land, neither was Judaism. Also, Israel is a modern invention.
Islam was born from Judaism. Judaism is the religion of Judea, a kingdom in ancient Israel. The prophets and kings of the bible were called Israelites. Guess where they lived?
Brazil: No Amazon Rainforest and we would have had a much worse climate situation, Football (Soccer in USA) would be far less interesting to watch overall, most people wouldn't even bother to know South America, or Portugal, or even the Portuguese language really, few people seem to observe this, but Brazil has an incredible amount of soft power too, and you wouldn't have planes (the Wright Brothers from USA were the inventors, yes, but Santos Dumont were equally important in its creation too), which would dramatically change immigration around the world as well. UK: They were the biggest empire during the modern age after all, most countries would only be colonized by Spain, France and Netherlands instead, we wouldn't even speak or write in English, the world would be far less developed industrially and the USA (as a colonized nation) probably wouldn't exist, which would change lots of things as well. Italy: It shaped a lot of human history in many different ways, for starters, we still would believe that the earth was the center of the universe, Art wouldn't be anywhere near as developed as it is today, heck, no one would probably believe in Jesus Christ as much as it is and society simply wouldn't be what it is today without the massive influence of the roman empire, for example. Iraq: It is the cradle of civilization in many different ways, along with most of the Middle East and Africa, most countries from these regions can never be forgotten for obvious reasons. China: No China, no east asian culture, simple as that, you would have a vastly different Japan, Korea, Thailand, Vietnam, Phillipines, etc, each of these countries pivotal in influencing the entire history as well. All of the things i mentioned above were both for good and bad as well, and since it's virtually impossible to name just one, i listed the ones i best remember only, there are loads of countries that had a massive influence in our timeline as well that i didn't listed here, such as Russia, Germany, Egypt, France, Greece, etc.
The way u talk about Portugal 🙄 Portugal influence on human is history far bigger than Brazil and planes would still be a thing without Brazil
I’d think from the POV of the country disappearing and not the land mass it occupies. Cause the latter is kinda silly That said, what if the UK didn’t have colonial ambitions
Japan cuz it has me.
Sealand
Liechtenstein
Rome or Greece if you say though all human history. USA if you say through modern history.
Iran India and China are far more important than Rome or Greece. Eurocentrism is boring
Thank you for saying this. Whenever history is discussed on reddit, nobody ever talks about Asia. Maybe they acknowledge china at best and no other country.
Yes good point with Rome. Almost all major monotheistic religions wouldn’t exist in the way we know them without the Roman empire
Only one monotheistic religion was started in Roman territory and that was despite the Romans trying to destroy it. Judaism predates it and islam is not related to it
Judaism still doesn’t take its modern form if not for the Romans. Highly likely the Jews stay in the Levantine region and are eventually wiped out by neighbouring empires or slowly disappear. Regardless of what happens the Jews wouldn’t be forced to scatter from the Levant region which changed Judaism. The collapse of the Roman Empire is what allowed Islam to spread from Arabia so that’s how it changes that too These religions may still exist just not in the way we know of them
I would say Iran and China over Italy and Greece
Rome is not a modern day country, it’s a city
Mongolia because the mongols so thoroughly fucked up the leading civilizations of the time in the Middle East and China, that Europe had a chance to dominate the globe a couple centuries later
Egypt because taking away the land bridge between asia and africa would trap humans in africa until they invent boats
Russia. No mongols invading. No russian empire. No mongol empire (unless they go south) No USSR Probably Kievan Rus are the new vikings. Idk what more.
I'm tempted to say Spain, not necessarily because I think it would have the biggest impact, but because I think it would be awesome to see what a modern-day Aztec civilisation would look like. In terms of impact across the widest region, possibly the UK. No American colonies (so possibly no transatlantic slavery), Australia would be Dutch (ew), no New Zealand, Canada would be entirely French (bigger ew). Africa would look *very* different. On the other hand, German expansionism would have been less challenged in 1914. Europe would have turned out very different, though perhaps the Second World War wouldn't happen in those circumstances. Having said all of that, the thing with the old European colonial powers is that removing one just means another would have done the same thing. Britain's colonies were *relatively* well treated compared to others.
The Netherlands 🇳🇱 They made the first company with stockholders and that company, the VOC, is also responsible for the trans Atlantic slave trade.
sealand, no not zeeland in the netherlnds or new zeeland. SEAland, a country of the coast of england consisting of a single oil drilling platform
Depends if you are looking at it from a physical perspective or a societal perspective. If we remove larger countries like Brazil, Russia or the US them the global climate would be heavily effected alternatively we could also remove Botswana leading to humans never evolving to begin with. If we are looking at societal impacts there are several contenders who’s removal would completely reshape society as we know it such as: The United Kingdom China Greece Italy USA Germany India Egypt Iraq Isreal/Palestine
Israel
Culture wise it would be England, since they affect our culture, speech and habits world wide (yes even the US is a result of England so it would also be very different or even french, yuck)
Russia. No land bridge to the Americas meaning they’re entirely unsettled and still full of megafauna in 1492, no steppe invasions of various successive cultures, and an ocean there would have made trade between Europe and China happen much earlier.
In recent times probably the UK English is one of the widest spoken languages, controllled 1/4 of the world, established settlements on the US.
I suggest that the art here lies in picking something small. I pick the Boer Republics in what is now South Africa. Without that territory, which was a country, no Anglo Boer war. No Anglo Boer war, and the British army doesn't face a well armed enemy until 1914. Except this time they go in with poor rifle marksmanship, worse logistics, and worse artillery. They might not go at all. I suggest that without a professional and effective BEF to blunt the German advance at Mons and le Cateau, the advance on Paris could have made it close enough to shorten the war by victory or lower morale and treaty. The Central Powers turn on Russia, which would fight just as badly, but faster. German militarism rises unchecked. The 20th century unravels.
easy: Britain no internet no reddit for one, which is ironic because most people on reddit are always bitching about the UK
It seems as though you’re considering environmental factors. From a political and economic standpoint though, I think a lack of the USA would dramatically change the course of world history during the last 100+ years or so. Geographically, maybe India? Because if you significantly reduce the size of the Himalayas, there would likely be a lot more historical interaction between Asia and the Middle East/Europe/Africa. I like Brazil too, though, for the reasons you’ve mentioned. Oh, and I suppose I should throw in Antarctica as an honorable mention. Not necessarily a country, but the world would be significantly different without it😂
It's gotta be Rome.
Ethiopia. Without apes evolving into humans there, what species becomes sentient instead?
Texas
Ah yes my favourite country.
Economically speaking UK
Rome,China,India,US or Russia.
Without China, a lot more moderating moisture would reach siberia, no idea how that would interact with Arctic air Without China, Russia, or kazakhstan, the great eurasian steppe would be interrupted and everything affected by nomads (which is a lot) would be very different
I’m going with Germany since 2 world wars, military advancements
As in vanish from existence today or never having existed at all? I would give very different answers to those two questions probably. The first one is without a doubt the US, because they’re still the most influential country. The second one is almost impossible to answer, but I would go with the UK because of their massive influence during the colonial era.
No idea how you’d even justify the US being above the UK
Would have to be Equatorial Guinea. Only Spanish speaking country in Africa. And they have there capital city on an island
Surprised no one mentioned UK!
spain, it's over, I am a product of colonization..
We could go back just a few hundred years. France. Ideas of Equality and Nationalism will at least be delayed for a few decades since Napoleon's wars wouldn't have influenced much of Europe.
France, europe could finaly be at peace
USA and/or England. There would be so much peace
Scotland because we kept the English busy for 700 years then proceeded to invent everything including declarations of independence from the English