I always thought "Scotch-Irish" was a generic Celtic people-group. Well, no. Scottish settled in Ulster, Northern Ireland, beginning in 1610. Somewhat like Germans in Russia. The Scotch-Irish tended to be evangelical Presbyterians who were key figures in America's War for Independence.* The Scots from Scotland tended to side with Britain and eventually moved to Canada after the war finished. Herman, Arthur (2001). How the Scots Invented the Modern World. Three Rivers Press. ISBN 9780609809990. Leicester, Graham (April 15, 2002). "Scotland can still help shape new world". The Scotsman. Edinburgh. p.17.

How Scotland invented the modern world | Metro News How Scotland invented the modern world | Metro News

The defeat of the 1745 Jacobite rising decimated the antiquated social structure based around clans lorded over by chieftains. This liberalized the Scottish way of life by allowing citizens to own land and keep the profits instead of giving all profits to the chieftains who owned all the land. Their literate foundation allowed the Scots to become economically literate and take advantage of trade. Edinburgh and Glasgow became epicenters of intellectual thought. There existed in Scotland a clergy who believed that a moral and religious foundation was required for, and compatible with, a free and open sophisticated culture, which moderated hardline conservatives. Herman presents biographies of Francis Hutcheson, Henry Home (Lord Kames), Robert Adam, Adam Smith, and others to illustrate the Scottish development. I said it was an eternal mystery; one of the problems with this book is that the Scottish Enlightenment remains a bit of a mystery even after finishing it. Herman never quite escapes the sense of merely delivering a laundry-list of great names and inventions, most of which could be more or less grasped by consulting Wikipedia's article on Scottish inventions and discoveries. Who formed the first literate society? Who invented our modern ideas of democracy and free market capitalism? The Scots. As historian and author Arthur Herman reveals, in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries Scotland made crucial contributions to science, philosophy, literature, education, medicine, commerce, and politics—contributions that have formed and nurtured the modern West ever since.How the Scots Invented the Modern World: The True Story of how Western Europe's Poorest Nation Created Our World & Everything in it Herman received his B.A. from the University of Minnesota and M.A. and Ph.D. in history from Johns Hopkins University. He spent a semester abroad at The University of Edinburgh in Scotland. [1] His 1984 dissertation research dealt with the political thought of early-17th-century French Huguenots. [2] Firstly, there was a large injection of rationalism into religious thinking by key prominant players. Equality of all before god, working to god's glory, and recognising god in the observable facts of nature were principles carried into the heart of Scottish society.

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In this book, you will learn about the Scottish Enlightenment. In particular, you will learn about how Scotland, prior to its enlightenment, was dominated by the Presbyterian Church (called the "Kirk"). At this time, the Kirk routinely executed blasphemers and promoted the world-view that man is an inherently sinful creature who can never truly redeem himself. Fortunately, a great thinker named Francis Hutcheson promoted the idea that men are generally moral creatures and shifted the focus of philosophical inquiry towards matters of concern to individuals living on earth (e.g., how men can be moral, how men can coexist in a society, etc.) as opposed to focusing on God, Church or Monarchy. Thus with Hutcheson, argues Herman, was the beginning of the Scottish Enlightenment. As for Herman's claim that the Scots invented the modern world, it should be taken with a grain of salt. In the free trade zone of the British Empire, commerce and ideas flowed both ways. It can be said that the Scots did much to improve or make new existing ideas, and in some cases invent; but they did not singlehandedly invent the modern world.advocated liberty in the sphere of commerce and the global economy. Hume developed philosophical concepts that directly influenced James Madison and thus the U.S. Constitution. Herman elucidates at length the ideas of the Scottish Enlightenment and their worldwide impact. In 19th-century Britain, the Scottish Enlightenment, as popularized by Dugald Stewart, became the basis of classical liberalism. At the University of Glasgow, James Watt perfected the crucial technology of the Industrial Revolution: the steam engine. The "democratic" Scottish system of education found a home in the developing U.S. This is a worthwhile book for the general reader, although much of the material has been covered better elsewhere, most recently in T.M. Devine's magisterial The Scottish Nation: A History, 1700–2000 Thirdly, the melting-pot effect: put lots of clever, imaginative people into the same cramped space (18th century Edinburgh) with lots of claret and oysters and their ideas will cross-pollinate and bring forth a great flourishing of creativity. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Herman taught at Sewanee: The University of the South, George Mason University, Georgetown and The Catholic University of America. He was the founder and coordinator of the Western Heritage Program in the Smithsonian's Campus on the Mall lecture series. [3] [4] How the Scots Invented the Modern Worldreveals how Scottish genius for creating the basic ideas and institutions of modern life stamped the lives of a series of remarkable historical figures, from James Watt and Adam Smith to Andrew Carnegie and Arthur Conan Doyle, and how Scottish heroes continue to inspire our contemporary culture, from William “Braveheart” Wallace to James Bond. Which is to say: the cover of the book magnetized me... and then the first eight chapters, focused on the Enlightenment, demagnetized me. But I have to walk my daily steps, so I slogged through the audio and learned me some philosophy and economics, along with who Francis Hutcheson and Lord Kames were. Once the second part, Diaspora, took off, I was an eager reader.

How the Scots Invented the Modern World: The True Story…

The Viking Heart: How Scandinavians Conquered the World, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2021 ISBN 978-1328595904 Starting in the century or so before the Enlightenment period, Herman explains the various factors that led to the Union of 1707. He shows the stranglehold that the Kirk had on Scottish society, but that out of this grew the idea of man as a free individual – that monarchs were not absolute and that tyrannies could and should be challenged. He gives the Kirk the credit for the idea that education should be for all, making Scotland one of the most literate societies in the world, with an appetite for books other than the Bible. And he explains very clearly the impact of the Darien scheme on both the financial state of Scotland and on its self-confidence as a nation. In Herman’s view, the Union was a resoundingly positive development for Scotland, despite its unpopularity amongst ordinary people, since it opened up opportunities and access to the rest of the world via the rapidly developing British Empire, hence revolutionising Scotland both economically and culturally. It was both exciting and fulfilling to read the history that led up to the Battle of Culloden and beyond, to meet the historical figures and read the family names from her books in the context of the history she drew on.HOW THE SCOTS INVENTED THE MODERN WORLD THE TRUE STORY OF HOW WESTERN EUROPE’S POOREST NATION CREATED OUR WORLD AND EVERYTHING IN IT Rifkind, Malcolm (February 18, 2002). "The world in union". New Statesman . Retrieved September 6, 2009.