The relationship between climate and wealth

Craven,
I do also suspect that your suspicion that a temperate climate is generally beneficial to the increase of technology. If it benefits humanity in general depends upon ones personal definition of benefits.

I was just suggesting some way to show it, should there actually be a bias in favor due to climate.

Another chart, perhaps fairer, could be of the average labor hours required to make availiable 10,000 calories per day per person.
Since I am required to heat my dwelling I lose a certain amount of work each day that a tropical resident does not just in smoke. Living standards based in cash available does not address this problem.



Due to the growth of service industries I hope that the economic distinctions will rapidly blur.

But IMO the question remains, How can we show if temperate climates benefit humans

mech,

As a method of showing it I'd suggest taking the average temperature of regions with the highest GNP per capita and comparing with the rest.

Per Capita might actually be a bad criteria because of climate and population relationships.

Thing is, using supported biomass is a bad criteria for me because it contradicts the notion I put forward that the very success in supporting biomass is a detriment of sorts to industrialization.

I agree that living standards is a bad criteria. I think the quality of life in some areas with no inductrialization is excellent. I ahve spent close to a year not wearing a shirt or shoes, walking beaches and drinking coconut water.

There is no way to quantify that.

I too hope that the rise in the import of services will serve as an equalizer.

I think a good idea you had is to measure the average amount worked. One complication is the productivity of teh work as temerature is already a recognized factor in this (e.g. many historians recognize the AC as an invention that improved productivity).

i have a pet theory like that ...

communities in the more mountainous regions are more likely to be conservative / chauvinist than people in regions with literally more open horizons.

(this is just my way of bookmarking, btw).

I doubt it, nimh. Kansas is one of our more conservative states. In fact, flat regions (unless dessert) are conducive to farming, and farmers tend to be conservative.

Dole cant be too conservative, he advertises viagra on t.v. (he also has a good sense of humor)

Listening here. I am interested in the relation of physical discomfort to productivity. From personal experience, I am slower at mapping a site when it is 98 degrees and tend to shut down earlier re any actual work at home if there isn't enough heat in my relatively advanced house in winter.

You can insulate and aircondition to some extent in a temperate zone, but it is much more expensive to make high production doable when the temps become more extreme.
People can be forced to be slaves in certain extreme circumstances, but siberia and equatorial sites are places where I suppose survival is the interest, not high production, and mechanisms for that survival have developed within the cultures who live in extreme circumstances over time.

Just musing, extrapolating from my own experience/observation.

yeh ... phaps it doesnt work in the US. (tho the rockies arent exactly a liberal walhalla). but it works within, er, germany, france, austria, slovakia, serbia ... err ... romania (kinda) ...

or: flattest countries in europe are denmark and holland; most mountainous ones include austria, slovakia ... bosnia, kosovo, chechnya! so there you go ...

<winks>

(actually, i know its too easy to falsify to state without a wink - but i do actually still think theres a point in there.

even farming, in the open horizon of a flat country that would tend to facilitate easier transport, trade and population moves and would be more likelly to yield good crops and thus more easily attainable economic growth - would generally encourage a different mindset, i'd presuppose, from farming on the hard-to-cultivate steep slopes or narrow valleys of mountain areas where trade and transport are more haphazard and village communities more isolated from each other, and thus less likely to get acquainted let alone habitual with strange voices and foreign products.

but perhaps i should add a wet vs dry criterium to finetune the theory ;-).

oic. Anyway, it was a swell bookmark.

Man who live in cold house in winter....
usually mean, man real broke......and stupid.

The equation I had heard about was:

Coast: relaxed, happy-go-lucky, violence prone, sexually free.
Plains: simple-minded, hard-working, unimaginative, restrained.
Mountain: diffident, melancholic, bent to tradition.
High plains: imaginative, but melancholic and restrained.

I believe it is mostly stereotyping.

Adele, I am not!
But I am more productive. I have to pay the oil man. And he sells more kerosene in the winter. The parts store sells more batteries. Snow tires are more expensive on a per mile basis. Somebody (me) has to buy the snow plow and pay my neighbor to run it. My car needs more gas, The cows have to have their meals delivered. I wear long johns whilst talking to y'all.
This also may be a factor in Cravens sneaky suspicion. Showing this is
going to be more difficult than it first appeared to be. LOL Craven

Woman who live in cold house in winter may be near broke from utility bills, but not necessarily stupid.

Hello!
If you don't have the brains (and I use that word loosely), to get off your duff and use your resources to make your home a more comfortable place for yourself and/or others, then you certainly would (in most circumstances, I hope), go beyond the easily aquired means that it might take and make it comfy. I have often been just please as punch as long as I couldn't see my breath while in the house. But, I didn't complain about it, if I didn't like it, I'd change it. Easy.
A person HAS to rely on themselves. Unfortunately, that isn't always possible. Then it comes to where a person has to 'leave themselves open' and ask for help.
The statement that I made was erroneous. I should not have said "stupid". After all look at the Donner Party.(Interpet it as you like.) And many of them died regardless.
And....while I'm at it. The one and only post that I have started myself, was one inquiring where I might get some help with my lack of punctuation etiquette...ok, ya,....and the use of verbs, adjectives, adnouns (haha) and such. Sometimes, my lack of knowledge in these particular subjects distorts what I am trying to get across.
Like my flagrant use of a comma that made it seam as though the 'stupid' person was mean. Although I remember being mean a time or two or quite a few (hahha) when I was uncomfortably cold.
So, there you have it.
I shall endeavor to enhance my writing capabilities.
I Promise, Adele

Interesting thesis, Craven.

But to show you what a schlump I am, the thought that came first to my mind after reading your intro was:

Jeez, I like to play golf in cool weather better than playing in the heat. In fact, weather cool enough to require a sweater is best.

Hey, we can't all be philosophers or social scientists!

But it is an interesting thesis. And tomorrow when on the golf course, I'll think about it.

Ah. Adele, many people are off their duffs and still cannot afford high utility bills, and other expenses in maintaining property, either owned or rented.

Interesting theory, Craven. I'll have to think about it, before I offer my .02c worth of opinion. Interesting subject, and what you offer makes much sense.

ossobuco,

But also many people have aspirations beyond their ambitions.

The cheapest way to live is in a boarding house or a commune, but I see many people struggling to keep up with the Jones's but they, for many reasons can't, or won't. This often seems to be a psychological problem, aided and abetted by Madison Ave. and Hollywood.

being a beach-bum might be a good way to live.

why?