Nationalism and the Creation of Italy

Nationalism is a positive feeling and positive doings in support of your country. It became really popular and started in the 180o's. It's one of the strongest things of all nations, no matter what type of society you run. Nationalism is when someone has devotion and loyalty for their country. Basically, patriotism. A lot of governments want their people to be loyal to them and feel like their government is the best. In order to say that you are a nationalist, you have to admit and have proof of how proud you are of your country. For me I'm proud of two countries. One country is where I was born, America. The other country is where my parents were born at. My nationality, which is Dominican.Americans represent America a lot without even noticing. Just by voting, that's one way you are supporting your country and you are supporting its government and society. I represent my pride of being American by speaking English and supporting the rights that we have. Even by standing to do the the Pledge of Allegiance.
Before Italy was known to be the Italy that it is today, it was like many other nations. It was separated and each empire had its ruler. The rulers weren't even Italian. Italians started to notice that having foreign rulers was breaking their nation apart even more. This led to the conclusion that the rulers should at least be Italian.
This led to two great leaders who believed in different things. There names were Giuseppe Mazzini and Giuseppe Garibaldi. Mazzini was an idealist and he created the Young Italy group which only held men younger than 40. He believed that Italy would actually be better with the separated nation-states. While Garibaldi, a nationalist, was uniting all the nation-states in the South of Italy. He fought many battles to unite the South while Count Camillo di Cavour was fighting many battles to unite the North. In the end, the united state- nations were handed over to King Victor Emmanuel II.
Now that Italy was united nationalism was taking its course. Of course, there was many disagreements, especially between Mazzini and Cavour. Mazzini believed that Cavour was trying to unite Italy for the wealth of the King, instead of for the advantage of having all of the people of Italy together. With so many wars, Italy was losing its money. This made Italy a poor country entering the 20th Century.

SImon Bolivar and Latin American Revolutions

Simon Bolivar, the Liberator, was a famous hero for the South American countries. He rescued them from years of monarchy. He was born in Caracas, Venezuela on July 24, 1783. He was a very privileged child because of the fact that his parents were very wealthy. Although he lost parents when he was a teenager, his guardians made sure that he received great tutoring in Venezuela and schooling in Spain. By the age of 19 he was married. His wife died shortly after they married.

He left Venezuela and traveled to Europe. In Europe, he learned the enlightenment ways of Rousseau, Locke and Voltaire. The ways of monarchy from, Napoleon Bonaparte. He learned justice, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Coming home from Europe he passed through United States, their he learned that it was fine for the people to govern themselves without having to face monarchy. These were great influences of the revolution in Latin America and started the spark of freedom for South America...

Bolivar started by joining the revolution against Spain for Venezuela in 1810. In 1811, Venezuela had received its independence but Spain was not ready to lose a colony. They attacked once again and this time Venezuela was not awaiting it. Bolivar did not give up, he was determined to be the leader of the next civil rights movement. He tried more attacks against Spain but once again failed. He made friends with the people of Haiti who had just received their independence from France. He wouldn't give up like a true leader, but he still hadn't won any freedom.

Other nations of South America, were waiting for their turn against Spain seeing how Venezuela was working to get their freedom. In 1811, it was Colombia's turn. Bolivar had an army of less than twenty-five hundred men. He made his army suffer, going through different kinds of lands and finally fighting. On August 7, Bolivar had a surprise for the Spanish defenders. The definition of his nickname, the Liberator, proved everyone that day he truly was the liberator.

Ten-thousand Spanish troops had landed in Venezuela in 1815 once again for the revolution. Meanwhile, other Hispanic countries were getting their freedom from Spain as well. Mexico had receive its independence in 1813, Argentina in 1816, in 1821, Bolivia, Peru,Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras had also received their independence. As well Venezuela, the country that had been fighting for so long. Ecuador was freed in 1822 with long companion and friend Antonio Jose de Sucre. Sucre had also helped with the other nations. Finally, in 1823 Peru and Bolivia got its independence. Bolivia was named after Bolivar. It became separate from Peru in 1825, under the honor of Simon Bolivar. After fighting with only seven-thousand, Bolivar defeated ten-thousand Spanish troops.

Bolivar was a better revolutionist leader than political leader. The different provinces were able to split from their helpful leader, leaving Bolivar with only Colombia. However after the death of his long and old friend Sucre, Bolivar resigned. Seeing how he had no one else to trust.

Bolivar fought for years. He fought for the independence of those who deserved it and he made sure that they lost their mother country, Spain. We all end up growing up right? Well the South American countries were ready for to be on their own. They just needed a little push.

Robespierre and The Reign of Terror

The people of France had to wait for the fall of Robespierre to start their democracy. The Reign of Terror was a period of time where people's heads were guillotined. For reasons as internal enemies towards France. The leaders of the Reign of Terror were George Danton and Maximilen Robespierre. The Reign of Terror was suppose to make all French people scared and make them want to stop the revolution. It even made people watch what they said because if anyone every heard about revolutionary ideas, that was all the evidence a jury would need to kill you.

Robespierre was one of the most powerful men in France. He was the leader of the Committee of Public Safety and the executive committee of the National Convention. Robespierre soon began to take the guillotine way to far. His own supporter started to notice and started to stand up against him. His friend Danton who was along his side was killed and before he was killed he said, "Above all, don't forget to show my head to the people - it's well worth having a look at." Although Danton was killed Robespierre was stopped. The other members of the Committee of Public Safety started to notice that something was wrong and they arrested Robespierre and killed him the next day. He was the last person ever to have his head cut off.

The Reign of Terror happened because the government was scared that everyone would keep revolting against them. They felt like they had to take action. That was their only way, they decided to threaten their people. The executions would start with a person who just looked like a threat to the government and then they would be arrested. After that they would have to kneel for their heads to get cut off. Thank god that we live in a place where we have freedom of speech.

The French Revolution:Social Causes

The French Revolution took place in the 1780's. It was a new era that started because of new political ideas where the people of France saw that they were being treated wrong. Things were unfair and for a long time the French people didn't notice it. When they finally did they decided to take matters into their own hands by defeating King Louis XVI and his Queen, Marie Antoinette.

They were three estates. The first estate was the Catholic clergies, the second estate was the Nobles and the third estate was the rest of the country. The rest of the country was the peasants, merchants, farmers, city workers and middle class people. The rest of the country paid the most taxes. Really high ones. After a while the people of the country didn't even have enough money to buy bread because they were paying all of their taxes. They started to understand that all the taxes they paid was only to suppport others above them. They basically paid a share that nobles and clergies should have paid instead of them. Which is why they felt like they were being used. They worked really hard only to have their work treated like it was nothing and then to have to smile at higher ranks and just keep paying was just about enough.

Most people started to think like the great Enlightenment thinkers. They thought about a world where they were able to speak up just as much as the next person. A democracy where everything was fair. A society where they could put their ideas in and have a leader that would help them and take in their ideas. Not a leader that was greedy and dozed off in important meetings where they needed a smart king. People started to get the idea of questioning everything because it was time they thought about themselves not just their king, because of this questioning a revolution began...

The people of France got together on July 14, 1789 and went to the Palace of Versailles. They were able to get the King and Queen out of their beautiful and huge palace. The King and Queen were never to return. The King and his Queen were beheaded a few years after that date.

Copernicus and the trial of Galileo

Heliocentrism is the theory of the Sun being at the center of the universe. This idea led to a huge dispute. Although the Earth seems to be in the middle of the universe and it looks like everything revolves around it, its not true. This theory has been discussed in many languages. In ancient India, Sage Yajnavalkya, noticed that the Sun was bigger then the Earth. He influenced the start of Heliocentrism. In ancient Greece, Aristarchus of Samos, calculated the distance of the Sun and the moon concluding that the Sun was at least 6 or 7 times bigger then the Earth. Along with these two men are many more that proved that heliocentrism.
Geocentric is the oppostie of heliocentrism, its the theory that the Earth is at the center of the universe. This was a wrong theory. This was an idea held in ancient Greek and ancient China. Ancient thinkers believed this theory because they saw that the Earth felt still and that the Sun, stars and moon moved around. The Sun, stars and moon moving around in the same routine made the very wrong theory seem very right. Even though, we learn that the Sun is definitely at the center of the universe people still do believe that the Earth is the universe's center. However, this is usually involving religious beliefs.
The theory that came first was the heliocentrism. Aristotle was one of the many who made the theory that Earth was at the middle of the universe but others like Galileo proved him wrong. By using the scientific method. Geocentrism was the theory that came out of the scientific revolution. Many used the scientific method to prove geocentrism.
Galileo was put on trial because of his disbeliefs about the earth being the center of the universe. Galileo and the church disagreed in the idea about where the earth was located. The Chruch thought that earth was at the center of the universe like many others did. However, Galileo tried to prove that was wrong by using the scientific method. This made the Church really angry leading Galileo into house arrest. The Church put him on trial so that he could admit he was wrong and that way no one would get new ideas. At the end, Galileo said that he was wrong about his beliefs. Even though, he didnt say we all knew that it was for the fear of being excommunicated.

Scientific Method:Scientific Revolution

A long time ago, before the 15oo's, many people had the wrong idea about a lot of science questions. For example, people thought that Aristotle's idea about the amount of weight affects how fast something will fall. However Aristotle was wrong, leading everyone in the wrong direction. Until Galileo proved him wrong by testing two objects in different amounts of weight.
This is why the scientific method is so important. Without actually experimenting something you can really be wrong. Even if you get the wrong idea after experimenting with something there is always room for changing your result. Scientific method includes observing, next you make a hypothesis, finally you do the experiment. You check up on your experiment and gather data. It can be in charts, graphs or notes.
The scientific method lets you know the difference between a fact, method or theory. For example, if you want to know if a bread will grow mold after being left in a dark location. You can experiment this by using the scientific method. You can get two pieces of bread and put one in the dark and another in a place with a lot of light. You can predict what is going to happen. Then you come back to both locations daily and check to see if the bread in the darker location is more moldy then the bread in the location with light.
Even though there is room for changes in results to a scientific experiment it does make you wonder if there ever is one answer?

Evolution vs. Creation

The difference between evolution and creation is that evolution has proof behind it while creation is a lot of faith. Eventhough, a lot of religous people do believe that whatever is in the bible is a fact. They are relying on something that they werent there to witness. Although no one from today was there to witness cavemen, there are fossils and DNA that help scientists look right. Its hard to choose which side is right, especially because they both seem to be. If you feel like God has helped you through out your life then you want to go with the religious side. If your just someone who needs proof then ofcourse you're going to go the scientific way.
Both sides have good points.Evolution states that all living organisms come from a common ancestor.Overtime the living organisms changed into what they needed to be to survive in their own enviroments. This is where natural selections comes in. Natural selection meant that if an animal needed to grow wings to survive it would. However, not all animals were able to change, proving that they could not be the strongest.It was indeed, the survival of the fittest.This didnt change the fact that we all come from a common ancestor. This just meant we all had different survival techniques that made is into the living organisms we are today. This is why certain species look similiar to others. Evolution has always been easy to proof with fossils but with new technology there has always been new ways to prove. For example, gel electrophorosis.
The religious side states that all living things and humanity came from God. The religious idea has been banned in schools all over America. Since they dont feel they should get children into new ideas, then what they are taught at home. According to Christianity, God worked long and hard for 6 days creating Earth. Earth's elements, humans and animals. On the 7th day he rested from all the work. The proof that the church had to back themselves up with is Jesus and his disciples. How they made sure that everything that happen was written down to pass down from century to century. Most people dont think its right to just believe in what someone wrote. But other people arent because they have a very stong faith.
Both sides would probably battle for a long time. You can believe in monkeys that evolved to us humans or an almighty God. A lot of people believe that creationism is there just to explain the unexplainable, they could be wrong or they could be right. Who's to know for sure??