Reddit mentions of The Shortest History of Europe

Not sure what a GOAT is, in this context, but he was a mystical, Cynical philosopher, to be sure. At the least, right?

P.S. Wisdom books
are a favorite. There's so much humor and clever wordplay in the Bible, it's great. Like when they say, (paraphrasing) 'an cheating woman is like the devil, she eats a dish, wipes her mouth and says nothing happened as if God won't see.'

There's also a strong Greek and Roman philosopher influence running through some of the books and, if nothing else, Christianity is one of the three main influences on civilization and more importantly, European culture.

John Hirst once wrote "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, the title of Edward Gibbon's great history, is etched into our consciousness. What must it have felt like to live after that event, to know there had been a great civilisation and now it was gone? But if you were to ask a medieval lord or scholar what it was like to live now that the Roman Empire was no more, they would have been puzzled. In their eyes the Roman Empire still survived. There was in fact something called the Roman Empire existing into the nineteenth century. The last Roman emperor traced his line back to Augustus."

Which isn't to say nothing had changed since the first century, it's just that continuity accompanies any change.

'Collapse' is one of those metaphors that's forgotten it's a metaphor, perhaps due for retirement.

Back in my Kunstler-following days I thought the 2013 budget impasse meant imminent collapse. Almost nothing that has happened since is something I had imagined.
Take the smokey haze that's drifted across the Tasman from Australian bush fires today. I'd never have thunk it.