Getting Started

     I think it's amazing how our planets topography, climate, natural resources and more have played such an integral role in the tale of human existence. The idea that a country being flat, or mountainous, or surrounded by water can be the deciding factor for its eventual rise or fall. In the world today we see entire nations of people being affected due to the locations and amounts of a substance (oil) under particular swaths of land. Generally speaking the ideology is if the oil isn't under my swath then that has to be changed. The Human race is under the control of the planet and this hold it has over us now has been there and will be there for the long run. 

     As was outlined in Mackinders theory of "The Heartland" the geographical features of one particular region in Russia possibly make it the most important piece of land on the planet. This potential affected Nazi military strategies and eventually led to the creation of new nations, buffer nations to create space between Germany and this important geographical hot spot. 

     The hold our planet has on us also, very likely, impacted what we currently view as the dominant world religions. This can at least be seen in Africa in which the Northern Epi-Saharan regions are mostly Islamic by nature and the Sub-Saharan regions are not. This might imply that the Sahara desert is the reason all of Africa isn't Muslim, or for that matter Arab. Besides that vast void of dry wasteland  what other reason is there for the limits on Muslim expansion on the African continent?