Why are there very few Spanish and Portuguese scientists or philosophers compared to the English, the French...

Why are there very few Spanish and Portuguese scientists or philosophers compared to the English, the French, the Germans and even Italians, despite being comparable powers throughout history?

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I don't know if this is a true statement

In any case, Spain and Portugal were on the decline by 18th/19th century iirc

Oh really? Is it due to them being slightly more religious than the others? Or that they had a lower population? I dont know about the population of European countries in the 18th-19th century.

Spain was "on the decline" from Rocroi to the 19th century, everything after that and until late 20th century was literally third world tier.

On the decline I don't mean population wise, they were losing colonies like Brazil, Mexico etc.

The empires you're comparing them to at the same time were incorporating whole sub-continents like India into their empires at the same time.

retarded nigger chink leafy mitherfucker

recessive society on decline: few breakthroughs
BULLISH countries: at their zenith, spain when philip have deformed incestual birth and sex, england when vicky kill the Nigger

this is why they bullied you in school

Due to internal conflicts, Spain industrialized very late.

This too

This is a question I've asked myself as well, but I'd say a few factors come into play here:
1. Population. England, France, Germany and Italy simply had more people.
2. "Tradition". Rome had been a center of learning ever since the Roman empire, practically uninterruptedly (during the Middle Ages the Vatican took over as the big patron of the sciences). London and Paris were also traditionally big institutions of learning (up until about the 19th century anyone who could afford it would send their children to Paris for at least a few months). Such a tradition never arose in Barcelona, Madrid or Lisbon.
3. Late industrialization as some others had mentioned (though that doesn't explain their lack of Renaissance thinkers, a period in which Italy excelled despite also industrializing very late)
4. Intellectual climate. Italy and Germany had loads of tiny meme nations. If you were being persecuted in one you could just hop over to another. This encouraged a wide diversity of ideas and competition. Liberal traditions arising in Britain and France also created a climate of debate and disagreement. This never arose in Iberia, where Spanish farmers took up arms because they didn't like Napoleon's constitution which, among others, guaranteed freedom of conciousness. Though to be fair to the Spanish, by the time Spain unified they had just come out of the reconquista. This explains their "no fun allowed" approach to religion and their oppression of opposing opinions (because one of them could be a Jew or a Muslim and then shit'll hit the fain again!)
5. Money. By the time point 4 was declining, Spain was bankrupt and broken, as was Portugal. The Spaniards worth a damn moved to France. France, Britain, Germany and Italy at the time had money, and the brightest minds go where the money is. This is why America today is the country that benefits the most from international brain drain, and Africa suffers the most.

But that's just me speculating.

because we are lazy desu senpai

Even during their colonial height they were still stupid as fuck. They just don't have an intellectual culture.

Nah when Spain wuz Moors and shit they did all kinds of science and maths.

t. kang

they only got rich due to american gold so in a way they were like modern day black football players or rappers who get rich during their career and then expecting them to found some sort of intellectual dynasty

they had some catholic philosophers and some of the best literature in the world history, they just get kicked out of world scene and became a shadow of what they used to be

Our colonial age was a lot earlier than the Anglos/Franks/Dutch/Germs, etc, so the things we discovered were low-level and practical (not abstract) - naval stuff, ocean stuff, cartography, astronomy, linguistics (translators and stuff), and stuff made for war.

Problem being that all this was discovered before the printing press and during a time where sharing information meant giving the other cunts the fruits of your labour, so we mostly didn't, and passed stuff by word of mouth.

We had different goals and technology available and, in the case of Portugal, only 1m population.

That and we had kicked all the (((intellectuals))) to fund our journeys to native pussy.

ebin
this

No, we won the 1st and 2nd place, so we stopped playing the Uno colonisation of the world game and went to hit on the girls at the bar while the other guys played for 3rd.

>2. "Tradition". Rome had been a center of learning ever since the Roman empire, practically uninterruptedly (during the Middle Ages the Vatican took over as the big patron of the sciences). London and Paris were also traditionally big institutions of learning (up until about the 19th century anyone who could afford it would send their children to Paris for at least a few months). Such a tradition never arose in Barcelona, Madrid or Lisbon.

The university of Salamanca is technically the oldest in Europe and it was also one of the most prestigious at the time, with five or six other universities founded in the 13th and 14th centuries. The University of Barcelona was founded in the 15th century and the Universidad Complutense de Madrid is actually an offshoot of the University of Alcalá, which was founded in 1293.

But anyhow, the OP's question is is a meme question since there was no shortage of Spanish philosophers during the Medieval and Early Modern periods, but most of them were properly theologians and have therefore lost more of their relevance than secular philosophers. If he wants to find their names, Google is his friend.

Good answer

>2. "Tradition". Rome had been a center of learning ever since the Roman empire, practically uninterruptedly (during the Middle Ages the Vatican took over as the big patron of the sciences). London and Paris were also traditionally big institutions of learning (up until about the 19th century anyone who could afford it would send their children to Paris for at least a few months). Such a tradition never arose in Barcelona, Madrid or Lisbon.
Portugal and Spain both have some of the oldest universities in Europe.
>lack of Renaissance thinkers
Plenty of Renaissance thinkers, just not protestant in nature.

many dutch, british, french artists/philosophers were of portuguese or spanish jewish descent that were banned during the inquisition.
david ricardo is one for example, I don't remember now but I know 2 or 3 famous dutch people from that time were also sons of portuguese jewish that were expelled.

also the fact that we're far away from europe's center, northen italy, germany, france

portugal are good lads

Espinoza is probably the most famous one.