Columbian Exchange Positive Effects

The Columbian Exchange is a term, coined by Alfred Crosby, meaning the transfer of ideas, people, products, and diseases resulting from Old World contact with Native Americans. Some goods exchanged between the New and Old Worlds include the three sisters, potatoes, wheat, tobacco, guns, languages, religion, weeds, influenza, smallpox, and human beings. While the transmission of foods to the Old World greatly contributed to population growth, there are largely more negative consequences worldwide than positive ones (3). After looking at all of the facts, one can only conclude that the Columbian Exchange had a more detrimental effect than a beneficial one.

Economic Effects of the Columbian Exchange  Inflation of cash-crops, slavery and silver resulting from the Columbian Exchange caused a drastic effect on the global economy.   Cash-crops forged new trade routes across continents, slavery supported New World exports, and silver caused power shifts in the world 's distribution of wealth.   As Spanish expeditions to the New World increased in size and purpose, the economic effects on the rest of the world spread with equal vigor.   The triangular trade circulated commodities between Europe, Africa, and the Americas.   From Europe some commodities were distributed throughout Asia.

A New Way of Life: How The Colombian Exchange Made a Difference in Our Lives It’s hard to believe that events that happened centuries ago have a huge impact on the way in which we form our ways of life. The Columbian Exchange was one of those events that still has effect on our lives, today. According to Cory Malone, (“Beginning after Columbus' discovery in 1492 the exchange lasted throughout the years of expansion and discovery”). It was a time period where cultural and biological exchanges were made between the new world and old world.

Historians differ on what they think about the net result of the European arrival in the New World. Considering that the Columbian Exchange, which refers to “exchange of plants, animals, people, disease, and culture between Afro-Eurasia and the Americas after Columbus sailed to the Americas in 1492,” led to possibly tens of millions of deaths on the side of the American Indians, but also enabled agricultural and technological trade (Henretta et al. 42), I cannot help but reflect on whether the effects should be addressed as a historical or a moral question. The impact that European contact had on the indigenous populations of North America should be understood as a moral question because first, treating it as a historical question is difficult due to lack of reliable historical evidence; second, the meaning of compelling historical claims is contestable as the academic historian perspective tends to view the American Indian oral history as invalid; and finally, what happened to the native Indians is morally repulsive and must be discussed as such. The consequences of European contact should be answered as a moral question because historically, it is hard to be historically objective in the absence of valid and dependable historical evidence.

The Columbian Exchange refers to the monumental transfer of goods such as: ideas, foods, animals, religions, cultures, and even diseases between Afroeurasia and the Americas after Christopher Columbus’ voyage in 1492. The significance of the Columbian Exchange is that it created a lasting tie between the Old and New Worlds that established globalization and reshaped history itself (Garcia, Columbian Exchange). Worlds that had been separated by vast oceans for years began to merge and transform the life on both sides of the Atlantic (The Effects of the Columbian Exchange). This massive exchange of goods gave rise to social, political, and economic developments that dramatically impacted the world (Garcia, Columbian Exchange). During this time,

The Columbian Exchange was the exchange of goods animals and plants from one country to another. The Columbian Exchange had many impacts. Some of them can still be seen today. One example is introduction of new species. Another is the slave trade that happened.

The European expansion into the Western Hemisphere in the 15th and 16th centuries was a great advance for human civilization. Three reasons was an advancement of the human race is that it laid the groundwork for changed politics, new economy and created views on other cultures. This is important because the expansion of the Europeans into the Western hemisphere was one of a kind at the time. The expansion brought new people, culture and ideas and that and this laid the groundwork for a new government.

The Columbian Exchange is a mark in history that has lead to pivotal outcomes that has affected the world today as well as the past. The Exchange between the old and new world has brought advances to today’s world due to sacrifices and interactions between two distinctly different populations. Both worlds introduced one another to new diseases, and resources that overall lead to advancements in research and new resources of survival to help sustain populations in both worlds, which have carried over into present day and has allowed for the development of the human population. Sustainable populations allowed individuals to no longer concentrate solely on survival rather have time to research and expand knowledge about health practices and give attention to preventing deadly epidemics. Although the interaction of disease did give rise to deadly epidemics in the new world the advancements made in medicine changed how disease and illness were treated and further allowed a change in perspective about health and survival.

During the early 15th century, there were thousands of groups of people with distinct cultures and languages spread across the Americas. Their lifestyles varied from hurters to farmers. Because of the diversity and complexity, civilizations rose and fell even before Christopher Columbus’s voyage. When Columbus sailed across the Atlantic Ocean, there were about 50 million people living on the Americas. Their lives drastically changed from the arrival of the Europeans.

Many years ago, a continental drift split North and South America from Eurasia and Africa. As they remained separated, new species of plants and animals developed and evolved on each continent. The Columbian Exchange was a period of physical exchanges between the Old and New worlds. The Old and the New worlds exchanged diseases, populations, crops, and animals. All of these exchanges were brought to the Americas after Christopher Columbus’ voyage to the Americas.

In 1492, just as the Reconquista ended in Spain, Christopher Columbus left for Asia. Spain would later create one of the largest empires in history. Expelling Jews and muslims, Ferdinand and Isabella highly centralized the Catholic bureaucracy and founded a strongly Catholic Spain (Norton 16). Also, increased competition with Portugal motivated the Spanish to explore this new route to Asia. Influence from the current cultural events shaped the motives for Spanish exploration.

The Columbian exchange is exactly what it sounds; it's what the new world and old world gained with the explorations of the America’s. The Columbian exchange sounds like a positive aspects but it carries both negative and positive connotation as the ‘Columbian exchange’ brought diseases, foods, and new ideas following the voyage of the ever-famous Christopher Columbus. The creation of the new world – about 90 percent of the native have disappeared, but “it was exchanges of animal and plants that made the new world possible”. The introduction of the new specifics of foods like, potatoes became essential to the old world, as it can grow In the soil of the old world that has been over used (Nunn). Corn was also brought from the new world to