What if?

Driving home today, we had the radio on an alternative music station the girls like. This evening, they were doing a show on alternate histories - those pivotal points in history where, had things not happened the way they did, we find ourselves wondering, "What if...? " The most commonly debated versions of these are things like "What if the assassination attempt on Hitler had succeeded?" or "What if the Nazis had won?" Others are things like "What if JFK, Abraham Lincoln, or Mahatma Gandhi weren't assassinated?" What alternate history would we have, if these "what if" moments ended differently.

Eldest had two interesting examples. One was;

What if Crete wasn't destroyed?

Crete was home to the Minoan empire. This was an advanced civilization, with some of their technologies being rediscovered only recently, that flourished 5000 years ago, then suddenly disappeared. There are some that believe that they are the source for the myths of Atlantis. Their technology and culture were highly sophisticated, with such modern conveniences as an elaborate sewerage system and hot and cold running water in homes. Their disappearance is still somewhat of a mystery, with blame being put on such things as a volcano, an earthquake and tsunami, famine, war, or combinations of several of these possibilities. How much different would our world be if the Minoans and their technology were never lost? One suggestion brought up was that the Roman Empire would never have risen to the power it did, being instead a part of the Minoan Empire. The fall of Rome would not have lead to the Medieval Dark Ages, where a great deal of knowledge and technology was lost. Would our modern technological and information age have happened millennia ago, instead of within the last century?

The other question that came up was;

What if the Avro Arrow had not been destroyed?

The Avro Arrow was the most technologically advanced plane of its time. In fact, much of its capabilities were not matched for many years after its destruction; a dark blot on Canadian history. The project was incredibly expensive and, when a new federal government was elected, shutting it down was one of its priorities. Shutting it down wasn't quite enough, though, as the prototypes and plans were also destroyed. Most of the developers ended up working for NASA, helping to put the first man on the moon. There are a number of theories as to why so much effort was made to wipe out these planes entirely.

I believe the destruction of the Arrow was as much a blow to the Canadian psyche as it was to the physical planes and plans. This was a project that brought Canada to the forefront of technology, worldwide. The excitement of this innovation could have spawned a culture of achievement. After its destruction, Canada faltered and fell behind. Personally, I think we have yet to recover from this, with our tendency to downplay our own achievements and look to other countries to emulate, rather than taking the lead ourselves.

One "what if" scenario suggested was that, if the Arrow had not been destroyed, Canada would have been the first to send a man to the moon.

All in all, it's a fascinating philosophical question.

So what is your "what if" scenario? Is there some pivotal point in history you can think of that might have change our world, had things gone another way?