Why do most developed nations lie in cold regions?

为什么很多发达国家都位于寒冷地区？

以下是Quora网友的评论：

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There are a few reasons why many developed nations tend to be located in colder regions. One reason is that these areas often have access to natural resources such as timber and minerals that are important for building and sustaining industrial economies. Additionally, colder regions tend to have fewer natural disasters and pests, which can help to reduce economic disruptions. Additionally, it is thought that the cold weather may have played a role in encouraging technological innovation and advancements in transportation, which have helped to spur economic development.

许多发达国家往往位于较冷的地区，原因有以下几个：一是，这些地区通常拥有木材和矿产等自然资源，这些资源对建立和支撑工业经济至关重要。此外，寒冷地区的自然灾害和害虫较少，经济受灾较少。此外，人们认为寒冷的天气可能有助于鼓励技术创新和交通发展，进而刺激经济发展。

Sourabh Mhetre

I would rather ask why the most of the world changing and world sha inventions were from cold regions? Which led them to develop their countries. Obviously the population in these countries is the considerable factor. But how did they find themselves in a place of science and technology? This is also the question. Unlike the hot regions you would feel very fresh in cold regions. Which I think leads to keep going in a certain work or research. New ideas comes to mind in such great atmosphere and it eventually shapes the country. Now , let us take an example of Japan. Japan is not that cold as compared to the European nations. But natural calamities are so high in Japan and also there is no production of oil one would find in Japan. Which led them to develop technology according to that. They are ahead of the rest of the world in technology related to the rock, soil and testing of the element erupts through the volcanoes.

我更想问的问题是：为什么大多数改变世界和塑造世界的发明都来自寒冷地区？显然，这些国家的人口是一个相当大的因素。但他们如何发现自己身处一个科学和技术的圣地？

这也是问题所在。和炎热地区不同，在寒冷地区你会感到非常清爽。我认为这促使我坚持进行某项工作或研究。在这样的氛围中，新的想法不断涌现，最终影响了国家。

我们以日本为例吧，和欧洲国家相比，日本并不是那么寒冷。但是日本的自然灾害非常频繁，也没有石油储量。

这迫使日本积极开发技术。他们在岩石、土壤和火山喷发元素测试方面的技术领先于世界其他国家。

Hari Subramanian

Earlier, fresh water, fertile land and comfortable climate were the valuable resources. This made India & China support large populations and generate a lot of wealth by human activity like agriculture and metal working. After the discovery of oil, cold regions & deserts not very conducive for human habitation became wealthy as oil could be used to heat/cool rooms and transport goods and people. Scantly populated means that the wealth generated needn’t be distributed among a lot of people. However, I think that once the world runs out of oil and/or steel, naturally habitable countries like India and China will again become wealthy. Or present day poorly populated wealthy countries dependent on oil could run out of skilled human capital. This might force them to attract foreign migrants to run the country which could lead to social and political unrest.

早先，淡水、肥沃的土地和舒适的气候都是宝贵的资源，所以印度和中国能够供养大量人口，并通过农业和金属加工等人类活动创造了大量财富。在人类发现了石油之后，本不太适合人类居住的寒冷地区和沙漠地区也变得富裕起来，因为石油可以调节室温，进行货运和客运。人口稀少意味着不需要将财富分配给很多人。但我认为一旦石油和/或钢铁耗尽，印度和中国等宜居国家自然会再次富裕起来。或者目前依赖石油的人口稀少的富裕国家失去熟练劳动力，这可能迫使他们引入外国移民来管理这个国家，可能会导致社会和政治动荡。

Kancheepuram Narasimhan

Singapore/ Australia/ South Africa/ BRAZIL/ UAE Dubai —are these countries not considered as developed?

They are not in cold regions.

新加坡、澳大利亚、南非、巴西、阿联酋迪拜—在你眼中，这些国家都不是发达国家吗？

这些国家都不在寒冷地区。

Akshay Gowda

Hot climate make human productivity to become very less. people will take rest more in the hot climate, ex. Nobody will work outside in afternoon hot summer.

Mild climate favoured Industrial revolution in Britain, because people including inventors worked long time without being tired..climate favoured them.

炎热的气候使人类的生产力变得非常低。在炎热的天气里，人们需要更多的休息，例如，没有人愿意在炎热的夏天下午在室外工作。

温和的气候促进了英国的工业革命，包括发明家在内，所有人都可以长时间工作而不感到疲倦。

Dr. Balaji Viswanathan

We are running through one period where there are many rich countries in colder region. There are also many poorer cold countries (Russia, Mongolia, central asia, eastern Europe) just as there are richer hot countries (Singapore, Australia).

Even among richer countries, a lot of important economic activity might come from their warmer regions (California in USA, Guangzhou — Hong Kong in China).

我们正在经历一个历史时期，寒冷地区出现了许多富裕国家，但也有着不少贫穷国家(俄罗斯、蒙古、中亚、东欧)，就像炎热地区也有富裕的国家(新加坡、澳大利亚)一样。

即使在较富裕的国家内部，许多重要的经济活动也可能发生在相对温暖的地区，比如美国的加利福尼亚，中国的广州和香港

Here is the thing — colder countries don’t necessarily have a high GDP, they just have low population that concentrates the land’s wealth into a few. Historically, very few people survived in those temperatures, thus yielding a small and a more hardy population.

Norway and Philippines have a comparable land area and GDP. Just that Norway has just a fraction of the population to share all of the country’s rich oil resources. Thus Norway is much more richer than Philippines on a per capita basis. There are also some warm countries with lower population (like Australia due to geographical isolation) that are rich. Again fewer people to share natural spoils. You don’t have to be white cold to get rich either — Botswana is rich (with lower population sharing a lot of the diamonds) and so are Qatar, Oman and other middle eastern countries.

事情是这样的—寒冷的国家不一定GDP就高，他们只是人口少，可以把土地财富集中在少数人手中。从历史上看，很少有人能在这样气候下下生存，因此产生了一个小而耐寒的种群。

挪威和菲律宾的土地面积和GDP相当。但挪威只有一小部分人口分享丰富的石油资源。因此，按人均计算，挪威要比菲律宾富裕得多。世界上也有一些人口较少、地处温暖地区的经裕国家(如澳大利亚，因为地理隔离)。也不是必须冰天雪地才能变得富有—博茨瓦纳也很富有(人口少，却出产大量钻石)，卡塔尔、阿曼和其他中东国家也是如此。

A lot of the cold countries including Canada, Norway, Russia, USA, UK have very rich natural resources. And unlike the densely populated warm countries they have to share this with fewer people. Over centuries, this had led to better education and a virtuous cycle of prosperity.

Besides natural resources, during the industrial age it was also much easier to build the industrial infrastructure (railroads, warehouses, factories, power plants) given that there were fewer people to be dislodged and land was very cheap. This led to a further improvement of prosperity.

许多寒冷的国家，包括加拿大、挪威、俄罗斯、美国、英国，都拥有非常丰富的自然资源。与人口稠密的温暖国家不同，这些地方分享经济成果的人口较少。长此以往，就能够提供更好的教育，形成经济繁荣的良性循环。

除了自然资源，在工业时代，因为需要迁移的人口较少，土地也非常便宜，因此建设工业基础设施(铁路、仓库、工厂、发电厂)也要容易得多，进一步促进了经济的繁荣。

Given the lower population density and colder climate, there were fewer epidemics to derail the economic growth.

Finally, a significant fact is that by 18th century the Europeans through a combination of factors got to dominate global trade and economy. European countries are colder and thus it made the correlation. In other periods other regions had dominated and were relatively richer.

由于人口密度较低，气候较冷，影响经济增长的流行病也较少。

最后还有一个重要的事实，18世纪欧洲人通过一系列手段主导了全球贸易和经济。欧洲国家气候较冷，形成了一个所谓的相关性。但在其他时期，其他地区也曾占主导地位，相对富裕。

Tran Huu Tuyen

Why rich nations is at temperate climate ?

Because

1) Temperature range 5-20oC is good for intellectual activity, and technical deepening. So, working time by brain is high, leading to many deep, innovative thinking and more productive result

2) This kind of Temperate climate is favourable for growing diverse natural food products and processing method, cooking recipes. People eat these foods will become healthy, having good characteristics, qualities like hardworking, patient,

3) The lifestyle of people tend to freedom,

4) Less severe diseases than other hot areas because of harmful microorganism and bacteria growth speed and its impacts on people, animals, tree.

5) Natural disaster's impact are not huge and damaged as tropical's.

为什么富裕国家处于温带气候？

因为

1)5-20℃的气候范围适合智力活动和技术提升。因此，人类大脑的长时间工作促进了许多深刻、创新的思维和伟大成就的出现。

2)这种温带气候有利于各种天然食品的种植以及加工方法和烹饪配方。这些食物会使人变得更健康，拥有更好的品质，比如勤奋，耐心等

3)人们的生活方式较为自由

4)由于有害微生物和细菌的生长速度及其对人、动物、树木的影响，疾病较其他炎热地区少。

5)自然灾害的影响不像热带地区那么严重，破坏程度也没有那么大。

Ojas Choudhari

I would like to add and emphasis on few supporting but essential points to Akshay's answer here:

Industrial revolution and colonialism,point from which Europe took off and went 'out of sight' of the slave colonies and countries. Exploiting resources from their colonies and kee a foot on the gas when it comes to scientific development.With Industrial development came most crucial elements of Economic development like added ability of production of goods at a cheaper rate,when aided with advanced Transport facilities (which were aided by Scientific and industrial development) like superior navy,Railroads and Land Transport enabled these countries (businesses) to overwhelm and conquer overseas markets, especially those in colonised nations which were mostly lying in hotter and tropical regions as pointed in your question.

我想对Akshay的回答进行补充并强调几个重要的观点：

工业革命和殖民 主义使得欧洲经济出现腾飞。他们从殖民地压榨资源，并加速科学技术的升级换代。随着工业的发展，经济发展的最关键因素出现了，比如以更低的价格生产商品的能力增加了，在先进的运输设施（比如先进的海军）的帮助下，铁路和陆路运输帮助这些国家(企业)征服海外市场，尤其是殖民地国家市场，这些国家大多位于炎热的热带地区。

e.g. In India Traditional Handloom business came under direct threat of extinction (during British Rule) as British cloth from mills (mostly located near Manchester) was available on large scale and at much cheaper rates than Indian cloth. Cotton used in these british mills was collected forcefully from farmers in from India and other slave countries at rates much below the market rate to England.Moreover,The farmers were made to take crops of Industrial importance and extra Taxes were added on domestic good to weaken their market share against Foreign goods.Colonialism aided with Industrial revolution widened the gap between Developed and underdeveloped countries.

例如：在印度，传统的手织布生意(在英国统治期间)就遭到了灭绝威胁，因为工厂(主要位于曼彻斯特附近)生产的英国布充斥市场，而且价格比印度布便宜得多。这些英国纺织厂使用的棉花是从印度和其他奴隶制国家的农民手中强行征收的，价格远低于英国的市场价格。此外，农民被迫种植具有工业价值的农作物，国产商品被征收额外税金，市场份额进一步缩水。有了工业革命的助力，殖民*义扩大了发达国家和不发达国家之间的差距。

The gap between nations clearly widened after 16th century with many revolutions mostly centered in Europe (Industrial revolution,Cultural revolution (Arts,Christianity and Church),French revolution and American Freedom,etc).

Education and Scientific Development is another primary area which according to me played a very important role in some countries develo faster than others,as we can see most of the top Universities in modern world are located in "colder" countries and were established in 18th and 19th century,some universities like "Oxford" and "Cambridge" date back to 17th century,this emphasis on quality education certainly triggered growth in science,Literature as well as Art which are all essential elements of balanced development of human civilizations;is evident and embedded in the word "Advanced nation"

国家之间的差距在16世纪之后明显扩大，许多革命主要集中在欧洲(工业革命，(艺术，基督教和教会)，法国大革命和美国独立革命等)。

教育和科学发展是另一个主要领域，据我所知，在一些发展速度较快的国家中，教育和科学发展都发挥了非常重要的作用，正如我们所看到的，现代世界上大多数顶尖大学都位于“寒冷”的国家，都始创于18世纪和19世纪，“牛津”和“剑桥”的历史甚至可以追溯到17世纪，这种对素质教育的重视无疑引发了科学、文学和艺术的发展。

Democracy,Legal system and Cultural development have their say in stating a nations as "Advanced" because lack of social security,law and order creates Chaos as observed in poorly ruled states like Zimbabwe (today),which works in counter to development.It can be commonly observe in todays developed nations that Law and order has been stronger than most underdeveloped nations,again the fact that these countris lie in the colder belt. Where most of the undeveloped countries lacked central Governing systems or were under slavery.

All these factors arose from close competition between European colonial powers which eventually led the world into 2 world wars in the 20th Century.

民 主、法律体系和文化发展对“发达国家”的定义也很有发言权，因为缺乏社会安全、法律和秩序，就会造成社会混乱，就像津巴布韦等治理不善的国家。在今天的发达国家，法律和秩序会比大多数不发达国家更强。大多数不发达国家缺乏中央管理，甚至仍处于奴隶制之下。

所有这些因素都源于欧洲殖民大国之间的激烈竞争，最终导致了20世纪的两场世界大战。