[slightwinder]

He was a small gear in a long chain of events. If not Columbus, someone else would likely have found the New World. It was the age of (Europeans) Discovery after all, where many people were sailing the world and finding new routes and lands.

[cafard]

Indeed. Next thing somebody will be making a fuss about Isaac Newton.

[lazyeye]

This same logic applies to every discovery in all of human history.

[Thiez]

Sure. This is just Great Man theory [1] in action. It's a bit absurd, once you know about it you see it everywhere.

It's especially distasteful when it's about people who 'discovered' places, because the next step was usually the subjugation or genocide of the people already living in the discovered place. But we still celebrate the explorers as heroes.

1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_man_theory

[alephxyz]

IIRC Cabot was trying to raise money for an expedition at the same time as Columbus and did reach continental America before him.

[borski]

Sure. But it wasn’t someone else; it was Columbus.

If it were someone else, I’m certain we’d be talking about them instead.