I would say no.  Technology trumps everything and wealthy industrialized nations have the technology.

Yes, but technology is terribly expensive.  The reason why the U.S. has a lot of technology is because it can spend massive amounts on defense.  So that part of Smith's equation rings true – as nations become more industrialized, defense gets more expensive.

I don't think Smith is saying this. He's saying that an agrarian society could more easily wage war, not necessarily win war.

Well true, I didn't actually think Smith said poorer nations could necessarily win wars, but they are still a threat since they can inflict damage, and richer nations still need to spend money to defend themselves.  And notice how the nations doing the sabre rattling nowadays are North Korea, Iran, and notice who they're directing their ire at – the U.S., not small countries like Costa Rica, Ireland, Portugal…  The thing is, I am not sure that the agrarian/non-agrarian distinction holds true any more.  I think the division is more along the lines of developed/underdeveloped nations.  Another thing about what Smith believed was that as universal opulence increased through the free market, countries would be more prone to peace since they would have a greater stake in protecting their property.  This raises a great question – how will China reconcile its growing wealth with its current political disposition?

Sorry – it was more of a test question….whether it had legs or not was unclear.  Better navigator?  Better man?  Better father to his children?  The question was open.  I did it because I was trying to find out how to embed live tweets into a PowerPoint presentation, and the posts here get tweeted automatically, and i needed an uncommon word the subject line (like Magellan).  Later, I realized that – duh – I could simply test it out by posting a message directly into Twitter.  Sorry…I probably should have deleted this thread, but figured what the heck.

I meant that there are some areas of psychology which are science, and there are areas that are less so.  My wife deals with the science side which involves a lot of studies, data, data crunching, etc.  The side which is not science (pseudoscience?) seems to be the side which is not grounded in reputable studies and data.  I think it's the same way with any field, even history.  If you read a book and it's sparse on footnotes and primary document citations, or it makes conclusions which are not rooted in primary documents, you may be looking at a pseudo-history text. 

Yes, the dissertation is the big thing.  And before I can do that I have to get my prospectus ok'd.  There's also the dissertation defense, but I am guessing for anyone who gets that far, it's a mere technicality.  It's kind of a long and drawn-out process, but I figure they need to keep their standards.  I do think that some programs go by much faster than others.  My wife got her PhD in psychology and it seems like that degree was quicker than a humanities doctoral degree.

Don't you live a hop skip and a jump away from a major metropolitan area?  I would imagine they have any number of historical sites, buildings, and museums which may be related to your field.  Then again, I have no idea what kind of pay such positions provide.Anyway, I used to think highly about getting graduate degrees because of the prestige/sense of accomplishment, but I eventually realized that the thrill is quickly lost.  Still, they are required to get certain jobs, and my ideal job is in academia, which is why I am trying to pursue it.  It also allows for some level of freedom so that I can pursue historical ideas that I am curious about.

Two things – first, what you say may be true, but I don't think it means that we have to buy into the status quo forever. After all, there was a point at which there were no feminist studies in academia either, but feminists didn't seem to care about that. Second, I think that a savvy scholar could hypothetically push through a reverse multicultural program of study under the guise of fairness.  I don't think liberalism is driven by a set of concrete rules, but one of the guiding forces is that underrepresented people without a voice need to be given a voice; trying to stamp out such voices is unjust.  Using this idea, someone could plausibly argue that the views of certain groups of people have not been given explicit attention in historical studies, and any opposition to this research could be rooted in fear, politics of power, or even racism.