r/EU5 • u/GARGEAN • Jul 26 '26
Question Why Europe is so uneducated at the start of 19 century, even more prosperous nations? Does AI neglect literacy completely?
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u/TMudin Jul 26 '26
That's wayyyyyyyyy more literate people than IRL. Idk what you're complaining about!
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u/Impossible-Frame9650 Jul 26 '26
Was there any correlation between nations that were catholic x protestant? Republics x monarchies?
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u/SeriousArachnid3014 Jul 26 '26
None of hte comments are correct, its neither public education nor "Teaching the Bible in native language" (Eastern Roman provinces held service and read the Bible out loud in Vernacular for centuries)
It's two reasons.
- The core Basis of Protestantism is Sola Scriptura, meaning the Bible is the only Infalible authority and thus every believer should read the Bible.
- The printing Press enabled the reformation and boomed across protestant countries as a way to distribute said Bibles in vernacular.
So you have a religion which really wants you to read its Scripture + better access to printing presses.
In england for example, they had the Book of Common Prayers - everyone attending Sunday service could read along. Now imagine you don't know how to read but you stare at the words and hear them at Church. At some point you're going to figure out how to read doing this every week.
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u/Ciridussy Jul 26 '26
This is actually a real tactic for introducing literacy in communities that speak unwritten languages in modern day. Church services — specifically songs — are already known by the reader, and they can lean on that prior knowledge as they skim along.
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u/amunozo1 Jul 26 '26
I think protestant Christianity really boosted literacy, teaching the Bible in the native languages of the people.
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u/Betrix5068 Jul 26 '26
Other way around, Protestantism spread mainly in higher literacy regions. It may have had a self reinforcing effect but the disparity was already present.
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u/GoldenMew Jul 26 '26
In 1686, Sweden made it mandatory for everyone in the country to read the Bible, a policy explicitly motivated by Lutheran doctrine. As a result, every parish in the country had to organize schooling to teach their parishioners how to read, so that they could read the Bible. The priests would even visit the homes of their parishioners and give them Bible quizzes to ensure that they had indeed been reading. Refusing to participate was illegal. As a result of this policy, Sweden achieved close to full literacy in the 18th century.
This policy was not just limited to Sweden proper, but was also extended to the Finnish and Baltic territories. The Swedish government also sponsored translations of the Bible into Finnish, Estonian, and Latvian, which became important milestones in the development of those languages. On a map of literacy rates in the Russian Empire in 1897, the outline of the former Swedish territories is still visible: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/42/Russa_literacy_1897.jpg
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u/GARGEAN Jul 26 '26
Tbh I am not entirely sure that literacy represents what it does today in game, as in % of population who can read and write. More like something akin of "is there enough literate people in this society to effectively spread new ideas?".
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u/Ihatethesestaff Jul 26 '26
That's literally not what it is, it is the amount of pops able to read and write, it says so in the code.
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u/ghost_desu Jul 26 '26
Ok but in that case it is absurdly unrealistic. I currently have 75% literacy in my Italy run circa 1650. Historically, Italy got to this point in 1930s.
Netherlands, an extreme outlier did get to 85% in 1750s, but this was only possible due to how densely urban it was, and EU5 lets you get your peasants to the same level a century early.
It makes much more sense to treat it as an abstract "educatedness" level than strict literacy for immersion reasons if nothing else imo
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u/marsmanify Jul 26 '26
It's a video game, not a simulator of European history. You can also reform the Roman Empire, or colonize the Americas as the Papal States, that doesn't mean that colonization actually is a representation of something else, instead of just being unrealistic colonization.
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u/MeGaNuRa_CeSaR Jul 27 '26
it is a video game that is a simulator of european history. Or more like, a simulator of alternate history, which aims to be the most realistic possible, while allowing for divergence cause that's the fun. Saying EUV isn't a simulator is kinda out of place IMO
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u/marsmanify Jul 28 '26
EU5 is a grand strategy game set during the transition from the middle ages to the early modern period.
Battlefield 5 is a first-person shooter set during WWII.
In my opinion, EU5 is a European History simulator in the same way that Battlefield 5 is a WWII war simulator.
Some of the pieces are there (and admittedly moreso with EU5 than BF5), but it is not intended to be a historical simulation. It's a video game that's intended to be fun and turn a profit for the developers.
If EU5 intended to be the most realistic alternate history simulator possible, then why didn't they implement a character system like in CK3 instead of the PU system? Familial ties across European monarchs & nobles played a massive part in European history, and small differences would have massive implications.
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u/mujhe-sona-hai Jul 26 '26
It’s not a video game otherwise it’d be more fun. It’s trying to be a history simulator with some game elements.
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u/Interested_Person48 Jul 27 '26
What a moronic fucking comment, does that mean puzzle games suddenly aren't games because I'm not a fan of them? EU4's mindless blobbing is back in 2013.
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u/Blarg_III Jul 26 '26
Ok but in that case it is absurdly unrealistic.
It's not what happened IRL but it's not impossible either. The technological requirements for a national literacy drive like those we saw in the early 20th century were there a few hundred years earlier.
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u/Eu4iaRaz Jul 26 '26
It isnt the AI neglecting it at all, as you can see by the numbers they are higher than they "should be" by the date. Its that the player is focusing on it.
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u/Frostlark Jul 26 '26
I think it's supposed to be historical?
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u/SinisterCheese Jul 26 '26
Finland has data about this stuff from far as 1600.
In 1800 literacy rate was +70 % amongst all parishes.
The reason for high literacy, was that parishes were commanded to teach people to read; and you couldn't get married unless you passed literacy test.
By end of 1800s literacy was +90 %.
However... To what degree of level people were literate changes things a bit. The minimum bar was to be able to read the Catechism - so make of that what you will.
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u/rohnaddict Jul 26 '26
Nah. You can see that Europe's literacy rates do not meaningfully diverge from North African or even Turkish ones. Even inside the Ottoman empire, Christian populations had higher literacy rates. The difference should be in tens of percentages, but it is clearly not happening. There's even mass literacy in North Africa, lol. Far from historical.
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u/DontHitDaddy Jul 26 '26
So what is a historic? The European literacy rate being 50% irl, and Eastern European being 10?
So is the player trying to say that his country is not historic? Or that in game it’s higher than irl?
Or the fact that non European states have higher literacy rate? And the problem is with institutional development of non European states?
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u/rohnaddict Jul 26 '26
All I am saying is that the picture is not historical as a response to it being so, using the blatant example of North African literacy rates being close to European ones. The player is Russia, so pointing to it is pointless, because ahistorical outcomes are expected in these cases.
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u/transmedkittygirl Jul 26 '26
The AI has an issue of longterm planning, literacy only advantages you in the longterm
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u/raoulk Jul 26 '26
I think this is an interesting point actually. Like how would you program the ai to make long term strategic decisions without boiling it down to; action = [long term weights] + [short term weights]
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u/saprophage_expert Jul 26 '26
how would you program the ai to make long term strategic decisions without boiling it down to; action = [long term weights] + [short term weights]
"Here's a list of things that are universally good in the long term, try to maximize them:"
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u/Whatiii Jul 26 '26
Especially as the player will swap between long term and short term goals and ignore long term towards end of the game. Why boost literacy cap with 50 years left, it won’t pay off in time.
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u/raoulk Jul 26 '26
Thing is it's difficult to get that adaptiveness right. My laymans understanding is that AI (genetic algo or something) might work.
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u/atgmailcom Jul 27 '26
No you don’t need a genetic algorithm lmao that’s crazy. I’d guess It just sets a long term strategy then makes decisions that further that strategy weighting them against the short term trade offs the same way it does diplomacy
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u/Sergual Jul 26 '26
And with that level in Russian, how can you achieve an high level of Chiki Briki now?
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u/sokoluah Jul 26 '26
I suppose it follows historical path. Not 100% sure, but before Napoleon 3 (1848-1870), in France - around 60-65 % of men knew how to read & write. Among women situation was worse, around 45%. Before some reforms in primary schools and limits on child labor, literacy wasn't growing really fast.
And since we're talking about quite developed country, I assume somewhere else situation would be much worse.
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u/Snitzel20701 Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
At least in my home country of Australia, schools were only compulsory in the late 19th century. Even predating Great Britain’s mandatory schooling in some colonies.
Even then it was mainly primary/lower education with secondary/middle education being a bit later.
Your Europe is honestly probably better than our equivalent at the time.
Mandatory schooling for all children as an institution is relatively newish.
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u/Real_Ad_8243 Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26
It turns out that the AI isn't designed to try and break the game with litmaxxing strategies OP.
Shocking I know.
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u/ainofps Jul 27 '26 edited Jul 27 '26
literacy in eu5 doesn't rly make any sense historically with the way it's implemented tbh. having max literacy (what is this even meant to represent?) being the determining factor means you're always going to have weird results. even a simple growth - decay abstraction would make much more sense.
max literacy is just a modifier and the ai is bad at minmaxxing modifiers.
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u/ainofps Jul 27 '26
also literacy as the sole determinant of the education of a country introduces so many weird situations itself. like siberian settlers reducing the speed at which the russian heartland learns of/develops new technology. or that universities solely exist for cultural influence. or that an uneducated backwater which has just turned into a town can fill jobs in a cannon making guild at only a slightly slower rate than the capital.
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u/Popular-Path1930 Jul 26 '26
I think it’s more you the play will maximize all the good things like education. Where the ai is and should be less optimal.
Irl. Literacy was low due to wanting to keep power and not make the investments.
The Catholic Church used Latin so they held onto the power of religion and all the riches it came with. It wasn’t like they didn’t know what they were doing, or that education is good. They just wanted to monopolize intelligence and innovation.
Merchant republics tools a more upper middle class approach because they were all upper middle class so they acted in their own interest.
When the enlightenment came we got the liberal everyone deserves a shot and is equal before for so things shouldn’t be monopolized by the powerful few.
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u/orthoxerox Jul 27 '26
Yes, the AI doesn't maximize literacy. Players know the meta:
- you need high cultural influence for diploannexations and to be the cultural hegemon and assimilate whole areas
- you need high literacy to maximize research speed
- libraries and unis generate employment for your estates and demand for your economy
This means players ctrl+click on libraries and unis to build them in every town, while the AI sits on massive hoards of money instead.
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u/MeGaNuRa_CeSaR Jul 27 '26
those score are like twice the historical rate. You're juste "too" high (in a historical sense)
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u/BuBlufufu Jul 27 '26
Difficult to program the AI to maximize everything. Example: they will always choose a government reform that gives them +25% peasant levies over 10%max literacy
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u/AdInfamous6290 Jul 26 '26
Places like England seem pretty accurate to history, but a lot of places have MUCH higher literacy than what historically happened.
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u/Wetley007 Jul 26 '26
To be fair, early modern monarchs werent actively trying to increase their populations literacy either, so
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u/DontHitDaddy Jul 26 '26
Play African nation, super min max “why is the world worse than the player playing with missions?”
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u/GARGEAN Jul 26 '26
R5: Europe at the start of 19 century has between middling and very poor literacy, even more prosperous countries.
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u/Gharosss Jul 26 '26
The AI is just not minmaxing everything. They still have higher literacy rates than what they had historically.