There is a sentence that is missing in the paragraph below. Look at the paragraph and decide where (option 1, 2, 3, or 4) the following sentence would best fit.

Sentence: [T]he Europeans did not invent globalization.

Paragraph: The first phase of globalization occurred long before the introduction of either steam or electric power...Chinese consumers at all social levels consumed vast quantities of spices, fragrant woods and unusual plants. The peoples of Southeast Asia who lived in forests gave up their traditional livelihoods and completely reoriented their economies to supply Chinese consumers......(1)........ . These exchanges of the year 1000 opened some of the routes through which goods and peoples continued to travel after Columbus traversed the mid-Atlantic. ........(2)....... . Yet the world of 1000 differed from that of 1492 in important ways....the travellers who encountered one another in the year 1000 were much closer technologically. ........ (3) ....... . They changed and augmented what was already there since 1000. ....... (4) ....... . If globalization hadn’t yet begun, Europeans wouldn’t have been able to penetrate the markets in so many places as quickly as they did after 1492

The correct option is Option 3.

To understand why the sentence fits best at position (3), let us analyze the logical flow of the paragraph, paying close attention to the sentence before and after position (3).

The sentence we need to insert is:
"[T]he Europeans did not invent globalization."

Let us look at the sentences surrounding position (3):
Before position (3): "...the travellers who encountered one another in the year 1000 were much closer technologically."
After position (3): "They changed and augmented what was already there since 1000."

The pronoun "They" at the beginning of the sentence following position (3) needs a clear referent. If we place the target sentence at position (3), the noun "Europeans" from the inserted sentence serves as the logical referent for "They". The sentence then reads: "[T]he Europeans did not invent globalization. They [the Europeans] changed and augmented what was already there since 1000."

Furthermore, this placement is supported by the final sentence: "If globalization hadn’t yet begun, Europeans wouldn’t have been able to penetrate the markets in so many places as quickly as they did after 1492." This sentence builds directly on the idea that globalization was already in progress before the Europeans arrived to change and expand it. Therefore, position (3) is the most logical and grammatically coherent fit.