Guns, Germs, and steel -- Jared Diamond


Guns germs and steel: This is fascinating! He tries to use strategy-esque frameworks to explain why the world is the way it is today. I agree with the thesis that differences between civilizations aren’t primarily due to genetics (He asserts that most don’t agree with his thesis, but I have seen no data on the subject). Some of his arguments are compelling (the spread of domesticable crops latitudinally but not longitudinally). Others are blatantly contradictory. Eg, some animals aren’t domesticable because all of the species is mean spirited and there is no way nobody in an entire civilization didn’t try to domesticate this animal, (both sides of generalization) (has this guy ever been around horse trainers???). Ultimately, he does a good job up until about 500AD but his explanations afterward demonstrate a lack of knowledge in sociology and economics. In short, he can explain why Eurasians instead of Indonesians have “the cargo”, but not why Britains over Aztecs or Chinese, and certainly not why Japan over the Automan empire or southeast Asia. Still frameworking like this is a great way to approach unstructured problems. It’s worth reading carefully. Thanks Wil!
verdict Recommend

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