Analysis Of Guns, Germs, And Steel By Jared Diamond

Jared Diamond discusses the reasons why geographical and environmental factors lead to a more rapid progression of certain civilizations throughout history. The book Guns, Germs and Steel portrays an argument that due to some societies’ access to an area witch contains sufficient amounts of wildlife and climates that are easily inhabitable, these societies developed into more advanced ways of living much easier and also earlier than societies who lacked these geographical attributes. These beneficial geographical attributes promoted the growth of technological improvements in weapons, religion, and farming.

Yali’s question is “Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea, but we black people had little cargo of our own?” In a broader sense, why did some things progress in some areas, but not in others?

Many geographers have attempted creating a unified theory explaining why cultures advance much more readily than others. Very few have actually reached mainstream society and even fewer seem reasonable. However, Jared Diamond shines where most do not. His book, Guns, Germs, and Steel, proposes an idea that has long been established called environmental determinism. Most view environmental determinism as a racist theory attributing a peoples’ intelligence only to their oppressive climates and geographical barriers. Diamond instead has created a theory that applies environmental determinism to only a peoples’ technology—not the people themselves. This has given researchers valuable tools that allow them to explain why some nations have

The “Factors Underlying the Broadcast Pattern of History” chart shows the spreading and domesticating of plants and animals and the pros and cons of it on civilization. I agree with the author that when you have domesticated animals in the civilization food storage and surpluses; large dense, sedentary, stratified societies with political

Chapter 1: Up to the Starting Line – In this chapter Jared Diamond attempts to answer Yali’s question by explaining how and where some of the first human settlements were located and where the earliest signs of evolution are. Diamond explains how many settlements had a clear advantage over others due to where they were located. He then shows the advantage by stating “… the earliest human fossil in Europe, the earliest evidence of domesticated corn in Mexico, or the earliest evidence anywhere…” This shows how the advantages played out. Diamond then goes on to explain how certain civilizations needed to adapt differently to survive. Diamonds last point describes how many of the civilizations were colonized and how certain colonies developed much

In J. R. McNeill’s The World According to Jared Diamond McNeil is arguing that Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel has reasonable arguments for how geographical determinism assisted some continents in their success, but he makes it known the argument has many downfalls. McNeill’s arguments all lie under the umbrella of Diamond’s arguments being to large scale. McNeill makes many examples that show these holes.

“Ender did not hesitate. He stepped on the head of the snake and crushed it under his foot. It writhed and twisted under him and in response he twisted and ground it deeper into the stone floor… And in the mirror he saw a face that he easily recognized. It was Peter.” (117)

Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, by Jared Diamond, attempts to explain why history progressed differently for people from various geographical regions. Diamond introduces his book by pointing out that history followed different courses for different people because of differences among peoples’ environments, not because of biological differences among people themselves. Through his convincing explanation for how civilizations were created and evolved throughout the course of history, he argues that environmental factors gave some societies advantages over others, allowing them to conquer the disadvantaged societies. While I agree with Diamond’s argument that the orientation of continental axis, availability of potential

Jared Diamond, however, believes that the environmental differences are exactly the case. His thesis is, “The striking differences between the long-term histories of people of the different continents have been due, not to innate differences in the peoples themselves, but to differences in their environments.” He believes that it is not biology that makes some societies more advanced than others, but rather the environments that people were and are currently living

In Jared Diamond’s book, Guns, Germs, and Steel, he starts the prologue off by introducing the reader a question, Yali's question, “Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea, but we black people had little cargo of our own?" In the book Guns, Germs, and Steel, Jared Diamond set’s out to answer Yali's question by touching on a few main categories, such as food production, writing, technology, government, and religion.

He compares three places that all developed food production and in which place it was more effective than the other two: Western Eurasia, specifically the Mediterranean and Fertile Crescent zones, New Guinea, and the Eastern U.S. Diamond first describes advantages of the Fertile Crescent that made it so suitable for farming. First, the Mediterranean climate with long dry seasons caused plants to adapt and consequently they were able to be stored for a long time. Second, the flora of the Mediterranean was previously abundant and productive, so they didn’t need to change much to be able to be cultivated. Lastly, many of the plants were self-pollinating, therefore they could keep the positive traits they were selected for by humans. These adaptations allowed food production to rise quickly and allowed for people to begin the process of civilization. Thus, the Fertile Crescent became one of the first cites of

As Professor Diamond walked along the side of the beach he came upon a politician named Yali who was preparing his people in New Guinea for self-government. Yali and Professor Diamond talked each about their jobs and soon Yali started quizzing Professor Diamond and asking him many questions but only one had really made Diamond think leaving him without an answer. “ Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea , but we black people had little much cargo of our own,” asked politician Yali. After thinking about the question for a while, Diamond saw that the true question was much more broad and universal than Yali's initial question. He reworded the question as follows: "Why did wealth and power become distributed as they now are rather than in some other way?”

When reading the title of Jared Diamond’s, “Guns, Germs, and Steels,” the readers must initially think how do these three connect? After starting the first few chapters they will realize that Diamond is referring to the proximate and ultimate factors in that lead to the advancement of society. When Diamond talks about proximate and ultimate factors, he is explaining the cause of European dominance in the world. The proximate factors are the one that directly led to the European dominance and the ultimate factors are the ones that let to proximate factors. I believe that this book is referring to the Homo sapiens revolutionizing through the years, through the Neolithic Revolution through agriculture and industrialization.

I first read Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs, and Steel in the Fall 2003 based on a recommendation from a friend. Many chapters of the book are truly fascinating, but I had criticisms of the book back then and hold even more now. Chief among these is the preponderance of analysis devoted to Papua New Guinea, as opposed to, say, an explanation of the greatly disparate levels of wealth and development among Eurasian nations. I will therefore attempt to confine this review on the "meat and potatoes" of his book: the dramatic Spanish conquest of the Incas; the impact of continental geography on food production; and finally, the origins of the Eurasian development of guns, germs, and steel. In terms of structure, I will first summarize the

Guns, germs, and steel. Three of the main components found in changing civilizations, and three essential factors that must be brought into consideration when discussing how our modern day world came to be. In the critically acclaimed documentary, based off of the book by Jared Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel provides valuable insight into these crucial aspects, showing an in-depth history of world and culture. In the first portion of this three part series, Diamond and other commentators explore the impact of agricultural development and how various societies were affected by either geographical advantages or hindrances. The explanations provided help to clarify reasons behind historical turmoils and wars, along with current economic status of states, and are perhaps more relevant than ever.