Book guns germs and steel reviews. Relection on the Book Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond: [Essay Example], 1235 words GradesFixer 2022-10-12
Book guns germs and steel reviews
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Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies is a Pulitzer Prize-winning book written by Jared Diamond, a professor of geography and physiology at the University of California, Los Angeles. The book, first published in 1997, examines the history of human societies and the factors that have contributed to their development and success.
One of the main themes of the book is the impact of geography on the development of human societies. Diamond argues that the differences in the development of societies around the world can be largely attributed to the geographical differences between them. He cites examples such as the availability of domesticable animals, the presence of suitable plant species for agriculture, and the presence of natural resources such as metal ores as key factors in the development of civilizations.
Another key theme of the book is the impact of technology on human societies. Diamond argues that the development and spread of new technologies, such as writing and the wheel, have played a significant role in the success of certain societies. He also discusses the ways in which societies have interacted with one another and how these interactions have shaped the course of history.
The book has received widespread acclaim for its thought-provoking ideas and its ability to present complex historical and scientific concepts in a clear and accessible manner. Many reviewers have praised the book for its ability to provide a fresh perspective on the history of human societies and to challenge traditional assumptions about the reasons for their success or failure.
Overall, Guns, Germs, and Steel is a thought-provoking and highly influential work that has had a significant impact on the field of history and anthropology. Its ideas have sparked extensive debate and discussion among scholars and the general public, and it continues to be a popular and highly respected work in the field.
"Guns, Germs, and Steel" Book Review Essay Example
However, there are several occasions in the book where he voices his own opinion and in particular, his utter disgust for the racism that European colonialists harbored. Professor Twist could not but smile. It just so happened that 13,000 years ago, with the ending of the last Ice Age, there was an area of the world better endowed with the flora and fauna that would lead to the take-off toward civilization: that valley of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers we now call the Fertile Crescent. Academic critics howled However, academic critics howled shortly after the publication of Guns, Germs, and Steel: They referred to supposed errors in geography and history, which I find largely pointless. Colonialism provided to Europe the raw materials necessary for industrial production.
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'Guns, Germs, and Steel'
However, it needs to be approached with an open-mind as it has some of its faults. Later in the book, Jared Diamond describes how Francisco Pizarro, a Spanish conquistador, easily overcame the Incas using European advantage. Geography has of course a terrible reputation. Using information from many diverse fields, Jared Diamond convincingly shows that narrow setting and head starts can give much details of the line of human account. There is much to learn, and much to contemplate in this book. Moreover, Diamond dismisses politics, religion, culture, individuals, and timing.
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GUNS, GERMS, AND STEEL
Production— especially in agriculture— depends on the geographical hand we have been dealt. Of the big over 100 pound herbivores and omnivores, 148 potential candidates for domestication, they are mostly located in Eurasia 72 candidate species, versus 51 in Sub-Saharan Africa, 24 in the Americas, and 1 in Australia. I'm not sure I agree that why the Spanish obliterated the Mayans instead of visa versa is the most interesting question of human history. One can learn much from reading Guns, Germs, and Steel. I checked out the book and during some downtime I began to read.
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Guns, Germs, and Steel: Book Recommendations & Review
A large portion of the book is focussed on the factors influencing the establishement of an agricultural system that is capable of supporting a whole large class of non-agricultural workers. For example, consider Cortez's victory over the Aztecs. After those animals were found and domesticated, societies then needed agriculture and food security. If readers had one lesson to take away after reading the book, it would to be more open-minded. Read also At first, many would wrongly assume that Diamond could be writing the book to celebrate European conquest over other nations. Eventually people living in Eurasia developed partial resistances to these diseases.
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Book Review: Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond
As illustrated by the New world's conquest of almost 95 percent of the 20million American Indians; exposing the Indians to strains of germs the Indians had never been exposed to, and against which they therefore had neither immunity nor genetic resistance to. Another disadvantage the Indians had in their competition with the Europeans is that their ancestors had hunted to extinction native species of horses and camels. . Clovis points have been found in large numbers in mammoth carcasses in North America, and Diamond thinks they were developed in Asia and transported across Beringia. Hence this chapter will offer a whirlwind tour of human history on all the continents, for millions of years, from our origins as a species until 13,000 years ago. Similarly, diffusion in the last 6,000 years has been easiest from Eurasia to sub-Saharan Africa, while long completely absent between Eurasia and the Americas isolated at low latitudes by broad oceans and at high latitudes by geography and by a climate suitable just for hunter-gatherers. They did not have any major impact on Australia.
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Guns, Germs, and Steel by SparkNotes
Why didn't the indigenous people of the Americas, Oceania, and sub-equatorial Africa conquer Europe and its people? The last four or five chapters start to get very repetitive, but except for that Diamond has taken a stunningly large scale view of history that keeps you enthralled throughout the 13,000 years we cover in this book. Regardless of the plausible geographic advantage of Europe and Asia, factors such as political intentions, morals, ethics, religion and culture all served to explain why some civilizations were determined to expand and build empires through conquest, while others did not. It's an excellent, thought-provoking book. In a book with greatly wider scope than most nonfiction Pulitzer winners, Diamond pulls together long-term threads of farming, herding, languages, disease, technology, government, and religion. The book was very interesting to me because it tried to provide an explanation of why there is such large socioeconomic disparities around the world in tolerant, open, and non-condescending way.
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Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies
The Chinese became xenophobic. It was that they had a body of technologies, cultural practices and diseases that naturally tended to overwhelm other groups. For some reason, the kindle version I purchased didn't have images due to copyright issues. If the Western world can just arrange two or three more leaders like him, all of Diamond's data will hopefully come out the way it's supposed to, and the last few hundred years of Western history can be written off as a statistical blip. With civilization, criminal justice systems remove men who are unusually physically aggressive from the gene pool.
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Guns Germs And Steel Book Review
But apart from a few examples, Diamond does not persuade us that this lay at the heart of the geographically challenged societies. She had, the guide informed him later, Been eaten by an alligator. His friend, who later became a leader in the independence movement, wanted to talk about "cargo" manufactured goods, technology. Ultimately, the author tries too hard to make all of history fit his model. It is a good book but not great. This implies a corresponding variety of environments, a high diversity of wild plants and a staggered harvest season. While we can see why, in broad strokes, European and Asian peoples might have overwhelming advantages in human history in purely biological and geographical terms, Diamond's analysis is of no help in answering historical questions that still might strike us as large, but come within the realm of European or Asian culture, instead of at the border with other peoples.
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childhealthpolicy.vumc.org: Customer reviews: Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies
Similar decisions stopped or impeded other advances. It turns out that not every locale is ideal for the emergence of farming. Diamond does a superb job at catching the attention of the reader by providing them with a fascinating and detailed account of about 13,000 years of societal development and human evolution. At that point China was the leading power in the world. This book is a brief history of the human evolution of the last 13,000 years with a focus on social evolution, ethnology, and ecology.
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