Talk:Guns, Germs, and Steel

See also: Archive 1

Point?

It is obvious that this is a big book with a lot of bigger ideas (the whole of human history is pretty general), and it's easy to get caught up with whether Diamond was right or wrong. Shouldn't the article (and the Talk) be a bit more about what the book says rather than whether its (unprovable?) theories are accurate or fully developed?

Geography

The Geography section of the article is rather weak. It doesn't make much sense to discuss it this way, considering that the whole book is about consequences of geography. Having rewritten the Outline and Agriculture sections to emphasize the book's premise that geography is a pervasive factor, perhaps we could just remove this section from the article? DPoon 11:53, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

"Diamond also explains how geography shaped human migration, not simply by making travel difficult (particularly by latitude)..."

A vital point he makes is that Europe is mountainous. This kept kingdoms small due to difficulties of ruling peoples spread through such difficult terrain. This meant that bright sparks who didn't obtain royal sympathy or who annoyed the king could leave and find refuge with the neighbouring kingdom. The most famous example would be Columbus who hawked his idea around before he struck a venture capitalist to sponsor him. Diamond contrasts this with China where a big flat country allowed vast empires to be dominated and original minds (who are likely to be troublemakers) had no options. - Pepper 150.203.227.130 23:49, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Sheeps and Peccary

Cheking the Wikiartikels of Sheep and Peccary Diamonds claim about lack of "useable" animals seems to be simply wrong. Any solutions anybody?

(please sign your name above by typing ~~~. In response to your question, I think his point about all the qualities of a domesticable animal needing to be present--in other words being necessary but not sufficient--is an interesting but mostly-untestable one. Because some of the qualities necessary are difficult to define, we will never know if a peccary or bison is domesticable unless we try. But, as he discusses regarding wild plants, local peoples can be expected to attempt to domesticate virtually all the animals in their area. It seems likely to me, that at some point, native americans had gotten their hands on a wild, young peccary, and like some of my more-insane clients (I'm a veterinarian), had tried to raise them, nursing them with human breast-milk, and the relationship probably didn't work out for one of the numerous reasons Diamond speaks about. Just look at all the crazies who "rescue" every orphaned animal they see. You think that started in modern times? I mean why was the wolf the only member of the canidae domesticated? There are plenty of foxes around, and people were looking for a smaller wolf. Why not just domesticate a fox? Why are none of the cervidae (deer, moose, etc ...) domesticated? Why only bovidae and the closely-related ovidae? I think the answer is because Diamond is correct, and it is the rare species which is domesticable. It's not an inherent characteristic of the species, but rather characteristics as they relate to typical, local, human characteristics. I mean for all we know, rhinos might be domesticable by VERY large, iron-clad people, with a lot of patience and no furniture.--Davidbessler 13:29, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Both deer and Fox have been domesticated. There are mllions of domestic deer throughout the Circumpolar north who are being actively bred and refined for specific tasks and characteristic. Domestic varieties of fox have been developed for furs. Also you are simply missing the point that people don't domesticate meat animals - like peccarys - when they remain plentiful enough in the wild and are more easily hunted rather than raised.DHBoggs 15:32, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

More Criticism

The issue of whether or not this book is 'Eurocentric' should be irrelevant. This book is leftist non-sense, and there are dozens of countries that destroy his theory. Consider that China has had domesticated animals for thousands of years while Germany was mostly a group of warring tribes until Roman occupation. How did Germany then become one of the world's richest nations only a short time later? What about the Aztecs? Did they not have maize and armies? Are there no European countries that have inhospitable conditions? Shouldn't Iceland then be one of the poorest countries in the world? What about the Egyptians or the Persians (Iran)? Anyone with even a basic sense of history should be able to see that this book is nothing but pc drivel. The fact that it won a Pulitzer only shows how political correctness can corrupt any institution.

The author talks at length about South East Asia, and China specifically, who had many advantages and were a world power during the period he focuses on and are today. He refers, in general, not to European dominance but Eurasian.

The Aztecs did indeed have maize and armies - in fact that's exactly why the question of how the massively outnumbered Cortez conquered them is interesting. Maybe it had something to do with Cortez's access to, oh, I don't know, germs, guns, and some third material that currently escapes me [/sarcasm].

The book is certainly not a complete theory of history, and can fairly be criticized as a populist metatheory that of course fails to address many incredibly complicated events in history. Increased consideration of Environmental factors has, however, become increasingly common in the study of history. --Camipco 07:58, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

Your comment is irrelevant. Please read our NPOV policy. You seem not to accept it. But for us editors, it is inviolable. user:Slrubenstein

I happen to agree with you on the point about having a NPOV is inviolable. But that isn't really the point I think your trying to make here, this is a talk page and discussion should be on improving the article. I think a policy you should refresh yourself on is Wikipedia:Civility.Colin 8 00:21, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Cortez conquered the aztecs using a huge indian army of rebelling natives. It had nothing to do with guns (pitiful matchlock muskets) germs (not extensive until several years after the conquest) or soft medieval steel. It was a result of superior spanish military tactics, leadership and a native alliance expertly exploited by the highly organized Spanish government. Magellan thought highly of the conquering power of European guns and steel too until he was slaughtered by "primitive" natives in the Philippines. Further the notion that Europeans were somehow favored with the only large animals suitible for domestcation is antiquated and demonstrably false and I have difficulty understanding how a man of Diamonds training in biology could still seriously entertain such an essentialy Biblical idea (God favored the white man). The ancestors of cattle (wild Aurochs), sheep and horses were certainly every bit as "wild" and unspecialized as non domesticated species anywhere. The tame meat, wool and milk producing versions we are familiar with are the results of hundreds of generations and thousands of years of selective breeding. The same could certainly have been done to zebras in Africa or bison in North America. In fact even in thier "unbred" natural state tame zebras can be ridden and harnessed (http://www.shartwell.freeserve.co.uk/humor-site/negative-zebra.html) and I have a neighbor who raises bison instead of cows and breeds them with other kinds of cattle. There is no reason, for example, that the varieties of reindeer or bison or llamas or camels or water buffallo or what-have-you couldn't have been selectively bred to become, for example, milk machines like modern Holstiens. Cultural choices, not biological determinism, led to colonialism. I will say this for Diamond however; at least he raises the publics awareness of issues.DHBoggs

If you can cite some authors who believe what you do, then you are free to add those beliefs to the criticism section. -- bcasterline • talk 20:59, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Regarding the spread of colonialism, the main article already sites some relevant works. Regarding the rise of domestication, there is a very large liturature, most of it in the form of journal articles; for the characteristics and suitibility of animals to domestication as well as some discussion of the alteration of characteristics through breeding try Simon J.M. Davis, The archaeology of Animals, 1987. There are more recent works but you will have to ferret them out yourself. For domestication processes in general, Lewis Binford, Constructing Frames of Reference and Tim Ingold, Hunters Pastoralists and Ranchers, are some works I find useful, among others you can refernce from the bibliographies.DHBoggs 15:37, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Criticism Section

I'm confused by the distinction between methodological criticism and criticism of scholarship, can someone explain this to me? I feel like the criticisms could be much better organized. Maybe I'll have a go at it. I agree with Ortolan88's point that the talk pages in some ways are superior to the article. --Camipco 17:54, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

Ok, I had a go at it. I think the structure of the section makes more sense now. I moved a lot around, and changed the headers, but made very few changes to the text. This was a lot of work, I'd appreciate it if people discuss before reverting :-)

Obviously, there's still more to be done. I'd like to see some of the interesting points from this talk thread brought into the page, for example. It is what it is. --Camipco 23:43, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

Great start, Epopt, going from incoherence to coherence! Now I'd like to know who the critics are who complain of "environmental determinism with racist implications". These are grave accusations from slrubenstein and it hardly seems fair to attack a book most noted for knocking the underpinnings from western smugness about inventiveness, etc. without providing both some concrete examples of the author's thesis and some concrete examples of these complaints. Some general linking into the history of technology also seems called for. I write, not as one who knows anything about the subject, but as one who would like to learn more than is here now. Ortolan88

I am away from my office and ill-equipped to provide more detail in the article, besides the reference to Blaut's book that I just put in the article. Most of the anthropologists, geographers, and historians with whom I have spoken -- people who consider the same issues Diamond addresses in the book -- raise more fundamental objections (meaning, questions of scholarship rather than politics): what is of value in Diamond's book (one example being points about the evolution of disease among agriculturalists, and the devastating effect of Old World pathogens in the New World) are not original to Diamond but rather long, and well, established; and what is new to Diamond (an argument about the advantages of east-west continents over north-south continents, for example) is based on poor analysis of facts -- but does echo a strand of thought among European thinkers dating at least as far back as Rousseau, viz that European society is in fact superior to other societies, and for "natural" or inevitable reasons. Diamond makes all sorts of claims about the superiority of Europe and the inferiority of other parts of the world (China, Africa) that are simply wrong.

There are two issues here: one is, is Europe really superior? Certainly, if you look at the last three hundred years, Europe (and the United States) have enjoyed economic and military supremacy. Of course, if you look at the world a thousand years ago, or two thousand years ago, or three thousand year ago, the answer to this question would be different. And frankly, we do not know what the answer would be a thousand years from now, or two thousand years, or three thousand years. Diamond tries in his book to construct a natural "experiment" and makes a grave error: he looks at the present as if the "experiment" is over. But in human society, the "experiment" is never over and we cannot make conclusive or absolute claims from the present state of the world.

Two thousand years ago - Europe dominated with the Roman Empire. What are you talking about when you say it would be different? JettaMann

Second, assuming that for the moment Europe and Euro-American societies are supreme, the second issue is why? Here, Diamond is clearly and unapologeticly a geographic determinist, and his argument is therefore vulnerable o all the arguments made against geographic determinism. I am no expert in this matter and would defer to professional geographers. But my sense is that Diamond emphasizes too much the autonomy and relative isolation of different parts of the world. it is well established that most of the technologies europeans relied upon in their economic and military ascent came from other parts of the world. Al too often european and Euro-American authors give too little credit to non-Europeans who developed the technologies or even taught Europeans how to use them. One example, based on a book by a geogrophe whose name I forget, will suffice: for a long time rice was one of the US's main exports; the cultivation of rice was crucial to US economic development. But not only was the rice brought to the US from Africa, Europeans relied on African slaves to cultivate it -- not only because slaves provided labor, but because slaves from Africa had knowledge of how to cultivate rice that Europeans lacked. This example suggests a different reason for European (and US) success: that Europeans stole and exploited the knowledge and labor and resources of others. This explanation is partial, but it does introduce a dimension lacking in Diamond's book: power. And, in fact, historians far more sophisticated and knowledgable than Diamond have explored this issue, like Emmanuel Wallerstein and Andre Gundar Frank and Eric Wolf ... there are many others.

The assertion here may be correct, but it is missing Diamond's point to argue that it undermines his thesis. It merely pushes the question one stage back to ask why Europeans had greater power to abduct Africans and appropriate their superior knowledge than vice versa. Diamond seeks to get to the bottom of the pile of turtles by rooting his study at the point in time when all living humans were hunter gatherers. Once you take a later starting point, the number of cultural factors grows steadily and the potential for their interaction grows combinatorially. Alan Peakall 14:54 Nov 7, 2002 (UTC)

With all due respect, I think Diamond is missing the point. At the time of Columbus, not all people in the Americas were hunter-gatherers; moreover, many people who are hunter-gatherers today may not have been hunter-gatherers in the past. To put the question as, "Why did Europeans have the power to abduct Africans, and not vice-versa" is offensive if the answer sugggests any inevitability. Prior to the 1500s Europeans did not abduct African slaves in any significant number; indeed, Europeans were captured as slaves regularly (the word slave comes from Slav). If Diamond wrote his book in the 1400s, he would have ended up concluding that North African or Asian culture was superior, and I am sure he would have found good reasons to make that claim. Who knows what the world will be like in the future? Maybe a few hundred years from now Europeans "civilization" will be in disarray and Africans will be raiding Europe and the US for slaves. If he were to write his book in 2500s, for all I know he might conclude that Ausralians or Amazonian Indians or some other group are superior, and find good reasons to explain how that happened. There is a fundamental problem with determinism, especially when you privilege one particular slice of human history as if that were the end point. Like it or not, the book reveals some fundamental Western biases. Slrubenstein

This would be a fair criticism, IF Diamond were talking about European dominance. He is not. As a cursory reading of the book will show, he is talking about Eurasian dominance; and moreover, he is talking about it as the superiority of the continent, not of the peoples living on it. This criticism is toothless, because there has not been a single moment in history since the dawn of civilization when cultures outside of Eurasia-and-Northern-Africa were more technologically advanced than those within that huge region. Diamond is explaining the reasons that this is the case. He is not arguing that ANY people are superior to any other. He is arguing that Eurasians had certain outcomes which others did not, because of different starting positions. I'm not sure why this idea is so offensive to some. And I am quite troubled by the assertion that "'Why did Europeans have the power to abduct Africans' is offensive if the answer suggests any inevitability" -- what if the answer really is "any group of people living where the Europeans lived would have had advantages the Africans did not"? Are we then to reject the entire question, because it offends our delicate sensibilities? (That's an answer that gives no pride of place to Europeans, incidentally; only pride TO place, in the sense that it favors Eurasia over Africa.)

Diamond's book may for some be an attack on European smugness because he is not claiming that Europeans are innately smarter than non-Europeans. Well, I regret bing so sarcastic, but "bravo." It is a shame that some people still need to be convinced that Europeans do not have a monopoly on intelligence. Be that as it may, I am happy to give Diamond credit if he has convinced some people of this. Nevertheless, Diamond still asserts that europe is superior, and his explanation of why Europe is superior suggest that this superiority was inevitable. Even if he is basicly saying that some people just had good luck to live in Europe rather than in Asia or Africa or South America, he is still claiming that science justifies European domination and power. But it does not. slrubenstein

You're missing the point. Diamond does not argue for European superiority. He argues for Eurasian superiority. He fully acknowledges that many European technologies came from Asia and Northern Africa (which, you'll note, was geographically connected to Asia before the development of the Suez Canal) and in fact he says that that's a substantial [i]part[/i] of the Eurasian Advantage -- a much greater interconnected area that permitted those kinds of cultural transfer. Your criticisms are based on facts that Diamond incorporates in his analysis. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.215.171.214 (talk) 19:44, 26 March 2007 (UTC).

As far as I can tell, Diamond has almost no pro-European bias whatsoever. I'd say he says scientific (materialistic, rationalistic) analysis "explains" European dominance, but not that it "justifies" it.

Many people disagree with you. there is obviously room for debate. What is important is that the article present both views. Slrubenstein

Okay, now I strongly agree with you. :-)

--- Thanks. I hope you'll write more about this (carefully) in an article. Ortolan88

Another case, I wonder how many there are, where the talk page is superior to the article. Ortolan88 14:39 Aug 15, 2002 (PDT)

Free-market critics

The Theory of History section seems more like a plug for free markets than a legitimate criticism. First of all, the information is incorrect: Japan and South Korea, despite being capitalistic, are incredibly interventionist. South Korea's Chaebol system involves government co-ordination and the forming of large multi-sector conglomerates which co-ordinate all manner of economic activity. Taiwan existed under a dictatorship until 1987 and received heavy U.S. support. As well, comparing the growth of nations during the 20th century with growth during the previous ten centuries is very problematic. In a way, it makes Diamond's point. The areas to which technology has flowed easily and readily have developed. Those that have not received the technology have not.Troyc001 19:53, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

It's a legitimate criticism from a free-market perspective. A criticism from a technocratic-statist perspective would read almost identically, saying that Diamond has ignored the effect of enlightened state planning and social forces that are not results of the environment. Both criticisms have limited applicability as Diamond focuses not on Europe vs. Asia but Eurasia vs. the rest of the world. --JWB 03:21, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

Can some source of the criticism be provided? If some semi-respectable source is making this criticism, then fine. Otherwise, would this not qualify as original scholarship?Troyc001 19:42, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

I didn't add it and am not standing up for its retention, though I doubt it's original research - this viewpoint is so common I'm sure it is in many sources, maybe even in some of those already cited in the article. I would prefer the article to focus on the book's Eurasia thesis.--JWB 06:07, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

I have a question about the section detailing criticism of Diamond's "law of history." The article currently states

"Many historians dispute Diamond’s “law of history” regarding the dominance of agricultural societies over their non-agricultural neighbors. [citation needed] There are numerous cases of nomadic societies conquering agricultural ones: the Hittites conquest of the ancient Middle East, the successive movements of Germanic people (such as Franks, Goths and Huns) across Europe, the Aryan migration into India, the Seljuk Turks conquest of much of the Muslim world that began in the 11th century, and the vast Mongolian conquests of the 13th and 14th centuries."

It seems to me that there is a confusion in this section between non-agricultural and nomadic. I will post back soon with sources, but I am fairly sure that a few of the people mentioned above possessed some form of agriculture, mainly the Hittite and Germanic peoples, and possibly the Mongolians if you count livestock. Also, I was quite sure that the Germanic peoples were on the whole sedentary not nomadic. I might be confusing different time periods.--tbonepower07 15:59, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

The "law of history" is stated a bit too broadly(more of a usual tendency than a law) but using the Hittites, Germanic tribes etc. as counter examples is simply mis-informed. Every single one of those groups whether nomadic or sedentary were relying predominantly on agriculture. I have removed those statements from the article. DHBoggs 15:45, 13 June 2007 (UTC) Diamond's thesis in this book is on the utility of raising both plants and animals, so there's no contradiction in pastoralists successfully competing with agriculturalists. Also, you've left Inuit vs. Norse as the only example of this criticism, but this is a case Diamond covers in detail in his later Collapse (book). Finally, who exactly is making this criticism? It's still unattributed, and it's hard to evaluate the criticism without being able to find out any more about it. --JWB 17:20, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Europe or Eurasia?

It seems to me the page discusses Europe too much. The book is primarily about Eurasia vs. other connected regions, not about Europe as a separate unit. --JWB 5 July 2005 21:36 (UTC)

I agree, and this shows up perhaps unfairly in the criticisms section. I didn't feel, for example, that he underestimated the importance of South East Asian technology. --Camipco 17:47, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

Intro

Proposed edit for intro:

"...which began broadcasting a documentary based on the book, produced by the National Geographic Society," which uses the term "Guns, Germs, and Steel" about 870 times in one hour. :(

-St|eve 01:38, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

Anna Karenina principle

The Anna Karenina principle is currently an orphaned stub describing one argument from Diamond's book. Can it and should it be merged into this article? MC MasterChef 14:51, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

I don't know if it should be merged or not, but after my edit it is at least no longer orphaned. DPoon 11:45, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I think it is Ok to keep it separate, because it is a well-defined piece of text. It just has to be properly linked whenever it is mentioned.

african contribution

can anyone point out exactly what were the african contribution to european ascendency? The more familiar non-European inventions of paper, gunpowder, compass, and the movable type were Chinese in origin, not African, and they were not forcefully appropriated, but learned through mutual exchange. Cowell 19:51, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

The contribution is usually said to mainly be that colonialism provided profits that helped Europe develop, and that it exercised key technologies like seafaring and industrial machinery, allowing Europe to gain the lead. The example of export of a African technical skill that I have seen documented in most detail is rice cultivation coming from the Niger Delta to South Carolina; I'm sure other people have other examples.--JWB 23:16, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

The areas from where most Africans were taken in the Atlantic slave trade were densely-populated chiefdoms, kingdoms and empires, all of which rested upon agricultural and iron-working systems that could maintain dense populations. Since most were farmers, ironworkers or other craftsmen, then they had a "pre-adaptation" to the requirements of plantation slave labor, without whose existence the Industrial Revolution would not have taken place (the stable, chattel labor force freed up capital that could be used in technological innovations and investments). Thank the African bodies themselves for the Industrial Revolution.Kemet 18:04, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

I was given to understand that the industrial revolution was primarily a British phenomenon, while African slavery was primarily an American one; and that industrialization in America happened more readily in places where slavery was less common (i.e. the Northern states vs. the South and the Caribbean islands). No? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.215.171.214 (talk) 19:47, 26 March 2007 (UTC).

FAC?

This is quite good, I think with minor adjustments it would survive FAC. Anybody interested in addressing eventual FAC objections? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 04:10, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

What is FAC? Which objections are you anticipating?--JWB 17:46, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

FAC = Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates. As for the objections - I guess we will see after nominations. My question was about whether there are any editors that will read the comments and try to address them. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 05:37, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

Sure, I'd look at objections. (not guaranteeing I would fix all objections) What page would they be on? --JWB 08:18, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

At Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates. Let's start with Peer Review first. There are usually not that many comments, but if they are, they are useful. Check the templates at the talk above for links. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 20:40, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

We have comments - see Wikipedia:Peer_Review#Guns.2C_Germs.2C_and_Steel. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 17:37, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

Adding more publishing info about the book is a good idea, though I'm not the person for that.--JWB 06:11, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

Criticism of Theory of History

A more fundamental argument against Diamond’s thesis is that he does not understand the true nature of history; if history is defined as “a study of human actions” then it must be a study of conscious action and the evolution of ideas, rather than environmental factors. The ability of man to shape his environment and create a positive environment for growth presents many counterexamples to Diamond’s thesis, such as the numerous cases of rapid prosperity achieved by countries with few resources but free markets such as Japan, South Korea, or Taiwan. (Compared with nations blessed with natural resources that have stagnated under interventionist governments, examples: Brazil, Nigeria, and Russia.) He also fails to explain the importance of the individual, as many countries received a direct increase in their standard of living because of key individuals. By implying that those individuals were just members of their respective groups undermines the significant contributions that those individuals provided.

This part of the criticism is very weird. Is defining "history" as “a study of human actions” anywhere close to the mainstream ? Does studying environmental factors is somehow not correct according to the historical orthodoxy ? It doesn't seem to me that either of these is true. If these two concepts are not mainstream, at least who supports them ?

The rest of the paragraph seems completely misdirected - it refers to the very modern times, oversimplifies the interventionism/free market issue (interventionism refers to government action in a free market economy, so there's no opposition here; the East Asian countries are pretty interventionists) and refers to the resources issue, that doesn't seem to be considered important by the book etc. The influence that individuals may have does not make the study of historical trends somehow invalid.

This section would need a complete rewrite before returning to the article. Taw 06:26, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

It is a weird and untenable definition. The articles on history and Prehistory are relevant hereDHBoggs 15:50, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

European domination of Asia and Native American defeat of Vikings in Vineland

How does the theory account for these?matturn 03:03, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

I've only read about half of the book, but I don't think he talks about Native Americans "defeating" the vikings in Vineland. He suggests limited contact between the two (says the first "significant" contact was in 1490's) and I think that the Vikings were driven out by natural conditions as much as natives.

As far as European domination of Asia, it seems to me he explains it by saying (for various reasons) they developed certain key technologies (war ships that made all others obsolete, better metal working, practical guns etc) which allowed them to dominate in Asia (and elsewhere). Everything but the germs basically ;)TastyCakes 23:38, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

The book doesn't claim to explain every bit of history. The hypothesis is that better natural resources (animals, plants, geography, weather) allowed peoples in Europe AND Asia to more easily develop agrarian cultures then other locations, such as sub-Saharan Africa and Oceania. With farming culture comes sufficient food supplies for larger human populations and specializations such as metal-working, math & writing for harvest management, etc. In hunter-gatherer societies, these specializations don't happen as EVERYBODY is scavenging for food all day long. These specializations are the beginnings of a technological advantage that snowball over time. A society that is lucky in geographical location not only benefits from the trade of goods and ideas, but also exposure to many diseases from other populations (and eventually gaining immunity to those diseases). The hypothesis does not claim to explain events much latter in human history. For example, Europe's technological progress after the dark ages (nor why Europe entered the dark age) nor why China stayed technologically stagnant after the 1600's are beyond the scope of the hypothesis. Dyl 07:29, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Plant foodstuffs not mentioned in the article

Besides domesticated animals, plant foodstuffs (eg. cereals/grains) of different geographical regions is a major topic in the book. This is not mentioned in the article. Dyl 08:52, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Europe And Not The Rest Of Eurasia

This article focuses too much on Europe. Why is it people always look to Europe when thinking of a dominate civilization. Europe has only caught up to the rest of Eurasia by 1500, and took the lead only at around 1800. Even in Ancient times only Greco-Roman civilizations were advanced while the rest of Europe were living no better than Native Americans and Native Africans below North Africa. On the other hand Southwest Asia (Arabia, Persia, ect.) South Asia (India, ect.), and East Asia (China, Korea, ect.) have dominated the world in technology far longer than most European "civilizations". China was vastly ahead of the world in technology for most of history.. If this book talks about civilization up to 1500s then Europeans shouldn't be mentioned too much, except for Greco-Roman and late Middle Ages Europe. Yet from this article it seems that Europeans are talked about most. Zachorious 04:40, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, said that in the "Europe or Eurasia?" section above. The book is not Eurocentric, but Eurasiacentric. IMO a lot of the discussion of Eurocentrism in this article is out of place and not relevant to the book, but so far I have been reluctant to just delete it. --JWB 18:24, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't see what parts are problematic. Some of the large criticism/response sections could probably be split into smaller sections or summarized using Wikipedia:Summary style. I would expect Europe and Asia to be central topics because part of the purpose of the book is to examine why these continents have been more developed.--Nectar 18:59, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

"Europe and Asia" is a central topic of the book, but "Europe vs. Asia" is not, in deliberate contrast to most conventional history. --JWB 02:14, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree about the criticism being summarized & split off onto a seperate article. As I see it this article focuses far too much on the criticism and not enough on the actual substance of the book. This book is popular non-fiction, not academic. Books and other references can act as counter-examples and comparisons to the assumptions and ideas in GGS and use those in place of a long-winded crit section. --Nick 17:58, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Eurasian hegemony

"But the book is not merely an account of the past; it attempts to explain why Eurasian civilization, as a whole, has survived and conquered others, while refuting the belief that Eurasian hegemony is due to any form of Eurasian intellectual or moral superiority." Where is this belief that is being refuted? Who believes that Eurasian hegemony is due to any form of Eurasian intellectual or moral superiority? Did Jared Diamond invent this idea? Someone help me with this. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by ShadowyCaballero (talk • contribs) 18:09, 25 July 2006.

It's a very common unstated or implicit belief, especially among cultural conservatives. Probably not common among academics (although Allan Bloom springs to mind as a likely candidate to hold such a belief), but it definitely is among the hoi polloi of Western culture. —

goethean ॐ 18:13, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Also see Social Darwinism. The most common belief even among intellectuals not so long ago. -- bcasterline • talk 19:37, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

It seems that this is a belief only held by white supremacists. Anyone familiar with chaos theory would agree with Diamond. - User:ShadowyCaballero

Do you really feel that the view that the belief in a theoretical European cultural superiority is an invention?. It was the most clear cut and widely held view until fifty years ago and is still held by a great many people. This has little to do with whether its correct, just that it exists and has for an extremely long time. what about manifest destiny or the British attempt during its rule over a third of the world to make all of their subject peoples as British as possible or the laughable claims that Africans were akin to beasts of burden or the still widely held modern nationalistic belief that this country whichever one it may be, is the greatest country in the world. Colin 8 00:49, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, that is a pretty sloppy and misinformed use of "chaos theory" which does not apply to the material Diamond is referring to. Moreover, this is not a belief limited to avowed or self-identified white-supremists. James Blaut argued that it is pervasive in Academia [1]. Slrubenstein | Talk 10:53, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Delisted GA

It seems that this article did not go through the GA nomination process. Looking at the article as is, it fails on criteria 2 in that it does not cite any sources. Most Good Articles use inline citations. I would recommend that this be fixed and submit the article through the nomination process. --RelHistBuff 15:24, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

This article is more Euro-centric than GGS ever could be!

I've read the book. One astonishing aspect of GGS is that Diamond hardly even mentions Europe! No, really! Diamond spends much more time talking about New Guinea and the Pacific Islands that he does about Europe. If one sits down and actually reads the book, Eurocentrism is the antithesis of what Diamond is arguing. He never argues for environmental determinism, and even anticipates this accusation in his book. He rather looks at the "broades pattern of human history", which is that the CONTINENT of EURASIA has been host to the predominately most complex societies with the most complex sociopolitical institutions and technology.

I can't understand why this article just blindly lists criticisms that so-obviously run counter to Diamond's own position in his book. Contrary to this article's words, Diamond does not just "never explicitly argue for racism" he ACTIVELY argues AGAINST it. It's the main thesis of his entire book!!! The book's main point is that no peoples are culturally or biologically superior to any other peoples, and thus there must be other reasons for the trend of history to be that Eurasia (including parts of Africa) was the primary location of major world civilizations, and why civilization on the other continents took such a different course. His conclusion, far from "environmental determinism", looks at a whole host of factors that have more to do with system dynamics than anything else. His ideas are echoed in The Human Web, a more recent book.

This article, in an attempt to be fair, is distorting the truth by allowing any criticism to pass equally, without weighing the validity of the arguments against the actual work itself. We don't have to be POV to acknowledge the differences between valid critical arguments and completely uninformed ones.

In particular, as others have noted, Diamond does not focus so much on Europe, but on EURASIA. In fact, in his new edition, he has added material that discusses the reactions to his work. One of the main things he talks about is that since his book was published a major public question has not been to ask "why Europe"--why was EUROPE in particular the eurasian region to spring to dominance so quickly with so much hegemony (another was "why NOT China"). The reason these are popular responses to the book is simple: he never really addressed European Ascendency with any depth! Instead he focuses on Eurasian societal evolution, and not Australia or the Americas. He never goes into too much analysis exploring why Europe ended up dominant, perhaps because it's fairly obvious that European dominance has only existed for barely 500 years. He implies this to be an anomolly resulting from a variety of chance events combined with other basic geographic, environmental, and sociopolitical factors. It's a theory of convergence more than anything else, and it's only implied. So these criticisms appear to come from folks who either didn't read the book at all, didn't read it closely, or who perhaps went into the book harboring some preconceived notions that tainted their interpretation.

Others here seem to agree in principle, so the article should be changed to reflect reality. I'm not saying get rid of criticism, just that we should be more selective about the criticism we include as to whether the critic seems to have any clue what Diamond was actually saying.

Merge Anna Karenina principle here

The article Anna Karenina principle is linked only from here and is of no use outside the context of GGS book. There is no info whether someone else have picked the name, so several articles just for a book (even if it was the best one ever) is useless.

It is also rather short which makes a very good candidate for a merge. Section here would be better to read than to navigate to another article. -- Goldie (tell me) 10:36, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I didn't know about this article. However, now that I see it, I think the real issue is that it should not be called "the Anna Karenina principle." In fact, Diamond is refering to a principle well-established in ecology and cultural ecology. I imagine his calling it the Anna Karenina principle is part of his attempt to popularize and reach a general audience through non-scholarly more friendly language. And there is a real (meaning, predates Diamond, is what is used by scientists) name for this: Liebig's law of the minimum: growth is limited by the minimum availability of one resource rather than by the abundance of all resources (there are other ways of putting it). I do not know of any references to an Ana Karenina principle that predate Diamond's book. Frankly, I would just propose speedy deletion of the AK article, merge the contents here but provide the correct link to the Liebig's law article. Will you do it, or should I? Slrubenstein | Talk 10:51, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I would redirect AK to here (since it is called that in this book), but mention and link to Liebig's law from this article. — goethean ॐ 14:30, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I haven't read the book and know about it only from The Big Wire. Level of knowledge about the Liebig's law was even lower :-( Thanks for educating me ;). For the merge - I can do it, NP. Just avoiding to be way too brave, and trying to be more cooperative. It seems that I haven't read the talk page either, there was already a merge proposal before (#Anna Karenina principle). But you'll have to add the reference what is the relevance of Diamond's AKP to Liebig's. -- Goldie (tell me) 14:32, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

This makes sense, Slrubenstein | Talk 16:52, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I can't agree. I don't care if it only has relevance to this article. Many wiki subjects deserve to have very long articles. This might be one. Very long articles are awkward in the wiki format. Breaking them into pieces this way makes sense to me. I read the AK matter with interest, separately. I have just skimmed the main article, because it is so long and complex... 69.87.199.69 13:39, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

---

Stop this obsession with merging articles. From the general reader's point of view, the pedia is much easier to use if the articles are on separate pages.

What is this?

This shows up in the article as displayed on my screen, under controversial claims.

In Chapter 5, Professor Diamond contends that the natives of Papa New Guinea fashioned boats out of hollowed out tree trunks to transport themselves to Australia. In reality, the could have built wings and flew.

It's clearly nonsense, but it doesn't appear in the "Edit" page, so I can't delete it. Help?

Gun History needed

This article needs much more info about the history of guns, and/or links to such. People coming to wikipedia seeking the history of guns end up here and find little help. 69.87.199.69 13:43, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

removal

• What I removed:

Professor Tom Tomlinson argues in a review of Guns, Germs, and Steel that Diamond's approach ignores "much of the current literature on cultural interactions in modern history" and that Diamond omits "almost all of the standard literature on the history of imperialism and post-colonialism, world-systems, underdevelopment or socio-economic change over the last five hundred years."[2] Though Diamond's book is a popular history that is not primarily interested in engaging academic debates, this point exposes a failure of the book to deal sufficiently with competing hypotheses that is especially problematic in light of Diamond's calls for history to be written as a science.

• Why I removed it:

• If you read the review, you'll see that that excerpt is meant to be descriptive, not critical. It's not even an argument: the Book's prologue makes clear that the question is why the eurasians got guns, germs, and steel, not what it did after they got them. Don't revert me until you've responded to my points here. Go ahead and revert it in the meantime if you want to discuss and we'll put a dispute tag on it while we discuss. --Urthogie 21:35, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

• I've reverted with slight editing because I don't feel your deletion of this point of criticism is justified. The book review in which this argument is made is both descriptive and critical. Diamond ignores the literature and theories mentioned by Tomlinson. I also disagree with your point on the purpose of the book. The top paragraph of this article says: "But the book is not merely an account of the past; it attempts to explain why Eurasian civilization, as a whole, has survived and conquered others, while refuting the belief that Eurasian hegemony is due to any form of Eurasian intellectual or moral superiority." The section you deleted essentially claims that Diamond ignored 'intervening variables' such as imperialism and colonialism that matter for how Eurasian civilization survived and conquered others. This is significant in regard to writing 'history as a science.' --InSpace 09:40, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Gun History not needed

The book isn't about how guns impacted the balance of power but rather how the geographic location of civilization affected the enviornment and organisms in the fertile areas, therefore creating a more sophisticated culture. The history of guns isn't really a main idea in the book.

American progress

I seem to recall the picture of "American Progress" by John Gast being either in the cover of some edition or discussed in the book. Should it be included in the article? --84.20.17.84 10:37, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

=hey...

there are almost no citations here! god people do something! Also, don't say if you dont like it change it yourself, as i am a wiki n00b, and would probly end up distroying everythang if i tryed Thedudewithglasses 07:13, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

release date

2020??? is that right

Bantu and SA

This is listed as a controversial claim in the article:

In chapter 19 (How Africa Became Black) he speculates that if the Dutch had arrived in South Africa after the Bantu they would have been unable to establish themselves in Cape Town, and says that since both sets of invaders displaced the Khoisan people the Dutch claim of prior occupation (although true) "needn't be taken seriously".

First: "he speculates that if the Dutch had arrived in South Africa after the Bantu"

This makes it sound like it was a matter of timing, which is not what the author claims. Diamond notes that the Bantu were already near the Cape of Good Hope, but had stopped expanding because the climate there was such that the Bantu agriculture and crops were not suitable for the area. Is was however suitable for crops the Dutch brought.

Second: I'm not sure what is actually controversial here. That needs to be clarified. A more complete quote is:

"once South African whites had quickly killed or infected or driven off the Cape's Khoisan population, whites could claim correctly that they had occupied the Cape [of Good Hope] before the Bantu and thus had prior rights to it. That claim needn't be taken seriously, since the prior rights of the Cape Khoisan didn't inhibit the whites from dispossessing them."