Guns, Germs, and Steel

[Blackking]

I will admit that I have not read this book...

But I know that everyone else had probably read it...

I had it for a while, but everyone knows that u can get backed up on books n shyt.....


can some of you explain the principles and ideas in it??

 

[Julius Skrrvin]

last time i checked shyt was on Netflix

 

[Matt504]

the videos are on YouTube and are excellent btw.

 

[Julius Skrrvin]

 

[Blackking]

I saw the videos... I didn't watch them. I always assume it's better to read the books (that's y I'm slow on shyt i guess)

post the vids here and ill watch.

edit: ^^ ok

 

[ch15x]

I browsed an e-book version of it...not much I can say other than it having some points...

 

[Julius Skrrvin]

I saw the videos... I didn't watch them. I always assume it's better to read the books (that's y I'm slow on shyt i guess)

post the vids here and ill watch.

edit: ^^ ok

it is, but the videos are well done.

 

[Depreciating Asset]

Read the book years ago and really enjoyed it but since it was so long ago, I won't do it justice trying to summarize it.

I haven't seen the videos but my guess is that they would provide the central ideas behind the Diamond's arguments but not actually provide detailed evidence.

You probably know this much already about the book but he basically argues that the reason why Europe and East Asia grew faster than the rest of the world was (1) because they switched from hunter-gatherer societies to agricultural societies earlier in their history and (2) because the geography of Europe-Asia allowed traders to travel East-West vs North-South. The reason this is important is because by maintaining relatively similar latitudes, they avoided the adverse weather effects, diseases that result when traveling North and South. Thus they traded more and more trade led to increased specialization and increased development and the eventual divergence.

Once again, I'm hardly doing it justice but this is how I recall the argument.

 

[Handsback]

Like @knowmadd said it's tough to give a real good summary of a book that covers so much.

Growth and advancement took place because of location and opportunity. We suffer from this narrative that the English and Australian Aborigines are very different people because they advanced at different rates. Guns, Germs, and Steel says that location is more important than the people. Australia doesn't have the climate or livestock to domesticate. Eurasia does. The author makes it pretty clear that 'primitive' is a relative term. While we may see New Guineans as less advanced, most Americans wouldn't make it three days out in a jungle that their 12 year olds have no problem in. All the iPhones in the world don't make a difference if you don't have an understanding of how to survive your environment.

The beginnings of language part was especially impressive to me. Suppose I'd just never thought about it before.

Coming from a black perspective the book really kicks racist arguments in the ass. It's not that white folks are naturally more inclined to be more intelligent or more advanced, it's that the environments that their ancestors lived in gave rise to cultures that allowed them to survive in those environments and expand elsewhere, while other environments did not foster the same kind of growth.

 

[newarkhiphop]

The book is better than those youtube videos and the two dudes above me summarized it fine

 

[theworldismine13]

you should read it, it will alleviate a lot of your ignorance, i always LOLed when i pointed out that the europeans were ahead of africans you said that i was promoting western imperialism

the book is a theory is its not the whole truth but you can learn a lot by reading it

 

[Serious]

i always LOLed when i pointed out that the europeans were ahead of africans you said that i was promoting western imperialism

I will say this:
Countries with natural resources tend to have more inequality, due to less "rapid economic growth".

http://www.iep.ru/files/text/confer/mar2002/gylfason_en.pdf

 

[Blackking]

you should read it, it will alleviate a lot of your ignorance, i always LOLed when i pointed out that the europeans were ahead of africans you said that i was promoting western imperialism

the book is a theory is its not the whole truth but you can learn a lot by reading it

I was asked if I read it because of a meeting where I explained some of the ideas in it.. and some chick was like... you must have read g g n s. I was like no, this is common sense.

You gonna just come in here and make up shyt? . You clearly stated..that you support the ideas of Western Imperialism at least 10 times. It would be different if I didn't read you type that and I just made it up. You wrote entire paragraphs on the ideas u represent.... Nothing like the summaries provided in this thread about this book.

You said the sole reason Europe was ahead of Africa and maintained that was because they were more advanced overall. I'm not getting that from the summaries in this thread and/or people I hear in life.

Your entire premise was the the translatic slave trade was African's fault ( you said this, NOT ME) and you went on and on and on and on explaining that they simply didn't advance as 'good' as the Europeans.

You mentioned none of the circumstances that I'm gathering from reading the book so far.

 

[Depreciating Asset]

A good companion book to read with GGNS is Darren Acemoglu and James Robinson's, Why Nations Fail. They don't buy Jared Diamond's arguments. They argue that institutions (basically controlled by society's elites) determine the rise and fall of civilizations. They try and dispel the location argument by pointing out that Nogales, Mexico and Nogales, Arizona are only separated by a national border. The people are virtually the same genetically. But life expectancy, crime and GDP are significantly different. They say the reason is government, rule of law, job opportunities, etc. In their view, you fix/contaminate the institutions, you make/break the society.

 

[theworldismine13]

You gonna just come in here and make up shyt? . You clearly stated..that you support the ideas of Western Imperialism at least 10 times. It would be different if I didn't read you type that and I just made it up. You wrote entire paragraphs on the ideas u represent.... Nothing like the summaries provided in this thread about this book.

yeah i have stated multiple times that american domination is a good thing and that american domination is the stepping stone for black domination

and?

You said the sole reason Europe was ahead of Africa and maintained that was because they were more advanced overall. I'm not getting that from the summaries in this thread and/or people I hear in life.

first of all stop throwing in modifiers like "sole"

i said that when europeans came into contact with africans the europeans were ahead technologically and that is why the africans lost

the book explains how the europeans got ahead

the whole premise of the book is that europeans were ahead and more advanced (im not sure why but apparently there is a difference to you between being ahead and being advanced)

the reason i LOLed is that you are disputing something that everybody knows and you are disputing the premise of the book, im just stating facts

Your entire premise was the the translatic slave trade was African's fault ( you said this, NOT ME) and you went on and on and on and on explaining that they simply didn't advance as 'good' as the Europeans.

i dont know why you are into this intellectually deceitful practice of using absolute modifiers, i never used the word 'entire'

what i did is post a video that discuses slavery and went into the reasons why slavery occurred



and i cosigned that the reason why the slave trade went on for so long is that 1) the europeans were more advanced 2) africans participated in the slave trade themselves

You mentioned none of the circumstances that I'm gathering from reading the book so far.

again i stated that the european were more advanced than the africans and you went into a hissy fit and started babbling about asian technology or something

you had a problem with the statement that europeans were more advanced when the whole book is premised on the notion that the europeans were more advanced

the circumstances of how it got to that point isnt going to make the europeans NOT advanced