Online Bookstore: W.W. Norton & Company Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies Book

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It is impossible to write a comprehensive treatise on world history, which will not induce attacks on political and cultural grounds. Some critics blamed J. Diamond for advocacy of pure geographic determinism, that "culture doesn't matter" and so on. I think it is unjustified. He considered foremost the time before and during emergence of agricultural and, consequently, sedentary societies, not today's civilizations. When human population consisted of small bands and, later, tribes, their development was determined by environmental factors. Indeed, evidence from all continents suggests similarities in the emergence of domesticated plants, agriculture, and village life, starting about 10.000 years ago. The difference was in speed of this process - faster in places of benign environment, where food resources allowed denser population, slower in more adverse areas. As human societies grew in complexity and technological and cultural sophistication, more nonlinear interactions and feedbacks emerged. Then geography had likely to become less of a decisive factor, at least in a relatively straightforward way described by J. Diamond.

Moreover, history of the last few thousand years didn't resemble anything like the linear ascendance of the Western Europe. Western civilization achieved its dominance right at the moment when advances in ship-building and navigational technology brought the era of "great geographic discoveries" starting in 1492, which led to colonization of much of the world. Had seafaring been more developed before, during the Islamic dominance of several centuries earlier, or had China not scrapped its fleet and long-range exploration plans in early XV century, the world history of the last five hundred years could be very different.

Some readers took issue with the author's statement that "average Guinean is probably smarter than average westerner". It is indeed highly debatable, even with the notion of "smartness" very different for different people. However, if one puts aside cheap chauvinism, one can see that there is something to this statement. A Guinean lives in a very diverse natural environment. He constantly needs to actively process (in contrast to, say, watching TV) large amount of information relevant to his essential survival and well-being. Another reason is that the Darwinian "survival of the fittest" mechanism still works in tribal New Guinea, while amenities of the modern consumer society allow procreation of relatively unattractive, inept and stupid people.

Primary enabling factors of early civilization developments was the availability of domesticable plants and animals. Interestingly, the role of animals, as follows from the author's discourse, was much greater in this respect. Indeed, domesticated plants number many hundreds species, with each major agricultural regions having at least several developed crops. In contrast, large domesticable animals good for field work and transportation, are much rare. American continent and much of Africa didn't have suitable animals at all. Domesticated animals not only provide muscle power, but also make humans adaptable to germs. This allowed expansion into new regions with different germ population, which was one of the crucial factors in rapid conquering of Latin American territory by Spain.

In Jared Diamond view the ultimate cause of Eurasian (and later European) domination is the extent of the East-West axis - largest for Eurasia and much smaller for other continents. Latitude stretch of Eurasian landmass certainly did play a role, but it is likely overstated by the author. Total East-West extent of the Eurasia was probably irrelevant, and the history of Sumerian and Egyptian empires would likely have been similar even without the Europe west of Greece and the Asia east of Persia. The crucial property was the Mediterranean and the Middle East juncture (Fertile Crescent and neighboring coastal territories). Was it latitudinal dominance or a fractal coastline? The role of a long, winding coastline could be a very significant one. It provides a lot of beachfront and river estuary water resources, temperate seashore climate, great variety of flora and fauna from sea level to mountains nearby. All this ensures richness of resources sustaining high-density human population. At the same time such topography allows easy interaction, trade and exchange between settlements, while preserving pockets of diversity and preventing easy conquering and destruction by a dominant tribe, unlike in areas of open mid-continent plains. Indeed, it is evident in this book that the Fertile Crescent and two-river delta in China are the only places having this combination of climate, topography and biological resources.

To stress the importance of geographic factors and in particular availability of domesticable animals, the author mentions a curious fact - the absence of wheeled transport on American continent. To J. Diamond the failure of relatively advanced Mesoamerican cultures to develop wheeled transportation was due to the lack of any domesticated animals, which could be used to power them. Indeed, he argues, they had used wheels in toys, therefore they didn't lack technological creativity in this respect. I disagree with the author on this issue. There is a huge difference between a toy wheel - something rotating on an axis - and a working tool for transportation. The latter needs much higher degree of sophistication than many other contemporary technologies. A wheel even in a simple wheelbarrow must be very round and well-balanced on an axle, have a very sturdy and low-friction axle and hub, firm but light and flexible stress-distributing spokes and stress-tolerant outer edge. A transportation carriage in addition to that needs to have a sophisticated amortization system for a smooth ride, and a suitable harness for the animal. Manufacturing an inexpensive, sturdy and reliable wheel for hauling and transportation was a very tough challenge. Still, the question of why Mesoamerican cultures hadn't developed a wheel requires further scrutiny. Perhaps the reason was related to available material technologies and quality of soil less suitable to build roads.

Other than that, the book is actually quite pedestrian, predictable, and prosaic. Of course geography is an essential factor in determining any society's potential for survival and/or success in competition with other societies. Having natural and easy access to the sea and all its products, for example, can lessen the otherwise considerable load on the populace for hunting, food gathering, and other requirements for the society's continued subsistence. Likewise, more temperate climates (neither too hot nor too frigid) give a substantial natural advantage to human societies intent on expansion, trade, and war. Yet, while such geographic factors are salient and helpful, they provide critical but insufficient means to explain human history. This is as true of the other factors he argues on behalf.

To argue on behalf of demographics as an essential ingredient in the unfolding of human history is a commonplace. To do so is neither profound nor useful. Instead, it is the mark of an idiographic academic so insulated from and evidently ignorant of the established verities and scholarship of another discipline that he is unable to recognize his own logical errors. Here too it is highly reductionistic to suppose that demography plays a central role in the unfolding of history any more than does geography. In anticipation of the next idea, let me hastily add that the same is obviously true for biology. To argue otherwise is make Herr Hitler's fascist argument on behalf of racial eugenics and a super race. Gee, I thought all that nonsense about racial purity and destiny ended in the smoke and ruins of post-war Berlin.

In essence, the author's painfully stated "logical" theories of 'guns, germs and steel' are actually anything but logical, and are more likely merely graphic instances of biological reductionism, which attempt to oversimplify the actual verifiable recorded complexities of history over with the faint pastels of more consistent, coherent, and centrist notions of a theoretical academic. Were he better grounded in world history and less anxious to take us on a quick and global tour, he might find that beneath those clear deep waters he has sailed over so quickly are the murky and muddy truths of actual history, which is nowhere near as consistent or as singularly pointed in a particular progressive direction as he would have us believe. This book is entertaining, well written, and easy to read. If you bother to read it, do it for those reasons, and not for edification. In my opinion it falls far too short in that dimension to be useful or believable.