Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies
by:
Jared Diamond (author)
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize.In this "artful, informative, and delightful" (William H. McNeill, New York Review of Books) book, Jared Diamond convincingly argues that geographical and environmental factors shaped the modern world. Societies that had had a head start in food production advanced...
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Winner of the Pulitzer Prize.In this "artful, informative, and delightful" (William H. McNeill, New York Review of Books) book, Jared Diamond convincingly argues that geographical and environmental factors shaped the modern world. Societies that had had a head start in food production advanced beyond the hunter-gatherer stage, and then developed religion --as well as nasty germs and potent weapons of war --and adventured on sea and land to conquer and decimate preliterate cultures. A major advance in our understanding of human societies, Guns, Germs, and Steel chronicles the way that the modern world came to be and stunningly dismantles racially based theories of human history. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the Phi Beta Kappa Award in Science, the Rhone-Poulenc Prize, and the Commonwealth club of California's Gold Medal.
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Format: paperback
ISBN:
9780393317558 (0393317552)
ASIN: 393317552
Publish date: April 1st 1999
Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company (NY/London)
Pages no: 480
Edition language: English
This is a weighty book, ya'll. Jared Diamond's book had been on my list for ages because once upon a time it had been on one of my recommended reading lists for an undergraduate Anthropology class (I majored in that field). I didn't have the time to read it then (it is 425 pages after all) but the t...
This is an interesting and influential book that in its broad conclusions makes a lot of sense, though I have doubts about Diamond’s reasoning on some of his smaller points. It’s longer than it needs to be, but largely because it is thorough and takes the time to break down academic subjects to be a...
Molto interessante, senza ombra di dubbio. Ho appreso molte cose che non sapevo, soprattutto su folklore e sui popoli polinesiani..purtroppo però, mi è sembrato spesso ripetitivo e a volte anche abbastanza "scontato". Forse, prefiggersi un compito così impegnativo come quello di riuscire a capire co...
Took me a year and a half to read this book. Not only because I'm a slow reader, though I am. But it was so long and there were so many other activities and books clamoring for my attention, that I got sidetracked several times. But it was worth coming back to. It's a fascinating study of how hu...
Diamond explains why some groups of humans have done well based on local circumstances: material resources, pathogens, human migratory patterns, that sort of thing. It's such a useful and non-racist theory that it holds immediate appeal. I've no idea how well it's withstood research over the past tw...