To add on to the 'why does Eurasia have such a good set of animals for domestication?' - Diamond also notes that, unlike every other continent, Eurasia's primary axis (i.e. longest distance that can be travelled) is horizontal rather than vertical. Civilizations forming in Eurasia have thousands of miles in either direction across which the climate will be roughly similar and their animals/plants able to survive. Contrast this with Central and South America where we go from temperate mountains, to jungle, to desert, to sub-tropical within a far more restricted space. Those early settlers in Eurasia were far more able to spread successful domestications across a far greater distance before encountering environmental obstacles. The horse was able to spread from Ukraine to China and Spain within a few centuries whereas the llama could never be transported across the various biomes in between Lima and Mexico City.
It is always worse to imprison a innocent man rather than let the guilty go free. The most basic math shows that if you convict an innocent man you've by extension let the guilty go free. It is a 2:1 ratio of injustices.
in Star Trek, not all civilizations are at the same level, that's why they have Prime Directive. we see the encounter of the ones that are at the same level, because, those that are not, are left alone.
I think they were referring to the fact that every warp-capable sepsis is roughly the same. For example, the Humans are at the same level as the Klingons, who are at the same level as the Romulans, who are at the same level as the Cardassians, who are at the same level as the Talaxians, etc.
i think you are some what correct but you must take into consideration that they are not all on the exact same level for instance the cloaking drive and also it only appears that the humans are at a top dog level because there are other cultures and races who are prime directing the humans and just not messing with us
I would agree that almost all warp-capable species are at about the same level, but I would argue that that is due more to their interactions with one another. For example, the Vulcans were far more advanced than humans upon first contact, but said contact allowed humans to make a great leap in a short amount of time. Even then, not all warp-capable species are at the same technological level. The Ferengi had to purchase their warp-capability, and seem to be slightly behnid some others, like the Cardasian Empire or Federation.
+John Vlasov If they release them all at the same time, the videos get buried in people's subscription boxes, they're forgotten there, and they get fewer views. Also, if (for whatever reason) they are unable to record more for a while, they have a few rounds in the chamber to tide people over until they're able to record more.
So sad none of you have seen 'The Hunt'. It's a Danish film that explores the horrendous consequence of any sort of accusation. In it, Mads Mikkelsen is wrongfully accused of pedophilia after a colleague at the kindergarten misconstrues a white lie told by one of the kids. It's a perfect example of how one feather becomes ten hens (to quote another Dane) in a small town, At one point, it seems as if our protagonist has molested every single kid in town, because the parents have this insane confirmation bias, that just snowballs in light of the "discoveries" all the other parents are making. The film is absolutely gut-wrenching, and a master class of film making on top of it, along with a stellar cast. Would've been an amazing reference point in the whole 'Making a Murderer' discussion.
360flyby Only subbed, but the acting practically bleeds through the screen, no matter the language. It's available on Danish Netflix, so there's a chance you can find it there.
Getting someone to give a false confession can't be that hard. I have confessed to not doing my work at school to my mom because she doesn't believe me anyways, and she leaves me alone quicker sometimes if I pretend I just didn't do my work even when I actually do, but just don't have time to finish it.
The state vs the defendant is already not a fair assessment. We're literally talking about the power of the government verses a single human being. The state has documentation, police detectives, the power to tap phones, seize property for investigation, and so on. These are things a person simply cannot do in their own defense. If the hurtle for a conviction is simply "does it seem more likely from the evidence that s/he did it" then there is going to be a *massive* number of false convictions because it would be almost trivial for the state to sift through its files and pull out something that could make literally anyone look guilty of just about anything. With so many resources on the state's side, they have to be met with an expectation that they're going to find a *lot* of evidence against someone who is guilty, not just a little bit, and that evidence should be solid enough that defense lawyers can't find good reasons to dismiss it. People suggest that it should be easier for the state to convict people invariably must resort to making an argument that the state, what with its billions of dollars and massive labor force, is simply too powerless to be expected to meet a burden of proof that rules out any reasonable chance that they're wrong about who they're trying to put in jail for the next few decades. It's absurd.
I think the insane number of tv cop shows have also just convinced people that criminals and murderers are all near geniuses with incredible foresight that need either immense power from the state or some young 20-30ish genius detective who believes in justice enough to take them down. When in reality most killings are not that hard to figure out if you look into it and most killers confess anyway.
The Hypothetical scenario you discuss at around 41:00 (where the black death killed a larger proportion of Europeans) is the premise of the novel The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson. It follows the alternative history where Europe's population was mostly wiped out and other societies (primarily the Arabs and Chinese) were the ones to colonize the word.
I know for a fact that the interrogation process sometimes prompt people to admit falsely to confessing crimes they actually didn't commit. In high school, my best friend was working at a retirement home, and one one of the resident's jewelry went missing. The accused my best friend, who was 17 but working there at the time as a cleaner. I know for a fact he didn't steal anything; he told me so and he was always 100% honest with me. But he said that he was suspected and so questioned, and the questioning lasted for so long and was so intense that he finally admitted to it, which ended up giving him a felony that will now follow him around for the rest of his life. When I asked him why he would admit to something he didn't do, he said that he was willing to say anything to make the interrogation end.
Guns, Germs, and Steel is one of my favorite books. Reading a book and listening to one are very different experiences. Listening to a non-narrative book is not a pleasant experience regardless of topic or writing style.
It's a book meant for lay people, not professionals. Carl Sagan and Neil Degrasse Tyson aren't ground breaking physicists. Popular Science & Popular Mechanics aren't respected science journals. Bill Nye isn't a scientist. I'm neither a Cultural Anthropologist nor a Human Geographer. You seem like someone who puts WAY too much stock in John Green's Crash Coarse series. Two more points: One) Your comment completely missed the point of mine which was audio books vs traditional reading. Two) Are you really that desperate to get a dialogue going that you dig up an old aside from over a year ago?
@@frankdantuono2594 Yes but Carl Sagan and Neil Degrasse Tyson generally teach things that are true. Guns, Germs, and Steel isn't taken seriously because it amounts to nothing more than pseudo history. Most of its claims have been disproven or contradicted, and even at the time of being written the claims amounted to little more than speculation yet were put forward as if they were fact. Geography is important but not to the point of being wholly deterministic. Also you made two statements in your original comment, one being about Guns, Germ, and Steel being one of your favourite books and one about prefering audio books. Matthew is allowed to comment on one of those statements in isolation, since the other is irrelevant. If I said "Oh boy I sure do think we should kill all the dogs in the country. Also I prefer to sleep sitting up." and you replied "What? We shouldn't kill all the dogs in the country." and I replied "You completely missed the point of mine which is sleeping sitting up vs lying down." you would rightfully find that ludicrous. Also yes, since this applies to me now, digging up an old aside from 2 years ago is important when people continue taking this book seriously. Look how many view CGP Grey's videos got 4M and 7M. The spread of misinformation should not be ignored.
@@Heligoland360 I've had multiple people claim that the ideas put forth in GG&S are either false or not taken seriously by "professionals". When I ask them to site their sources for these claims, it's usually a TH-camr (usually One of John Green's channels) or someone's blog. If what you say is true, I'd like to read it. Can you please send me a PRIMARY SOURCE for the ideas you have put forth?
For anyone interested it the emerging field of World History, there are a number of books in the field, many of the in almost direct discourse with "Guns, Germs and Steel" - I'd like to recommend the book "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind" by Yuval Harari, which is the one I like. It's based on a course it was written for, and is also available in many forms, including a video series on TH-cam. I think the book gives some good answers to Gray's questions, and very readable.
+Blabla130 I took the first offering of the "Brief History of Humanities" course and also like the book, however I think that Professor Harari is very influenced by Jared Diamond.
I think the general equation Animals + Cities = Plagues seems hard to argue against. Now that Africa has large cities, we've seen both HIV (from apes) and Ebola (from bats) turn into plagues.
+Ted Clancy I couldn't find a source that said Ebola came from Apes. Some I found said bats, and a few said pigs. Do remember where you heard the Ape theory from?
+My Pineapple Gets WiFi Ebola does likely originate from fruit bats, but it can also infect apes. I had read that it was believed humans were being infected via apes, which is why I said the infection was from apes, but now apparently the leading theory is that humans are being infected directly via bats. My apologies for the outdated information. I've updated the comment.
+Ted Clancy Two small problem with your assessment. 1) HIV isn't considered a plague. It spreads too slow and through such limited contact. Additionally, you can't survive it and become an immune carrier. 2) Ebola also doesn't quite count as their term of "plague" because it kills too effectively and too fast. Ebola has been around for quite a while, but before modern transportation when a population center got ebola, everyone died. There was no immunity, no survivors, no chance of spreading it to another population center because it is far too fatal. We've through modern medicine gotten the death rate down to 50% but it was originally over 90% which leaves no one left to spread the disease. --- I can understand disagreements about ebola but not HIV. Ebola is a fine line while HIV is apples and oranges.
Even though you can't become an immune carrier for HIV in fact, it can actually be seen as a plague, since the incubation time is so long, that you can carry it around and infect other people for a long period, so from the spreading aspect, it can be spread a long time, even though it isn't spread easily. At least in the beginning, before it was noticed and in those places today were people are still not informed enough to protect theirselves, it can somehow work as a plague, can't it?
I do think Guns Germs and Steel is a great summary of why civilization developed. The main element that Diamond left out was culture and competition, but he included a disclaimer at the end, that this area is indeed uncovered, and in need of more examination. Steel and Guns, ended up being popular because of multiple different European states, all attempting to murder each other, but not quite being able to finish their neighbor off, whereas China was a single State and as a result went full insular. If China's geography defined natural and more definable borders for nations to exist... maybe they'd have taken over, because they had massive advantages compared to Europe, then stagnated, without serious threats and competition. Also, he aimed to come up with an explanation of why white people better, which had been plaguing academia for years, and as a result he went overkill to kill off the notion of racial differences. Massive Overkill, but I feel that is kinda understandable considering the topic.
I'd love to see a CGP Grey video on the idea of men of leisure during the early period of science. The stuff you guys talk about at 1:06. It makes me think as well about the idea of basic incomes. Could the implementation of basic incomes on a wide scale actually help spur further development of technology or the human race in general by giving people more idle time? Or let people work jobs that may pay a little less than some people find livable but are inherently more beneficial to mankind?
Grey, I love your content man and I know that you've read a fair amount of criticism about GG&S, but I implore you to read more because as /u/anthropology_nerd said "this isn't like general relativity to quantum mechanics. Historians want to talk about chemistry, while (Diamond) is promoting alchemy."
I just wanted to comment for Grey, and I mean this with the utmost respect and adoration and understanding, and saying this being Asperger's myself -- but man, Grey, you are Aspergers/Autistic, I don't know if you're aware or not (it seems not based on the chit chat between you and Brady over things like, the darts vs talking about productivity efficiency thing, loving systems and lists and organization etc, haha), but you're one of my favourite ASD content producers on TH-cam. Your perception of the world and it's system, your grasp and especially your excellent communication skills, have always been something I identify with and/or inspire/aspire to. Thank you!
I've lived in PNG, and a lot of expats LOVE it there; and my understanding is that it was an even nicer place to live (as an expat) during the 70's to 90's.
I think 53:47 is basically a description of the difference between a scientist's approach to a question, and a historian's one. History, as far as I know, doesn't really /do/ overarching theories in the same way science does. History might have and use things they call theories, but they mean something different in History than they do in Science. Disclaimer: I am a scientist, not a historian. Any historians reading this are very welcome to disagree with me.
I wish you would have mentioned whether anyone else has advanced geography as the foundation of a theory of history. I applaud Jared Diamond for advancing the idea whether or not all his details are correct. I applaud Grey for focusing on the geography.
I was making my decision on the NZ flag while listening to this and Brady's estimation of us as progressive people swung me in favour of the new flag. You are an agent of change, Brady!
The big idea you didn't cover about Diamond's theory is that culture is relatively unimportant compared to environment, geography or other physical factors in "the great theory of history" as you put it. Much of modern academia is obsessed with questions like "did the West's embrace of ... thinking drive they belief they should expand and conquer?" and "why did China turn inward?" The part about Rice vs. Wheat is a great example. Diamond says the demands of the rice crop led to China's cultural drive to focus inward compared to Wheat in the West. In stating that "surely everyone things people are the same all over" you ignore the fierce debate on how much ideas/culture have a role in differences. To use your "strategy game" example, how much is the map unbalanced vs. bad strategy by the players led to the result? Huge debate today and hugely important. Consider the current view of immigration by many on the right wing of Western countries - fear that "bad culture" will come in with immigrants and "ruin" the West. I do NOT agree with such concerns, but this topic is hugely important to that debate and should be the central question.
he does an entire book about how geography shapes culture -- for example you can accurately guess how a society views hitting kids using nothing but information on their primary source of food (cattle herders who can lose their whole harvest from a kid leaving a gate open or breaking a piece of fence beat the ever-loving shit out of their kids; brush-threshers who harvest berries from the foliage whose food income is physically incapable of being messed up by their kids don't), or you can guess a people's dependence on religious institutions based on how much luck factors in to their harvest (deep-sea fishers who not only rely on luck for the quality of their harvest but also coming back alive being extremely religious and dependant on rituals while shoal-net fishers, who lay a net across a bay that is guaranteed to bring in a safe harvest every time without incident have nearly no rituals to speak of) the cultural answer is nonsense bc culture is also a function of geography as much as the animals and crops available to a people
If you like GG&S then have a look at "Richard Bulliet - History of the World to 1500 CE" from the university of Columbia. His theory of history is based on technology and the utilization of energy. He does talk the horse and carriage a bit too much, but it's a good set of lectures to check out.
I think having a working theory of history is in fact very useful for the sociological impact it can make. If we are to fix the various inequalities and issues in this world understanding how cities are made and how the "leisure class" is created can be key. I'm not saying we should give domesticated animals and germs to third world countries, but the beauty of a working theory and model is that you can switch out some variables to predict and produce similar effects. There is a general need for us to understand human societies better and history is a fine source to study.
This book is interesting to me becauseI took AP Human Geography a couple of years ago and a good chunck of the class was basically set aside to disagree with the ideas posed by the book. We constantly discussed environmental determanism vs possibilismm, and the textbooks almost always sided with possiblism, and while I agree that anywhere on the boardgame of the world some society could have become dominant, I think that Determinism gives more information and stuff to think about than possibilism, so I'm not sure why there is such a push against it.
Also, you guys should absolutely check out Integral Theory (popularized by Ken Wilber, but by no means exclusively related to him lololol). For example, Grey, when you talk about how you want a coherent, large-scale theory of history, and historians don't "seem to understand" that in discussion and want to talk about the individual atoms and not a coherent theory... well, that is explained by Integral Theory xD I suck at le explainin' but eh, that's there. (Integral Theory is 'touted' as a Theory of Everything (more accurately, a Meta-Theory of Theories), after all. That said, I would be deeply surprised if you aren't familiar with Integral Theory already, Grey xD)
Trevor Ditrani I had 3 people and one friend die who went to my high-school. 3 were car related deaths and one was suicide(for the record my friend died running a red light, he didn't kill himself). In all fairness though only 2 of the deaths happened while I still was in school, my friend and the other person died well after graduation. Oh, and 2 people died at my college the other day(school shooting), I didn't know either of them but it made national news :/
Trevor Ditrani So in all fairness of the roughly 10 or so thousand people who went to my highschool and college, 6 died(that I know of) and I only knew one personally. 2 suicides, 1 person got hit by a car, 2 in-car deaths, and one violent death by gun. I say that is a statistically relevant number to base early deaths on in a small population. Drive safe kids...
Historians are right to be weary of proposed "theories of history." On its face you might think the question is simple enough and can be answered within the domains of the study of history (hence the reference to asking historians) but any answer would necessitate venturing into multiple other fields of study. It would be impossible to propose an accurate theory without making some definite conclusion, or at least assumptions, about psychology, sociology, anthropology, etc; all in the realm of the social sciences. Social science is not nearly as concrete (or dare I say, simple) as the natural sciences and there are hardly many definite absolutes drawn within the respective fields, let alone a grand unifying theory. The social sciences are vexed by this problem of having to rely on inductive reasoning (generating theories based on observed phenomena) without really having measured ways of proposing testable or experimental theories, unlike the natural sciences. In the end, history is the study of past events and is only a body of precedents. We would have to make the erroneous assumption that the past necessarily will have an effect on the future (which BTW not even science can be certain of as cause and effect is more or less an assumption, albeit a very reasonable one; see: David Hume). And even if this is the case, too many variables are at play to enable us to pinpoint cause and effect and the issue is further compounded when you draw out long chains of cause and effect over long spans of time. So there's little to no certain means of making projections into future trends solely from a body of precedents, though some parallels or patterns could be discerned but even then variables are at perpetual play, and one would be forced to humbly confine and constrain their so called theory. Therefore, it seems that any proposed theory would simply be replete with assumptions that an author would be forced to make in order to reach any kind of "theory of history." I think CGP makes a similar assumption to those who propose that since humans are a derivative of nature that their behavior and everything else could be explained through some natural phenomenon; but again, this ventures into territory that the wise historian should know not to cross and so sticking to empirical records of events is preferred. This is not to say a theory doesn't necessarily exist, it's just to say that the odds are certainly against you if you think you could ever come up with anything close to it. So instead of searching for such a theory, I would stick to finding good objective rules of thumb that can at least anchor you down and help you wade through interpreting history in a measured way without falling into some dogmatic reliance on an overarching theory.
Man, I read Gun, Germs, and Steel a long time ago because one of my high school teachers recommended it to me since I was the only one remotely interested in history.
Brady: Like a toddler who just keeps asking why-- Me: ... 36 years old, still haven't quit. Why? Why? How? How did we get that definition? How does this relate to that? When I don't ask questions like that, my friends and family assume I'm ill. I'm not sure it's odd that populations recovered after the plague. Humans *love* to breed, on the whole. It's similar to how antibiotic resistant drugs come about--the ones who survive breed and breed, and then are less likely to have genes that makes them as susceptible to that plague. IIRC, it happened in Japan as well, with similar rebound results.
Europe divided into rival nation-states the same way Ancient Greece had rival city-states. Europe also had a common culture, heritage, and communications, as did Ancient Greece. So both had a rich combination of competition and cooperation leading to an upward spiral of progress.
The reason I see the theory of Guns, Germs and Steel as important also explains why it is controversial. It kind of undermines the idea of history as meritocratic. It undermines the idea that Europeans colonized the world because they were smarter. If your starting position in the world largely determines your outcome, then rich people are just lucky, and if Europe is just lucky then its continued cultural, economic and political hegemony is not particularly deserved. The idea that Europeans are more wealthy and powerful because they are superior is subconsciously still a part of the way a lot of people interpret and judge world events. Admitting that we are just lucky jeopardizes the unfair advantages white people have .
It's easy to see how the hypothesis can challenge ethnocentric/nationalist ideas in popular discourse, that things are a certain way because they "ought" to be. Though, the fact that Europe developed a major technological edge and began the Age of Exploration just as the rest of the world wasn't really in a position to do that (i.e., they got lucky) *has* been the scholarly consensus for a long time. Like Brady alludes to, this was already an answered question in modern academia. But it's notable that Diamond collect all the information together and massively simplify it for the general public to digest.
Last year I felt really sick . I've seen 3 doctors and they all said "you just got a cold " 2 weeks into this my fever was over 40℃ . Finally a doctor said you have pneumonia . this is why I don't like doctors.
Grey, what you are looking for is called Historiography... at least to an extant, since historiography isn't global or universal in scale (usually). However the quick and dirty over-simplified answer to your question about a theory of history, is that there was a big push from the late 18th to the early 20th century to produce one, and the consensus now is that such a thing isn't possible because history isn't a "science". Further the failed 19th century attempts to create a general theory of history were frequently misappropriated by demagogues (Hitler) for militaristic and hateful reasons, making historians gun shy as it were about pursuing general theories of history.
Niall Ferguson does good stuff about the theory of history. They're all basically about the 'engine of history' so Adam Smiths Wealth of Nations and Marx's stuff are alternate theories as well.
I'm study archaeology at the top university in my country for it, and my department (especially the prehistory specialists) are very divided on this book. Some (me included) view it as leading the understanding of early human development, whereas some say that Diamond simply takes what he wants out of the archaeological record to support his own theories rather than look at it as a whole so provide a clearer picture. This book is very divisive in the academic world, yet perhaps one of the most important.
I thought the whole thing with the star trek people all being about the same level of tech was that new civilizations weren't invited to come play until they brought themselves high enough up But idrk
Switched off when he said the author used "hunter gatherer" too many times... Well if he meant something else he would have used another word, it would have been wildly inaccurate but fuck it, don't want to be R E P E T I T I V E
I had to read this book for AP world history and man, that was a chore. The book itself was fine but its flaws combined with the activities I had to do made for a huge debacle.
It's interesting you conclude it's pointless on the hour mark, it has a pretty strong and clear anti-racialist message, which he emphasises at the beginning.
I think that diamond doesn't go far enough. At the starting point in 10,000 BC he assumes that all groups of humans have roughly the same intelligence, his only justification for that being that they all had roughly the same level of technology at that point. And we will grant him that premise. but along with intelligence he seems to assume that they share almost all of the same behaviors, which i think is unjustified considering the different environments each had become adapted to by that point. Proto-Africans and Proto-Native-North-Americans for example had become adapted to wide plains and open fields which allowed for tribes to spread out. Meanwhile Proto-Europeans had been huddling together in caves for warmth during the ice age, not a lot of living space. so after they left the caves and started forming their own tribes they had a much more innate comfort with living in close quarters compared to their North American and African cousins. That, combined with all the the other advantages Europe had with it's diversity of domesticated animals, allowed their technology to rise sharply.
he actually wrote an entire book about the social structures of societies, and even includes a chapter about an entire european country that affectively mass-suicided
also before Europeans inflicted the extinction of 90+% of the Native population of the Americas, there were individual native cities in America that had nearly the entire population of Europe. Natives had massive, massive cities. They just got wiped out in the genocide -- the image we have nowadays of all natives being wandering, landless people and having always been that way by choice/culture is a myth; we are living RN in what the world would be like if nobody ever stopped the Nazi holocaust and all just pretended that the jews basically never existed or were never capable of building cities, which is also utter nonsense
This is sort of frustrating to listen to -- it's not about certain locations making it easier to thrive so much as making it easier to EXPAND. Thriving in situ can be done in a large number of location, including Australia. It's moving beyond that's hard. I get the feeling the guys were captive to an underlying assumption that they didn't even realize was in the room that existence REQUIRES expansion rather than calling that out explicitly. Anyway, it is an interesting book, and I share their opinion that most people online spent their time disagreeing with what they thought the book said rather than what the book said.
well, guns, germs and steel does have a practical application. It provides evidence for the grand philosophical theory that all human beings are fundamentally the same. First this theory was proposed by the stoics in ancient time. the counter theory being that there are "psychological races". It has a direct influence on the interpretation of what it means to be human itself.
(1:00) Is this knowledge useful? Yes. "...there is something we can do about it. Look at Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan. They recognized that their biggest disadvantage was public health. They didn't say, We got these tropical diseases-it's inevitable. Instead they said, We have these tropical diseases and they are curable and all it takes is money so let's invest in curing the diseases. Today they are rich, ... poverty is something you can do something about. ... knowledge is power. Once you know what it is that's making you poor, you can use that knowledge to make you rich." ~Jared Diamond, 2005, National Geographic, news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/07/0706_050706_diamond_2.html
Diamond says what motivated him to write the book: his friend from Papua New Guinea asked him why Europeans were wealthier than his people. The book was Diamond's attempt to answer that question.
I mean, if no one has offered any challenges to the overall theory of 'Guns, Germs and Steel', I can think of one. 'Civilization: The West and the Rest', though it has plenty of its own problems, offers a pretty healthy challenge to it. The theory 'geography is destiny' fails to account for all the comebacks and changes that have occurred throughout history. Key idea: Europe wasn't always ahead. In fact, at about 1500, they were pretty far behind many other parts of the world. China, for instance, was much nicer. It had bigger cities, and in some ways more advanced technology. In general, there were few to no signs that Europeans were on their way to conquer the rest of the world. Then Europe happened to experience a rapid acceleration (for reasons that are, of course, hotly debated). Within a few generations the situation had reversed itself; this makes it difficult to trace the cause of Europe's dominance back to the beginning of civilization itself. It seems likely that at least some of the major causes were local to that century. Also, it seems quite plausible to assume that human history is a chaotic system, given what we understand about the prevalence of chaotic systems in the natural world; it would then make sense that chaos theory applies. Small changes can all have large consequences. So, to me, there's a lot of potential legitimacy to the 'you need to list all things' idea. Let me know your thoughts, if you have time. This is fascinating.
You're both missing the central concern about the "debate" over the book. I've read it three times, and it's importance is not that it gets everything right. It doesn't. No book on anthropology could be held to that standard. It is important because it is maybe the first cogent and accessible presentation of it's kind. For centuries we've been fed the simplistic explanation that "we, white guys, are on top because god wants us here, so he made us smarter, and gave us dominion over the lesser peoples". We should always be suspicious of explanations that make us look good. The book is sort of a first pass attempt to pull the evidence together for a more realistic accounting of history, and in that light it is overwhelmingly effective. Perfect? No. What's concerning about the debate, though, is that much of it is in the "guilt-ridden liberal white male rewriting history" vein. We need to hold them to a higher standard of debate. Finding a small inaccuracy doesn't invalidate the central point of the book. The first standard that we need to insist on (Brady) is that anyone with an opinion of the book should have actually read it from beginning to end.
This is totally like psychohistory, a fictional science in Isaac Asimovs Foundation series. A science that enables a mathematical and statisticial way to predict the collapse of an empire that spans the whole milky way and beyond. EDIT: Ok of course you know about this :)
To add on to the 'why does Eurasia have such a good set of animals for domestication?' - Diamond also notes that, unlike every other continent, Eurasia's primary axis (i.e. longest distance that can be travelled) is horizontal rather than vertical. Civilizations forming in Eurasia have thousands of miles in either direction across which the climate will be roughly similar and their animals/plants able to survive. Contrast this with Central and South America where we go from temperate mountains, to jungle, to desert, to sub-tropical within a far more restricted space. Those early settlers in Eurasia were far more able to spread successful domestications across a far greater distance before encountering environmental obstacles. The horse was able to spread from Ukraine to China and Spain within a few centuries whereas the llama could never be transported across the various biomes in between Lima and Mexico City.
@BitChute Nice.
Good point I think I have also heard CGP grey mention that in one of his videos but I don't remember witch one
It is always worse to imprison a innocent man rather than let the guilty go free. The most basic math shows that if you convict an innocent man you've by extension let the guilty go free. It is a 2:1 ratio of injustices.
+
Do you catch an guilty man at the expense of letting an innocent man go free or
do you free an innocent man at the expense of catching a guilty one?
But if you let the guilty man go free, he might kill 50 people.
@@RJStockton keyword being might
@@RJStockton he might go and launch nukes for all we know
in Star Trek, not all civilizations are at the same level, that's why they have Prime Directive. we see the encounter of the ones that are at the same level, because, those that are not, are left alone.
I think they were referring to the fact that every warp-capable sepsis is roughly the same. For example, the Humans are at the same level as the Klingons, who are at the same level as the Romulans, who are at the same level as the Cardassians, who are at the same level as the Talaxians, etc.
i think you are some what correct but you must take into consideration that they are not all on the exact same level for instance the cloaking drive and also it only appears that the humans are at a top dog level because there are other cultures and races who are prime directing the humans and just not messing with us
I would agree that almost all warp-capable species are at about the same level, but I would argue that that is due more to their interactions with one another. For example, the Vulcans were far more advanced than humans upon first contact, but said contact allowed humans to make a great leap in a short amount of time.
Even then, not all warp-capable species are at the same technological level. The Ferengi had to purchase their warp-capability, and seem to be slightly behnid some others, like the Cardasian Empire or Federation.
"This video is unlisted. Be considerate and think twice before sharing."
first time I've ever seen this.
+John D. This one hasn't yet been released on the HI YT schedule -- but feel free to share it.
+Hello Internet There's a schedule? Why not just release them all at the same time?
+John Vlasov If they release them all at the same time, the videos get buried in people's subscription boxes, they're forgotten there, and they get fewer views.
Also, if (for whatever reason) they are unable to record more for a while, they have a few rounds in the chamber to tide people over until they're able to record more.
+Ri Yu Because of an archaic live TV methodology? Netflix full season releases ftw.
+Matthew Fry the thing is TH-cam doesn't work like that. many people just scroll through their inbox and watch what comes up.
Whoever is steering this boat is drunk
Found the person who's never steered a boat.
there's a giant drinking bird just outside of the frame attached to the wheel.
I didn't realize Brady was in it until he started talking and I exclaimed, "Hey, it's Brady."
My life is soooo interesting
"Yeah"- Brady
Highly engaging discussion of both Guns, Germs, and Steel & Making a Murderer - really brought back the emotion of watching the show.
Does Grey ever play Civ V?
+Dunkleosteus He mentioned before that he does
I could listen 24/7 and never be bored.
So sad none of you have seen 'The Hunt'. It's a Danish film that explores the horrendous consequence of any sort of accusation. In it, Mads Mikkelsen is wrongfully accused of pedophilia after a colleague at the kindergarten misconstrues a white lie told by one of the kids. It's a perfect example of how one feather becomes ten hens (to quote another Dane) in a small town, At one point, it seems as if our protagonist has molested every single kid in town, because the parents have this insane confirmation bias, that just snowballs in light of the "discoveries" all the other parents are making.
The film is absolutely gut-wrenching, and a master class of film making on top of it, along with a stellar cast. Would've been an amazing reference point in the whole 'Making a Murderer' discussion.
Clemens Stubbe a
Clemens Stubbe sounds interesting. i'll look it up when i'm free. is it available in english?
360flyby Only subbed, but the acting practically bleeds through the screen, no matter the language. It's available on Danish Netflix, so there's a chance you can find it there.
Getting someone to give a false confession can't be that hard. I have confessed to not doing my work at school to my mom because she doesn't believe me anyways, and she leaves me alone quicker sometimes if I pretend I just didn't do my work even when I actually do, but just don't have time to finish it.
THANK YOU for catching the videos up with the podcast. PLEASE keep them close behind as there are those of us who only watch on TH-cam.
The state vs the defendant is already not a fair assessment. We're literally talking about the power of the government verses a single human being. The state has documentation, police detectives, the power to tap phones, seize property for investigation, and so on. These are things a person simply cannot do in their own defense. If the hurtle for a conviction is simply "does it seem more likely from the evidence that s/he did it" then there is going to be a *massive* number of false convictions because it would be almost trivial for the state to sift through its files and pull out something that could make literally anyone look guilty of just about anything. With so many resources on the state's side, they have to be met with an expectation that they're going to find a *lot* of evidence against someone who is guilty, not just a little bit, and that evidence should be solid enough that defense lawyers can't find good reasons to dismiss it.
People suggest that it should be easier for the state to convict people invariably must resort to making an argument that the state, what with its billions of dollars and massive labor force, is simply too powerless to be expected to meet a burden of proof that rules out any reasonable chance that they're wrong about who they're trying to put in jail for the next few decades. It's absurd.
I think the insane number of tv cop shows have also just convinced people that criminals and murderers are all near geniuses with incredible foresight that need either immense power from the state or some young 20-30ish genius detective who believes in justice enough to take them down. When in reality most killings are not that hard to figure out if you look into it and most killers confess anyway.
The Hypothetical scenario you discuss at around 41:00 (where the black death killed a larger proportion of Europeans) is the premise of the novel The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson. It follows the alternative history where Europe's population was mostly wiped out and other societies (primarily the Arabs and Chinese) were the ones to colonize the word.
I know for a fact that the interrogation process sometimes prompt people to admit falsely to confessing crimes they actually didn't commit. In high school, my best friend was working at a retirement home, and one one of the resident's jewelry went missing. The accused my best friend, who was 17 but working there at the time as a cleaner. I know for a fact he didn't steal anything; he told me so and he was always 100% honest with me. But he said that he was suspected and so questioned, and the questioning lasted for so long and was so intense that he finally admitted to it, which ended up giving him a felony that will now follow him around for the rest of his life. When I asked him why he would admit to something he didn't do, he said that he was willing to say anything to make the interrogation end.
Guns, Germs, and Steel is one of my favorite books. Reading a book and listening to one are very different experiences. Listening to a non-narrative book is not a pleasant experience regardless of topic or writing style.
You do understand that in the field of human geography "Guns Germs and Steel" is not taken seriously at all right?
It's a book meant for lay people, not professionals. Carl Sagan and Neil Degrasse Tyson aren't ground breaking physicists. Popular Science & Popular Mechanics aren't respected science journals. Bill Nye isn't a scientist. I'm neither a Cultural Anthropologist nor a Human Geographer. You seem like someone who puts WAY too much stock in John Green's Crash Coarse series.
Two more points: One) Your comment completely missed the point of mine which was audio books vs traditional reading. Two) Are you really that desperate to get a dialogue going that you dig up an old aside from over a year ago?
@@frankdantuono2594 Yes but Carl Sagan and Neil Degrasse Tyson generally teach things that are true. Guns, Germs, and Steel isn't taken seriously because it amounts to nothing more than pseudo history. Most of its claims have been disproven or contradicted, and even at the time of being written the claims amounted to little more than speculation yet were put forward as if they were fact. Geography is important but not to the point of being wholly deterministic.
Also you made two statements in your original comment, one being about Guns, Germ, and Steel being one of your favourite books and one about prefering audio books. Matthew is allowed to comment on one of those statements in isolation, since the other is irrelevant.
If I said "Oh boy I sure do think we should kill all the dogs in the country. Also I prefer to sleep sitting up."
and you replied "What? We shouldn't kill all the dogs in the country."
and I replied "You completely missed the point of mine which is sleeping sitting up vs lying down." you would rightfully find that ludicrous.
Also yes, since this applies to me now, digging up an old aside from 2 years ago is important when people continue taking this book seriously. Look how many view CGP Grey's videos got 4M and 7M. The spread of misinformation should not be ignored.
@@Heligoland360 I've had multiple people claim that the ideas put forth in GG&S are either false or not taken seriously by "professionals". When I ask them to site their sources for these claims, it's usually a TH-camr (usually One of John Green's channels) or someone's blog.
If what you say is true, I'd like to read it. Can you please send me a PRIMARY SOURCE for the ideas you have put forth?
@@frankdantuono2594 and silence was your only answer...
For anyone interested it the emerging field of World History, there are a number of books in the field, many of the in almost direct discourse with "Guns, Germs and Steel" - I'd like to recommend the book "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind" by Yuval Harari, which is the one I like. It's based on a course it was written for, and is also available in many forms, including a video series on TH-cam. I think the book gives some good answers to Gray's questions, and very readable.
+Blabla130 I took the first offering of the "Brief History of Humanities" course and also like the book, however I think that Professor Harari is very influenced by Jared Diamond.
@53:45 its a game theory
I love this episode
I think the general equation Animals + Cities = Plagues seems hard to argue against. Now that Africa has large cities, we've seen both HIV (from apes) and Ebola (from bats) turn into plagues.
+Ted Clancy I couldn't find a source that said Ebola came from Apes. Some I found said bats, and a few said pigs. Do remember where you heard the Ape theory from?
+My Pineapple Gets WiFi Ebola does likely originate from fruit bats, but it can also infect apes. I had read that it was believed humans were being infected via apes, which is why I said the infection was from apes, but now apparently the leading theory is that humans are being infected directly via bats. My apologies for the outdated information. I've updated the comment.
Thank you of expounding, and it's no issue.
+Ted Clancy
Two small problem with your assessment.
1) HIV isn't considered a plague. It spreads too slow and through such limited contact. Additionally, you can't survive it and become an immune carrier.
2) Ebola also doesn't quite count as their term of "plague" because it kills too effectively and too fast. Ebola has been around for quite a while, but before modern transportation when a population center got ebola, everyone died. There was no immunity, no survivors, no chance of spreading it to another population center because it is far too fatal.
We've through modern medicine gotten the death rate down to 50% but it was originally over 90% which leaves no one left to spread the disease.
---
I can understand disagreements about ebola but not HIV. Ebola is a fine line while HIV is apples and oranges.
Even though you can't become an immune carrier for HIV in fact, it can actually be seen as a plague, since the incubation time is so long, that you can carry it around and infect other people for a long period, so from the spreading aspect, it can be spread a long time, even though it isn't spread easily. At least in the beginning, before it was noticed and in those places today were people are still not informed enough to protect theirselves, it can somehow work as a plague, can't it?
Best episode of Hello Internet so far - but maybe I'm biased because I came up with my graduating thesis while listening to this one.
+Pear Leaf No, this was an especially fun one
How did the thesis go?
Listening to these podcasts at 2x speed whilst playing vidya is probably the greatest invention since taming the tapier and making the modern cat
was here 3 months ago and watched to 15:17. now im ready to listen to the conversation. (i read very slowly)
I paused the podcast and watched the series, glad I did that
I do think Guns Germs and Steel is a great summary of why civilization developed.
The main element that Diamond left out was culture and competition, but he included a disclaimer at the end, that this area is indeed uncovered, and in need of more examination.
Steel and Guns, ended up being popular because of multiple different European states, all attempting to murder each other, but not quite being able to finish their neighbor off, whereas China was a single State and as a result went full insular. If China's geography defined natural and more definable borders for nations to exist... maybe they'd have taken over, because they had massive advantages compared to Europe, then stagnated, without serious threats and competition.
Also, he aimed to come up with an explanation of why white people better, which had been plaguing academia for years, and as a result he went overkill to kill off the notion of racial differences. Massive Overkill, but I feel that is kinda understandable considering the topic.
+Comando96 Very interesting, do you have any sources of info/books you'd recommend on the topic?
I'd love to see a CGP Grey video on the idea of men of leisure during the early period of science. The stuff you guys talk about at 1:06.
It makes me think as well about the idea of basic incomes. Could the implementation of basic incomes on a wide scale actually help spur further development of technology or the human race in general by giving people more idle time? Or let people work jobs that may pay a little less than some people find livable but are inherently more beneficial to mankind?
I am sorry for nitpicking but 31:58 Grey - "There's nice places". should not it be "There ARE nice places" please clarify?!
love the background video accompanying this podcast
Grey, I love your content man and I know that you've read a fair amount of criticism about GG&S, but I implore you to read more because as /u/anthropology_nerd said "this isn't like general relativity to quantum mechanics. Historians want to talk about chemistry, while (Diamond) is promoting alchemy."
+Derek N this is pretty funny, considering anthropology_nerd seems to love citing sources that contradict the arguments he makes.
celticwelsh Hey I'm always keen to hear arguments. Could you give an example of his contradicting sources?
I just wanted to comment for Grey, and I mean this with the utmost respect and adoration and understanding, and saying this being Asperger's myself -- but man, Grey, you are Aspergers/Autistic, I don't know if you're aware or not (it seems not based on the chit chat between you and Brady over things like, the darts vs talking about productivity efficiency thing, loving systems and lists and organization etc, haha), but you're one of my favourite ASD content producers on TH-cam.
Your perception of the world and it's system, your grasp and especially your excellent communication skills, have always been something I identify with and/or inspire/aspire to. Thank you!
why is it unlisted?
I've lived in PNG, and a lot of expats LOVE it there; and my understanding is that it was an even nicer place to live (as an expat) during the 70's to 90's.
I've read this book and found it fascinating.
Darn, I have to wait before I watch this so I can keep in order.
+Sandwich247 I was just thinking that. Bye podcast.
A good book about the Spain and United Kingdom thing is Kicking Away The Ladder by Ha-Joon Chang
Great job! As a counterpoint, I'd love to see you guys do Victor Davis Hanson's "Carnage and Culture," too.
"I am covered in oil" - Brady Harren, 2016
I think 53:47 is basically a description of the difference between a scientist's approach to a question, and a historian's one. History, as far as I know, doesn't really /do/ overarching theories in the same way science does. History might have and use things they call theories, but they mean something different in History than they do in Science.
Disclaimer: I am a scientist, not a historian. Any historians reading this are very welcome to disagree with me.
Can you guys upload MP3s of the podcasts?
I wish you would have mentioned whether anyone else has advanced geography as the foundation of a theory of history. I applaud Jared Diamond for advancing the idea whether or not all his details are correct. I applaud Grey for focusing on the geography.
I hold on to the dream that one day Grey will nerd out and talk in depth about his factorio play session. Maybe just maybe he’ll live stream it
You didn't close the parentheses (or whatever it's called in the description.
Kind of annoying isn't it?
Brady is in numberphile, Periodic Table of Videos, Sixty Symbols, and now Hello Internet how do you do it Brady?
I was making my decision on the NZ flag while listening to this and Brady's estimation of us as progressive people swung me in favour of the new flag. You are an agent of change, Brady!
As a Wisconsinite, I can safely say that that trial is, by far, not the most messed up thing to happen in the state.
If i use itunes to get these, do I still get ads?
Yes
The big idea you didn't cover about Diamond's theory is that culture is relatively unimportant compared to environment, geography or other physical factors in "the great theory of history" as you put it. Much of modern academia is obsessed with questions like "did the West's embrace of ... thinking drive they belief they should expand and conquer?" and "why did China turn inward?" The part about Rice vs. Wheat is a great example. Diamond says the demands of the rice crop led to China's cultural drive to focus inward compared to Wheat in the West. In stating that "surely everyone things people are the same all over" you ignore the fierce debate on how much ideas/culture have a role in differences. To use your "strategy game" example, how much is the map unbalanced vs. bad strategy by the players led to the result? Huge debate today and hugely important. Consider the current view of immigration by many on the right wing of Western countries - fear that "bad culture" will come in with immigrants and "ruin" the West. I do NOT agree with such concerns, but this topic is hugely important to that debate and should be the central question.
he does an entire book about how geography shapes culture -- for example you can accurately guess how a society views hitting kids using nothing but information on their primary source of food (cattle herders who can lose their whole harvest from a kid leaving a gate open or breaking a piece of fence beat the ever-loving shit out of their kids; brush-threshers who harvest berries from the foliage whose food income is physically incapable of being messed up by their kids don't), or you can guess a people's dependence on religious institutions based on how much luck factors in to their harvest (deep-sea fishers who not only rely on luck for the quality of their harvest
but also coming back alive being extremely religious and dependant on rituals while shoal-net fishers, who lay a net across a bay that is guaranteed to bring in a safe harvest every time without incident have nearly no rituals to speak of)
the cultural answer is nonsense bc culture is also a function of geography as much as the animals and crops available to a people
If you like GG&S then have a look at "Richard Bulliet - History of the World to 1500 CE" from the university of Columbia. His theory of history is based on technology and the utilization of energy. He does talk the horse and carriage a bit too much, but it's a good set of lectures to check out.
"Zebras are bastards" 33:22
I think having a working theory of history is in fact very useful for the sociological impact it can make. If we are to fix the various inequalities and issues in this world understanding how cities are made and how the "leisure class" is created can be key. I'm not saying we should give domesticated animals and germs to third world countries, but the beauty of a working theory and model is that you can switch out some variables to predict and produce similar effects.
There is a general need for us to understand human societies better and history is a fine source to study.
using this and the smallpox video for an economic history exam tomorrow thanks Grey
Is it just me or has this episode be posted before?
+Theodor Butters You're thinking of the Amerapox CGPGrey video.
+David Kelly I think tha was the one...thanks
This book is interesting to me becauseI took AP Human Geography a couple of years ago and a good chunck of the class was basically set aside to disagree with the ideas posed by the book. We constantly discussed environmental determanism vs possibilismm, and the textbooks almost always sided with possiblism, and while I agree that anywhere on the boardgame of the world some society could have become dominant, I think that Determinism gives more information and stuff to think about than possibilism, so I'm not sure why there is such a push against it.
Also, you guys should absolutely check out Integral Theory (popularized by Ken Wilber, but by no means exclusively related to him lololol). For example, Grey, when you talk about how you want a coherent, large-scale theory of history, and historians don't "seem to understand" that in discussion and want to talk about the individual atoms and not a coherent theory... well, that is explained by Integral Theory xD I suck at le explainin' but eh, that's there.
(Integral Theory is 'touted' as a Theory of Everything (more accurately, a Meta-Theory of Theories), after all. That said, I would be deeply surprised if you aren't familiar with Integral Theory already, Grey xD)
Did Gray just say that a kid died at his school? He sounded so casual about it, does that happen a lot?
Trevor Ditrani I had 3 people and one friend die who went to my high-school. 3 were car related deaths and one was suicide(for the record my friend died running a red light, he didn't kill himself). In all fairness though only 2 of the deaths happened while I still was in school, my friend and the other person died well after graduation. Oh, and 2 people died at my college the other day(school shooting), I didn't know either of them but it made national news :/
Trevor Ditrani So in all fairness of the roughly 10 or so thousand people who went to my highschool and college, 6 died(that I know of) and I only knew one personally. 2 suicides, 1 person got hit by a car, 2 in-car deaths, and one violent death by gun. I say that is a statistically relevant number to base early deaths on in a small population. Drive safe kids...
As for why a particular country collapsed, that's what Rise and Fall of the Great Powers is for, by Paul Kennedy.
1:24:13 Alright, let's do this
53:53 - "that's not a theory" - sounds a lot like chaos theory to me
Historians are right to be weary of proposed "theories of history." On its face you might think the question is simple enough and can be answered within the domains of the study of history (hence the reference to asking historians) but any answer would necessitate venturing into multiple other fields of study. It would be impossible to propose an accurate theory without making some definite conclusion, or at least assumptions, about psychology, sociology, anthropology, etc; all in the realm of the social sciences. Social science is not nearly as concrete (or dare I say, simple) as the natural sciences and there are hardly many definite absolutes drawn within the respective fields, let alone a grand unifying theory. The social sciences are vexed by this problem of having to rely on inductive reasoning (generating theories based on observed phenomena) without really having measured ways of proposing testable or experimental theories, unlike the natural sciences.
In the end, history is the study of past events and is only a body of precedents. We would have to make the erroneous assumption that the past necessarily will have an effect on the future (which BTW not even science can be certain of as cause and effect is more or less an assumption, albeit a very reasonable one; see: David Hume). And even if this is the case, too many variables are at play to enable us to pinpoint cause and effect and the issue is further compounded when you draw out long chains of cause and effect over long spans of time. So there's little to no certain means of making projections into future trends solely from a body of precedents, though some parallels or patterns could be discerned but even then variables are at perpetual play, and one would be forced to humbly confine and constrain their so called theory. Therefore, it seems that any proposed theory would simply be replete with assumptions that an author would be forced to make in order to reach any kind of "theory of history." I think CGP makes a similar assumption to those who propose that since humans are a derivative of nature that their behavior and everything else could be explained through some natural phenomenon; but again, this ventures into territory that the wise historian should know not to cross and so sticking to empirical records of events is preferred.
This is not to say a theory doesn't necessarily exist, it's just to say that the odds are certainly against you if you think you could ever come up with anything close to it. So instead of searching for such a theory, I would stick to finding good objective rules of thumb that can at least anchor you down and help you wade through interpreting history in a measured way without falling into some dogmatic reliance on an overarching theory.
Man, I read Gun, Germs, and Steel a long time ago because one of my high school teachers recommended it to me since I was the only one remotely interested in history.
Asking 'Why?' is the correct question to ask in every intellectual discipline
Brady: Like a toddler who just keeps asking why--
Me: ... 36 years old, still haven't quit. Why? Why? How? How did we get that definition? How does this relate to that? When I don't ask questions like that, my friends and family assume I'm ill.
I'm not sure it's odd that populations recovered after the plague. Humans *love* to breed, on the whole. It's similar to how antibiotic resistant drugs come about--the ones who survive breed and breed, and then are less likely to have genes that makes them as susceptible to that plague. IIRC, it happened in Japan as well, with similar rebound results.
this is that dude from numberphile?
+Pedro Freitas Description!
+Pedro Freitas It's Brady from Numberphile, etc. and CGPGrey.
I'm half way through, and I keep feeling like he's gonna say "history; it's just one damn thing after another"...
As you surely know by now, he actually ends by asserting that Micronesians are genetically smarter than Europeans. Good lulz all around.
Europe divided into rival nation-states the same way Ancient Greece had rival city-states. Europe also had a common culture, heritage, and communications, as did Ancient Greece. So both had a rich combination of competition and cooperation leading to an upward spiral of progress.
The reason I see the theory of Guns, Germs and Steel as important also explains why it is controversial. It kind of undermines the idea of history as meritocratic. It undermines the idea that Europeans colonized the world because they were smarter. If your starting position in the world largely determines your outcome, then rich people are just lucky, and if Europe is just lucky then its continued cultural, economic and political hegemony is not particularly deserved. The idea that Europeans are more wealthy and powerful because they are superior is subconsciously still a part of the way a lot of people interpret and judge world events. Admitting that we are just lucky jeopardizes the unfair advantages white people have .
It's easy to see how the hypothesis can challenge ethnocentric/nationalist ideas in popular discourse, that things are a certain way because they "ought" to be. Though, the fact that Europe developed a major technological edge and began the Age of Exploration just as the rest of the world wasn't really in a position to do that (i.e., they got lucky) *has* been the scholarly consensus for a long time.
Like Brady alludes to, this was already an answered question in modern academia. But it's notable that Diamond collect all the information together and massively simplify it for the general public to digest.
+Tim de Visser lol
And again it argued Eurasia facilitated that not specifically Europe.
Last year I felt really sick . I've seen 3 doctors and they all said "you just got a cold " 2 weeks into this my fever was over 40℃ . Finally a doctor said you have pneumonia . this is why I don't like doctors.
1:18:54 "Look, are you *Team Tzeentch* or *Team Nurgle* ???"
I can watch this now.
My taking antibiotics was one of the stupidest things my doctor's ever done.
Nice love the new H.I.
"this will give you some idea of the gravity of how sick I am, I went to the doctor"
In Norway this would mean deathly sick...
simsom4343 Nei
Grey, what you are looking for is called Historiography... at least to an extant, since historiography isn't global or universal in scale (usually). However the quick and dirty over-simplified answer to your question about a theory of history, is that there was a big push from the late 18th to the early 20th century to produce one, and the consensus now is that such a thing isn't possible because history isn't a "science". Further the failed 19th century attempts to create a general theory of history were frequently misappropriated by demagogues (Hitler) for militaristic and hateful reasons, making historians gun shy as it were about pursuing general theories of history.
Niall Ferguson does good stuff about the theory of history. They're all basically about the 'engine of history' so Adam Smiths Wealth of Nations and Marx's stuff are alternate theories as well.
I'm study archaeology at the top university in my country for it, and my department (especially the prehistory specialists) are very divided on this book. Some (me included) view it as leading the understanding of early human development, whereas some say that Diamond simply takes what he wants out of the archaeological record to support his own theories rather than look at it as a whole so provide a clearer picture. This book is very divisive in the academic world, yet perhaps one of the most important.
I thought the whole thing with the star trek people all being about the same level of tech was that new civilizations weren't invited to come play until they brought themselves high enough up
But idrk
How is Brady going to fit that wheel on his toy shelf?
Switched off when he said the author used "hunter gatherer" too many times... Well if he meant something else he would have used another word, it would have been wildly inaccurate but fuck it, don't want to be R E P E T I T I V E
Jesus I just realized that where making a murderer happened was just down the road from where I used to live. Small world...
I had to read this book for AP world history and man, that was a chore. The book itself was fine but its flaws combined with the activities I had to do made for a huge debacle.
It's interesting you conclude it's pointless on the hour mark, it has a pretty strong and clear anti-racialist message, which he emphasises at the beginning.
I think that diamond doesn't go far enough. At the starting point in 10,000 BC he assumes that all groups of humans have roughly the same intelligence, his only justification for that being that they all had roughly the same level of technology at that point. And we will grant him that premise. but along with intelligence he seems to assume that they share almost all of the same behaviors, which i think is unjustified considering the different environments each had become adapted to by that point. Proto-Africans and Proto-Native-North-Americans for example had become adapted to wide plains and open fields which allowed for tribes to spread out. Meanwhile Proto-Europeans had been huddling together in caves for warmth during the ice age, not a lot of living space. so after they left the caves and started forming their own tribes they had a much more innate comfort with living in close quarters compared to their North American and African cousins. That, combined with all the the other advantages Europe had with it's diversity of domesticated animals, allowed their technology to rise sharply.
he actually wrote an entire book about the social structures of societies, and even includes a chapter about an entire european country that affectively mass-suicided
also before Europeans inflicted the extinction of 90+% of the Native population of the Americas, there were individual native cities in America that had nearly the entire population of Europe. Natives had massive, massive cities. They just got wiped out in the genocide -- the image we have nowadays of all natives being wandering, landless people and having always been that way by choice/culture is a myth; we are living RN in what the world would be like if nobody ever stopped the Nazi holocaust and all just pretended that the jews basically never existed or were never capable of building cities, which is also utter nonsense
This is sort of frustrating to listen to -- it's not about certain locations making it easier to thrive so much as making it easier to EXPAND. Thriving in situ can be done in a large number of location, including Australia. It's moving beyond that's hard. I get the feeling the guys were captive to an underlying assumption that they didn't even realize was in the room that existence REQUIRES expansion rather than calling that out explicitly.
Anyway, it is an interesting book, and I share their opinion that most people online spent their time disagreeing with what they thought the book said rather than what the book said.
I think I'm gonna play some Civ 5 now...
JARED DIAMOND IS AMAZING. I don't care what people say. Guns, Germs & Steel is really good.
well, guns, germs and steel does have a practical application. It provides evidence for the grand philosophical theory that all human beings are fundamentally the same. First this theory was proposed by the stoics in ancient time. the counter theory being that there are "psychological races". It has a direct influence on the interpretation of what it means to be human itself.
Obviously grey, people can't wait.
A nice critique of Jared Diamond's book I recently enjoyed: th-cam.com/video/kq6EuZj4axA/w-d-xo.html
(1:00) Is this knowledge useful? Yes. "...there is something we can do about it. Look at Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan. They recognized that their biggest disadvantage was public health. They didn't say, We got these tropical diseases-it's inevitable. Instead they said, We have these tropical diseases and they are curable and all it takes is money so let's invest in curing the diseases. Today they are rich, ... poverty is something you can do something about. ... knowledge is power. Once you know what it is that's making you poor, you can use that knowledge to make you rich." ~Jared Diamond, 2005, National Geographic, news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/07/0706_050706_diamond_2.html
Do you believe that Guns, Germs, and Steel was intended in part as a response or refutation to Herrnstein's The Bell Curve?
+tifforo1 Probably not.
Diamond says what motivated him to write the book: his friend from Papua New Guinea asked him why Europeans were wealthier than his people. The book was Diamond's attempt to answer that question.
Last year someone at my school died from meningitis. Only had symptoms for like 2 days. Thought it was a flu.
Anyone else here because of the whole Crash Course thing?
I mean, if no one has offered any challenges to the overall theory of 'Guns, Germs and Steel', I can think of one. 'Civilization: The West and the Rest', though it has plenty of its own problems, offers a pretty healthy challenge to it.
The theory 'geography is destiny' fails to account for all the comebacks and changes that have occurred throughout history. Key idea: Europe wasn't always ahead. In fact, at about 1500, they were pretty far behind many other parts of the world. China, for instance, was much nicer. It had bigger cities, and in some ways more advanced technology. In general, there were few to no signs that Europeans were on their way to conquer the rest of the world. Then Europe happened to experience a rapid acceleration (for reasons that are, of course, hotly debated). Within a few generations the situation had reversed itself; this makes it difficult to trace the cause of Europe's dominance back to the beginning of civilization itself. It seems likely that at least some of the major causes were local to that century.
Also, it seems quite plausible to assume that human history is a chaotic system, given what we understand about the prevalence of chaotic systems in the natural world; it would then make sense that chaos theory applies. Small changes can all have large consequences. So, to me, there's a lot of potential legitimacy to the 'you need to list all things' idea.
Let me know your thoughts, if you have time. This is fascinating.
> Change is crucial.
You're both missing the central concern about the "debate" over the book. I've read it three times, and it's importance is not that it gets everything right. It doesn't. No book on anthropology could be held to that standard. It is important because it is maybe the first cogent and accessible presentation of it's kind. For centuries we've been fed the simplistic explanation that "we, white guys, are on top because god wants us here, so he made us smarter, and gave us dominion over the lesser peoples". We should always be suspicious of explanations that make us look good. The book is sort of a first pass attempt to pull the evidence together for a more realistic accounting of history, and in that light it is overwhelmingly effective. Perfect? No. What's concerning about the debate, though, is that much of it is in the "guilt-ridden liberal white male rewriting history" vein. We need to hold them to a higher standard of debate. Finding a small inaccuracy doesn't invalidate the central point of the book.
The first standard that we need to insist on (Brady) is that anyone with an opinion of the book should have actually read it from beginning to end.
This is totally like psychohistory, a fictional science in Isaac Asimovs Foundation series. A science that enables a mathematical and statisticial way to predict the collapse of an empire that spans the whole milky way and beyond.
EDIT: Ok of course you know about this :)
" He's into birds. " XD good podcast though. props
It would really be something to go to the doctor if you lived in America
I would have asked to keep the robe