Kim Gentes

Human history, and its constituent civilizations, has largely been driven and directed by its discovery of key technologies, the development of which are largely determined by advantages of geographic location and plentiful access to essential species of domesticable plants and animals. This is the overall premise of Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs and Steel". The book is a lengthy (512 pages) but insightful review of the evolution of peoples from the beings who lived as hunter-gatherers to the societies that developed from the advantages of food producing farmers. While "Guns, Germs and Steel" encapsulate some of the topics Diamond covers in this book, it is a serious bit of salesmanship that placed that title on this volume. The vast majority of this book is related to topics of food production especially focusing on agriculture and animal domestication. A more representative title might have been "The Advantages of Agriculture on Human Civilizations", but I am guessing that using 'agriculture' in a book title doesn't win sexy awards from publishers.

While guns, germs and steel are discussed and do play important roles in later civilization history, it is the pre-history of city-states that Diamond is concerned with. He builds the case from biology, history and linguistics that the foundation of food production (agriculture and animal domestication) was the seminal discovery that advantaged one society over another. Food producing societies were the ones able to support people who didn't have to worry about subsistence living (as every member of a hunter-gatherer society must do). The result of larger scale food production (which fed more than the family who produced/harvested the food) allowed people to live collectively and develop into the clans, tribes, and eventually cultures we have come to know. This collective grouping of peoples and sedentary living permitted the development not only of additional technologies but the sharing of those technologies, trade, and even exposure to a broader array of diseases to which a society could become sufficiently resistant (it is this disease resistance that becomes the later pivotal weapon of European societies as they conquered other cultures and lands).

In short, food production became the lynch pinch of early success which skewed technology and natural disease resistance to favor the Eurasian super-continent (and, initially at least, the Fertile Crescent) to become the place from which world wide colonialism would spring. The impact and effect of Eurasia's multi-millenial (in most cases) head start in food production and technology advancement would mean that European/Asian societies (Europe and China as their eventual descendants) would be the center from which conquest and expansion would emanate.

Diamond is clear that he believes he can prove from this premise that it is the intrinsic benefits of climate, geography and environment (including the selection of domesticable mammals present in various continents) that allowed Eurasia to gain the head start in food production and allowed it to sustain its lead in a upwardly spiraling positive feedback loop of food production, technology, language (especially written language) and other factors that ensured the blossoming of modern "Western Society" as the dominant civilization across the earth.  Diamond is clearly taking aim (and he doesn't try to hide this) at racist claims that certain peoples flourished because of their genetically better mental accumen (which presumably would allow for faster discovery/invention of technology).

Overall, the book is an exceptional work of logic, science and history. Diamond does well to employ his extensive biological understanding of food, plants and genetics to help the reader understand how man and nature engaged with one another and forced the process of evolution along the road of plant and animal domestication.  He also is exceptional in gathering facts of multi-disciplines (history, linguistics, archeology and biology) and making the peices fit the narrative he is building.

But for most casual readers this book will seem long and extremely tedious. If you have the patience for it, however, it can prove to be a global tour of human history that "connects the dots" across many facets of human development that may be of interest.  Personally, I enjoyed the book immensely, though I have had no previous interest in agricultural science. What fascinated me most about this book was its cohesive narrative- by building on the major premise of food production, one sees the development of classical to modern societies in a wholely different light than simply one group conquering another out of sheer military might. While the book is full of arduous details, I found the writing style enjoyable.

Amazon Book Link: http://amzn.to/NrthLd

If you like detailed reading with high-order concepts, I highly recommend this book.

Review by Kim Gentes