Guns Germs And Steel Summary

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According to Jared Diamond, there are various reasons for the differences in the development of societies around the world. The reason societies dominated others are due to the developments of writing, germs and food producing capabilities. In Guns, Germs and Steel:The Fates of Human Societies, he argues the success of a society is not derived from race or culture, but more-so on “geographic location.” Which refers to areas suitable for the domestication of plants and animals, in regard to climate and the availability of specific species. The differences are not a result of intelligence, but a difference in environments. He studies the causes of this and why history “unfolded differently on different continents.” The domestication of food and animals, along with writing ultimately contributed to the progression of a society because it determined its path in history. These resources are closely…show more content…
Diamond argues that once people began to transition from hunter-gatherer to food production, the structure of civilizations changed. Food production contributed to people building permanent settlements, allowing for denser populations. Diseases that were unique to humans required many closely dwelling people in order to thrive. These infectious diseases such as smallpox, measles and the flu, are called “crowd diseases”, which required denser populations to spread. Hence, diseases could not have been persistent in small hunter-gatherer civilizations. Diamond points out that successful “crowd diseases” could spread easily in densely populated societies and were only exclusive to humans. As a result, diseases developed from domesticated livestock; measles and smallpox were acquired from cattle and influenza from pigs. The concept of germs is what affected the development of stronger societies and eliminated the weaker ones. Eurasians became the stronger race and conquered more land due to the role of germs in

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