[Jason Vines]

Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond attempts to explain "the broadest pattern of human history": why different peoples on different continents developed at different rates, and why peoples from certain continents were able to conquer people from other ones. Diamond doesn't resort to tired, racist explanations, but offers an explanation he terms "geographic determinist." According to him, the greater availability in Eurasia of domesticable plants and animals, Eurasia's east-west axis (as opposed to Africa's and America's north-south axis), Eurasia's relative lack of geologic barriers, and Eurasia's larger area, and thus more people and societies competing against each other, ultimately account for the success of people from Europe and Asia in advancing rapidly in their own regions, then dominating the world.

Diamond expertly supports these conclusions throughout the book, detailing and illustrating who had access to what, and why that was important. Diamond makes everything so obvious and clear, with logical explanations, I occasionally stopped to ask myself, "Why didn't I think of this before?" I had never thought racist theories explained the disparity between societies, but I never considered how powerful geography was before reading this book.

I recommend the book to anyone with the slightest bit of interest in world history. Even if some might not like its marginalization of Western nations, it's still worth everyone's time.

Has anyone else here read the book? What did you think?