Guns Germs And Steel Determinism Essay
Guns, Germs and Steel: The Ultimate Sociological Thesis or Blind Determinism?
If there is anything certain about the current state and history of our species, it is that there are and always have been vast discrepancies in terms of wealth and advancement between the various civilizations that inhabit our planet. The underlying causes of these discrepancies have long been a matter of discussion. Arguments range from racial superiority to the existence of societal institutions to geographical determinism. In the series Guns, Germs and Steel, anthropologist Jared Diamond puts forth a defense of the latter. That is, Diamond is a proponent idea that environmental factors such as the shape of continents, vegetation and access to domesticatable animals are the cause of the achievement gap between civilizations.
The ideas set forth in Guns, Germs and Steel are not without merit. Intuitively, it seems plausible that …show more content…
There exist various arguments such as the controversial and politically incorrect ideas of Richard Lynn, who purports that evolutionary differences are responsible for variations in human intelligence, which in turn leads to different levels of civilizational advancement. On the other side of the spectrum, Economists Daron Acemoğlu and James Robinson claim that manmade institutions such as nations and democracy have been the key drivers of advancement throughout human history. Diamond seems to avoid Acemoğlu and Robinson’s perspective by entirely avoiding the discussion of early societal institutions. He also brushes off Lynn’s ideas of intelligence driven advancement with the anecdotal statement: “I know too many intelligent New Guineans to believe there is anything genetically inferior about
If there is anything certain about the current state and history of our species, it is that there are and always have been vast discrepancies in terms of wealth and advancement between the various civilizations that inhabit our planet. The underlying causes of these discrepancies have long been a matter of discussion. Arguments range from racial superiority to the existence of societal institutions to geographical determinism. In the series Guns, Germs and Steel, anthropologist Jared Diamond puts forth a defense of the latter. That is, Diamond is a proponent idea that environmental factors such as the shape of continents, vegetation and access to domesticatable animals are the cause of the achievement gap between civilizations.
The ideas set forth in Guns, Germs and Steel are not without merit. Intuitively, it seems plausible that …show more content…
There exist various arguments such as the controversial and politically incorrect ideas of Richard Lynn, who purports that evolutionary differences are responsible for variations in human intelligence, which in turn leads to different levels of civilizational advancement. On the other side of the spectrum, Economists Daron Acemoğlu and James Robinson claim that manmade institutions such as nations and democracy have been the key drivers of advancement throughout human history. Diamond seems to avoid Acemoğlu and Robinson’s perspective by entirely avoiding the discussion of early societal institutions. He also brushes off Lynn’s ideas of intelligence driven advancement with the anecdotal statement: “I know too many intelligent New Guineans to believe there is anything genetically inferior about