Thus, Fertile Crescent and eastern Mediterranean societies had the misfortune to arise in an ecologically fragile environment. They committed ecological suicide by destroying their own resource base. Power shifted westward as each eastern Mediterranean society in turn undermined itself (...)
That is how the Fertile Crescent lost its huge early lead over Europe.
Jared Diamond identifies food production as a major factor in world history. However, are we to understand the above as meaning that food production completely halted in the Fertile Crescent and eastern Mediterranean as of some date? What are some numbers to indicate how much food production was possible in that area at various times?
For example, aren't there sections of Egypt where it has been possible for a long time for people to produce more food than they consume, thus making it possible for them to trade food for goods or services produced by people who are able to specialize in non-agricultural work?
Also, why does he simply say "power shifted westward" without explaining why power didn't shift to the east, the south, or the north?
Why did China also lose its lead? (...)
Then, over a number of pages, the author claims that the root cause is the lack of formidable geographical barriers in China, leading to political unification at an early date.
Compare the USA from 1866 to 1966 to China in the same time period. Wasn't the USA politically unified in that time period? Why was there more technological development in the USA during that time period than in China during that time period? Did the disunity of the Civil War provide America with some kind of "disunity capital" that America proceeded to spend during the next one hundred years? Did China fail to have a civil war in 1866 and thus fail to have sufficient "disunity capital"?
Unlike Zaire or Paraguay, Japan and the other new powers were able to exploit the transistor quickly because their populations already had a long history of literacy, metal machinery, and centralized government. The world's two earliest centers of food production, the Fertile Crescent and China, still dominate the modern world, either through their immediate successor states (modern China), or through states situated in neighboring regions influenced early by those two centers (Japan, Korea, Malaysia, and Europe), or through states repopulated or ruled by their overseas emigrants (the United States, Australia, Brazil).
The above sentences are consecutive in the book as shown above. However, isn't there a difference between exporting electronic Mickey Mouse watches and dominating the world?
Why is a long history of centralized government thought to enable people "to exploit the transistor" when the same explanation is put forward as explaining why China lost its position ahead of Europe?
Also, how many generations of literacy and using metal machinery do people need before they are able to do various things? I suspect that if any institution of higher education were to refuse to admit a student on the grounds that the student's grandparents were illiterate peasants, then Jared Diamond would be among those who would be (legitimately) complaining that it is unfair discrimination. Yet, he seems to think that a number of generations of literacy are a requirement for education to actually make it possible for the education to be successfully applied. If he really believes that, then he should advocate no more than elementary education for people whose recent ancestors were illiterate. Advanced education would only be for those who have a number of generations of literacy in their family histories.
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
