Guns, Germs, and Steel Themes

At the heart of Guns, Germs, and Steel is a theory that has since become known as “geographic determinism”: the idea that civilizations develop over time in different ways in response to environmental factors such as temperature, soil fertility, availability of large mammals, and physical barriers to travel. While Diamond wasn’t the first to propose such a theory, he was the first to compile all the existing data to paint a convincing picture of how…

One of the basic assumptions of Diamond’s theory of geographic determinism is that there are no fundamental differences in the intelligence, propensity for violence, or talent of peoples from different parts of the world—the cause of differences between civilizations is, in a word, geography. Nevertheless, Diamond contrasts his theory with another “theory,” which, unfortunately, has been all-too popular over history: racism. There are many who have argued that certain societies rise to power because their…

One of the most important developments in modern human history—and one of the major reasons why certain societies were able to colonize other societies—is the development of the modern state. Diamond defines a state as a large (at least 100,000 people, usually) society organized around a single central leadership (that leadership could be a king, a parliament, or a combination of President, Congress, and Supreme Court, as in the United States). The central leadership passes…

As its title would indicate, Guns, Germs, and Steel is largely about technology—in particular, how civilizations develop technologies and then use them to gain a comparative advantage over other civilizations.

By his own admission, one of the big blind spots in Diamond’s book is how civilizations, or rather, individual people, discover technologies in the first place. Diamond is writing a book of world history, which means that he has limited time to study what motivates…