Guns, Germs, and Steel: Documentary Series

[hailtotheking]

I saw the whole lot back-to-back last night on More4. Brilliant. I read the book, which was also excellent (albeit a little dry in parts) a few months ago, and this series is almost as good, and perfect for those that want to capture the basics of Diamond's message. If you want to know about human sociological development, and why humans has become so fragmented in their unequal development all over the world, look no further. It doesnt cover everything thats in the book, such as African history before the arrival of the Europeans, or the development of Oriental Asia, or the theories as to why native Autralia never developed at the rate of its surrounding islands. I would still recommend reading the book.

Whole series here YouTube - Broadcast Yourself.

[Kohaku]

It's a big subject for a forum but I like to think of cultural development much like species development, almost totally seperate from humans. For instance one culture may have succombed to a 'bad' idea which was good at spreading, for instance a bad religion and which actively sort to keep the status quo and deny sexual equality etc etc, while another may have developed women's suffrage. This would make the first culture look backwards.

Of course how you judge other cultures depends on your own culture, and it's all relative at the end of the day.

[hailtotheking]

If you read / watch Jared Diamond's work, he puts across a very convincing argument that the origins of inequality among nations is almost nothing to do with human predjudices, etc. It appears to infact be down to geographical differences that gave some regions much bigger advantages in terms of decent farming crops, animals that could be tamed into livestock, and optimal landscapes and seasons for food production that enabled people to get away from spending so much time hunting and gathering, and have enough resources to produce 'specialists' such as chiefs, soldiers, inventors, medicine men, priests, etc. Other groups of people that never got the same headstart because they didnt have these bonus features of their land ended up developing much more slowly. You need to either watch the documentary or read the book to understand this. The start of it all really has nothing to cultural diferences - it goes way back before that.

[Kohaku]

Looks like an interesting series anyhoo, I'll give that a watch next time I'm sat twiddling my thumbs. I like the cargo quote from the you tube link:

""Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo, but we black people had little cargo of our own?""

Search for Cargo Cult on Wikipedia (can't give you a link yet).

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Members, leaders, and prophets of cargo cults maintain that the manufactured goods ("cargo") of the non-native culture have been created by spiritual means, such as through their deities and ancestors, and are intended for the local indigenous people, but that, unfairly, the foreigners have gained control of these objects through attraction of these material goods to themselves by malice or mistake

Don't know if he mentions that in the videos I think that sort of thing is really interesting.

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The Yaohnanen believe that Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, the consort to Queen Elizabeth II, is a divine being, the pale-skinned son of a mountain spirit and brother of John Frum. According to ancient tales the son travelled over the seas to a distant land, married a powerful lady and would in time return. The villagers had observed the respect accorded to Queen Elizabeth II by colonial officials and came to the conclusion that her husband, Prince Philip, must be the son from their legends

[Wotan]

For an alternative view of human development you should really read:-

Race by the late Dr John Baker, published by Oxford University Press in 1974.

He was, amongst other things, a biologist, physical anthropologist, Emeritus Reader in Cytology at Oxford University, a Fellow of the Royal Society, and one of the two founder members of the Society for Freedom in Science.

Its a book well worth reading.

[hailtotheking]

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Looks like an interesting series anyhoo, I'll give that a watch next time I'm sat twiddling my thumbs. I like the cargo quote from the you tube link:

""Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo, but we black people had little cargo of our own?""

Don't know if he mentions that in the videos I think that sort of thing is really interesting.

Yes, this question was posed to Jared Diamond by Yali, an indegenous New Guinean who is a friend of his. This question, Yali's Question (as the chapter in the book and documentary is called), sets up the whole premise for Diamond's inquiries into inequalities between nations.

[rogues_mrs]

I'm going to have to watch this now. :-).. People been talking about it at work and thought it sounded good then! :-D