Guns, Germs, and Steel PBS miniseries discussion thread.

[Dis]

not much discussion on the content of the tv show here.

I'll tape it tonight, see if it's worth watching.

[JohnT]

Dissident - my wife just told me that Monday's episode will be repeated Friday night. It might be different in your neck of the woods, though.

[Immortal Wombat]

Originally posted by JohnT
And that's my point. There's more to colonizing the planet than mere geographical happenstance. People have to want to colonize the planet. China didn't want to, Europe did, and that's how we ended up speaking English here in the New World. And that "wanting" is cultural - one of the elements Diamond removes in his narrative and dismisses as unimportant.

Although it may have had something to do with the fact that Europe was full. Having found a huge continent to the west to exploit, there was an enormous incentive to go and exploit it. Even if the Chinese had found America or Australia, their geography at home may well have made them happy to just trade rather than colonise.

[Drake Tungsten]

And yet none of those ranges in the eastern parts, the heavily cultivated and populated parts, are really high enough to be too great an obstacle for conquest, otherwise it would not have been possible to have a united China so early and for so long.

Sichuan and (sometimes) Yunnan were both parts of historical China. Both are heavily mountainous. The remainder of southern China is fairly studded with mountains that, while not nearly as high as the massive mountains in western China, functioned as barriers to conquest when combined with the rivers of the Yangxi system.

There's a reason southern China escaped nearly all of the barbarian invasions that afflicted northern China over the centuries.

[Drake Tungsten]

A couple of good maps...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Qin_empire_210_BCE.jpg#filelinks

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Han_commanderies_and_kingdoms_CE_2.jpg#file

Note how much of southern China the Qin and Han (the first two unified dynasties in China) managed to control.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by JohnT
Please note that the use of the word "racist" that you quoted was from Diamonds writings, not mine.

At best Diamond showed why it was likely that an Eurasian civilization would be the one to dominate the globe. What he didn't do at all was explain why it was the Europeans that did so - but so, so many claim that's what he did.

He explains this by the fact that China was largely unified (explained by geography) and that therefore there was less competition and drive to expand.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by JohnT
I'm surprised that, over 80 years after physics got rid of determinism, that so many people want to work determinism into the social sciences, which are just as chaotic as physics.

Determinism in physics has nothing to do with "chaos" and everything to do with the fact that its laws are actually stochastic in nature.

[Berzerker]

Gepap

While complicated, its not dangerous. The state makes sure to keep murder relatively low compared to the high murder rates among very primative groups.

Pretty smart, huh? It is dangerous if you need a long time to adapt and people wont help. But you keep assuming the Bushman gets help but wont allow the New Yorker help. from Bushmen. The point is the NYC system is more complicated than the Bushman's system. I believe more isolated peoples were just far enough away from sufficient contacts for their traditional lifestyles to survive. Technology expanded thru war and trade and the crossroads of the old world had plenty of contact. Civilisation spread out from those crossroads...

That was not natural selection, but human-guided selection. There is a difference, a big difference.

True, but the slavery example mimics both eugenics and survival of the fittest.

What are you talking about? Living in jungles is extremely demanding- lots of things to kill you, and its very hard to find food.

Juts look at New Guineans- you don;t really see any fat, contended ones, or you didn;t in the show among those still caryring out subsistance farming.

We didn't get to see the farmers in the show, they just showed an aerial shot. But I didn't say New Guinea was easier than NYC, I said it wasn't that demanding, i.e., closer to NYC than the Kalahari.

[GePap]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten



Sichuan and (sometimes) Yunnan were both parts of historical China. Both are heavily mountainous. The remainder of southern China is fairly studded with mountains that, while not nearly as high as the massive mountains in western China, functioned as barriers to conquest when combined with the rivers of the Yangxi system.[

There's a reason southern China escaped nearly all of the barbarian invasions that afflicted northern China over the centuries.

And you still don't address the political unity aspect of the situation, which is what is being discussed.

Try to keep up Potemkin.

[GePap]

Originally posted by JohnT


True, a really crappy position can kill you. However, one starting at a marginal position, depending on the player (read: culture) can still beat a player that starts in OCC-heaven.

Culture does not equal some god driven universal never changing force. Culture changes. European culture in 300 AD was fundamentally different than European culture in 1300 AD.

[Drake Tungsten]

And you still don't address the political unity aspect of the situation, which is what is being discussed.

Try to keep up Potemkin.

When did "political unity" become what we were discussing? You said "China is a relatively flat- a conqueror can, with sufficient power, easily come to control the entire land of China." I disagreed and believe I have shown you to be incorrect. The fact that you are trying to move on to some other issue seems to back that up...

[GePap]

Originally posted by JohnT


And that's my point. There's more to colonizing the planet than mere geographical happenstance. People have to want to colonize the planet. China didn't want to, Europe did, and that's how we ended up speaking English here in the New World. And that "wanting" is cultural - one of the elements Diamond removes in his narrative and dismisses as unimportant.

Europe did not "want" to colonize anything. Where the hell do you get that notion?

States in Europe saw a way to increase their power. Note that the firsdt states to send forces to the new world were in the fringes of Europe, the Portuguese. They did not have many other ways to go, now did they? The Chinese on the other hand had plenty of land space to move to, and besides, they were already the richest, largest empire in the world with plenty of land enemies-why send people off somewhere?

So what you attribute to this nebelous "culture" can better be explained by the need for States to increase their power. note that the age of colonization comes hand in hand with the greater centralization of power by European monarchs over feudal interests. Is that centralization of power "European culture" as well?

The Europeans could claimt he Americas cause the locals mostly fell dead. European culture had **** to do with that crucial (if not utterly indespensible) bit.

[GePap]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten

And you still don't address the political unity aspect of the situation, which is what is being discussed.

Try to keep up Potemkin.

When did "political unity" become what we were discussing? You said "China is a relatively flat- a conqueror can, with sufficient power, easily come to control the entire land of China." I disagreed and believe I have shown you to be incorrect. The fact that you are trying to move on to some other issue seems to back that up...

The discussion is between China's relative unity vs Europe's political disunity (even given that China has plenty of "cultural" disunity within it), because that is what matters to this discussion.

Now, I know that might be hard for you to understand, but do try to keep up, Potemkin.

[Drake Tungsten]

The reason you gave for the difference is wrong and shows an ingnorance of Chinese geography and history on your part. Deal with it.

[GePap]

Originally posted by Drake Tungsten
The reason you gave for the difference is wrong and shows an ingnorance of Chinese geography and history on your part. Deal with it.

http://map.huhai.net/

A great set of historical maps of China, either when it was a single state, or broken up into larger states.

Yunnan is not generally part of China until after 1000 AD.

And yes, China as a large land mass is relatively flat. It may not be the great plains flat, but you don't get mountains that make terribly difficult natural barriers. The Urals might be a mountain range, but they are not a huge obstacle either way, going east or west.