Philosophy
For the past three decades, historian Jared Diamond has been studying the historical reasons that might be able to explain human inequality in our own time.
In the first episode of this series, Diamond discovered that although our species originally came from Africa, geography (and the many other variables that go with it) eventually endowed some previously nomadic societies in the Fertile Crescent with the environmental and natural resources that could help them sustain increasingly larger populations.
The second episode demonstrated how a long and violent history of war molded Europe in the direction of increasingly sophisticated weapon technology, which the Europeans subsequently unleashed on the unsuspecting inhabitants of the new world. It also helped that the Europeans brought with them all kinds of bacterial infections to which the natives had not yet had a chance to evolve modes of resistance.
But what happens when you come full circle to Africa, the very place from which our species originated? How did guns, germs and steel fare then? Part of the story is already familiar to you, but then it gets a lot more complicated and a lot more heart-breaking...
Will we learn from the lessons of history and mend our ways now that there is virtually no more undiscovered land to exploit and abuse, or will continue with the trends that will eventually consign us to our own doom?
.
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One of the arguments you hear for the German willingness to extend itself to bail out Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Ireland is that the Eurozone is not just a monetary union for the sake of financial advantage. The integration of Europe serves a...
- 700 New Species...from Indian Amber
"Ancient Amber Reveals 700 New Insect Species" October 26th, 2010 Science News Researchers have discovered more than 700 new species of prehistoric insects in a 50-million-year-old amber deposit in India. The 330 lb. deposit, dubbed Cambay amber, was...
- Joshua Pusey And Matchbooks
Joshua Pusey March 27th, 1842 to May 8th, 1906 Sort of a disappearing product. In 1892, book matches were patented by Joshua Pusey of Lima, Ohio, No. 483165. He subseqerntly sold the patent rights to the Diamond Match Company of Barberton, Ohio. The...
- Biodiversity...an Essay
International Year of Biodiversity "Biodiversity Explained by Ignoring the Forest for the Trees" by Brandon Keim February 25th, 2010 Wired A painstaking, multidecade study of 33,000 individual trees may finally have uncovered the roots of biodiversity....
- Refined Killing Machines
It just won't end...better and better killing machines and the more impersonal it is the better. Impersonal? Just think of the revolutionary killing machine of World War I--the machine gun. Nevertheless, it has recently been discovered that Elizabeth...
Philosophy
Guns, Germs & Steel - Tropics
For the past three decades, historian Jared Diamond has been studying the historical reasons that might be able to explain human inequality in our own time.In the first episode of this series, Diamond discovered that although our species originally came from Africa, geography (and the many other variables that go with it) eventually endowed some previously nomadic societies in the Fertile Crescent with the environmental and natural resources that could help them sustain increasingly larger populations.
The second episode demonstrated how a long and violent history of war molded Europe in the direction of increasingly sophisticated weapon technology, which the Europeans subsequently unleashed on the unsuspecting inhabitants of the new world. It also helped that the Europeans brought with them all kinds of bacterial infections to which the natives had not yet had a chance to evolve modes of resistance.
But what happens when you come full circle to Africa, the very place from which our species originated? How did guns, germs and steel fare then? Part of the story is already familiar to you, but then it gets a lot more complicated and a lot more heart-breaking...
Will we learn from the lessons of history and mend our ways now that there is virtually no more undiscovered land to exploit and abuse, or will continue with the trends that will eventually consign us to our own doom?
.
- Is The Euro Necessary For A Peaceful Europe?
One of the arguments you hear for the German willingness to extend itself to bail out Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Ireland is that the Eurozone is not just a monetary union for the sake of financial advantage. The integration of Europe serves a...
- 700 New Species...from Indian Amber
"Ancient Amber Reveals 700 New Insect Species" October 26th, 2010 Science News Researchers have discovered more than 700 new species of prehistoric insects in a 50-million-year-old amber deposit in India. The 330 lb. deposit, dubbed Cambay amber, was...
- Joshua Pusey And Matchbooks
Joshua Pusey March 27th, 1842 to May 8th, 1906 Sort of a disappearing product. In 1892, book matches were patented by Joshua Pusey of Lima, Ohio, No. 483165. He subseqerntly sold the patent rights to the Diamond Match Company of Barberton, Ohio. The...
- Biodiversity...an Essay
International Year of Biodiversity "Biodiversity Explained by Ignoring the Forest for the Trees" by Brandon Keim February 25th, 2010 Wired A painstaking, multidecade study of 33,000 individual trees may finally have uncovered the roots of biodiversity....
- Refined Killing Machines
It just won't end...better and better killing machines and the more impersonal it is the better. Impersonal? Just think of the revolutionary killing machine of World War I--the machine gun. Nevertheless, it has recently been discovered that Elizabeth...