Title: Guns Germs and Steel The Fates of Human Societies
1Guns Germs and SteelThe Fates of Human Societies
Text extracted from Chapters 1-10
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2After the Ice Age
- Human societies began to change 13,000 years ago
- when the last ice age melted
3After the Ice Age
- Different societies resulted
- Some literate, industrial
- Some illiterate, agricultural
- Some hunter gatherers retaining stone tools
4Inequality and Extermination
- Those historical inequalities have cast long
shadows on the modern world, - because the literate societies with metal tools
- have conquered or exterminated the other
societies."
5Yalis Question
- Yali, a New Guinea politician asked
- "Why is it that you white people developed so
much cargo and brought it to New Guinea, - but we black people had little cargo of our own?"
6Distribution of Wealth
- To rephrase,
- "why did wealth and power become distributed as
they now are, - rather than in some other way?
Distribution of Wealth in the World
7Common explanations
- Racial or genetic superiority?
- No objective evidence for this theory
8Common explanations
- Cold climate stimulates inventiveness?
- But Europeans inherited from warm climate peoples
- agriculture,
- wheels,
- writing, and
- metallurgy
- Japan inherited
- Agriculture, metallurgy, writing
- Industrial Revolution
9Cro Magnons
- Cro-Magnons moved into Europe 40,000 years ago.
- Technologies
- Tools, needles, fishhooks, harpoons, bows and
arrows, sewn clothing, houses, carefully buried
skeletons, art, hunting big prey. - Displaced or killed off Neandertals
10Spreading Out
- 40,000-30,000 years ago
- Technology water craft to cross from Asia to
Indonesia to Australia and New Guinea. - Time period correlates to
- massive extinction of large game in those places.
11Large Game in Eurasia
- Diamond's theory
- large game survived in Eurasia because
- humans took a million years
- to develop tools
- become lethal predators of large game
- Gave Eurasian game time to adapt.
12Spreading to the Americas
- 20,000 years ago
- Technology clothing and shelter to survive
Siberia - led to migration to Americas by 12,000 BC.
- It took 1,000 years for humans to get to S.
America. - Time period correlates to
- massive extinction of large game in Americas
- Horses, lions, elephants, cheetahs, camels, and
giant ground sloths.
13Chatham Islands
- 1835
- Chatham Islands discovered by British Seal
Hunting ship - 500 miles off coast of New Zealand
- News told to native New Zealanders
- Chatham Islands
- Abundance of fish, food
- Inhabitants numerous
- Dont know how to fight
- No weapons
14Chatham Islands
15Maori of New Zealand
- Nine hundred of the native Maori people of New
Zealand, - armed with guns,
- arrived in the Chatham Islands
- announced that the Chatham Islands people (the
Moriori) - were now their slaves,
- and killed those who objected.
16Moriori Slaughter
- An eyewitness account said
- "The Maori commenced to kill us like sheep...
- We were terrified, fled to the bush,
- concealed ourselves in holes underground, and in
any place to escape our enemies. - It was of no avail we were discovered and killed
- -- men, women, and children indiscriminately".
Maori
17Maori Explanation
- A Maori conqueror explained
- "We took possession...in accordance with our
customs and we caught all the people. - Not one escaped.
- Some ran away from us, these we killed, and
others we killed -- but what of that? - It was in accordance with our custom".
18Natural History Experiment
- This is a natural history experiment.
- Both the Maori and Moriori
- descended from the same Polynesian farmers who
settled New Zealand.
19Moriori
- When the the Moriori moved to the Chatham islands
- hundreds of years earlier
- could not farm due to the cold climate, and
- became hunter/gatherers.
- They learned to live peacefully because their
resources were so limited.
20Maori
- The New Zealand Maori
- continued farming
- dense populations
- more complex technology and political
organization - ferocious wars
- The difference was geography.
- Competing agricultural societies are prone to
warfare
21Conquest of the New World
- "The biggest population shift of modern times
- has been the colonization of the new World by
Europeans, - and the resulting
- conquest,
- numerical reduction ,
- or complete disappearance
- of most groups of Native Americans".
22Pizarro
- The Incas were conquered by the Spaniard
Francisco Pizarro.
23Pizarros Forces
- Pizarro had 168 soldiers.
- They were in unfamiliar territory,
- ignorant of the local inhabitants,
- were 1000 miles away from reinforcements,
- and were and surrounded by the Incan empire
- with 80,000 soldiers led by Atahuallpa.
24Guns, Germs and Steel
- Pizarro had
- steel armor
- swords
- horse mounted cavalry
- guns
- a minor factor
25Treachery
- Pizarro
- ambushed and captured Atahuallpa
- used religion to justify it.
- collected a huge ransom in gold and silver,
- killed him anyway.
Inca Gold
26Conquistadors
- In addition to horses and steel, conquistadors
had - Superior ocean going ships
- Superior political organization of the European
states - Carried infectious diseases that wiped out 95 of
Native Americans - smallpox, measles, influenza, typhus, bubonic
plague - Superior knowledge of human behavior
- from thousands of years of written history.
-
27Why not the other way?
- Still, why was it that the Europeans had all of
the advantages instead of the Incas? - Why didn't the Incas
- invent guns and steel swords,
- have horses,
- or bear deadly diseases?
Inca
Inca Warrior
28Advantages of Agricultural Societies
- More food, more people.
- Domestic animals
- Meat
- Pull plows, carts
- Transportation, war
- Furs, fiber
- Fertilizer
- Deadly germs
29Advantages of Agricultural Societies
- Sedentary Existence
- Short birth intervals
- higher population densities
- Grain Storage
- Support specialists
- Kings
- bureaucrats
- soldiers
- priests
- artisans.
30Unequal Conflicts
- "Much of human history has consisted of unequal
conflicts - between the haves and the have-nots
- between peoples with farmer power and those
without it, - or between those who acquired it at different
times."
31Independent Crop Domestication
- Middle East (8,000 BC)
- Wheat, pea, olive
- China
- Rice, millet
- Mexico (3,000 BC)
- Maize, squash, beans
- Andes mountains
- Potato
- USA
- Sunflower
Other people adopted these crops (and
domesticated animals) later as a cultural package
32Adoption by Hunter-Gatherers
- Sometimes domesticated plants and animals were
adopted by hunters/gatherers - Native Americans in U.S.
- Sometimes hunters/gatherers were displaced by
agriculturalists - European expansion in Australia, Tasmania
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Trugannie.jpg
Trugannini, last Remaining Tasmanian Aboriginal,
1868
33Head Start
- "The peoples of areas with a head start on food
production - thereby gained a head start on the path leading
to guns, germs and steel. - The result was a long series of collisions
between the haves and have-nots of history."
34Food Production
- Food production often led to
- poorer health
- shorter lifespan
- harder labor for the majority of people.
35Early Plant Domestication
- Humans unknowingly selected for traits
- seed size, fiber length
- lack of bitterness
- early germination
- selfing
- dispersal mutations
- wheat that does not shatter
- seeds that stay in pods
http//www.union.ku.edu/traditions/desktops/wheat.
JPG
36Sowing by Broadcast
- Grains in Eurasia were sown by broadcast,
- later in animal plowed fields to give
monoculture.
37Digging Sticks
- In the new world,
- planting done by digging stick
- no domesticated plow animals
- Result mixed gardens.
3880 of Worlds Production
- Wheat
- Maize
- Rice
- Barley
- Sorghum
- Soybean
- Potato
- Cassava
- Sweet potato
- Sugar cane
- Sugar beet
- Banana
39Major Domesticated Crops
- No new plants domesticated in modern times
- All of these domesticated thousands of years
ago. - Need a suite of domesticated plants to make
agriculture work - Thus new plants domesticated where agriculture
already successful
40Fertile Crescent
41Fertile Crescent Attributes
- Mediterranean climate.
- Wild stands of wheat
- Hunter/gatherers settled down here before
agriculture, living off grain - High percentage of self pollinating plants --
easiest to domesticate. - Of large seeded grass species of the world, 32 of
56 grow here. - Big animals for domestication goat, sheep, pig,
cow
42Meso America
- In Meso America, the only animals domesticated
were turkey and dog - Maize was slow to domesticate.
- Occurred 5,000 years after domestication of wheat
43Big 5 Domesticated Animals
- Horse
- Cow
- Pig
- Sheep
- Goat
- All from Eurasia
44Large Animals
- Of 148 large herbivorous or omnivorous species in
the world - Eurasia had 72
- Africa 51
- Americas 24
- Australia 1
- Most cannot be domesticated
45Why have 134 out of 148 big species not been
domesticated?
- Diet too finicky
- koala
- Growth rate too slow
- elephants, gorillas
- Wont breed in captivity
- cheetah, vicuna
- Nasty Disposition.
- grizzly bear, African buffalo, onager, zebra,
hippo, elk
46Why have 134 out of 148 big species not been
domesticated?
- Hard to herd (no dominance structure)
- deer, antelope
- Tendency to panic.
- deer, antelope, gazelles
- Solitary
- only cats and ferrets domesticated
- Territorial
- rhino
47Easier to spread East-West
- It was easier for domestic plants and animals
- later, technology like wheels, writing)
- to spread East-West in Eurasia
- than North- South in Americas.
48Evidence
- Some crops domesticated independently in both S.
America and Meso America - due to slow spread
- lima beans
- common beans
- chili peppers
49Evidence
- Most crops in Eurasia domesticated only once.
- Rapid spread preempted same or similar
domestication. - Fertile Crescent crops spread to Egypt, N.
Africa, Europe, India and eventually to China.
50Africa
- East-West spread of plants, animals easier
- due to same day-length, similar seasonal
variations. - Temperate N. Africa crops did not reach S. Africa
until colonists brought them - Sahara
- Tropics
- Tropical crops spread West to East in Africa with
Bantu culture, - did not cross to S. Africa due to climate.
51Americas
- Distance between cool highlands of Mexico and
Andes was only 1,200 miles but separated by low
hot tropical region. - Thus, no exchange of crops, animals, writing,
wheel. - Only maize spread.
-
52Americas
- It took 2,000 years for maize to cross 700 miles
of desert to reach U.S.A. - It took another 1000 years for maize to adapt to
U.S.A. climate to be productive
53Not a Cultural Issue
- Some species like cows, dogs, pigs independently
domesticated in different parts of the world. - These animals were well suited for
domestication. - Modern attempts to domesticate
- eland, elk, moose, musk ox, zebra, American Bison
- are only marginally successful.