While we sit around watching TV and eating fast food, they are out trying Guinea must be more intelligent than a contemporary western European because To recognize that different ethnic groupings might have genuinely differing In one of the strangest moments in the book, Diamond seems Relying instead on environmental happenstance as the sole cause of thisĭisparity. But it seeks toĪnswer it in a very specific and seemingly underhanded way, by trying toĬompletely discount biological, intellectual and cultural differences and This book attempts to answer Yali's question. Why is it that you white people developed so muchĬargo and brought it to New Guinea, but weīlack people had little cargo of our own? Little more than a house of cards and the bottom card is especially weak.īiologist at UCLA, has done extensive field work in New Guinea.Ī native friend named Yali once asked him:
The book is fascinating, entertainingĪnd eminently readable, but it is also either maddeningly obtuse or anĮxercise in utter intellectual dishonesty, for Diamond's argument is ultimately In the respective levels of development between human societies are purelyĪ function of environment. Won the Pulitzer Prize, uses scientific sleight of hand to argue that differences Similarly, this book by Jared Diamond, which even Is no scientific basis for believing there to be any differences between Top 100 Non-Fiction Books of the 20th Century, wherein he essentiallyĪrgues that since the validity of phrenology has been disproved, there Review), which even made the Modern Library Jay Gould's book, The Mismeasure of Man (see Orrin's One example that comes to mind is Stephen But there are other, more respected, folks Long and have made so many inaccurate predictions that we are mostly wise Their own political views are "correct" is especially troubling.Įnvironmentalists and population doomsayers have been doing this for so Modern tendency of scientists to use scientific theories to prove that Popper and those who are easily dismissed as religious fanatics, the Has gone largely unchallenged, except by a few intrepid philosophers like System, independent of human influence, revealing certain immutable
But Science laysĬlaim to a special status as a wholly impartial, rational and incorruptible Some corruption is inevitable and probably natural. Review) respectively, but these are essentially human constructs, so The politicization of the Law (see Orrin's Robert BorkĪnd Tom Wolfe have written eloquently about the consequences of Is the degree to which science has been corrupted. Possibly the worst aspect of this catastrophe No development of the 20th Century was more unfortunate than the politicization Peoples because of differences among peoples'Įnvironments, not because of differences among people History followed different courses for different
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