Guns Grems and steel chapter 5 response.

image from http://www.traveljournals.net/pictures/l/1/16994-rice-field-takayama-japan.jpg
picture of rice field where rice comes from


"These days you can travel to just about any country in the world and find a McDonald’s or a Pizza Hut. Not that you’d want to, but you could. We live in a highly diversified global economy, and the accessibility of a wide variety of foods is consistent across most parts of the planet. However, this was not always true. In the recent past the part of the world you lived in would dictate what foods were available in your diet. According to the table on page 100 - and your general knowledge about the world - what part of the world would you have wanted to live on if you were alive 1,000 years ago?" page 100 in Guns Germs and Steel Written by Jared Diamond.

My Response:

Well, for me this was an extremely hard decision. My first choice was Andes and Amazonia. This immediately stood out to me because it reminded me of Andes mints. But i soon realized that 1000 years ago, those defiantly did not exist. DANG! I also realized that they eat guinea pig and llama. First of all, guinea pigs are pets, NOT FOOD, and they smell bad, but then again, what animal does not? But second, llamas spit at you and are mean, so i understand how people could get mad enough to eat them, but i can't see llama tasting too great. Also, a bonus was that here they had potato, but i decided it wouldn't have been worth the llama thing.

Next i thought that Mesomerica because they have corn and beans. Two of which don't taste bad at all and i quite like them both. But the only animal the ate was turkey. I do not like turkey and thanksgiving is not an exception. Yea, the corn and beans would be good, but not worth it to have to eat the turkey. I also thought i could live here and be vegetarian, but naww. It would be nearly impossible for me to never eat meat. I think i would die without meat. (not literally)

My final decision where i would want to live because they had the best food would be China. Come on, they have rice! I can live with rice even though i am not chinese. I don't know if i can eat it every-night like Krista, but i could get used to it. Also, china had pork. I know i like pork and i could basically live on it. Pork and rice. Thats all id need. But the also eat silkworms, worms are not for me to eat, and millet, millet sounds like that stuff you feed to birds. I think i would stay away from the worms and millet and stick to pork and rice. But based on food, i would have liked to live in China 1000 years ago.

Guns Germs and steel chapter response

We where living what we thought was a normal day. For me that means sitting on my royal throng. All of the sudden i heard a loud screaming outside my palace. Being a good ruler, i went to see what it was. My city was being attacked! There was nothing i could do. My people are kind and gentle, no need ever to fight. We had never been in a situation like this before, so we did not know how to respond. We lost many people that day. Because we are peaceful, we did not want to fight back. We have never had to fight for our lives before and did not know how.

Before i could give any commands, my people thought of their own ideas. They thought that if they put themselves in one huge pile(s) their problems would be solved. They thought that they would protect each-other. This was obviously not the case. Those on the bottoms of the mounds where suffocated or crushed by the weight. Those on the outside of the piles where killed. It was a loose loose situation. The only person that was fighting us who got injured was he who was next to one of the piles when one of the men fell off and landed on him. Now this man was LARGE. The man below him clearly had no chance.

That was what happened that tragic day my people where attacked.

Guns Germs and Steel Chapter 1

1. Describe the “fluke colonization theory” (pages 41-42). What evidence challenges this theory?

Ok, at first this concept was extremely confusing to me. So i just hope i comprehend it. So, there where islands that where uninhabited by humans at one point. Over a hundred miles of ocean away. No record of water-craft or boats was thought to exist. But i guess they where wrong. Then it was thought that a pregnant lady got stuck there. But the final answer was that there where other islands nearby that people could have traveled from their nearby islands to that one.

2. What lesson have we learned from the animals on the Galapagos Islands, and how do they apply to our thinking of the apparently quick mass extinctions of megafauna (giant animals) extinctions in New Guinea and elsewhere? (pages 42-43)

From the mass extinction on the Galapagos island and in New Zealand we have learned that people coming onto the island did in-fact cause their extinction. There are many reasons that these mammals and birds could have been lost. They could have been over hunted or they could have even lost too much of their natural terrain. It is a shame that these magnificent creatures are now extinct. I would have liked to see them. Imagine a 400 pound Ostrich.

3. In what ways is the travel of Clovis descendants from North America to Patagonia (southern edge of South America) in only 1,000 years impressive? In what ways is it not impressive? (Consider page 45 and the map on page 37 to guide your thinking)

What is amazing is that these people had no way of easy travel like we have now, yet they traveled over 8000 miles. But what makes this a little less interesting is that they did this in 1000 years. But back then 8000 miles was a lot and that distance would have extremely different terrain and a whole adaptation would have to be made to they way they had been currently living their lives. But i think that 1000 years is plenty of time to adapt to some new area. What is also kind of amazing is that while they where doing this, the population was growing. Imagine dealing with a crying baby while migrating to a new place!

4. Jared Diamond talks about “The Great Leap Forward” throughout the chapter. What is this? Is it a biased perspective to paint it so positively? What are your thoughts?

I do not think that this is bias at all. It truly was a great leap forward. People began to take "bigger steps" and travel beyond where anyone had gone before. People began to leave what they knew as home and start life in new, unknown places. To me that is pretty amazing. Would life be any different no if that wold not have happened?