Measles and TB evolved from diseases of our cattle, influenza from a disease of pigs, and smallpox possibly from a disease of… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
Even to this day, no native Australian animal species and only one plant species-the macadamia nut-have proved suitable for domestication. There still… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
Although native Africans domesticated some plants in the Sahel and in Ethiopia and in tropical West Africa, they acquired valuable domestic animals… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
Eurasia ended up with the most domesticated animal species in part because it's the world's largest land mass and offered the most… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
Native Americans had only stone and wooden weapons and no animals that could be ridden. Those military advantages repeatedly enabled troops of… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
Why were there far more species of domesticated animals in Eurasia than in the Americas? The Americas harbor over a thousand native… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
But this was the only way of life that humans knew for their first 6m years on the planet. In giving it… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
In short, Europe’s colonization of Africa had nothing to do with differences between European and African peoples themselves, as white racists assume.… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
Livestock adopted in Africa were Eurasian species that came in from the north. Africa's long axis, like that of the Americas, is… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
Perhaps our greatest distinction as a species is our capacity, unique among animals, to make counter-evolutionary choices. — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
Thousands of years ago, humans domesticated every possible large wild mammal species fulfilling all those criteria and worth domesticating, with the result… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
Bird taxonomy is a difficult field because of the severe anatomical constraints imposed by flight. There are only so many ways to design a… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
What did the last Easter Islander say as he chopped down the last tree? The Easter Islanders didnt have anthropologists. — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
“We come to conquer this land by his command, that all may come to a knowledge of God and of His Holy Catholic Faith;… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
“With the rise of chiefdoms around 7,500 years ago, people had to learn, for the first time in history, how to encounter strangers regularly… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
Human societies vary in lots of independent factors affecting their openness to innovation. — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
No government is here forever. And there are other forces - the most potent force in our society, in fact, big business - doing… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
“Those parasites pass to a person from an eaten animal, but the virus causing laughing sickness (kuru) in the New Guinea highlands used to… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
“...invokes the supposed stimulatory effects of their homeland's cold climate and the inhibitory effects of hot, humid, tropical climates on human creativity and energy.… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
“Throughout the Americas, diseases introduced with Europeans spread from tribe to tribe far in advance of the Europeans themselves, killing an estimated 95 percent… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
History followed different courses for different peoples because of differences among peoples' environments, not because of biological differences among peoples themselves — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
We study the injustices of history for the same reason that we study genocide, and for the same reason that psychologists study the minds… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
I decided that now is the time to start doing the things that really interest me and I find important. It was in the… — Jared Diamond Copy Share Image
