Reddit reviews Why the West Rules--for Now: The Patterns of History, and What They Reveal About the Future

My admittedly untrained opinion on Diamond's work is that, while incomplete, it's probably still worth reading (though, in your case, maybe not worth prioritizing). If I might offer an alternative "big history" sort of text with a similar thrust, I would recommend Ian Morris' "Why the West Rules -- for Now." It's an easy, fun read and generally more well-regarded around these parts.

Here's a couple I'd recommend:

Why The West Rules: For Now- this is a book by Stanford Professor Ian Morris, in which he details the rise of Western and Eastern Civilization and the effects of geography, philosophy, and nature upon this rise, asking questions such as: Why did the industrial revolution occur in Western Europe first? Fantastic book.

Link- https://www.amazon.com/Why-West-Rules-Now-Patterns/dp/0312611692

A Short History Of Western Civilization- This book by John Harrison traces the development of Western Civilization starting in Mesopotamia then Egypt and through Crete to Greece and eventually Rome and Western Europe. Really helped me to conceptualize the concept of Western Civ.

Link- https://www.amazon.com/Short-History-Western-Civilization-Combined/dp/0070268975

Depends on how you define civilization and destruction. Personally, I like Ian Morris's ideas. The fall of Rome was accompanied in a fall in development, but it wasn't the total destruction of western civilization.

It's been vastly superceeded by more scientific based research, (I still loved the book though) instead of Diamond's approach more on "is one society better"-type outlook.

I recommend Why The West Rules--For Now by Ian Morris - basically the best book on the subject of why the west rules ever written, its a bit advanced though, having read Guns first will vastly help.

Next would be 1491 by Charles C. Mann an educated look on the pre-Colombian Americas and why we were so wrong in viewing them and why the myths persist. Highly recommended.

Not true. There are cycles that were primarily influenced by regional climatic changes resulting in migration, war and disease. Unfortunately, Africa never had that upswing other than the Sahel region about 6,000 - 8,000 years ago. China and the ME were booming in the BCs era, while Europe languished. Then Europe (basically Rome), rose then fell. The ME and China flourished from the 9th - 12th centuries, then Europe...etc etc etc.. A really good read on these cycles is [Why the West Rules for Now.] (http://www.amazon.com/Why-West-Rules-Now-Patterns/dp/0312611692)

Holy fuck, man.

> Typically they're defined by factors like economic performance, social stability, resources, political structure, etc.

So what made their economic performance, social stability, and political structure that of a 4th grade level? Who did that?

Here's something you should read to help you, and here's another, and I guess even this one, although it's not nearly as good. But I'm sure you won't- you just stumbled into a very complex topic with the faintest of knowledge- so it really doesn't matter. What you'd learn from it is that geography is about the only thing that is really deterministic in human development- everything else is what you decide to do. And geography isn't what's determining the difference between North and South Korea, so...

It seems as if we should be comparing them all, instead of infantilizing whole nations of people so you can make some awkward and cringeworthy conspiracy that isn't even correct anyway.

Wow. Just wow.

Anyone interested:

Why the West Rules For Now

There has never been a collapse everywhere at once. So when one region collapses, another is in a rebirth.

Naill Ferguson simplifies things with his "Six killer apps of Civilization". When this article was written, China had 5 out of 6 of the apps. They are now getting the 6th.

http://www.npr.org/2011/11/02/141942357/how-the-west-beat-the-rest-six-killer-apps

"Why the west rules for now" this author is interesting in that he divides humans into 7 major groups. But the then goes PC correct and says geography determines things.

But he again shows there is a similar pattern.

http://www.amazon.com/Why-West-Rules-Now-Patterns/dp/0312611692

The speed of rebirth is a lot quicker. Mao drove China into the stone age, less then 40 years later they are building projects like these.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/13/business/international/in-china-projects-to-make-great-wall-feel-small-.html?_r=0

Snide comments like that where made about the Empire state building, Hoover dam etc 80 years ago. What the critics failed to reason is that the project itself might be useless, but it is what is learned in the process.

In the book "Why the west rules for now" is people forget the amount of ideas that where transfered from India/China to Britain. A civil service is an Indian/Chinese invention. The Brits go ahold of the idea and improved on it. By the same token, China is getting western ideas that work, fusing them to their own culture and improving on them.

Later the "west" when it rebirths, will take the new and improved Chinese ideas and improve on them.

https://www.amazon.com/Why-West-Rules-Now-Patterns/dp/0312611692

>Even more embarrassing for contemporary leftists is the fact that they will concede that different races have different gross physical attributes, are predisposed to different genetic diseases, and respond differently to different types of medication, all while claiming that despite all of these differences, every race has the same genetic mean intellectual capacity.

Race is not a valid method of categorizing human beings. The groupings are far too vague and based more on cultural norms than biology. There are two reasons that different "races" have different outcomes. Firstly, racial groupings can partially overlap with actually meaningful groupings of human beings, as in the case of relatives of victims of the American slavery and the wider African-American community. The second is just statistics. If you compare two groups you're likely to find differences. This is the reason that the moment a researcher starts breaking racial categories down into valid classifications the racial category loses all of its coherence.

>in spite of the aforementioned fact and every study done on the topic of race and mean IQ concluding that the gap between races appears to be caused by genetic differences

If you're referring to the studies from the Charles Murray debacle, that's not what they show. What's more, IQ has very little to do with factors that affect children from birth. Looking at trends across generations is quite complicated. Although, I'm willing to bet that there is not a single respectable historian that will endorse the level of importance that you place on IQ. If you you want to get a better understanding of how disparities can be created across large groups of human beings, then I suggest you read Why the West Rules for Now. Hint: it's not IQ

https://www.amazon.com/Why-West-Rules-Now-Patterns/dp/0312611692

The world's a complicated place, my friend. No point arguing in a sandbox.

Thanks. Some food for thought in return: http://www.amazon.com/Why-West-Rules-Now-Patterns/dp/0312611692

It's an expansive and unifying theory about major historical developments in this world that took all this over-complication head on. Great read. Mind expanding. A different perspective at least.

May the Force be with you.

I'm personally very disturbed by the many instances in world history of the chaos and literal collapse of civilization that has followed modest changes in climate. The fact that we are living in such a period now, and that we are doing it to ourselves, worries me.

The complacency with which people dismiss climate change as "no big deal" is startling (even among many who accept that mankind is causing it). It seems to betray an ignorance of history over the last five thousand years.

The idea seems to be that the modern world could absorb such a shock (and the resulting migrations and power shifts) more gracefully. But I'm not sure what evidence there is of this.

Sources:

• Why the West Rules -- For Now by Ian Morris covers world history very quickly and, although the book isn't about climate change, gives many instances of collapse following climate change (one of the "horsemen of the apocalypse" in his parlance).
  
  
• First Intermediate Period in Egypt
  
  
• Bronze Age Collapse
  
  
• Medieval Warm Period (Example, but I haven't read the book)
  
  
• The Little Ice Age ... which curiously, may have been caused by human activity as well.

The following books are taken from the General section of our books and resources list:

• Why the west rules - for now, it's an overview of both eastern and western history.
  
  
• A History of Western Society, it looks at the history of western civilization.
  
  
• A Little History of the World, it does what it says and tells the history of world up until the 1930's.
  
  I'm sure more books can be found in the book list.
  
  Happy reading :)

Ian Morris does a good attempt at explaining Why the West Rules--for Now: The Patterns of History, and What They Reveal About the Future.

A good sequel to Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond.

I don't think they're the best nonfiction books I've read, but really relevant today and with lots to think about and new books to explore after..

In that case, I'd recommend Ian Morris's book from last year, "Why the West Rules--for Now." It looks at much of the same questions as Guns, Germs, and Steel, but from a different direction. Also, the conclusion (about the near future) is kind of astonishing, though the entire book leads up to it. I won't spoil it for you, but it's worth reading just for the conclusions.

If you're going to read this book, do not read any reviews or spoilers first.

>Again, name a non-asian stable country.

>not knowing when our stability started, not knowing Western history, forgetting what nuance is yet again

>White people built the cities and their wealth

Fuck off. Don't reply to me anymore. I'm done with this White Pride^TM historically revisionist bullshit. Non-white people aren't people to you, and any of their contributions, innovation, or leadership in the Western world since its inception are invalid, so frankly, you aren't a person to me either. Your brand of culture that you express is trash.

It's cultish vomit, you should kys, and you should export yourself elsewhere where you aren't enjoying the fruits of past immigrants' labour out of ethical commitment.

Not completely on this topic (I don't have the time to find literature on hand for our conversation), but because of your illiteracy (combined with brash, dehumanizing extremity) I've noticed in some areas, here are a few accessible books I'd recommend reading in general

https://books.google.ca/books?id=XzJdpd8DbYEC&printsec=frontcover&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false

http://www.amazon.com/Why-West-Rules-Now-Patterns/dp/0312611692

http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Germs-Steel-Fates-Societies/dp/0393317552

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europe_and_the_People_Without_History

and, just to really get on your nerves, here's some interesting triggering history of philosophy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muqaddimah

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_Khaldun

http://www.historyofphilosophy.net/islamic-world

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_al-Haytham

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avicenna

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Averroes

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Ghazali

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shahab_al-Din_Yahya_ibn_Habash_Suhrawardi

http://www.salaam.co.uk/knowledge/al-jahiz.php

Islamic scholars also scoured the earth to obtain copies of books and texts so that they may build on that knowledge and share it with future generations. But progression in society is not always a certainty.

Book recommendation for those who loved Germs, Guns & Steel.

Why the west rules, for now

'Why the west rules for now' by Ian Morris. Best overview of human history I've ever read.

Amazon link

https://www.amazon.com/Power-Sex-Suicide-Mitochondria-Meaning/dp/0199205647/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1502474332&sr=8-1&keywords=power+sex+and+suicide

https://www.amazon.com/Debt-Updated-Expanded-First-Years/dp/1612194192/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1502474404&sr=1-1&keywords=5000+years+debt

https://www.amazon.com/Why-West-Rules-Now-Patterns/dp/0312611692/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1502474420&sr=1-1&keywords=why+the+west+rules+for+now

Why the west rules — for now. https://www.amazon.com/Why-West-Rules-Now-Patterns/dp/0312611692 Lembra Sapiens, mas é mais científico, menos especulativo. Também é um Guns Germs and Steel mais bem embasado.

If India is to lead the 21st century it must look beyond the USA, and Europe. It must look at everything that the ideologies of the past 200 years have done wrong, which have lead to the chaos, and destitution in the world. It is for that reason that they're rich, their imperialistic tendencies, and to respond to that system we must create a new world, and look towards new ideas, and a different future that addresses other aspects of humanity other than the ever pervasive GDP. We must in essence redefine, and rework all the "progress" of the past 200 years.

To think that there was no rule of law, and that this is some new European invention is a load of bull, each country, each culture, each people, from the muslims, to the tribes in Africa had their own systems that worked well for them, and the destruction of those systems is exactly what is causing the chaos in the Middles-East, and Africa (especially Africa since much of it was based in an oral tradition), because the traditional institutions that were in place to deal with the problems were destroyed. The destruction of that cultural basis is tremendously useful for exploitation, and it is through that exploitation that Europe, and America, to this day even, have tremendous wealth. Look at European history, and you will realize that they had a very interesting culture that lead to their rise (read Why The West Rules - For Now by Ian Morris for an overview.). In essence it's when a traditional institution is destroyed that chaos arises, and the area is ripe for exploitation, but that may not be a bad thing in the long run as those institutions also restrict progress towards better ways of doing things.

With that said we must put an end to that exploitative ideology, including the very basis of our economics values, and capitalistic goals.

I think India is in a unique position to literally change the course of history in the 21st century, and redefine what is the goal of humanity as a whole. From education, to the economic goals of nations, and even redefining nationhood as an entity, and the political paradigms within that nation. The very essence of governance needs to shift in order to meet the challenges of the 21st century, and the reason I think India is in a unique position ranges from its culture, philosophy, history, but more concretely is its young population, and focus on technology.

The answers for the 21st century lie in technology, and are fundamentally based in decentralization of governance. This requires a tremendous amount of communicative powers, which thankfully to the technology bit provides. Communications allows for a people to assemble together to solve problems, and gives unparalelled ability for the common man to educate him self. The communication of ideas, not laws (not throwing away the concept), is what provides the stability, and progress within a people. So that's what I mean dismissing Law, and Order because I think it's going to be replaced in one form or another by basic communication abilities of a people.

http://www.amazon.com/Why-West-Rules-Now-Patterns/dp/0312611692

Thanks, I've downloaded a sample. Ian Morris discusses the costs and benefits of the Neolithic and Industrial Revolutions in his book, Why the West Rules -- for Now.