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Guns, Germs and Steel
- The Fate of Human Societies
- Narrated by: Doug Ordunio
- Length: 16 hrs and 20 mins
- Categories: Politics & Social Sciences, Social Sciences
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Collapse
- How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
- Written by: Jared Diamond
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 27 hrs and 1 min
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In Jared Diamond’s follow-up to the Pulitzer-Prize winning Guns, Germs and Steel, the author explores how climate change, the population explosion, and political discord create the conditions for the collapse of civilization. Environmental damage, climate change, globalization, rapid population growth, and unwise political choices were all factors in the demise of societies around the world, but some found solutions and persisted.
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Ought to be a textbook
- By Derek on 2020-04-25
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Sapiens
- A Brief History of Humankind
- Written by: Yuval Harari
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 15 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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In Sapiens, Dr. Yuval Noah Harari spans the whole of human history, from the very first humans to walk the earth to the radical - and sometimes devastating - breakthroughs of the cognitive, agricultural, and scientific revolutions. Drawing on insights from biology, anthropology, paleontology, and economics, he explores how the currents of history have shaped our human societies, the animals and plants around us, and even our personalities.
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I'll definitely listen to this again.
- By Shea Earl on 2017-11-25
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Homo Deus
- A Brief History of Tomorrow
- Written by: Yuval Noah Harari
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 14 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Homo Deus explores the projects, dreams, and nightmares that will shape the 21st century - from overcoming death to creating artificial life. It asks the fundamental questions: Where do we go from here? And how will we protect this fragile world from our own destructive powers? This is the next stage of evolution. This is Homo Deus.
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Accept minor defects and enjoy this book
- By Reza on 2017-12-10
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Upheaval
- Turning Points for Nations in Crisis
- Written by: Jared Diamond
- Narrated by: Henry Strozier
- Length: 18 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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In his earlier best sellers Guns, Germs and Steel and Collapse, Jared Diamond transformed our understanding of what makes civilizations rise and fall. Now, in the final audiobook in this monumental trilogy, he reveals how successful nations recover from crisis through selective change - a coping mechanism more commonly associated with personal trauma.
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waste of time
- By Pouyan on 2020-05-19
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21 Lessons for the 21st Century
- Written by: Yuval Noah Harari
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 11 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Yuval Noah Harari’s 21 Lessons for the 21st Century is a probing and visionary investigation into today’s most urgent issues as we move into the uncharted territory of the future. As technology advances faster than our understanding of it, hacking becomes a tactic of war, and the world feels more polarized than ever, Harari addresses the challenge of navigating life in the face of constant and disorienting change and raises the important questions we need to ask ourselves in order to survive.
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Eloquent & insightful, yet lacking in direction
- By Francois Lanthier Nadeau on 2019-01-09
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The World Until Yesterday
- What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies?
- Written by: Jared Diamond
- Narrated by: Jay Snyder
- Length: 18 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Most of us take for granted the features of our modern society, from air travel and telecommunications to literacy and obesity. Yet for nearly all of its six million years of existence, human society had none of these things. While the gulf that divides us from our primitive ancestors may seem unbridgeably wide, we can glimpse much of our former lifestyle in those largely traditional societies still or recently in existence.
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Close to excellent
- By Grenade on 2020-09-16
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Collapse
- How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
- Written by: Jared Diamond
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 27 hrs and 1 min
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In Jared Diamond’s follow-up to the Pulitzer-Prize winning Guns, Germs and Steel, the author explores how climate change, the population explosion, and political discord create the conditions for the collapse of civilization. Environmental damage, climate change, globalization, rapid population growth, and unwise political choices were all factors in the demise of societies around the world, but some found solutions and persisted.
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Ought to be a textbook
- By Derek on 2020-04-25
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Sapiens
- A Brief History of Humankind
- Written by: Yuval Harari
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 15 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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In Sapiens, Dr. Yuval Noah Harari spans the whole of human history, from the very first humans to walk the earth to the radical - and sometimes devastating - breakthroughs of the cognitive, agricultural, and scientific revolutions. Drawing on insights from biology, anthropology, paleontology, and economics, he explores how the currents of history have shaped our human societies, the animals and plants around us, and even our personalities.
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I'll definitely listen to this again.
- By Shea Earl on 2017-11-25
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Homo Deus
- A Brief History of Tomorrow
- Written by: Yuval Noah Harari
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 14 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
-
Story
Homo Deus explores the projects, dreams, and nightmares that will shape the 21st century - from overcoming death to creating artificial life. It asks the fundamental questions: Where do we go from here? And how will we protect this fragile world from our own destructive powers? This is the next stage of evolution. This is Homo Deus.
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Accept minor defects and enjoy this book
- By Reza on 2017-12-10
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Upheaval
- Turning Points for Nations in Crisis
- Written by: Jared Diamond
- Narrated by: Henry Strozier
- Length: 18 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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In his earlier best sellers Guns, Germs and Steel and Collapse, Jared Diamond transformed our understanding of what makes civilizations rise and fall. Now, in the final audiobook in this monumental trilogy, he reveals how successful nations recover from crisis through selective change - a coping mechanism more commonly associated with personal trauma.
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waste of time
- By Pouyan on 2020-05-19
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21 Lessons for the 21st Century
- Written by: Yuval Noah Harari
- Narrated by: Derek Perkins
- Length: 11 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Yuval Noah Harari’s 21 Lessons for the 21st Century is a probing and visionary investigation into today’s most urgent issues as we move into the uncharted territory of the future. As technology advances faster than our understanding of it, hacking becomes a tactic of war, and the world feels more polarized than ever, Harari addresses the challenge of navigating life in the face of constant and disorienting change and raises the important questions we need to ask ourselves in order to survive.
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Eloquent & insightful, yet lacking in direction
- By Francois Lanthier Nadeau on 2019-01-09
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The World Until Yesterday
- What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies?
- Written by: Jared Diamond
- Narrated by: Jay Snyder
- Length: 18 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Most of us take for granted the features of our modern society, from air travel and telecommunications to literacy and obesity. Yet for nearly all of its six million years of existence, human society had none of these things. While the gulf that divides us from our primitive ancestors may seem unbridgeably wide, we can glimpse much of our former lifestyle in those largely traditional societies still or recently in existence.
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Close to excellent
- By Grenade on 2020-09-16
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A Brief History of Time
- Written by: Stephen Hawking
- Narrated by: Michael Jackson
- Length: 5 hrs and 46 mins
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This landmark book is for those of us who prefer words to equations; this is the story of the ultimate quest for knowledge, the ongoing search for the secrets at the heart of time and space. Its author, Stephen W. Hawking, is arguably the greatest mind since Einstein. From the vantage point of the wheelchair, where he has spent the last 20 years trapped by Lou Gehrig's disease, Professor Hawking has transformed our view of the universe. A Brief History of Time is Hawking's classic introduction to today's most important scientific ideas.
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change the narrator
- By V Camp on 2018-07-10
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The History of the Ancient World
- From the Earliest Accounts to the Fall of Rome
- Written by: Susan Wise Bauer
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 26 hrs and 20 mins
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This is the first volume in a bold new series that tells the stories of all peoples, connecting historical events from Europe to the Middle East to the far coast of China, while still giving weight to the characteristics of each country. Susan Wise Bauer provides both sweeping scope and vivid attention to the individual lives that give flesh to abstract assertions about human history. This narrative history employs the methods of "history from beneath" - literature, epic traditions, private letters, and accounts - to connect kings and leaders with the lives of those they ruled.
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Iffy narration, abrupt ending
- By Micah Clark on 2020-09-07
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The End Is Always Near
- Apocalyptic Moments, from the Bronze Age Collapse to Nuclear Near Misses
- Written by: Dan Carlin
- Narrated by: Dan Carlin
- Length: 7 hrs and 55 mins
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In The End Is Always Near, Dan Carlin looks at questions and historical events that force us to consider what sounds like fantasy; that we might suffer the same fate that all previous eras did. Will our world ever become a ruin for future archaeologists to dig up and explore? The questions themselves are both philosophical and like something out of The Twilight Zone.
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almost excellent
- By Amazon Customer on 2019-12-21
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Thinking, Fast and Slow
- Written by: Daniel Kahneman
- Narrated by: Patrick Egan
- Length: 20 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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The guru to the gurus at last shares his knowledge with the rest of us. Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman's seminal studies in behavioral psychology, behavioral economics, and happiness studies have influenced numerous other authors, including Steven Pinker and Malcolm Gladwell. In Thinking, Fast and Slow, Kahneman at last offers his own, first book for the general public. It is a lucid and enlightening summary of his life's work. It will change the way you think about thinking. Two systems drive the way we think and make choices, Kahneman explains....
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Very difficult to follow in audio format
- By Amazon Customer on 2017-10-06
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Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World
- Written by: Jack Weatherford
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis, Jack Weatherford
- Length: 14 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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The Mongol army led by Genghis Khan subjugated more lands and people in 25 years than the Romans did in 400. In nearly every country the Mongols conquered, they brought an unprecedented rise in cultural communication, expanded trade, and a blossoming of civilization.
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Terrible start.
- By William H. on 2019-11-02
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The Selfish Gene
- Written by: Richard Dawkins
- Narrated by: Richard Dawkins, Lalla Ward
- Length: 16 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Richard Dawkins' brilliant reformulation of the theory of natural selection has the rare distinction of having provoked as much excitement and interest outside the scientific community as within it. His theories have helped change the whole nature of the study of social biology, and have forced thousands to rethink their beliefs about life.
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Life changing book
- By Amazon Customer on 2018-07-25
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Mythos
- Written by: Stephen Fry
- Narrated by: Stephen Fry
- Length: 15 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Here are the thrills, grandeur, and unabashed fun of the Greek myths, stylishly retold by Stephen Fry. The legendary writer, actor, and comedian breathes life into ancient tales, from Pandora's box to Prometheus's fire, and transforms the adventures of Zeus and the Olympians into emotionally resonant and deeply funny stories, without losing any of their original wonder. Learned notes from the author offer rich cultural context. This volume is a doorway into a captivating world.
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Amazing
- By Kindle Customer on 2019-10-04
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Beyond Order
- 12 More Rules for Life
- Written by: Jordan B. Peterson
- Narrated by: Jordan B. Peterson
- Length: 13 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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In 12 Rules for Life, acclaimed public thinker and clinical psychologist Jordan B. Peterson offered an antidote to the chaos in our lives: eternal truths applied to modern anxieties. Now in his long-awaited sequel, Peterson goes further, showing that part of life's meaning comes from reaching out into the domain beyond what we know, and adapting to an ever-transforming world.
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A continuation of greatness...
- By Colbie Grieve on 2021-03-02
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Guns, Germs, & Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond
- Key Takeaways, Analysis & Review
- Written by: Eureka Books
- Narrated by: Michael Pauley
- Length: 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Guns, Germs, & Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond won the Pulitzer Prize for the first edition, which was published in 1997. Over 13,000 years of human history are explored in order to explain why societies around the world evolved differently from each other and how those differences led to the conquest of particular groups at the hands of others. This companion to Guns, Germs, & Steelincludes an overview of the book, important people, key takeaways, analysis of key takeaways, and much more.
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1491
- New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus
- Written by: Charles C. Mann
- Narrated by: Darrell Dennis
- Length: 16 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Traditionally, Americans learned in school that the ancestors of the people who inhabited the Western Hemisphere at the time of Columbus' landing had crossed the Bering Strait 12,000 years ago; existed mainly in small nomadic bands; and lived so lightly on the land that the Americas were, for all practical purposes, still a vast wilderness. But as Charles C. Mann now makes clear, archaeologists and anthropologists have spent the last 30 years proving these and many other long-held assumptions wrong.
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This needs to be mandatory reading!
- By nicolethebumblebee on 2019-03-07
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How to Avoid a Climate Disaster
- The Solutions We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need
- Written by: Bill Gates
- Narrated by: Wil Wheaton, Bill Gates
- Length: 7 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Bill Gates shares what he's learned in more than a decade of studying climate change and investing in innovations to address the problems, and sets out a vision for how the world can build the tools it needs to get to zero greenhouse gas emissions. Bill Gates explains why he cares so deeply about climate change and what makes him optimistic that the world can avoid the most dire effects of the climate crisis. Gates says, "We can work on a local, national, and global level to build the technologies, businesses, and industries to avoid the worst impacts of climate change."
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Who's this for?
- By Amazon Customer on 2021-02-21
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The Body
- A Guide for Occupants
- Written by: Bill Bryson
- Narrated by: Bill Bryson
- Length: 14 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Bill Bryson once again proves himself to be an incomparable companion as he guides us through the human body - how it functions, its remarkable ability to heal itself, and (unfortunately) the ways it can fail. Full of extraordinary facts (your body made a million red blood cells since you started reading this) and irresistible Bryson-esque anecdotes, The Body will lead you to a deeper understanding of the miracle that is life in general and you in particular. As Bill Bryson writes, "We pass our existence within this wobble of flesh and yet take it almost entirely for granted."
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Required reading for the self-aware
- By Dr. Gordon K. McIvor on 2020-02-04
Publisher's Summary
Pulitzer Prize, General Nonfiction, 1998
Guns, Germs and Steel examines the rise of civilization and the issues its development has raised throughout history.
Having done field work in New Guinea for more than 30 years, Jared Diamond presents the geographical and ecological factors that have shaped the modern world. From the viewpoint of an evolutionary biologist, he highlights the broadest movements both literal and conceptual on every continent since the Ice Age, and examines societal advances such as writing, religion, government, and technology. Diamond also dissects racial theories of global history, and the resulting work—Guns, Germs and Steel—is a major contribution to our understanding the evolution of human societies.
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What listeners say about Guns, Germs and Steel
Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Julie
- 2019-10-08
Boring yet thought provoking
While I found some of the information and theories in this book fairly thought provoking, I also found that it drones and drones and my mind often wandered as I listened. A nail biter this is not.
6 people found this helpful
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- TK
- 2018-05-18
A must!
You aren't a junior historian without it. The narration is clear and digestible, albeit best at 1.1x or 1.2x speed.
6 people found this helpful
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- Witzy
- 2020-07-13
Starts and ends well, tedious middle.
Obviously an important book and topics that are given careful, if at times tedious treatment. If you just read/listen to first and last chapters, you get a pretty good synthesis. The narration is fine and clear, but all the extensive details become a bit boring, and the narrator is unable to make these details particularly interesting to the typical listener.
1 person found this helpful
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- Karen
- 2019-11-23
Worth the read
I finally read this masterpiece! It was worth every Pulitzer Prize winning minute. Jared Diamond provides a strong theory for how geography created the circumstances leading to the advancement of some populations over others over time. The move from hunter-gatherer to farmers with domesticated crops and animals, the creation of societies and then language and technology... all of it basically depended on which latitude humans, plants and animals evolved in. A fascinating theory and I think it holds up well.
1 person found this helpful
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- Corbin Smith
- 2019-10-29
Great at what it does but read critiques as well
It is a good book written with good narrative and great narration. This book is heavily criticized in academic circles and while I think the book is still worth reading, one should understand that it is too simplistic and too narrowly focused on this specific element of history to be taken entirely at face value.
1 person found this helpful
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- Amazon Customer
- 2019-10-22
Good read, very interesting!
My only complaint is that the thesis gets a little repetitive by the end.
Otherwise it's a well read, well researched book with plenty of interesting insight!
1 person found this helpful
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- Yousuf J.
- 2019-10-10
Provides core thesis with many examples.
core concepts were easy to grasp. author provided many examples and summarised after every few chapters.
if you already have a background in evolutionary biology, you can probably skip the first few chapters.
1 person found this helpful
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- Patricia G.
- 2019-04-15
This book did not live up to its reputation.
It was recommended by a number of friends and I thought that my love of history would make it a perfect match. If I had been reading it instead of listening, I would never have finished it. Boring is too subtle a word to describe this book. At least the narrator tried to make it more interesting, kudos for him for not yawning.(probably were cut out!)
3 people found this helpful
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- Myself
- 2019-03-13
So painfully blah!
Save your time and your credit. There's some good info but there are more interesting books to get it from.
Imagine asking someone how their pizza was. "Hot gooey cheese with a sweet yet tangy sauce. The dough was light with a nice crust to it. Nothing but the freshest toppings.....etc." That would be descriptive, interesting and informative. This book's answer would be something more like "There was dough. Dough is made with multiple ingredients, one of them being flour. Now in this case it was bleached flour, it differs from its unbleached counterpart. There are many types of flour, each with its own purpose. Water was added to the flour. Water in most cases today is filtered before human consumption....blah blah blah."
10 people found this helpful
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- Robert Belanger
- 2021-03-30
5 stars
Guns, Germs and Steel is the modern day Origin of the Species. Very fascinating and informative
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- Nick M.
- 2016-03-27
Great book, poor narration
This is a great and thought provoking book, just what I've come to appreciate and expect from Jared Diamond.
Unfortunately, the narration is so dull it makes it incredibly difficult to keep engaged with the story. His voice is monotone and devoid of meaningful inflections, and throaty, I keep waiting for him to clear his throat, it turns this in to a very dry listen. Significantly reduces my enjoyment of this incredible book.
40 people found this helpful
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- Jimmy Mak
- 2016-02-02
Poor preformance
What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?
Unfortunately the narrator was completely unable to capture the drama of this book. I read it shortly after it came out in hardback and lent my copy one too many times so I was excited to read it again. This was not the experience I hoped for.
What other book might you compare Guns, Germs and Steel to and why?
Kon Tiki, Rapa Nui. Similar cultures.
What didn’t you like about Doug Ordunio’s performance?
You get the feeling he isn't hearing the words that he is saying.
You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?
I do love this book. The ease with which the author relays his information is astounding. When on paper the pages fly by, when narrated it's like setting through a lecture. Such a shame that this book was presented by someone as disinterested as Doug Ordunio.
32 people found this helpful
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- Doug
- 2011-08-25
Compelling pre-history and emergent history
This is a fascinating and foundational work that takes a topic (for me) shrouded in obscurity (how and why did civilization emerge in the pattern it did around the globe), and provides a vivid, detailed, and substantially convincing explanation. Thanks to GGS, I see world and cultural history with new eyes. That is pretty much the highest praise I can think of for a book.
I have a personal policy of ignoring (or at least trying to ignore) negative narrator reviews, as I find them always overstated. This reading is on the dry/flat/dull side, but it is still professional. The book is great and one of the most stimulating I have ever listened to. It is dense, but if you don't like fact, analysis, and theory, you wouldn't seek out this sort of book. Extremely highly recommended. It will change the way you see the world.
83 people found this helpful
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- Daniel
- 2011-12-19
A story all should know, not all can endure
What a wealth of information! So amazing to think about the inevitabilities and chance occurrences that shaped our world. I wish I could recommend this book to all since it should be standard reading(listening). The down side is that its a bit of an endurance challenge to get through. There are a lot of numbers lists and .. vocally read charts. I doubt most could make it through this entire book. An abridged version might be more digestible.
Regardless, give it a try. You'll think about the world in a completely different way. But take your time, or else you'll burn out on this anvil of a book.
78 people found this helpful
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- Jeremy
- 2011-02-16
Informing, Interesting, and Boring all in one
His point of view is compelling, and gives definite weight to the view that all men are created equal, and 'Whites' for example aren't 'better' than anyone else, but that they had a better deck of cards than other peoples and cultures at a time when it mattered. I have heard others talk on the same issues and topics and make it much more engaging however. And while he titles the book "Guns, germs and steel", given what takes up the majority of the book it should be titled, "Grains, Vegetables and Domestic-able animals".
82 people found this helpful
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- Steven
- 2011-11-19
So much potential, so little craft
With all the field work and research available to him Diamond stands at the brink of what could be the most fascinating and significant popular science book of the era. He brings together so many disciplines to show macro trends, chaos theory, the power of germs in fashioning human history. It could all havee been absolutely mind changing. Sadly Diamond is not Bill Bryson. He has a scientific mind and a scientific compulsion for being comprehensive. Where Bryson can spin a story out of a proton, Diamond gets mired in a repetitive catalogue of insights applied meticulously yet tediously to every possible place, time and civilisation. I would really love someone else to re-tell this - someone who has the ability to convert the linear into the prosaic. I gave up after about 50%.
53 people found this helpful
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- firstrich1
- 2015-09-22
interesting but dry
I had some difficulty staying focused on the subjects due to the fact that the narrator was a bit on the side of sleep inducing. A soothing voice but dry in the reading, often coming across as methodical and like a recitation of facts. Much of the information is interesting but it was hard to stay focused. I think I got about 50% of what the author was saying just due to the dry expression of the narrator.
24 people found this helpful
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- Bhaskar ch
- 2018-10-07
Nothing about guns,germs,steel
Sapiens is much better book to know humane history and evolution. This book is all about plants, agriculture. except title we don't find much about GUNS,GERMS and Steel. Don't waste time.
3 people found this helpful
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- Neil Chisholm
- 2013-03-26
Anthropology? Compelling? This book is!
The Fates of Human Societies is the subheading of this book and it grabbed me. I've recently listened to histories of several societies and I thought this might be interesting in doing some comparisons. What I wasn't ready for was a gallop through the history of man from our first bands of hunter gatherers wandering out of Africa to detailed explanations of why Eurasia was by its geography destined to be more successful than either the Americas and Africa.
If you had told me I was going to be left gaping by linguistic analysis, natural experiments or the result of reviews by evolutionary biologists I wouldn't have believed you but I am agog as what I've heard and the implications it has meant for all the histories of different societies.
I am still digesting what I've heard and I know I shall be back to listen to parts if not all of it again. This book is highly recommended if you want to know why Eurasia came to dominate the world and to understand early civilisations destinies from their geography and biology. It really is compelling listening.
14 people found this helpful
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- Darwin8u
- 2015-09-01
Location, location, location...
“In short, Europe’s colonization of Africa had nothing to do with differences between European and African peoples themselves, as white racists assume. Rather, it was due to accidents of geography and biogeography—in particular, to the continents’ different areas, axes, and suites of wild plant and animal species. That is, the different historical trajectories of Africa and Europe stem ultimately from differences in real estate.”
- Jared Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel
This is one of those books that once you finish, you sit back and say "yeah, um, duh". Since I'm reading this about 18 years after it was first published and probably 14 years since I bought and first perused it, it never seemed very shocking to me. Look, certain civilizations came to dominate based on a couple random, accidental, and nonracially based situations that combined to give the Eurasian people a slight advantage once these civilizations came into contact with each other.
First, the domesticated food and animals of Eurasiaa contained more protein and more varieties of domesticated animals (pigs, cows, goats, etc) that allowed the people on the Eurasian continent to achieve a certain population density that allowed them to move from band > tribe > chiefdom > state > empire first. This density also allowed for more technological advances, more exposure and protection against herd diseases, so that when cultures collided, the more advanced societies were able to dominate. End of book. Q.E.D.
Is it still worth reading? Certainly. Just because you get the basic premise of Natural Selection does not mean you shouldn't read Darwin's classics. I'm to going to compare Jared Diamond to Charles Darwin. This book isn't that good, but the apparent simplicity of the book's premise only appears simple. The argument that Diamond delivers is tight and simple but hides a lot of work.
** Just a note. This audiobook does NOT include the newer edition's chapter on Japan or the 2003 author's Afterword.
43 people found this helpful
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- Pierre Gauthier
- 2017-10-29
Momentous!
In a nutshell, in this fascinating work, the author Jared Diamond sets out to explain why, in the 16th century, the Spaniards conquered Mexico and the Aztecs did not invade Spain.
He is adamant that any potential racial differences have nothing to do with it and explains that geography and the distribution of domesticable plants and animals are the key to understanding the unequal speed of development in various parts of the world throughout history.
Despite a few repetitions and an insistence on Papua-New Guinea that is only justified with his long personal presence there, his style is engaging and crystal clear.
This very enlightening offering is not at all dated and highly advisable to all interested in long term historical trends.
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