Talk:Guns, Germs, and Steel/Archive 4

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Archive 4

Deletion of Critique

An Ip editor has deleted the following Blaut noted examples of North-South diffusion Now was it deleted because Blaut did not say it? If there is a problem with a sentence it is better to add a tag than delete large portions of the article. Esp when there is no talk page to back it up. --Inayity (talk) 16:53, 15 February 2014 (UTC)

The links used in citations 3 and 10 have issues and are in need of repair. The formatting for citation 18 seems off, and it might be better off replaced or supplemented with a link to http://www.cup.columbia.edu/static/interview-shenefelt-white-logic. Although, to be honest, that entire Adam Smith subsection needs to be reduced to maybe 1/3 its size unless it truly is the most substantial and popular criticism of GG&S (and frankly, it doesn't seem to be). In fact, even after taking an axe to some of the uncited, redundant chaff, the whole "Reception" section still gives far too much weight to negative reception compared to positive reception. There's only one single sentence describing the awards that the book has won (which, oddly, doesn't even mention the Phi Beta Kappa award that the publisher seems to think is quite significant) and nothing else positive before launching into a rather muddled collection of criticisms. Oh, and "Weaknesses in Arguments"? Could there be a more vague heading? And "Eurocentrist determinism" should probably be changed to "Eurocentrism and environmental determinism". In addition, (sorry, but I just noticed this), perhaps some stronger criticisms could be found for the "Weaknesses in Arguments" subsection? Tomlinson flat out states in his conclusion that his criticisms/objections are "cavils" and that the flaws he points out are "minor". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.75.37.169 (talk) 22:26, 15 February 2014 (UTC)

You make some good points. Who are you? Paulmlieberman (talk) 17:47, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

I removed the section with Pickover’s “criticisms” because Pickover clearly wasn’t “pointing out” much at all about political factors, let alone using political factors as a criticism of GG&S. He was commenting about maps and how great they are (which, as Diamond notes, is part of the broader discussion of writing technologies that is already addressed in the book itself). In fact, in the latter part of Pickover’s comment, he speculates about how changes in geography would have affected geopolitics and culture, which is in keeping with and supportive of the book’s overall thesis. Using Pickover’s comment strikes me as coming up with a criticism category called “Political Factors” first and casting about for something to add to it second. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.75.37.169 (talk) 23:42, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Hi there, article watchers, I have some questions/comments about some possible changes that I'd like to open up for discussion rather than make myself:

I'm thinking that the sentence "The National Geographic Society produced a documentary of the same title based on the book that was broadcast on PBS in July 2005" doesn't really belong in the "Reception" section, but I'm not really sure where it might fit better. Would its own little section be appropriate? Or perhaps simply move the sentence to the "Publication" section? Of course, this move would leave the "positive" part of "Reception" even more ridiculously anemic, but again, that section really needs more fleshing out anyway.

On a completely different note, what's up with the "Aventis Prize" mentioned in the introduction? Apparently it's the same as the "Rhône-Poulenc Prize" mentioned in "Reception"? That's kind of confusing. Would it be clearer to go by what the prize is called on its own wikipedia page ("Royal Society Prizes for Science Books")?

And help a newbie out: Is it proper style to list an unrelated book's full title and publication data in the text of an article (e.g. "...in their book If A, Then B: How the World Discovered Logic (Columbia University Press, 2013)") instead of putting it in a citation? That really stood out to me, especially when all Blaut gets is "In his last book published in 2000..." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.75.37.169 (talk) 04:12, 12 March 2014 (UTC)

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When Celtic people ruled over most of Europe they did not have a civilization.

WP:NOTFORUM

When Celtic people ruled over most of Europe they did not have a civilization. Guns germ and steel does not explain this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.103.131.238 (talk) 19:59, 14 February 2014 (UTC) Please see WP:OR. We can only put in the article what reliable sources have written about the book. — goethean 22:37, 14 February 2014 (UTC) Dear Preceding unsigned (...) at 19:59, 14 February 2014 (UTC). Smart observation. I also noted this: the early pre-historic Germanic peoples [1] roamed for thousands of years over the plains of (Northern) Europe without any cultural achievement worth mentioning. Diamond has to explain, why after 100.000-300.000 years of Homo Sapiens or 10.000 years after the last Ice Age, after as many years of stasis in Europe, the Germanic peoples made it to the Moon in about 1500 (!) years - that is, in the blink of an eye. Why then and not (much) earlier or (much) later? This is not the only loose end/contradiction in the book by Diamond. [1] Malcolm Todd, The Early Germans (2nd edition, 2004) --Gerard1453 (talk) 17:42, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

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DeLong review

DeLong's review is on his personal blog, and is thus a self-published source. He is not an expert in the relevant field whose works in said relevant field have been published by third party sources. He is an economic historian, and looking through his publications the emphasis is on economics. I can only find one publication before the Industrial Revolution, and it's about economic development in pre-industrial revolution Europe. How does this make him an expert on: Geography, History, social evolution, ethnology, and cultural diffusion? Note the lack of the word economics there. I can't find any publications by DeLong about colonialism or the history of anything other than Europe. Again, I bring up the climate change argument. Climate science necessarily uses physics, but that does not make an astrophysicist an expert in climate science, and a blog post by an astrophysicist should not be used as a source for an article on climate science. I move to remove DeLong's review from Reception because it does not meet the standards for a reliable source. His review says basically nothing of importance anyways. He just repeats what's in the book and calls it genius. All the other reviews have critical analysis of the book (except the Foreign Policy articles, which I also have a beef with, but that's a separate issue). His only criticism of the book is the "smell of excessive political correctness". That should be all you need to read for how reliable of a source it is. The rest of the blog is dedicated to current events, so any review of a history book on his blog will necessarily have a political slant. And none of this even matters because he's not an expert in the relevant field. TAlphaM (talk) 15:07, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

DeLong has published on European city growth between 1000 to 1800[1], as well as numerous works on economic growth. He's absolutely a recognized expert on aspects related to the subject of the book (economic growth, innovation). It's bizarre to say the least to see you list the subjects of the book while omitting economic history and economics. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 15:13, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

I don't know how to reply, I'm sorry. First of all, I just copy pasted the subjects from the Wiki page since I figured that was fair. Second of all, I mentioned that one article, but that's only on European city growth. Again my analogy with climate change. He is an expert on some subjects related to the book, but he is missing a lot of the other important subjects. The book is mainly about geography, history, and anthropology. Yes, economics is in there, but it's not the main focus. And also, he's only published on European economics, which is a bit problematic for a review of a book about global development. I hate to use the Eurocentric argument, but being an expert on only European economics, his opinion is likely to be Eurocentric. He and Diamond both fall in the presentism trap, presupposing Eurasian dominance and then working backwards, when it reality the relationship to geography could just be a coincidence. TAlphaM (talk) 15:30, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure no one is an expert on all subjects covered in the book. Diamond certainly isn't. We're not going to scrub reviews by anthropologists and geographers just because they are not experts on economic history. It's bizarre to scrub economic historians from the article because they are not geographers. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 15:37, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

First off, that's a false analogy. Geography and anthropology are primary subjects of the book. Economics is secondary to those two. Secondly, that's honestly not even my main critique. My problem is that his review isn't even focused on economic history. His review talks about ecology and geography and ancient history. Economic history is actually the one subject he almost never talks about in his review. If his review was praising the book from an economic history point of view, that would be fine, but it's not. He's talking about the book from perspectives not related to his field, which makes it really hard to get any good quotes out of his review. I'm pretty sure his main citation for his review would be the book he's reviewing, as such there's very little of value to be gained from this review. The original use of this review just used the quote "It is truly a work of complete and total genius." How is that useful from an editorial point of view? TAlphaM (talk) 15:48, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

No, pretty much the entire review is about topics and issues covered at great length by economic historians (technology, innovation, growth). Snooganssnoogans (talk) 15:59, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

Okay, that's incredibly broad, and frankly bizarre. That's like saying a historian is an expert on "society," like society in general. I still don't care what an Ancient Greek Historian has to say about the Great Turkish War, unless it somehow relates to Ancient Greece. DeLong is not an expert in domestication. He is not an expert in ecology (the part where he talks about seeds). He is not an expert on geography. The part where he talks about the spread of corn in North America. That does not fall under his field of expertise. I'm sure there are some economic historians who have studied that, but he has not. At least I can't find any publications on it, which is the standard. The European conquest of the New World is not in his field of expertise. Yes, if you generalize to "technology, innovation, growth," then literally anything falls under his field of expertise. The logistics of Operation Barbarossa involved technology and innovation. Vaccines involved technology and innovation. TAlphaM (talk) 16:10, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

The book is a macro-history of the world. It is not about one war, one battle or one biological substance. There is not a single person in the world who is an expert on all the subjects covered in the book. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 16:20, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

You're right, there is no one who is an expert on every subject in the book, and that was never my point. He is an expert on almost none of what's in the book. Let's break down his review, again. Skip the introduction. He talks about seeds. Not his field of expertise. He talks about the history of agriculture. Not his field of expertise. He talks about the spread of technology in Eurasia. That could be his field of expertise, given he published an article about Europe from 1000 to 1800. But the article is specifically about the role of absolutist monarchs in economic development, not about the spread of technologies through Eurasia. So this also is not his field of expertise. He talks about the European conquest of the New World. Not his field of expertise. And that's the end of his analysis. Again, if we keep this review, what are we supposed to include? Nothing in the review is his field of expertise, so the only thing useful from the review is that he likes the book. TAlphaM (talk) 16:26, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

"What are we supposed to include?" The praise of a recognized expert, which the article already does include. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 16:42, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

He's not an expert in the relevant fields. What about his review doesn't give that away? At no point does he talk about anything within his field of expertise. The nature of economics and the development of societies is something that some economic historians might be experts in, but he is not. He is a historian of capitalism very specifically, as evidenced by his publications. This book is not about capitalism or the history of capitalism, therefore DeLong is not an expert in the relevant field. TAlphaM (talk) 16:48, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

Are we done? Can I remove it now? You haven't provided a good enough explanation for why we should keep it, at least from my perspective. TAlphaM (talk) 17:53, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

Nope, praise from a recognized expert on related subjects is definitely pertinent. If you disagree, feel free to start a RfC. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 17:58, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

I agree, but unfortunately that's not what this blogpost is. But fine, I'll start an RfC, but I'd like to point out the burden of proof is on you to prove it's pertinent, not me to prove it isn't. TAlphaM (talk) 18:12, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

RfC On DeLong Blogpost

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Should economic historian Brad DeLong's blogpost complimenting Guns, Germs, and Steel be mentioned? RfC relisted by Cunard (talk) at 01:46, 11 March 2019 (UTC). TAlphaM (talk) 18:15, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

The diff in question is (I think) this. Icewhiz (talk) 17:14, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

Comments

• Oppose You can see rest of my arguments above, but the TL;DR is that I don't think a blogpost is a good source, and I don't think DeLong's credentials are good enough in the relevant fields to warrant him being included, as evidenced by his published works and the content of the review itself. And even if they were, I still think including a blogpost as of the same credibility as peer-reviewed academic journals and peer-reviewed academic books is misleading. TAlphaM (talk) 18:27, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
• Leaning Exclude. It would need significant third party mentions to rate anything and I’m just not seeing that in a quick google. Seems just some casual bashing of critics, of no particular significance or note, and just not important to the article topic. CheersMarkbassett (talk) 03:52, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
• It's no worse than most of the rest of the sources. Only a few of them are journal articles. There may be too much Brad DeLong in this article, but honestly, the acclaim/criticism sections are just a lot of cherry-picked stuff. We're at the stage where there are secondary sources that describe the reception to the book. We need to use the best available sources, not fight over which of the crappy sources currently in the article we should add or remove. For starters, get rid of the dueling sections and write a proper "reception" section. Guettarda (talk) 06:24, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

I don't know if I'm supposed to respond to these, but you're absolutely right, I'm not happy with most of the sources or the section in general. The problem is that there aren't many academic sources I can find that do a thorough critique of the whole book or the historical community's reaction to it. There are books that indirectly respond to Diamond's work, like books that refute the "virgin soil" hypothesis or criticize environmental determinism. Would it be okay to use those as sources for the reception section? TAlphaM (talk) 20:21, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

• Keep. Brad DeLong is a recognized expert on subjects related to the book. He's an economic historian at UC Berkeley and has published on the subject of European city growth 1000-1800[2], as well as numerous publications on economic growth more broadly. He's furthermore a public intellectual. One sentence noting that he's praised the book is perfectly fine. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 22:42, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. This is in my mind WP:UNDUE as Guns, Germs, and Steel has been discussed numerous times in a published academic setting (as well as published non-academic settings of some note). There's little need to use a self-published opinion here from an economic historian. My opinion would've been different for a book with lesser published attention (in which I case I might've leaned towards inclusion) - but given the amount of good hits discussing Guns, Germs, and Steel in a simple google scholar search - I don't see why a self-published sourced is needed here.Icewhiz (talk) 17:18, 27 January 2019 (UTC)
• Keep. The WP:UNDUE argument is compelling in the abstract, but (simply) removing a sentence on DeLong can't be the top priority in a section that gives John Brätland ten clauses (recency isn't the right criterion for trimming). The proper way to tame this (overlong) section is to prioritize sources, and for that, we must consider expertise/recognition & representativeness (as well as publication method). In writing this, I'm probably just echoing TAlphaM's point, but I want to add this as a way to look at WP:UNDUE--It's the whole damn section that's excessively long (in relation to its value-add for the article). --Wragge (talk) 18:06, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

  @Wragge: - what you are basically saying is that since there is other crud in this over-long section - we should leave this piece of crud in. I would argue the obverse - we should remove this bit of crud (following consensus at the RfC) - and then follow up (per the implied consensus at the RfC) - and remove all similar crud in the section and trim it down (and if someone were so inclined - add better published review, commentary, and analysis). Icewhiz (talk) 08:23, 28 January 2019 (UTC)

  @Icewhiz: I agree that this is exactly the reasoning for the narrow "Keep" conclusion I've come to. This is despite WP:OTHERTHINGSEXIST. Contrasting with other things is inherently necessary if WP:UNDUE is the claim (since UNDUE is a relative weighting argument). And we must be careful with WP:OTHERTHINGSEXIST, which is not policy (but is an essay that begins with the caveat: "simply referring them to this essay by name, and nothing else, is not encouraged")..... But I disagree with Icewhiz on the correct approach. In fact, I propose the opposite plan: we should remove in order of crud-iness. The paragraph given to Brätland is directly relevant to inclusion of the DeLong sentence for three reasons: (a) These text blocks appear in the same section of the same article; (b) Icewhiz's UNDUE argument of the 27th accepts that there's nothing wrong with the DeLong sentence in isolation--it would be acceptable in another article; (c) Removing DeLong's opinion but keeping Brätland's probably raises the mean crud-iness of the section; the "other stuff exists" counterargument might be based on the assumption that the Brätland paragraph can't be relevant because we'll ultimately and independently remove it too. The editorship of Wikipedia being what it is, there's a high variability in the persistence of undue opinions. --Wragge (talk) 22:00, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

  @Wragge: Would you be okay with getting rid of every citation that's not a peer-reviewed journal article or a book published by a scholarly publisher? Because that's what I want to do eventually, I'm not a fan of the Bratland article or the two Foreign Policy articles either (the Bratland article is technically in a peer-reviewed journal, but Austrian economics is not exactly mainstream economics, and also an economist's opinion shouldn't be given that much weight on a history/anthropology book). Given the amount of attention this book has gotten, I'd like to hold it to the same standard that academic works are held to. A blogpost or New York Times article has no place on a page about plate tectonics, and I don't think it should be different for this book. TAlphaM (talk) 17:18, 3 February 2019 (UTC)

• Oppose. Given the abundance of sources on the topic including a blog post is unnecessary - and to counter an argument above, WP:OTHERTHINGSEXIST is not an argument for the inclusion of this segment, though it could be an argument for the exclusion of that one. -- NoCOBOL (talk) 13:53, 29 January 2019 (UTC)
• Remove DeLong's blog. As noted above the problem isn't with DeLong himself, despite the contention of the proposer he is absolutely an expert on this topic, but that we should not be relying on SELFPUB for this topic. There is no reason to be including anything in reception that isn't either the highest quality RS secondary source or a RS which summarizes the reception to the book itself. If DeLong had written that for the Washington Post as he did with thsi review this would be a very different thing. But he didn't. The solution according to policy really should be to cleanup this section in general not get bogged down about this one expert's blog. Best wishes, Barkeep49 (talk) 22:51, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose/remove/no it should not be mentioned (to answer the question asked) simply because there are better sources available for the same content/point, per above. We don't need to attribute to a single self-pub source for praise, it puts too much emphasis on that one source. Leviv ich 04:42, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
• Remove DeLong (no relation to me, as far as I know) is a noted economist, but none of the three comments which are quoted in the original diff have anything to do with economics. DeLong is not an expert on genius, on comparative intelligence, or on diplomatic language. The section is too long already; information about the book itself should predominate. Add to that the fact that this reference is to a posting on a personal blog, and not to one of DeLong's hundreds of published documents, and I think the article is better without it.—Anne Delong (talk) 03:53, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
• Weak Keep I agree with Wragge that the DeLong reference is probably better than average for this section, and the section as it stands is better than it would be if the only change were to drop the DeLong mention. I'd leave it in pending a full redo of the Reception section along the lines that TAlphaM proposes.--BubbaJoe123456 (talk) 14:09, 2 April 2019 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Redundant synopsis

The synopsis portion of this article has a lot of redundancies between the "outline of their" section and the sections that follow. If someone wants to try to eliminate some of those, I think it'd improve the page. Sdkb (talk) 04:39, 12 September 2019 (UTC)