Pobama posted:

Ah you are right, although the Ottoman cannons would have looked similar.

Pobama posted:

Guns, Germs, and Steel is an exceptionally good book, and people calling it racist likely have ether not read it, did not understand it, or have some odd preconceived notions that they don't like facts and reality clashing up against.

tehloki posted:

Sure is hilarious to watch people grasping desperately for reasons Jared Diamond is an idiot and Guns, Germs And Steel is a load of crap because it's a popular book. Fond memories of everybody doing the same thing once the filthy masses found Malcolm Gladwell.

Snickeringshadow posted:

It's one thing to construct an argument and then simplify it for a general audience. It's another thing entirely to simplify your data first and then construct an argument. Jared Diamond's model of cultural evolution is archaic, he makes huge assumptions in building his arguments, and often times the facts he uses to support his arguments are either wrong or taken out of context. His arguments don't survive under close scrutiny, but they sound really persuasive to people with no background in the subject. I could spend pages giving specific examples, but that's a topic for another thread.

Zeitgueist posted:

The OP of the mesoamerican thread I linked earlier has this to say:


But what does he know, he's only an archaeologist who specializes in the region.

I'd love to see some of this discussion go to that thread, or the book thread, or somewhere people can do more than give drive-by's on something. What do you guys think?





edit: This Ask/Tell thread.

Pobama posted:

Oh well if forums user Snickeringshadow a "grad student in Anthropology at Colorado State University" shoots down Pulitzer prize winning author and scientist with a PhD from Cambridge, and numerous awards and professional commendations then I guess we all better sit down and take notes.

I'm sorry but while his opinion is certainly valid, I would hardly turn to him over Diamond without some very good reasons.

Criticizing Diamond seems to be in vogue among lesser academics trying to make a name for themselves though.

tehloki posted:

Sure is hilarious to watch people grasping desperately for reasons Jared Diamond is an idiot and Guns, Germs And Steel is a load of crap because it's a popular book. Fond memories of everybody doing the same thing once the filthy masses found Malcolm Gladwell.

Pobama posted:

Oh well if forums user Snickeringshadow a "grad student in Anthropology at Colorado State University" shoots down Pulitzer prize winning author and scientist with a PhD from Cambridge, and numerous awards and professional commendations then I guess we all better sit down and take notes.

I'm sorry but while his opinion is certainly valid, I would hardly turn to him over Diamond without some very good reasons.

Criticizing Diamond seems to be in vogue among lesser academics trying to make a name for themselves though.

Pobama posted:

Criticizing Diamond seems to be in vogue among lesser academics trying to make a name for themselves though.

Zeitgueist posted:

Again, I'd love to see some actual discussion about why the book is bad that goes beyond "it's an awesome book y'all are haters" drive by opinions in the picture thread. Can I count on you posting your stance in the book thread or the Ask/Tell thread?

R. Mute posted:

Well, if you count most if not all historians and archaeologists as 'lesser academics' (and I'd certainly listen to such an argument, being a historian myself) then yeah, I guess. The thing to remember about Guns, Germs and Steel is that it's popscience/pophistory. It's shallow as hell, glosses over so many things and oversimplifies the rest, commits about every no-no a historian can commit and is built upon an outdated premise and with outdated research. That's not even touching upon the whole 'determinism' thing. I'd still recommend people give it a read, because it's an area of historiography that doesn't get much attention. But to call it a serious historiographical work? Nah.

Badera posted:

I'm not trying to be contrarian for its own sake, but this video seems to be aching to say that the truth is somewhere in the middle. In fact, the correspondent uses that exact phrase over and over ("the people caught in the middle!") I appreciate that the Naxalites may not be actively working for class struggle as the former fighter says, etc, but it simply asserts that fact and then breathlessly tells us about some bad poo poo that they've done, which I have a very hard time comparing to the state's violence because of the scale and resources of the two sides. Anyways, I'll shut up about it now and go check out the Asian politics megathreads.

Pobama posted:

No you can't. I'm not interested in getting involved in a protracted debate on the matter.

Pobama posted:

Oh well if forums user Snickeringshadow a "grad student in Anthropology at Colorado State University" shoots down Pulitzer prize winning author and scientist with a PhD from Cambridge, and numerous awards and professional commendations then I guess we all better sit down and take notes.

Pobama posted:

Oh well if forums user Snickeringshadow a "grad student in Anthropology at Colorado State University" shoots down Pulitzer prize winning author and scientist with a PhD from Cambridge, and numerous awards and professional commendations then I guess we all better sit down and take notes.

fermun posted:

Or maybe his PhD and science credentials aren't applicable in this specific situation and we should defer more to experts in the particular field sometimes.

fermun posted:

You make a good point and have convinced me. I now take James Watson's stance that black people aren't as intelligent as white people, since he is a Nobel prize winning scientist.

Pobama posted:

Nice strawman there.

You must be awful to talk to in real life, the way you just put entire arguments into peoples mouths and then run with that bullshit to form your own nonsense statement.

I was simply making a comparison, due to the fact one poster tried to shoot down Diamond's work by randomly quoting some goon who happens to be in grad school for a similar subject. Obviously I found this to be a really silly line of argument.

Then you come in, like a prion infected bull in a overcrowded china shop and say whatever dumbshit you just said. Bravo.

Zeitgueist posted:

Hmm, it's almost as if you want to say your piece but don't want to put any effort into actually defending your claims.

Almost.

quiggy posted:

The world will end in fire, not ice. Sorry Frost.

Highspeeddub posted:

DrBouvenstein posted:

Paula Dean a racist scumbag? Well I never!

DrBouvenstein posted:

Paula Dean a racist scumbag? Well I never!

Paula Dean posted:

“Well what I would really like is a bunch of little n***ers to wear long-sleeve white shirts, black shorts and black bow ties, you know in the Shirley Temple days, they used to tap dance around. Now, that would be a true Southern wedding wouldn’t it? But we can’t do that because the media would be on me about that.”

Zeitgueist posted:

But what does he know, he's only an archaeologist who specializes in the region.

Ruckby posted:

He's a archaeology student. There's a big difference.

quote:

Sure. For his primary evidence that agricultural technologies take longer to spread north-south than east-west, he cites the difference in the spread of crops in the old world vs the new world. He says wheat and barley spread at 0.5 miles/year, an oversimplifying calculation itself, and compares that with maize, which he says spread 0.7 miles/year. The problem is, he picks 3000 BC as the date of maize domestication. As far as I can tell, he just pulled that number out of his rear end. Maize meets the scientific definition of domestication by 8,000 BC, but early maize cobs were only an inch or two long. That's not really feasible for use as a staple crop. Maize actually didn't become useable as an agricultural staple until 800 BC. If you pick that as the start date for maize agriculture, then Maize actually spread through the Americas faster than wheat and barley did through Eurasia. So that whole argument falls to pieces.

I will say this about Jared Diamond, he gets the "germs" part right. His explanation for the difference in the distribution of epidemic diseases is spot on. I just wouldn't trust any of his arguments on anything else.

Zeitgueist posted:

^^^^ Might want to post a pic.


Absolutely, but the opinion is hardly uncommon among archaeologists and anthropologists. My point was that people aren't really wanting to discuss this, they're just using the pic thread's format to drop lovely opinions. Which is all well and good, I just wanted to draw attention to it.

Pobama posted:

Geokinesis posted: