Like any good self-respecting omnivorous reader, I have just come across (thanks to my friend Giuseppe!) In a book of those that you can not only taste but whose content, page after page, pushes you to devour with voracity.
The book is entitled "Weapons, Steel and Diseases" and the subtitle gives a clearer view of the content: "brief history of the world in the last thirteen thousand years".
The author is Professor Jared Diamond, he teaches Geography at the University of California in Los Angeles.
Everything seems to begin with a talk on the beach between Professor Diamond and a politician from New Guinea, Yali, during which Yali asks: "Why do you whites have all this cargo and bring it here to New Guinea, while we blacks have so little?"
Yali and his fellow villagers used the term "cargo" to indicate the material assets that were marketed!
This question, elaborated over time and thanks to work experiences around the world, turns into "Why is wealth and power distributed in the world?", Finds a partial answer in the book that begins with the analysis of the different civilizations that emerged in the world since the last glaciation and the resources made available by the territory they occupied.
Resources in terms of domesticable plants and animals, minerals, size of the territory, possibility of cultural exchanges with other neighboring civilizations and so on.
The book is a path of knowledge that must be followed until the end and that leads us to investigate different aspects of the development of human civilization, up to the present day.
The author's ideas are always clearly expressed and discussed from different angles so that the reader can make his own idea.
The book is really good even though I think an aspect is missing which, in my opinion, was important in the evolution of civilizations, the effect of natural disasters (earthquakes, tsunamis, tsunamis etc ...) on their evolution / regression.
My advice is that this book cannot be missing from your library.
Enjoy the reading!
Alessandro Rugolo
