GGS - Epilogue

The epilogue beings with a succinct recapitulation of Diamond's thesis. The four main factors of "geographical determinism" are:

• The availability of wild plants and animals for domestication to allow food production for a large population and to feed specialists
• Rates of diffusion within a continent for the spread of ideas, crops, livestock and technology
  
• This incluces ecological barriers and the major axis
• Rates of dissuion between continents for the same reasons
• Total population size to foster more potential inventors, competing societies and the adoption of innovation.

But if the Fertile Crescent and China were arguably the first places to develop food production, why did Europe pull ahead in the modern world?

In the Fertile Crescent the answer is easy. Destruction of forests for agriculture coupled with low rainfall led to the erosion of much of the land. Other societies took their domesticate package and applied to areas with more sustainable environments (Europe as much higher rainfall). China is another story; it was a leader in technology and pioneered naval transport, gunpowder and bronze. However, it's political unification was to it's detriment. Without competing societies, there is no impetus to compete to adopt new technologies. China's landscape is generally uninterrupted and well-connect by the two major rivers, allowing for early political unification. Europe, on the other hand, has never achieved political unification, due to a highly indented coast and moderate ecological borders that prevent societal integration but allow spread of techonlogy. Thus, it is observed that China regularly stymied various technological innovations (due to a stubborn, unified government), whereas in Europe, technologies that were disregarded in one society were adopted elsewhere due to intense competition.