Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea, but we black people had little cargo of our own?
Interpretation
The quote questions the disparities in development and wealth distribution between different races and cultures.
Jared Diamond's quote addresses the historical and geographical factors that have contributed to the unequal distribution of resources and technological advancements between societies. It invites contemplation on the influence of environment, history, and societal structures in shaping the capabilities of different groups and raises important questions about race and economic disparity.
In practice
In a discussion about cultural development and historical context.
For anyone inclined to caricature environmental history as 'environmental determinism,' the contrasting histories of the Dominican Republic and Haiti provide a useful antidote. Yes, environmental problems do constrain human societies, but the societies' responses also make a difference.
The metaphor is so obvious. Easter Island isolated in the Pacific Ocean β once the island got into trouble, there was no way they could get free. There was no other people from whom they could get help. In the same way that we on Planet Earth, if we ruin our own [world], we won't be able to get help.
But this was the only way of life that humans knew for their first 6m years on the planet. In giving it up over the past few thousand years, we have lost our vulnerability to disease and cold and wild animals, but we have also lost good ways to bring up children, look after old people, stave off diabetes and heart disease and understand the real dangers of everyday life.
We scientists have fantasies of being uniquely qualified to make great discoveries. Alas, reality is cruel: most of us are replaceable. For the vast majority of scientific contributions, if scientist X hadn't achieved it that year, scientist Y would have achieved the same result or something very similar soon thereafter.
All human societies go through fads in which they temporarily either adopt practices of little use or else abandon practices of considerable use.
AIDS and malaria and TB are national security issues. A worldwide program to get a start on dealing with these issues would cost about $25 billion... It's, what, a few months in Iraq.
But, alas! what poor Woman is ever taught that she should have a higher Design than to get her a Husband?
Sooner or later, if man is ever to be worthy of his destiny, we must fill our hearts with tolerance.
The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed.
This is the good and happy news, that Christ has paid for our sin, and through His suffering has redeemed us from eternal death. It is His kingdom and His ministry, to preach the Gospel to the poor; that is His purpose. For to the great and holy He cannot come. They do not wish to be counted sinners, and therefore do not need His Gospel.
The zipper displaces the button and a man lacks just that much time to think while dressing at dawn, a philosophical hour, and thus a melancholy hour.
May all sentient beings be happy and free of suffering.
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