“Why have we developed differently than other parts of the world?” That is Jared Diamond’s question in the book Guns, Germs, and Steel. He begins his book with a description of what he plans to convey to us in the following pages. He explains that he is not writing a racist book, but the topics are often thought of as racist in the everyday world. He says he merely wants to push back time and find the very beginning, so he can find out why there are countries that live in the modern era, while there are still some that live in the “Stone Age”.

His search begins when a New Guinean politician takes a walk with him around a beach in New Guinea. This friend (Yali), and Mr. Diamond begin to talk about the differences between the white Europeans that were inhabiting New Guinea, and the black inhabitants that had lived there all their lives. After talking for a while Yali asks Mr. Diamond “Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo (cargo refers to all the inventions that Eurasians invented such as: matches, medicine, soft drinks, etc.) and brought it to New Guinea, but we black people had little cargo of our own?” This seems like such a simple question, but the answer is almost impossible to find, and it has also become one of the most controversial topics ever.

As Mr. Diamond ponders this question and the possible solutions and the already assumed solutions he realizes how the world sees the answer. He tells us that the rest of the world would think that because of their skin color they were less intelligent, therefore that’s the obvious reason for them not inventing as much “cargo” as we did. But Mr. Diamond shares with us how, if anything, the New Guineans are smarter than we are. They might not score as high on IQ tests, but when it comes to building a fire or surviving in the jungle they are much smarter than we are, and having the knowledge of being able to survive in the world is much more valuable compared to knowing how to use a computer or any of the other things we white people know how to do.

Mr. Diamond then begins to relay us his take on why he thinks white people had invented more things than the New Guineans. He starts off with telling us the previous thought answers to this question but also he gives us the reasons why those answers were incorrect. The first theory he breaks down is the one about our climates causing more creative thought in the Northern Eurasian, where we had to create warm houses and create clothes, where as the New Guineans would need simple shelters and little to no clothing at all. This however was disproven over in the America’s during this same time people where the Higher altitudes were of no help at all when it came to inventing things, and the smartest groups over in the America’s lived in the thickest and hottest jungles like the Mayan’s and the Inca’s. These groups were very artistic and knew the most about astronomy, and they even created their own alphabet.

Jared Diamond hasn’t yet told us the truth of how we came to be who we are yet in his book, but I think that in due course all of ours and Yali’s questions will be answered.