Jared M. Diamond

Draws on decades of field work in the Pacific islands and other world regions to illuminate the degree to which modern society reflects traditional cultures from earlier and ancient time periods.

What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies?

The World Until Yesterday

Félix

I consider «The World until Yesterday» enlightening about us as human being and where we came from. Since many Reviews have been written about this book, let me just add a recommendation. The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies? goes very well withThe Story of the Human Body: Evolution, Health, and Disease. After having read both books, I feel like I understand «us» a lot better.

Jared Diamond

From the author of No.1 international bestseller Collapse, a mesmerizing portrait of the human past that offers profound lessons for how we can live today Visionary, prize-winning author Jared Diamond changed the way we think about the rise and fall of human civilizations with his previous international bestsellers Guns, Germs and Steel and Collapse. Now he returns with another epic - and groundbreaking - journey into our rapidly receding past. In The World Until Yesterday, Diamond reveals how traditional societies around the world offer an extraordinary window onto how our ancestors lived for the majority of human history - until virtually yesterday, in evolutionary terms - and provide unique, often overlooked insights into human nature. Drawing extensively on his decades working in the jungles of Papua New Guinea, Diamond explores how tribal societies approach essential human problems, from childrearing to conflict resolution to health, and discovers we have much to learn from traditional ways of life. He unearths remarkable findings - from the reason why modern afflictions like diabetes, obesity and Alzheimer's are virtually non-existent in tribal societies to the surprising benefits of multilingualism. Panoramic in scope and thrillingly original, The World Until Yesterday provides an enthralling first-hand picture of the human past that also suggests profound lessons for how to live well today. Jared Diamond is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the seminal million-copy-bestseller Guns, Germs, and Steel, which was named one of TIME's best non-fiction books of all time, and Collapse, a #1 international bestseller. A professor of geography at UCLA and noted polymath, Diamond's work has been influential in the fields of anthropology, biology, ornithology, ecology and history, among others.

Chris Aldrich

I'm honestly shocked that no one else has written a book similar to this prior to now. It's certainly a wonderful synthesis and a fantastic resulting thesis based on an incredibly broad array of areas of study over a lifetime of work.

I personally don't think that it is as significant as Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies was, though perhaps it should be just as (if not more) ground shaking for modern society. As a long-time student of evolutionary biology and other fields related to this work, I'm not as impressed with the effort as I might otherwise be since most of the overarching thesis is second nature to me. It does however have some superb anecdotes and broad reviews of large areas of literature to provide some excellent motivation that I might not otherwise have spent the time to find thus giving it some excellent value to me. 

As for others in the general public, I highly recommend it for it's simple and clear examples and the ultimate thesis which are exceptionally worth reading (and implementing) into one's life as well as into broader areas of modern society. If nothing else, it points out how drastically life has changed for human societies even in the last 150 years, much less the last 10,000.

For those in the field or with an interest in Big History, this is certainly a must-read and possibly an excellent place to start for those without any background at all.

Based on my own personal background, I'd give this 3 stars (in terms of it's direct value to me), but for the general public it's easily a 5 star work. I do wish that it had been more traditionally and extensively footnoted, but for a broader audience I certainly understand Dr. Diamond's reasons for publishing it as he did.

Diamond draws extensively from his decades of field work in the Pacific islands, as well as evidence from Inuit, Amazonian Indians, Kalahari San people, and others. Diamond finds that their solutions to universal human problems have much to teach the contemporary world. A provocative, enlightening, and entertaining book that will be essential and delightful reading.

The World Until Yesterday What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies?

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