RaveLos Angeles Times\"[Diamond] is broadly erudite, writes in a style that pleasantly expresses scientific concepts in vernacular American English and deals almost exclusively in questions that should interest everyone concerned about how humanity has developed ... Reading Diamond is like watching someone riding a unicycle, balancing an eel on his nose and juggling five squealing piglets. You may or may not agree with him (I usually do), but he rivets your attention ... Diamond ranges across the globe, describing and comparing and casting a cold eye on the process of gaining \'civilization\' in one continent and region after another ... Am I a completely gaga Diamond disciple? Well . . . yes, if you mean in comparison with Marx and Spenser and the others who have tried to explain everything. He has stuck to measurable or at least discernible factors. He hasn\'t slipped off into trances about the youths, senescences, personalities and inalterable destinies of classes, peoples, civilizations. But I do have my complaints. He does love to give chapters names that obscure rather than enlighten ... And when he rushes through areas of scholarship about which I know something, I am often stunned by his simplifications ... This is a wonderfully interesting book, especially for historians of the usual liberal arts background, who will find the final chapter, \'The Future of History as a Science,\' alone worth the price of admission ... Think big. Guns, Germs, and Steel is a provocative start.\
