Mr. Jared Diamond’s Gun, Germs and Steel, sold over 1 million copies worldwide, was translated into 33 languages and won (among other awards) a Pulitzer prize. It was first copyrighted in 1997, and was converted into a TV series by the National Geographic Society in 2005. Its ideas have received wide distribution. I include a review of it in a Christian blog because those ideas will inevitably show up in the college classroom, and you should be aware of them.
Mr. Diamond teaches Geography at UCLA and has studied different fields, including being a professor of Physiology at UCLA medical school. He also developed parallel careers in ornithology, ecology and environmental history. His religious beliefs are as atheist and skeptic; he is on the board of The Skeptic Magazine, the publication of the Skeptic Society. Of the world’s top 100 public intellectuals, he was ranked 9th in a poll. It is safe to say that he has accumulated many honors and has worked in several different academic fields.
Gun, Germs and Steel purports to show why do some societies become more prosperous than other societies. He does not say it in precisely this way; the subtitle of his book is the fates of human societies. He then dances around the world and the varying rates of technological progress displayed by different societies, before deciding that it is all random, i.e. technological progress is a random variable.
It’s a curious thesis, but it is in line with other historians of technology. James Burke, in Connections, makes much the same argument except his book is mostly confined to Europe. It might not be obvious to any outside observer, but Gun, Germs and Steel is not a book about science at all; it is a theological tract to reassure liberals.
The faithful (of Mr. Diamond’s kind) need to be reassured of several different thing in order for Mr. Diamond to be successful and achieve wide distribution of his ideas. They are, as one wag put it, the herd of ‘independent thinkers’. The ‘independent thinkers’ stick together because to depart from the group means ostracism whereas staying in the group results in the individual member believing that he is an ‘independent thinker’ and is smarter than people outside the group. This ego-boost is the primary reason that people stay in the group. In effect, a person in the group tells others outside the group, “I’m better than you, and I have a right to rule over you.” Mr. Diamond’s first book made clear what he thought of the rest of us; it was titled The Third Chimpanzee. Charming.
In the 19th century, men like Mr. Diamond would have attributed the success of European civilization to themselves. Their Theory of Evolution stated (scientifically!) that whites were better than other races and that men like Mr. Diamond, being advanced, scientific thinkers, were the reason technology became so much more advanced in Europe than anywhere else. They justified their support for odious institutions like the KKK and eugenics based on their supposed genetic superiority to others. They initially supported Hitler; the Nazis modeled their eugenic courts on courts in liberal California.
After pictures of the Nazi death camps flashed around the world, racism became repugnant and so the liberals blamed Christians (what else were they going to do?). Since technology was still a good thing, they decided that it occurred randomly, since attributing anything good to others, particularly others of white, European descent similar to themselves (but not liberals), is also repugnant to the liberal. He still needs his ego-boost. Far from being the product of original thinking, Mr. Diamond’s conclusion was, as they say, overdetermined.
Mr. Diamond skips over any thought of religion being a driver of technology; such a conclusion would be repugnant both to him and his friends. He would lose his place in society and much of his income. For Christians, the case is different. The real question for a Christian is: is there any theological reason why Christians should embrace technology and did they embrace technology?
For an answer to the first question, let’s turn to Lord Jesus.
“.. for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink … I was naked and you clothed me …”
Matthew 25:35-36
To most people this is an exhortation to be charitable to the poor; to an engineer this is a request for an industrial revolution. Everyone is working and doing their best; where is all of this extra food, drink and clothing going to come from? The poor and slaves constituted perhaps 90% of the population, so feeding them and clothing them was no small matter.
In fact there actually was a Medieval industrial revolution. In the 11th and 12th centuries, Europe industrialized. This was right in the middle of the Dark Ages. It came just after the wars and invasions largely ceased due to stronger defenders and better fortifications. Before then, while the invasions were going on, it was impossible. A good case can be made that Europe never stopped industrializing; the cell phone you hold in your hand would not have happened without that first industrial revolution in the Dark Ages.
Here are some examples of the Medieval industrial revolution. In 1066 William of Normandy conquered England. He ordered a survey of his new lands in 1086, and the survey was complete in 1088. It is called the Domesday Book. According to it, in 1086 England had 5674 watermills, performing all sorts of tasks, including milling grain. The same thing was going on in France, where both water power and tidal power were utilized. Also during this period, the windmill was invented independently in Europe. The Dutch lowlands were promptly blanketed with them, and they did more than pump water.
Is there any evidence that the Church played any role in encouraging industrialization? Actually, there is. Technology is hardly the stuff of theological studies, but there are signs that the Roman Catholic Church looked favorably on technology. Consider Psalm 63 of the Utrecht Psalter. This was an illuminated manuscript of the Book of Psalms, done by a monk between 816 and 834.
Source: Wikimedia
The forces on the left are the forces of evil; King David and the forces of good are on the right. They are preparing for battle. A man is sharpening a sword for the forces of evil with an old-fashioned whetstone. On the right, two men are operating a more advanced rotary grinder, sharpening a sword for the forces of good. The good are using advanced technology. That grinder is interesting. It is the first depiction of a rotary grinder anywhere, and it is also the first evidence that we have of a hand crank, or any kind of crank, outside of China. The artist is saying that technological advance is God’s will1.
Alone, this does not prove that the Church was decisive in promoting technology in Western Europe, but it should dispel any notion that such a thing is impossible, or that devout people regarded technology unfavorably.
Humility
The final topic is humility. Engineering is, and always has been, a lower class occupation. Decision-making power is in the upper classes, which means that if the upper classes have no humility, then they do not listen, and promising new technologies never get developed. This is really management 101; every smart manager knows that he needs to listen.
If you read accounts of life in Ancient Rome, for example, you readily come away with the impression that the wealthy had little or no humility; they weren’t going to listen to some crazy idea from a slave. They wanted obedience. An atmosphere like that is never conducive to technological progress; in fact in Ancient times, technology almost stagnated; progress was very slow.
After Christianity became triumphant and began to preach humility, technological progress sped up. The acceleration began in the 9th century, around the time that the Utrecht Psalter was created. Western Christendom started in a very low state; not only had Rome been far behind China in technology, but also the incessant wars and invasions in Europe had left this area in a shambles. Yet starting in the 9th century, technological change accelerated until Western Europe surpassed China and went on to explore the world and colonize it.
Mr. Diamond has no answers and indeed avoids this question. Historians have, in the last 50 years, avoided using the term ‘Dark Ages’. I think Christians should use it and demand answers for this insulting term. The Faith has been damaged by atheists and liberals who claim that Christianity caused a ‘Dark Age’, that religion makes no difference to world history and there is no difference between religions. We should start making them back up their claims.
Sources
Diamond, Jared, Guns, Germs and Steel, WW Norton, 1997, New York, NY.
Burke, James, Connections, Simon and Schuster, 1978 New York, NY.
References
1White, Lynn Jr., Medieval Religion and Technology, University of California Press, Berkeley, CA, 1978, p 249, 250.
