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Societal collapse broadly includes both quite abrupt societal failures typified by collapses (such as that of the Mayan Civilization), as well as more extended gradual declines of superpowers (like the Roman empire in Western Europe and the Han Dynasty in East Asia). The general subject arises in anthropology, history, sociology, politics and other fields, and more recently in complex systems science.

In systems science it refers to the presumed organizational structures of societies and how they prevent societies from adapting to change in their circumstances. A simple example would be the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The abrupt disappearance of a global superpower in the course of a few months, without any external attack, was evidently caused by some kind of structural change in its internal complex system. That researchers, as yet, have very little ability to identify such internal structures for large distributed systems like human societies is an important scientific problem. That genuine structural collapse seems, in many cases, the only plausible explanation supports the idea that such structures exist. However, until they can be concretely identified, scientific inquiry appears limited to the construction of scientific narratives,^[1] using systems thinking for careful story telling about systemic organization and change. History includes many examples of the appearance and disappearance of human societies with no obvious explanation.

Although a societal collapse is generally an endpoint for that form of administering the social and economic life of a culture, it can be as another kind of change of administration of the same culture (Russian culture would seem to have outlived both the society of Imperial Russia and the society of the Soviet Union, for example). Frequently the phenomenon is also a process of decentralization of authority after a 'classic' period of centralized social order, perhaps replaced by competing centers as the central authority weakens. As when the black plague contributed to breaking the hold of European feudal society on its underclass in the 15th century, societal failure may also result in a degree of empowerment for the lower levels of a former climax society, who escape from the burden of onerous taxes and control by exploitative elites.

Causes of collapse[link]

Common factors that may contribute to societal collapse are economic, environmental, social and cultural, but they manifest combined effects like a whole system out of balance. In some cases a natural disaster (e.g. tsunami, earthquake, massive fire or climate change) may seem to be an immediate cause. Other factors such as a Malthusian catastrophe, overpopulation, dysgenics or resource depletion might be the proximate cause of collapse.

This is the reasoning method used by Joseph Tainter, and how he examined the evidence to eliminate the insufficient causes in his thesis that societies essentially exhausted their own designs, and were unable to adapt to natural diminishing returns for what they knew as their method of survival. It matches closely Toynbee's idea that "they find problems they can't solve".

The diversity of forms that societies evolve corresponds to diversity in their failures too. In other instances significant inequity may combine with lack of loyalty to a central power structure and result in an oppressed lower class rising up and taking power from a smaller wealthy elite.

If there is a general "antidote" to collapse, it would seem to be social cohesion, economic growth and adaptability.^{[citation needed]}

Collapse vs. decline[link]

The term "societal collapse" usually refers to the disappearance of human societies along with their life support systems, but due to the lack of clear definition for why that occurs includes both quite abrupt societal failures typified by collapses such as that of the Mayan Civilization, as well as more extended gradual declines of superpowers like the Roman Empire in Western Europe and the Han Dynasty in East Asia. The great irony expressed by these and others like them is that civilizations that seem ideally designed to creatively solve problems find themselves doing so self-destructively.

What distinguishes the more dramatic failures of human societies, seeming to deserve the term "collapse", from less dramatic long term decline is not widely agreed on. The subject also then generally includes any other long term decline of a culture, its civil institutions or other major characteristics of it as a society or a civilization, generally permanent.

The coupled breakdown of economic, cultural and social institutions with ecological relationships is perhaps the most common feature of collapse. The most accessible and thorough discussions of the subject are the review of the scientific anthropology literature by J.A. Tainter and the popular but thorough book of similar title by Jared Diamond.

Linking social/environmental dynamics[link]

Modern social critics commonly interpret things like sedentary social behavior as symptomatic of societal decay, and link what appears to be laziness with the depletion of important non-renewable resources. However, many primitive cultures also have high degrees of leisure, so if that is a cause in one place it may not be in another—leisure or apparent laziness is then not a sufficient cause.

What produces modern sedentary life, unlike nomadic hunter-gatherers, is extraordinary modern economic productivity. Tainter argues that exceptional productivity is actually more the sign of hidden weakness, both because of a society's dependence on it, and its potential to undermine its own basis for success by not being self limiting as demonstrated in Western culture's ideal of perpetual growth.

As a population grows and technology makes it easier to exploit depleting resources, the environment's diminishing returns are hidden from view. Societal complexity is then potentially threatened if it develops beyond what is actually sustainable, and a disorderly reorganization were to follow. This is like the scissors model of Malthusian collapse where the population grows without limit and resources do not, and is the usual simple idea of great opposing environmental forces cutting into each other.

It also appears to occur in complex forms in real collapses. For the modern world economy, for example, the growing conflict between food and fuel, depending on many of the same finite and diminishing resources is visible in the recent major commodity price shocks, and is one of the key relationships people since the early studies of the Club of Rome have been most concerned with.

Energy return on energy invested theories[link]

A related economic model is proposed by Thomas Homer-Dixon^[2] and by Charles Hall^[3] in relation to our declining productivity of energy extraction, or energy return on energy invested (EROEI). This measures the amount of surplus energy a society gets from using energy to obtain energy.

There would be no surplus if EROEI approaches 1:1. What Hall showed is that the real cutoff is well above that, estimated to be 3:1 to sustain the essential overhead energy costs of a modern society. Part of the mental equation is that the EROEI of our generally preferred energy source, petroleum, has fallen in the past century from 100:1 to the range of 10:1 with clear evidence that the natural depletion curves all are downward decay curves. An EROEI of more than ~3, then, is what appears necessary to provide the energy for societally important tasks, such as maintaining government, legal and financial institutions, a transportation infrastructure, manufacturing, building construction and maintenance and the life styles of the rich and poor that a society depends on.

The EROEI figure also affects the number of people needed for sustainable food production. In the pre-modern world, it was often the case that 80% of the population was employed in agriculture to feed a population of 100%, with a low energy budget. In modern times, the use of cheap fossil fuels with an exceedingly high EROEI enabled 100% of the population to be fed with only 4% of the population employed in agriculture. Diminishing EROEI making fuel more expensive relative to other things may require food to be produced using less energy, and so increases the number of people employed in food production again.

Population dynamics and other features of collapse[link]

In the general study of cultural change and population dynamics, a whole system displays complex ecosystem change, and organizational adaptability relates importantly to organizational diversity. Several key features of human societal collapse can be related to population dynamics^[4]

Reversion/Simplification: A society's adaptive capacity may be reduced by either a sharp increase in population or societal complexity, destabilizing its institutions and causing massive shifts in population and other social dynamics. In cases of collapse civilizations tend to revert to less complex, less centralized socio-political forms using simpler technology. These are characteristics of a Dark Age. Examples of such societal collapse are: the Hittite Empire, the Mycenaean civilization, the Western Roman Empire, the Mauryan and Gupta Empires in India, the Mayas, the Angkor in Cambodia, and the Han and Tang dynasties in China.

Incorporation/Absorption: Alternately, a society may be gradually incorporated into a more dynamic, more complex inter-regional social structure. This happened in Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, the Levantine cultures, the Eastern Roman Empire, the Mughal and Delhi Sultanates in India, Sung China, the Aztec culture in Mesoamerica, the Inca culture in South America, and the modern civilizations of China, Japan, and India, as well as many modern states in the Middle East and Africa.

Other features

• Destratification: Complex societies stratified on the basis of class, gender, race or some other salient factor become much more homogeneous or horizontally structured. In many cases past social stratification slowly becomes irrelevant following collapse and societies become more egalitarian.

• Despecialization: One of the most characteristic features of complex civilizations (and in many cases the yardstick to measure complexity) is a high level of job specialization. The most complex societies are characterized by artisans and tradespeople who specialize intensely in a given task. Indeed, the rulers of many past societies were hyper-specialized priests or priestesses who were completely supported by the work of the lower classes. During societal collapse the social institutions supporting such specialization are removed and people tend to become more generalized in their work and daily habits.

• Decentralization: As power becomes decentralized people tend to be more self-regimented and have many more personal freedoms. In many instances of collapse there is a slackening of social rules and etiquette. Geographically speaking, communities become more parochial or isolated. For example, following the collapse of the Mayan civilization many Maya returned to their traditional hamlets, moving away from the large cities that had been the centers of the empire.

• Destructuralization: Epiphenomena, institutions, processes, and artifacts are all manifest in the archaeological record in abundance in large civilizations. After collapse, evidence of epiphenomena, institutions, and types of artifacts change dramatically as people are forced to adopt more self-sufficient lifestyles.

• Depopulation: Societal collapse is almost always associated with a decline in population densities. In extreme cases, the collapse in population is so severe that the society disappears entirely, such as happened with the Greenland Vikings, or a number of Polynesian islands. In less extreme cases, populations are reduced until a demographic balance is re-established between human societies and the depleted natural environment. A classic example is the case of Ancient Rome, which had a population of about 1.5 million during the reign of Trajan in the early 2nd century CE, but had only 15,000 inhabitants by the 9th century.

Models of societal response[link]

According to Joseph Tainter^[5] (1990), too many scholars offer facile explanations of societal collapse by assuming one or more of the following three models in the face of collapse:

1. The Dinosaur, a large-scale society in which resources are being depleted at an exponential rate and yet nothing is done to rectify the problem because the ruling elite are unwilling or unable to adapt to those resources' reduced availability: In this type of society, rulers tend to oppose any solutions that diverge from their present course of action. They will favor intensification and commit an increasing number of resources to their present plans, projects, and social institutions.
2. The Runaway Train, a society whose continuing function depends on constant growth (cf. Frederick Jackson Turner's Frontier Thesis): This type of society, based almost exclusively on acquisition (e.g., pillage or exploitation), cannot be sustained indefinitely. The Assyrian and Mongol Empires, for example, both fractured and collapsed when no new conquests were forthcoming.

   Tainter argues that capitalism can be seen as an example of the Runaway Train model in that generally accepted accounting practices require publicly traded companies, along with many privately held ones, to exhibit growth as measured at some fixed interval (often three months). Moreover, the ethos of consumerism on the demand side and the practice of planned obsolescence on the supply side encourage the purchase of an ever-increasing number of goods and services even when resource extraction and food production are unsustainable if continued at current levels.

3. The House of Cards, a society that has grown to be so large and include so many complex social institutions that it is inherently unstable and prone to collapse. This type of society has been seen with particular frequency among Eastern bloc and other communist nations, in which all social organizations are arms of the government or ruling party, such that the government must either stifle association wholesale (encouraging dissent and subversion) or exercise less authority than it asserts (undermining its legitimacy in the public eye).

   By contrast, as Alexis de Tocqueville observed, when voluntary and private associations are allowed to flourish and gain legitimacy at an institutional level, they complement and often even supplant governmental functions: They provide a "safety valve" for dissent, assist with resource allocation, provide for a for social experimentation without the need for governmental coercion, and enable the public to maintain confidence in society as a whole even during periods of governmental weakness.

An example of Tainter's Critique of Simplistic Models[link]

Tainter argues that these models, though superficially useful, cannot severally or jointly account for all instances of societal collapse. Often they are seen as interconnected occurrences that reinforce each other.

Ahu Tongariki near Rano Raraku, a 15-moai ahu excavated and restored in the 1990s

For example, the failure of Easter Island's leaders to remedy rapid ecological deterioration ("Dinosaur") cannot be understood without reference to the other models above. The islanders, who erected large statues called moai as a form of religious reverence to their ancestors, used felled trees as rollers to transport them. Because the islanders firmly believed that their displays of reverence would lead to increased future prosperity, they had a deeply entrenched incentive to intensify moai production ("Runaway Train"). Because Easter Island's geographic isolation made its resources hard to replenish and made the balance of its overall ecosystem very delicate ("House of Cards"), deforestation led to soil erosion and insufficient resources to build boats for fishing or tools for hunting. Competition for dwindling resources resulted in warfare and many casualties (an additional "Runaway Train" iteration). Together these events led to the collapse of the civilization, but no single factor above provides an adequate account.

Mainstream interpretations of the history of Easter Island also include the slave raiders who abducted a large proportion of the population and epidemics that killed most of the survivors (see Easter Island History#Destruction of society and population.) Again, no single point explains the collapse; only a complex and integrated view can do so.

Tainter's position is that social complexity is a recent and comparatively anomalous occurrence requiring constant support. He asserts that collapse is best understood by grasping four axioms. In his own words (p. 194):

1. human societies are problem-solving organizations;
2. sociopolitical systems require energy for their maintenance;
3. increased complexity carries with it increased costs per capita; and
4. investment in sociopolitical complexity as a problem-solving response reaches a point of declining marginal returns.

With these facts in mind, collapse can simply be understood as a loss of the energy needed to maintain social complexity. Collapse is thus the sudden loss of social complexity, stratification, internal and external communication and exchange, and productivity.

Toynbee’s theory of decay[link]

The British historian Arnold J. Toynbee, in his 12-volume magnum opus A Study of History (1961), theorized that all civilizations pass through several distinct stages: genesis, growth, time of troubles, universal state, and disintegration. (Carroll Quigley would expand on this theory in his The Evolution of Civilizations.)

Toynbee argues that the breakdown of civilizations is not caused by loss of control over the environment, over the human environment, or attacks from outside. Rather, ironically, societies that develop great expertise in problem solving become incapable of solving new problems by overdeveloping their structures for solving old ones.

The fixation on the old methods of the "Creative Minority" leads it to eventually cease to be creative and degenerates into merely a "Dominant minority" (that forces the majority to obey without meriting obedience), failing to recognize new ways of thinking. He argues that creative minorities deteriorate due to a worship of their "former self," by which they become prideful, and fail to adequately address the next challenge they face.

He argues that the ultimate sign a civilization has broken down is when the dominant minority forms a "Universal State," which stifles political creativity. He states:

He argues that, as civilizations decay, they form an "Internal Proletariat" and an "External Proletariat." The Internal proletariat is held in subjugation by the dominant minority inside the civilization, and grows bitter; the external proletariat exists outside the civilization in poverty and chaos, and grows envious. He argues that as civilizations decay, there is a "schism in the body social," whereby:

• abandon and self-control together replace creativity, and
• truancy and martyrdom together replace discipleship by the creative minority.

He argues that in this environment, people resort to archaism (idealization of the past), futurism (idealization of the future), detachment (removal of oneself from the realities of a decaying world), and transcendence (meeting the challenges of the decaying civilization with new insight, as a Prophet). He argues that those who Transcend during a period of social decay give birth to a new Church with new and stronger spiritual insights, around which a subsequent civilization may begin to form after the old has died.

Toynbee's use of the word 'church' refers to the collective spiritual bond of a common worship, or the same unity found in some kind of social order.

Foreign invasions[link]

The decline of the Roman Empire is one of the events traditionally marking the end of Classical Antiquity and the beginning of the European Middle Ages. Throughout the 5th century, the Empire's territories in western Europe and northwestern Africa, including Italy, fell to various invading or indigenous peoples in what is sometimes called the Barbarian invasions, although the eastern half still survived with borders essentially intact for several centuries (until the Arab expansion). This view of the collapse of the Roman Empire is challenged, however, by modern historians who see Rome as merely transforming from the Western Empire into barbarian kingdoms as the Western Emperors delegated themselves out of existence, and the East transforming into the Byzantine Empire, which only fell in 1453 CE.

North Africa's populous and flourishing civilization collapsed after exhausting its resources in internal fighting and suffering devastation from the invasion of the Bedouin tribes of Banu Sulaym and Banu Hilal.^[6] Ibn Khaldun noted that the lands ravaged by Banu Hilal invaders had become completely arid desert.^[7]

In the brutal pillaging that followed Mongol invasions, the invaders decimated the populations of China, Russia, the Middle East, and Islamic Central Asia. Later Mongol leaders, such as Timur, though he himself became a Muslim, destroyed many cities, slaughtered thousands of people and did irreparable damage to the ancient irrigation systems of Mesopotamia. These invasions transformed a civil society to a nomadic one.^[8]

Encounters between European explorers and populations in the rest of the world often introduced local epidemics of extraordinary virulence. Smallpox ravaged Mexico in the 1520s, killing 150,000 in Tenochtitlán alone, including the emperor, and Peru in the 1530s, aiding the European conquerors.^[9] Some believe that the death of up to 95% of the Native American population of the New World was caused by Old World diseases.^[10]

Examples of civilizations and societies that have collapsed[link]

By Reversion/Simplification

• Hittite Empire
• Mycenaean Greece
• The Neo-Assyrian Empire
• Indus Valley Civilization
• Mauryan and Gupta states
• Angkor civilization of the Khmer Empire
• Han and Tang Dynasty of China
• Anasazi
• Western Roman Empire, Decline of the Roman Empire
• Izapa
• Maya, Classic Maya collapse
• Munhumutapa Empire
• Olmec

By Incorporation/Absorption

• Sumer
• Ancient Egypt
• Babylonia
• Etruscans
• Ancient Levant
• Classical Greece
• Dacians
• Eastern Roman Empire (Medieval Greek) of the Byzantines
• Modern North East Asian civilisations, Hindu and Mughal India
• Qin, Song, Mongol and Qing China
• Tokugawa Shogunate of Japan, ending with the Meiji Restoration
• Aztecs and Incas

Places that are believed to represent past "societal collapses"[link]

• Cahokia
• Atlantis
• Easter Island
• Lost cities
• Norse colony on Greenland
• Pitcairn Island
• Malden Island

See also[link]

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Diamond, Jared M. (2005). Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. New York: Viking Books. ISBN 0-14-303655-6.
• Homer-Dixon, Thomas. (2006). The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilization. Washington DC: Island Press.
• Tainter, Joseph A. (1990). The Collapse of Complex Societies (1st paperback ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-38673-X.
• Toynbee, Arnold J. (1934–1961). A Study of History, Volumes I-XII. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Wright, Ronald. (2004). A Short History of Progress. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers. ISBN 0-7867-1547-2.

Joel M. Skousen is an American conservative political commentator^[1] non-fiction Survivalist author, and retreat consultant who specializes in preparedness topics, particularly survival retreat and fallout shelter design and construction, as well as in what he calls "strategic relocation."^[2] Skousen is the founder and chief editor of World Affairs Brief,^[3] a weekly news-analysis service. He has offered in both North and Central America consultation regarding architectural and retreat design.^[4]

Skousen has written several books. including Essential Principles for the Conservation of Liberty, Strategic Relocation—North American Guide to Safe Places, The Secure Home, Survival Home Manual: Architectural Design, Construction, and Remodeling Of Self-Sufficient Residences and Retreats, and How to Implement a High Security Shelter in the Home. He also published a booklet titled 10 Packs for Survival, which he has also posted to several web sites.^[5]

Skousen designs and consults on hardened retreat homes,^[6] often including fallout shelters with HEPA air filtration systems. In the book Dancing at Armageddon: Survivalism and Chaos in Modern Times by Richard G. Mitchell, Jr., (2001) Skousen was quoted: "'You never want to make a house look like an obvious fortress. Those who want in can always move up a bigger gun. There is no way you can design a home to withstand RPG (Rocket-propelled grenade) rockets and tanks. I design these homes so you virtually cannot tell inside or out that they are any different from a conventional home.'"^[7]

Because of its low population density and diverse economy, both Skousen^[8] and survivalist writer James Wesley Rawles ^[9] recommend the Intermountain west region of the United States, as a preferred region for relocation and setting up survival retreats.

Skousen was raised in Oregon and later served as a USMC fighter pilot during the Vietnam Era. During the 1980s Skousen was the Chairman of the Conservative National Committee. He was also the Executive Editor of Conservative Digest.^[10]

In late 2007, Skousen gained attention^{[citation needed]} when he gave his support to Ron Paul rather than to fellow LDS church member Mitt Romney in the 2008 US presidential campaign, in a widely-circulated YouTube video clip.^[11] After John McCain became the Republican Party's presumptive nominee in early 2008, Skousen also endorsed Pastor Chuck Baldwin of the Constitution Party: "As Ron Paul goes back to Congress to continue the fight there, I believe Chuck Baldwin is the person to continue the fight during this election cycle and beyond."^[12]

Joel Skousen is the older brother of Mark Skousen and the younger brother of Royal Skousen. The three Skousen brothers are the nephews of conservative author and commentator Cleon Skousen.^[10]

Books[link]

• Survival Home Manual: Architectural Design, Construction, and Remodeling Of Self-Sufficient Residences and Retreats, ISBN 1-199-30639-6 (1982)

• Essential Principles for the Conservation of Liberty, ISBN 1-199-30661-4 (1984)

• How to Implement a High Security Shelter in the Home, ISBN 1-199-30652-4 (1998)

• The Secure Home, ISBN 1-199-30672-0 (May, 1999)

• Strategic Relocation—North American Guide to Safe Places, ISBN 1-56861-053-X (various editions, latest listed is February, 2006)

Quotes[link]

This section is a candidate to be copied to Wikiquote using the Transwiki process.

• Many Christians think it is wonderful anytime government officials mention God or quote from the Bible. I take strong exception, and not because I believe it is improper for government officials to appeal to God. I simply object to dropping the name of God or quoting scripture to cover for evil, and otherwise convince naive troops and Christians in general that an evil cause is just.^[13]

• More than ever, I still consider the nuclear attack on America as inevitable, both because the real axis of evil (Russia and China) are still building for that attack, and because our own government is controlled by those intent upon destroying US sovereignty and delivering our nation over to a socialist New World Order (NWO). [2006]^[14]

• The one thing you can learn from the liberal and controlled media, including arch liberal newspapers like the Washington Post, NY Times, and LA Times, is the direction in which the conspiracy against liberty is going. I spend about a third of my time watching what the opposition does. When they start uniformly promoting certain issues in all the liberal journals (global warming, smart growth, gun control, etc.), it is obvious that there is some coordination going on. But remember, you can only learn to see through the selectively filtered news dispensed by the establishment media if you have other sources that feed you the missing pieces.^[15]

• In terms of unity, we are at a real disadvantage up against the left. It only takes one thing in common for “liberals” to unite. It only takes one difference of opinion for conservatives to divide.^[16]

See also[link]

	Biography portal
	United States Marine Corps portal

• Self-sufficiency
• Intentional Community
• Blast shelter

References[link]

External links[link]

• Skousen's web site
• World Affairs Brief, Joel Skousen's weekly news analysis
• 10 Packs for Survival
• Joel Skousen Bill of Rights Day Speech, Salt Lake City, Utah. December 15, 2007

Jared Diamond
Born	Jared Mason Diamond (1937-09-10) September 10, 1937 (age 74) Boston, Massachusetts
Residence	United States
Citizenship	American
Fields	Physiology Biophysics Ornithology Environmentalism Ecology Geography Evolutionary Biology Anthropology
Institutions	University of California, Los Angeles
Alma mater	Harvard College Cambridge University
Notable awards	Phi Beta Kappa Award in Science (1997) Royal Society Prize for Science Books (1992, 1998 & 2006) Pulitzer Prize (1998) National Medal of Science (1999)

Jared Mason Diamond (born September 10, 1937) is an American scientist and author best known for his popular science books The Third Chimpanzee, Guns, Germs, and Steel, and Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. Originally trained in physiology, Diamond's work is known for drawing from a variety of fields, and he is currently Professor of Geography at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Biography[link]

Diamond was born in Boston, Massachusetts, to a Bessarabian Jewish family. His father Louis K. Diamond was a physician and his mother Flora Kaplan a teacher, musician, and linguist. He attended the Roxbury Latin School and earned an A.B. from Harvard College in 1958 and a Ph.D. in physiology and membrane biophysics from the University of Cambridge in 1961.

After graduating from Cambridge, Diamond returned to Harvard as a Junior Fellow until 1965, and, in 1968, became Professor of Physiology at UCLA Medical School. While in his twenties, he developed a second, parallel, career in ornithology and ecology, specialising in New Guinea and nearby islands. Then in his fifties, Diamond developed a third career in environmental history and became Professor of Geography at UCLA, his current position.^[1] He was awarded the National Medal of Science in 1999^[2] and an honorary doctorate by Westfield State University in 2009.

Diamond is married to Marie Diamond (née Marie Nabel Cohen), granddaughter of Polish politician Edward Werner, and has two adult sons.^{[citation needed]}

Work[link]

Diamond's original specialism was salt absorption in the gall bladder.^[3] He has also published scholarly works in the fields of ecology and ornithology, but is best known for authoring of a number of popular science books combining topics from diverse fields other than those he has formally studied. Because of this diversity Diamond has been described as a polymath.^[4][5]

Diamond's first popular book, The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal (1991), examined human evolution and its relevance to the modern world, incorporating evidence from anthropology, evolutionary biology, genetics, ecology, and linguistics. It was well-received by critics and won the 1992 Rhône-Poulenc Prize for Science Books^[6] and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize.^[7] In 1997, he followed this up with Why is Sex Fun?, which focused in on the evolution of human sexuality, again drawing from anthropology, ecology, and evolutionary biology.

His third and best known popular science book, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, was published in 1997. In it, Diamond sought to explain the political and economic dominance of Eurasian societies over those from other parts of the world throughout history. Using evidence archaeological and historical case studies and evidence from genetics and linguistics, he argued that gaps in power and technology between human societies are not primarily caused by cultural or racial differences, but originated in environmental differences amplified by various positive feedback loops. According to Diamond the geography and ecology of the Eurasian landmass gave societies there an advantage over those on other continents, which they were subsequently able to dominate or conquer. Guns, Germs, and Steel was a best-seller and received several awards, including a Pulitzer Prize, an Aventis Prize for Science Books^[6] and the 1997 Phi Beta Kappa Award in Science. However the work was criticised for factual inaccuracies in some of Diamond's case studies, and more generally as an argument for environmental determinism. A television documentary based on the book was produced by the National Geographic Society in 2005.

Diamond's next book, Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (2005), examined a range of past civilizations in an attempt to identify why they either collapsed or succeeded, and considers what contemporary societies can learn from these historical examples. As in Guns, Germs, and Steel, he argued against explanations for the failure of past societies based primarily on cultural factors, instead focusing on ecology. Among the societies mentioned in the book are the Norse and Inuit of Greenland, the Maya, the Anasazi, the indigenous people of Rapa Nui (Easter Island), Japan, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and modern Montana. Similarly Collapse was again both critically acclaimed and criticised for environmental determinism and specific factual inaccuracies.^[8] It was nominated for Royal Society Prize for Science Books.^[6]

Diamond's most recent book Natural Experiments of History, co-edited with James Robinson, is a collection of essays illustrating the multidisciplinary and comparative approach to the study of history that he advocates.^[9]

[edit] Vengeance Is Ours (2008)

On 21 April 2009, Henep Isum Mandingo and Hup Daniel Wemp of Papua New Guinea filed a $10 million USD defamation lawsuit against Diamond over a 2008 New Yorker magazine article entitled "Vengeance Is Ours: What Can Tribal Societies Tell Us About Our Need to Get Even?"^[10] Mandingo and Wemp claimed the article, an account of feuds and vengeance killings in the New Guinea highlands, misrepresented and embellished their involvement in inter-tribal violence.^[11] The lawsuit came after Rhonda Roland Shearer alleged that the New Yorker article contained factual inaccuracies – most notably that Mandingo was fit and healthy, not, as claimed by Diamond, wheelchair-bound after being injured in fighting.^[12]

Diamond and the New Yorker both stood by the article, maintaining that it was a faithful account of the story related to Diamond by Wemp while they worked together in 2001 and again in a formal interview in 2006. They said that the article was based on "detailed notes", that both Diamond and the magazine did all they reasonably could to verify the story, and that in a recorded phone interview conducted in August 2008 by Chris Jennings, a fact checker for the New Yorker, Wemp did not raise any significant objections.^[13] Wemp contends he told Jennings the story was "inaccurate, inaccurate".^[12] According to anthropologist Pauline Wiessner, an expert on tribal warfare in Papua New Guinea, young men often exaggerate or make up entirely their exploits in tribal warfare; she stated that Diamond would have been naïve to accept Wemp's stories at face value.^[13]

Selected publications[link]

Books[link]

• 1972 Avifauna of the Eastern Highlands of New Guinea, Publications of the Nuttall Ornithological Club, No. 12, Cambridge, Mass., pp. 438.[1]
• 1975 M. L. Cody and J. M. Diamond, eds. Ecology and Evolution of Communities. Belknap Press, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass.
• 1979 J. M. Diamond and M. LeCroy. Birds of Karkar and Bagabag Islands, New Guinea. Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist. 164:469–531
• 1984 J. M. Diamond. The Avifaunas of Rennell and Bellona Islands. The Natural History of Rennell Islands, British Solomon Islands 8:127–168
• 1986 J. M. Diamond and T. J. Case. eds. Community Ecology. Harper and Row, New York
• 1986 B. Beehler, T. Pratt, D. Zimmerman, H. Bell, B. Finch, J. M. Diamond, and J. Coe. Birds of New Guinea. Princeton University Press,Princeton
• 1992 The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal, ISBN 0-06-098403-1
• 1997 Why is Sex Fun? The Evolution of Human Sexuality, ISBN 0-465-03127-7
• 1997 Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. W.W. Norton & Co. ISBN 0-393-06131-0
• 2001 The Birds of Northern Melanesia: Speciation, Ecology, & Biogeography (with Ernst Mayr), ISBN 0-19-514170-9
• 2003 Guns, Germs, and Steel Reader's Companion, ISBN 1-58663-863-7.
• 2005 Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. New York: Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-303655-6.
• 2010 Natural Experiments of History (with James A. Robinson). ISBN 0-674-03557-7 ISBN 978-0674035577

Articles[link]

• Island Biogeography and the Design of Natural Reserves (1976), in Robert M. May's Theoretical Ecology: Principles and Applications, Blackwell Scientific Publications, pp. 163–186.
• Ethnic differences. Variation in human testis size. (April 1986) Nature 320(6062):488–489 PubMed.
• The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race (May 1987) Discover pp. 64–66
• Japanese Roots (June 1998) Discover
• Curse and Blessing of the Ghetto (March 1991) Discover, pp. 60–66
• Race Without Color (November 1994) Discover
• The Curse of QWERTY (April 1997) Discover
• Kinship With The Stars (May 1997) Discover
• Japanese Roots (June 1998) Discover
• What’s Your Consumption Factor? (January 2, 2008) The New York Times
• Vengeance is Ours (April 2008) The New Yorker
• Diamond, Jared (2011). "Why do some societies make disastrous decisions?". In John Brockman. Culture: leading scientists explore civilizations, art, networks, reputation, and the on-line revolution. New York: Harper Perennial. ISBN 978-0-06-202313-1. 

Boards[link]

• Editorial board, Skeptic Magazine, a publication of The Skeptics Society
• Member, the American Philosophical Society
• Member, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
• Member, the National Academy of Sciences
• US regional director of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF/World Wildlife Fund)

Awards and honors[link]

• 1961–1965 Prize Fellowship in Physiology, Trinity College, Cambridge, England
• 1968–1971 Lederle Medical Faculty Award
• 1972 Distinguished Teaching Award, UCLA Medical Class
• 1973 Distinguished Teaching Award, UCLA Medical Class
• 1975 Distinguished Achievement Award, American Gastroenterological Association
• 1976 Kaiser Permanente/Golden Apple Teaching Award
• 1976 Nathaniel Bowditch Prize, American Physiological Society
• 1978 American Ornithologists Union, elected fellow
• 1979 Franklin L. Burr Award, National Geographic Society
• 1985 MacArthur Foundation “Genius” Grant
• 1989 Archie Carr Medal
• 1990 MacArthur Foundation Fellow
• 1992 Tanner Lecturer, University of Utah and many other endowed lectureships
• 1992 Rhône-Poulenc Prize for Science Books for The Third Chimphanzee^[6]
• 1992 Los Angeles Times Science Book Prize^[7]
• 1993 Zoological Society of San Diego Conservation Medal
• 1994 Skeptics Society, Randi Award
• 1995 Honorary doctor of literature, Sejong University, Korea
• 1996 Faculty Research Lecturer, UCLA
• 1997 Phi Beta Kappa Science Book Prize for Guns, Germs and Steel
• 1998 Pulitzer Prize for Guns, Germs and Steel
• 1998 Elliott Coues Award, American Ornithologists' Union
• 1998 California Book Awards, Gold Medal in nonfiction for Guns, Germs and Steel
• 1998 Aventis Prize for Science Books for Guns, Germs and Steel^[6]
• 1998 International Cosmos Prize^[1]
• 1999 Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction
• 1999 National Medal of Science
• 2001 Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement
• 2002 Lewis Thomas Prize for Writing about Science
• 2006 Royal Society Prize for Science Books for Collapse^[6]
• 2006 Dickson Prize in Science
• 2008 Ph.D. Honoris Causa at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium

See also[link]

• Assembly rules

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Jared Diamond

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Jared Diamond

• Diamond's page at the UCLA Department of Geography
• UCLA Spotlight – Jared Diamond
• Edge – Jared Diamond

Lectures and talks[link]

• Why societies collapse at TED, 2003
• Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed at The Earth Institute at Columbia University, April 2007
• The Evolution of Religions at the Center for Religion and Civic Culture, University of Southern California
• PBS – Guns, Germs and Steel (with full transcripts)

Interviews[link]

• Hammer Conversation with Jared Diamond and John Long, March 16 2010
• Interview with Charlie Rose
• Interview with New Books in History

Mark Levin
Levin speaks at an Americans for Prosperity conference in 2011
Birth name	Mark Reed Levin
Born	(1957-09-21) September 21, 1957 (age 54) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Show	The Mark Levin Show
Station(s)	WABC
Network	Cumulus Media Networks
Time slot	6-9 p.m. EST
Style	Talk radio
Country	United States
Website	marklevinshow.com

Mark Reed Levin (born September 21, 1957) is a lawyer, author and the host of American syndicated radio show The Mark Levin Show. Levin served in the administration of President Ronald Reagan and was a chief of staff for Attorney General Edwin Meese. He is president of the Landmark Legal Foundation, has authored bestselling books and contributes commentary to various media outlets such as National Review Online.^[1]