After you've read Part I: From Eden to Cajamarca, identify one point or issue with which you agree, disagree, or about which you would like to learn more. Use the SVHS databases or the Internet to find out more.
Your comment to this post should include the author, title, source, link or database title, and a summary of the source. In your summary, please explain why you choice this particular topic for further exploration.
"The migrations from Hawaiki" from Te Ara, the Encyclopedia of New Zealand. www.teara.govt.nz/en/moriori/page-2
ReplyDeleteI wanted to find out more about the pacifist nature of the Moriori, so I found this article. The article provided details about the first migration of the Wheteina people to Chatham Island, the second migration of Rauru people to Pitt Island. It explained some of the fighting that led to a declaration of peace. The Wheteina and Rauru tribes had begun fighting because of a lover's spat that ended in one of the partners dying. All of the fighting ended disastrously when a group of people were allegedly burned in their huts. A high ranking chief named Nunuku-whenua, in response to the fighting, forbade murder and cannibalism. He stated, "From now and forever, never again let there be war as this day has seen!" and this covenant became known as Nunuku's Law. The Nunuku's Curse, which followed after, stated "May your bowels rot the day you disobey." I chose this topic for further explanation because I was curious about what exactly influenced a culture so much to the point where they refused to fight back against an intimidating enemy. This was one of the major factors that allowed the Maori to triumph over the Moriori, and I wanted to know the details about how they renounced war forever.
Bennett Peterson, Barbara. "Maori Migration in New Zealand." World History: The Modern Era, ABC-CLIO, 2016, worldhistory.abc-clio.com. Accessed 27 Dec. 2016.
ReplyDeleteWhile reading the first part of Guns, Germs, and Steel I became curious about the history of the Maori tribe in New Zealand. The article begins by describing how the Maori had migrated from eastern Polynesia to New Zealand in the twelfth century, and mainly settled in the North Island around the Bay Islands while only a small amount of the population settled in the South Island. The article then goes on to describe how white settlers forced the internal Migration of the Maori tribes, and the white settlers provided the tribes with muskets, fish hooks, and iron implements. The muskets allowed for the northern tribes such as the Ngapuhi, led by Hongi Hika, to go to war with the central and southern tribes of the North Island which caused a large amount of Maori tribes to migrate to the South Island. The article then goes on to explain the battles of Hongi Hika against the many tribes on the North Island. As a result of this war the Maori population had decreased from 100,000 to 60,000 not only because of the war, but due to the fact that white settlers were introducing new diseases. Since the British were settling in New Zealand they needed to have peaceful relations with the Maori, so they sent the naval officer Captain William Hobson to negotiate sovereignty with the Maori chiefs. These negotiations ended with signing of the Treaty of Waitangi which extended British sovereignty over all of New Zealand. Even though this treaty was signed there was still land and sovereignty issues between the Maori and the British which resulted in a war between them. At the end of the war the Maori had lost most of their land to the British. The development of the Maori interested me because they were said to be more advanced than the Moriori, and I was curious to how they became more advanced. Through researching the history of the Maori tribe I can determine how they were able to kill many of the Moriori, and this article helps one understand what happened to the tribe after the collision between the Moriori and the Maori.
Mayell, Hillary. “First Humans in Australia Dated to 50,000 Years Ago.” National Geographic, National Geographic Society, 24 Feb. 2003, news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/02/0224_030224_mungoman.html.
ReplyDeleteChapter One of Guns, Germs, and Steel is partly about how parts of the world were populated, and goes into specifics about Australia and New Guinea. It focuses more on ways that Australia most likely was not populated, and I wanted to find more about the possible ways it was. The article begins by describing two burials at Lake Mungo in Australia, the oldest known burial with red ocher and the oldest known burial using cremation. The man and the woman buried both died around 40,000 years ago, but some scientists say they were 20,000 years old while others have found that they were 60,000 years old. The next part of the article states that there were modern humans in Africa around 130,000 years ago, and humans began to migrate out of Africa about 50,000 years ago. Many scientists think that it is unreasonable to believe that humans were in Africa 60,000 years ago if mass migration didn't start until 50,000 years ago, but there could have been many smaller wave of migration before mass migration. The final part of the article describes how some of the small communities lived at Lake Mungo, and that they left when water levels were low and returned when the water levels were high again. I chose to look into this topic more because the explanations of how people populated Australia in the book are vague, and it is important to know how early people accomplished tough tasks with their limited knowledge of how to best use their resources.
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ReplyDeletePerlman, USGS Howard. "Some Irrigation Methods." Irrigation: How Farmers Irrigate Fields. U.S. Department of the Interior, 2 Dec. 2016. Web. 01 Jan. 2017. .
ReplyDeleteThis informational page created by the U.S. Department of the Interior about the methods of irrigation and their uses. I chose this topic because Diamond talks about how long irrigation systems have existed and I wanted to know how far the process has come. Firstly, the different types of systems are of various complexities, starting from furrows in the ground to route water to the crops. A furrow, is very simple and inexpensive to construct, however does not water plants evenly and has limited range. This would be effective in a small home garden or in auxiliary fields where larger system cannot reach. On the other side of the spectrum, a center pivot irrigation system rotates a large boom arm on wheels and feeding water to the sprinklers on the arm. Here, it is neither simple or inexpensive, but allows for even watering across hundreds of acres of field with one unit. This would be appropriate in an industrial farm where thousands of tons of food is produced. All in all, the level of technology has greatly increased and with it comes massive benefits and scalability.
https://water.usgs.gov/edu/irquicklook.html
DeleteUsilton, Larry W. "Francisco Pizarro." Salem Press Biographical Encyclopedia, Salem Press, 2016. Topic Overviews 6-12. Accessed 7 Jan. 2017.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading about the encounter between Pizarro and Atahuallpa, I wanted to learn more about Pizarro himself. This article provides an account of Pizarro's personal life and his career as a conquistador. The article talks about how Pizarro grew up impoverished and at first had little success in his conquests. However, he managed to get help from the king and queen of Spain for more expeditions. In 1532 he encountered and executed Atahuallpa at Cajamarca. He then proceeded to conquer Cuzco and rule over most of Peru, establishing Lima as his capital. A few years later he was killed in a revolt. I chose to research him because I wanted to find out more of the story of Cajamarca from his perspective.
Siggurdsson. "Battle of Cajamarca: Pizarro's Conquistadores Ambush, Capture Incan Emperor." Burn Pit, American Legion, 16 Nov. 2012. Accessed 18 Jan. 2017.
ReplyDeleteWhen reading about the Battle of Cajamarca, I became interested with this topic and wanted to learn more, in detail, about what had happened during this time. This article, in summary, was mainly about how Spanish conquistadores sought out to find wealth and power in the Western Hemisphere. This group was led by Francisco Pizarro. Like in the book, this article explains that the Spanish did not have numbers, but they carried more advanced weapons and firearms. One thing I have learned, is that they tried to convince the aztecs that they had “super powers”, or in other words, gods. The day of the battle, Atahualpa had no intent in following the Spaniard’s orders, so the Spanish army fired guns, and other advanced weaponry. Overall, this article backed up Diamond’s information, and broadened the topic for more understanding on what had happened that day.
“Introduction to Human Evolution” Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History http://humanorigins.si.edu/education/introduction-human-evolution
ReplyDeleteWhen reading part 1 of Guns, Germs, and Steel I became further interested in the evolution of humans and our closest living relatives, three species of the great ape. To start, the article introduces human evolution and explains that humans have evolved for roughly six million years. The article then describes how the ability to walk on two legs most likely evolved over four million years ago, but additional significant traits evolved more recently during the past 100,000 years. Furthermore, the article explains that humans share a common ancestor with the great ape and evolved from Africa. Also, most of human evolution occurred in Africa, and humans did not leave Africa to go to Asia until around two million years ago. Scientists acknowledged that there were about fifteen to twenty species of humans and most species did not leave living descendants. The article then describes how Paleoanthropology is the study of human evolution, where paleoanthropologists discover how evolution has influenced humans today. Lastly, the article concludes by discussing the process of evolution. I decided to gather further information on the topic of evolution because all that I had really learned about evolution was that we descended from apes. I was interested in learning more of the specifics of evolution.
Gardener, A. T. "What Were the Most Important Factors in Explaining the Spanish Victory Over the Aztecs & Incas." seattlepi, Hearst Seattle Media, education.seattlepi.com/were-important-factors-explaining-spanish-victory-over-aztecs-incas-6698.html. Accessed 20 Jan. 2017.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading how Pizarro captured Atahualpa and the Incas in Part One of Guns, Germs, and Steel, I was interested in finding out more about what contributed to the Spanish victory. The article starts by giving the general information on what happened when the Spanish sailed to the Americas to conquer the Aztecs and Incas even though they were vastly outnumbered. The author attributes their victory to more than is easily observed. One of these factors were the superior weapons of the Spaniards. They had guns and gun powder that the native people did not and even steel-edged swords gave them an advantage. In addition, several generations of Spanish warriors used the strategy of forming alliances with captured or battled Aztecs or Incas after they learned of their plans to conquer the rest of them. This helped with the fact that the Spaniards were outnumbered. Also, since there were many more animals suitable for domestication in Europe, the Spaniards had the advantage of horses that the Aztecs and Incas had no match for. Finally, in the Spaniards more developed societies, more germs existed that they had already been exposed to, but when they exposed them to the Aztecs and Incas who had not built up an immune system to them, many died. Overall, coinciding with Guns, Germs, and Steel, I found this article insightful in picking out the underlying reason for the many shocking victories of the Spaniards.
Human Rights Watch. "World Report 2014: Papua New Guinea." Human Rights Watch,
ReplyDelete2014, www.hrw.org/world-report/2014/country-chapters/papua-new-guinea.
Accessed 20 Jan. 2017.
While reading part one of Guns, Germs, and Steel I was really intrigued by Diamond's description of New Guinea. I thought it was interesting how he said they could be smarter than the westerners and I followed what he said. However, I wanted to know more about what New Guinea was like so I looked it up. It turns out that as of 2013 it is a pretty violent place. There is a ton of crime that occurs and a lot of it happens to children and women. The article first describes the police and there are cases of physical and sexual abuse that occur towards women and children. The page also described a gruesome event where the police sliced 74 ankles belonging to men in a street brawl. More facts were astonishing me like 68% of women have endured violent acts and a third of them have been raped. Citizens with disabilities are also oppressed and after years of not having the death penalty it has made a reappearance. Corruption is a huge factor that is seen where 40% of their budget is misappropriated every year and corruption occurs in their biggest economic growth area which is the extraction of oil. The country that really supports them as an international partner is Australis who gave them $469 million dollars for developmental purposes in 2012-2013. It seems like a very dangerous place to be in and looks like it doesn't have a positive outlook.
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ReplyDeleteWhile reading the first part of Guns, Germs, and Steel I found it very interesting about the dramatic capture of Atahualpa, the last Incan Emperor. I found it weird because he had this huge empire around him, probably the most built up at the time, and he was captured in a matter of minutes. According to GGS he was captured by Pizarro who lead a group of 168 men in unfamiliar territory. According to the article I used he was captured at a dinner invitation by Vincent de Valverde. Atahualpa's men, 5,000 were all killed within the hour. He was kept prisoner for the rest of his life, and strangled as a Christian so he could have an afterlife.
ReplyDelete"The Dramatic Life and Death of Atahualpa, the Last Emperor of the Inca Empire." Ancient Origins. Ancient Origins, 7 Apr. 2015. Web. 21 Jan. 2017.
http://www.ancient-origins.net/history-famous-people/dramatic-life-and-death-atahualpa-last-emperor-inca-empire-002873
Delete“Unit 1 - Spain in the New World to 1600” Lebame Houston and Wynne Dough
ReplyDeletehttps://www.nps.gov/fora/learn/education/unit-1-spain-in-the-new-world-to-1600.htm
When reading the first part of Guns, Germs, and Steel I became interested in how the Spanish conquistadors conquered the New World. Essentially, in the early 1500’s, more Spanish settlers started to come to the New World. Upon their arrival, they spread diseases endemic to Europe, the “germs” of GGS, which weakened indigenous people who were not immune to the diseases. By 1550, Spain had control over the West Indies and Central America. The New World was also rich with resources like precious metals, spices, sugar, wood, tobacco, and cacao. However, Spain was unsuccessful in conquering North America. This article supported what Diamond had to say about European guns, germs, and steel having been the main reasons why Europe was able to conquer so much of the world. Spanish weapons and diseases proved to be enough to conquer much of Central America.
Our Brains Are Shrinking. Are We Getting Dumber? http://www.npr.org/2011/01/02/132591244/our-brains-are-shrinking-are-we-getting-dumber
ReplyDeleteNPR's Jaki Lyden was the reporter for this article.
While reading chapter 1 of From Eden Cajamarca, I was curious to learn more about what Cro-Magnons exactly were. While reading through Diamond's text it was quite intriguing learning about how they had a fully modern developed human skeleton. Building upon this idea, I discovered an NPR article pertaining to the Cro-Magnons and humans in this generation. The article is an interview explaining how the Cro-Magnon had the biggest brain of any human species. Humans brains today are in fact getting much smaller rather than growing. The article additionally states how the evolution of humans up to now, we do not have to survive as much as Cro-Magnons essentially. It seems as society grows more complex, the thoughts needed to know how to survive decreases. Cro-Magnons as Diamond said developed some of the earliest tools like fishhooks so they could survive, this could have increased the size of their brain from the fact they have to start from scratch in order to obtain food, find a shelter, rather than just relying on modern machinery for something to be completed.
Kopel, Dave, et al. "A Moriori Lesson: A brief history of pacifism." Dave Kopel, www.davekopel.com/NRO/2003/Moriori-Lesson.htm.
ReplyDeleteWhile reading part 1, I found myself wanting to learn more about the Moriori Tribe, I was especially wondering why they decided to settle everything peacefully even after they started to be killed. After searching for a while a found this website that provided a story of how the Moriori became a peaceful tribe. It turns out that the Moriori were actually a very violent tribe of cannibals. They would always be fighting. One day the chief got sick of what he was witnessing and demanded the fighting sides to stop. He declared, "Listen all! From now and forever, never again let there be war as this day has been! From today on forget the taste of human flesh!" Those who refused to honor Nunuku's decree would be cursed: "May your bowels rot the day you disobey.". This virtually caused an extremely violent tribe to transform into a peaceful one overnight. The website also stated that the Moriori and Maori tribes shared a common ancestry but in the 13th or 14th century the Moriori tribe left New Zealand and traveled to the Chatham Islands.
Human Evoluation 101
ReplyDeletehttp://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/09/human-evolution-101/
While reading the first part of Guns, Germs, and and steel I became interested in human evoluation and our ancestors. The articles starts off by saying that 99% of our genes are shared with that of chimpanzee's and baboon's. We have evolved from apes and other species of that kind. About 13 million years ago we have emerged from apes to human through evolution. The article then states that the modern humans started in Africa and somehow broke into 2 groups 1 in Asia and 1 in Africa.
The Moriori
ReplyDeletehttp://history-nz.org/moriori.html
While reading the first part, I became very interested in the Moriori people and their relationship with the Maoris. In the article explaining the Moriori in more detail, starting with the Moriori settling on the Chatham Islands close to New Zealand. Before the Moriori even associated with the Maori, Europeans arrived on the island in 1791. Although the European settlers did not bother the people, there was lots of fighting between tribes, which lead to declining population and eventually the chief demanding those to stop fighting. With that, the people became very peaceful and only fought until blood was drawn. This did not work out in their favor when more Europeans started settling on the islands in 1793, making the land more industrialized. Then in 1835, the Maori people came and claimed their land, and the leaders urged the people to be peaceful. This lead to the decline in number of people to only 101.
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ReplyDeletehttps://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/apr/16/artsandhumanities.arts
ReplyDelete"World's oldest jewellery found in cave" by Tim Radford
When Diamond discussed the first use of jewelry and linked it to the first signs of modern human thought that he describes as the Great Leap Forward, I was curious as to what use it had 40,000 years ago. In addition, I wondered whether an even older example of the Great Leap Forward was in existence. After a few minutes searching the web, I found this website that claimed the oldest piece of jewelry found was in fact a necklace laced with snail shells, that was found to be more than 75,000 years old. Further research found this to be true, so the necklace described in the book was not actually the oldest one, as he attests. This validates his theory that there will never be any true oldest X, as people will continually look for something older, beat the record, and be usurped. As for the first question, the use of these necklaces was to trade and to symbolize power.
Neanderthals, Humans Interbred—First Solid DNA Evidence
ReplyDeletehttp://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/05/100506-science-neanderthals-humans-mated-interbred-dna-gene/
Diamond describes homo sapiens and contrasts them to neanderthals. He says that they come from each other and I agree with him. This article scientifically proves that homo sapiens come genetically from neanderthals. The author of this states that there has been DNA evidence of similar thought processes and the only thing differing the two generations is knowledge capacity and brain development.