How did humanity come to its current state? What are the
mechanisms or processes that structure its historical development? What
explains the rise and fall of various groups of peoples? What is the “meaning”
of history? These are some of the questions that haunt the human evolutionary
story. These are big questionstypically not addressed by practicing historians.
At least, in the past, they have been the preserve mainly of mythologists,
theologians, metaphysicians, and philosophers of history. Is it possible that
the situation is now changing?
To comprehend what is happening,this article will briefly
establish the background against which the two books here under review should
be considered, look next atDiamond’s and Spier’s books themselves in some
detail, then contemplatealternative developments in world history and global
history, to finally arrive at an answer, even if only a tentative one, to some
of the questions posed above.
In the two to two and a half million years of evolution of
the hominoid species, a recognizable
consciousness came intoexistence only in the last one to two hundred thousand
years. Thus, the emergence of homo sapiens is a recent affair, first in
the form of Neanderthal man and only in the last 35,000 to 40,000 years in the
shape of their cousins,Cro-Magnon man (the sexism in the classifying term is
obvious). It is only with the latter that some structured future time sense, as
evidence in the form of religious relics and artistic renditions, appears.
Vague questions about human life and its trajectory
presumably arose about this time, 35,000 years ago, and, in the hunting-gathering
societiesthat have characterized most of human existence, found their response
in the form of myths. Not until the coming of the agricultural communityabout
12,000 years ago, did these myths take on formal and stable attributes. They
generally became the preserve of a specialized priesthood, though broadly
embraced by the general populace.
