WorldWide Molecular Matrix

For this book, here is such a sentence: "History followed different courses for different peoples because of differences among peoples' environments, not because of biological differences among peoples themselves." Naturally, the notion that environmental geography and biogeography influenced societal development is an old idea. Nowadays, though, the 26 •PROLOGUE view is not held in esteem by historians; it is considered wrong or simplistic, or it is caricatured as environmental determinism and dismissed (ha as did Cambridge Prof of history Martin Daunton!), or else the whole subject of trying to understand worldwide differences is shelved as too difficult. Yet geography obviously has some effect on history; the open question concerns how much effect, and whether geography can account for history's broad pattern. The time is now ripe for a fresh look at these questions, because of new information from scientific disciplines seemingly remote from human history. Those disciplines include, above all, genetics, molecular biology, and biogeography as applied to crops and their wild ancestors; the same disciplines plus behavioral ecology, as applied to domestic animals and their wild ancestors; molecular biology of human germs and related germs of animals; epidemiology of human diseases; human genetics; linguistics; archaeological studies on all continents and major islands; and studies of the histories of technology, writing, and political organization. This diversity of disciplines poses problems for would-be authors of a book aimed at answering Yali's question ...»