Jared Mason Diamond (born September 10, 1937) is an American

geographer A geographer is a physical scientist, social scientist or humanist whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's natural environment and human society, including how society and nature interacts. The Greek prefix "geo" means "earth" a ...

, historian,

ornithologist Ornithology is a branch of zoology that concerns the "methodological study and consequent knowledge of birds with all that relates to them." Several aspects of ornithology differ from related disciplines, due partly to the high visibility and th ...

, and author best known for his

popular science ''Popular Science'' (also known as ''PopSci'') is an American digital magazine carrying popular science content, which refers to articles for the general reader on science and technology subjects. ''Popular Science'' has won over 58 awards, incl ...

books ''

The Third Chimpanzee ''The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal'' is a 1991 book by academic and popular science author Jared Diamond, in which the author explores concepts relating to the animal origins of human behavior. The book follows a ...

'' (1991); ''

Guns, Germs, and Steel ''Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies'' (subtitled ''A Short History of Everybody for the Last 13,000 Years'' in Britain) is a 1997 transdisciplinary non-fiction book by Jared Diamond. In 1998, it won the Pulitzer Prize for gen ...

'' (1997, awarded a

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made h ...

); ''

Collapse Collapse or its variants may refer to: Concepts * Collapse (structural) * Collapse (topology), a mathematical concept * Collapsing manifold * Collapse, the action of collapsing or telescoping objects * Collapsing user interface elements ** ...

'' (2005), ''

The World Until Yesterday ''The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies?'' is a 2012 popular science book by American intellectual Jared Diamond. It explores what people living in the Western world can learn from traditional societies, includi ...

'' (2012), and ''

Upheaval {{Short pages monitor In 2008, Diamond published an article in ''The New Yorker'' entitled "Vengeance Is Ours", describing the role of revenge in tribal warfare in

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea (abbreviated PNG; , ; tpi, Papua Niugini; ho, Papua Niu Gini), officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea ( tpi, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niugini; ho, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niu Gini), is a country i ...

. A year later, two indigenous people mentioned in the article filed a lawsuit against Diamond and ''The New Yorker'', claiming the article defamed them. In 2013, ''The Observer'' reported that the lawsuit "was withdrawn by mutual consent after the sudden death of their lawyer."

''Natural Experiments of History'' (2010)

In 2010, Diamond co-edited (with James Robinson) ''Natural Experiments of History'', a collection of seven case studies illustrating the

multidisciplinary Interdisciplinarity or interdisciplinary studies involves the combination of multiple academic disciplines into one activity (e.g., a research project). It draws knowledge from several other fields like sociology, anthropology, psychology, ec ...

and comparative approach to the study of history that he advocates. The book's title stems from the fact that it is not possible to study history by the preferred methods of the laboratory sciences, i.e., by controlled experiments comparing replicated human societies as if they were test tubes of bacteria. Instead, one must look at natural experiments in which human societies that are similar in many respects have been historically perturbed. The book's afterword classifies natural experiments, discusses the practical difficulties of studying them, and offers suggestions on how to address those difficulties.

''The World Until Yesterday'' (2012)

In ''

'', published in 2012, Diamond asks what the western world can learn from traditional societies. It surveys 39 traditional small-scale societies of farmers and hunter-gatherers with respect to how they deal with universal human problems. The problems discussed include dividing space, resolving disputes, bringing up children, treatment of elders, dealing with dangers, formulating religions, learning multiple languages, and remaining healthy. The book suggests that some practices of traditional societies could be usefully adopted in the modern industrial world today, either by individuals or else by society as a whole.

''Upheaval'' (2019)

In '' Upheaval: How Nations Cope with Crisis and Change'' Diamond examines whether nations can find lessons during crises in a way like people do. The nations considered are Finland, Japan, Chile, Indonesia, Germany, Australia, and the U.S. Diamond identifies four modern threats: nuclear weapons, climate change, limited resources, and extreme inequality.

Anand Giridharadas Anand Giridharadas () is an American journalist and political pundit. He is a former columnist for ''The New York Times''. He is the author of four books: ''India Calling: An Intimate Portrait of a Nation's Remaking'' (2011), ''The True American: ...

, reviewing for ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', claimed the book contained many factual inaccuracies.

Daniel Immerwahr Daniel Immerwahr is an American historian, professor, and associate department chair of History at Northwestern University. His book, ''Thinking Small'', won the Merle Curti Award. His book, ''How to Hide an Empire'', was a national bestseller, on ...

, reviewing for ''

The New Republic ''The New Republic'' is an American magazine of commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts. Founded in 1914 by several leaders of the progressive movement, it attempted to find a balance between "a liberalism centered in hum ...

'', reports that Diamond has "jettisoned statistical analysis" and the associated rigour, even by the standards of his earlier books, which have themselves sometimes been challenged on this basis.

Personal life

Diamond is married to Marie Cohen, granddaughter of Polish politician

Edward Werner Edward Henryk Werner (23 May 1878 – 13 November 1945) was an economist, judge, industrialist, and politician. He was best known as Vice-Minister of Finance in the Second Polish Republic. Life Edward Werner was born in 1878 in Warsaw, to Broni ...

. They have twin sons, born in 1987.

Boards

* Editorial board of the ''

Skeptic Magazine ''Skeptic'', colloquially known as ''Skeptic magazine'', is a quarterly science education and science advocacy magazine published internationally by The Skeptics Society, a nonprofit organization devoted to promoting scientific skepticism and re ...

'', a publication of

The Skeptics Society The Skeptics Society is a nonprofit, member-supported organization devoted to promoting scientific skepticism and resisting the spread of pseudoscience, superstition, and irrational beliefs. The Skeptics Society was co-founded by Michael Sh ...

* Member of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...

* Member of the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

* Member of the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...

* U.S. regional director of the

World Wide Fund for Nature The World Wide Fund for Nature Inc. (WWF) is an international non-governmental organization founded in 1961 that works in the field of wilderness preservation and the reduction of human impact on the environment. It was formerly named the Wor ...

Awards and honors

* 1992

Tanner Lecturer The Tanner Lectures on Human Values is a multi-university lecture series in the humanities, founded in 1978, at Clare Hall, Cambridge University, by the American scholar Obert Clark Tanner. In founding the lecture, he defined their purpose as fol ...

University of Utah The University of Utah (U of U, UofU, or simply The U) is a public research university in Salt Lake City, Utah. It is the flagship institution of the Utah System of Higher Education. The university was established in 1850 as the University of De ...

* 1992

Rhône-Poulenc Prize for Science Books The Royal Society Science Books Prize is an annual £25,000 prize awarded by the Royal Society to celebrate outstanding popular science books from around the world. It is open to authors of science books written for a non-specialist audience, and ...

for ''The Third Chimpanzee'' * 1997 Phi Beta Kappa Science Book Prize for ''Guns, Germs and Steel'' *

1998 Pulitzer Prize A listing of the Pulitzer Prize award winners for 1998: Journalism Letters * Biography or Autobiography ** ''Personal History'' by Katharine Graham (Alfred A. Knopf) * Fiction ** '' American Pastoral'' by Philip Roth (Houghton Mifflin) * Hi ...

for General Non-Fiction for ''Guns, Germs and Steel'' * 1998

California Book Awards The Commonwealth Club of California is a non-profit, non-partisan educational organization based in Northern California. Founded in 1903, it is the oldest and largest public affairs forum in the United States. Membership is open to everyone. Act ...

, Gold Medal in nonfiction for ''Guns, Germs and Steel'' * 1998 Aventis Prize for Science Books for ''Guns, Germs and Steel'' * 1998

International Cosmos Prize The International Cosmos Prize was established in 1993, commemorating Expo '90 in Osaka, Japan. The objective of the prize was to develop the basic concept of Expo 90, "The Harmonious Coexistence between Nature and Mankind" and is awarded annually ...

* 1999 Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction * 1999

National Medal of Science The National Medal of Science is an honor bestowed by the President of the United States to individuals in science and engineering who have made important contributions to the advancement of knowledge in the fields of behavioral and social scienc ...

* 2001

Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement The Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement is an annual award for environmental science, environmental health, and energy. Tyler Laureates receive a $200,000 cash prize and a medallion. The prize is administered by the University of Southern Cal ...

* 2002

Lewis Thomas Prize The Lewis Thomas Prize for Writing about Science, named for its first recipient, Lewis Thomas, is an annual literary prize awarded by The Rockefeller University to scientists or physicians deemed to have accomplished a significant literary achieveme ...

for Writing about Science * 2004 A foreign holder of honorary title of Academician in

Academy of Finland The Academy of Finland ( fi, Suomen Akatemia, sv, Finlands Akademi) is a governmental funding body for scientific research in Finland. It is based in Helsinki. Yearly, the Academy administers over 260 million euros to Finnish research activities. O ...

* 2005 Elected Honorary Fellow,

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by Henry VIII, King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge ...

, England * 2006

Royal Society Prize for Science Books The Royal Society Science Books Prize is an annual £25,000 prize awarded by the Royal Society to celebrate outstanding popular science books from around the world. It is open to authors of science books written for a non-specialist audience, and ...

for ''Collapse'' (shortlisted) * 2006 Dickson Prize in Science * 2008 PhD Honoris Causa at the

Katholieke Universiteit Leuven KU Leuven (or Katholieke Universiteit Leuven) is a Catholic research university in the city of Leuven, Belgium. It conducts teaching, research, and services in computer science, engineering, natural sciences, theology, humanities, medicine, l ...

, Belgium * 2013

Wolf Prize in Agriculture The Wolf Prize in Agriculture is awarded annually by the Wolf Foundation in Israel. It is one of the six Wolf Prizes established by the Foundation and awarded since 1978; the others are in Chemistry, Mathematics, Medicine, Physics and the Arts. The ...

* 2016

American Humanist Association The American Humanist Association (AHA) is a non-profit organization in the United States that advances secular humanism. The American Humanist Association was founded in 1941 and currently provides legal assistance to defend the constitutiona ...

Humanist of the Year The American Humanist Association (AHA) is a non-profit organization in the United States that advances secular humanism. The American Humanist Association was founded in 1941 and currently provides legal assistance to defend the constitutiona ...

Eastern long-beaked echidna '' Zaglossus bartoni diamondi'' was named in honor of Jared Diamond, as was the frog ''

Austrochaperina adamantina ''Austrochaperina adamantina'' is a species of frog in the family Microhylidae. It is Endemism, endemic to New Guinea and occurs in the Torricelli Mountains, Torricelli and Bewani Mountains in the West Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea. The Speci ...

''.

Selected bibliography

* 1992: ''

: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal'' (-) * 1997: '' Why Is Sex Fun?'' (-) * 1997: ''

: The Fates of Human Societies'' (). Also published with the title ''Guns, germs and steel: A short history of everybody for the last 13,000 years'' () * 2005: '' Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed'' () * 2010: ''Natural Experiments of History'', with

James A. Robinson James Alan Robinson (born 1960) is a British economist and political scientist. He is currently the Reverend Dr. Richard L. Pearson Professor of Global Conflict Studies and University Professor at the Harris School of Public Policy, University ...

() * 2012: ''

: What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies?'' () * 2015: ''The Third Chimpanzee for Young People: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal'' () * 2019: '' Upheaval: How Nations Cope with Crisis and Change'' ()

References

External links

Personal website

Diamond's page at the UCLA Department of Geography

UCLA Spotlight – Jared Diamond

with bio, conversations, podcasts at ''

The Third Culture ''The Third Culture: Beyond the Scientific Revolution'' is a 1995 book by John Brockman which discusses the work of several well-known scientists who are directly communicating their new, sometimes provocative, ideas to the general public. John ...

'', (

Edge Foundation The Edge Foundation, Inc. is an association of science and technology intellectuals created in 1988 as an outgrowth of The Reality Club. Its main activities are reflected on the edge.org website, edited by publisher and businessman John Brock ...

) * *
Jared Diamond: Why do societies collapse? (TED2003)
*
Jared Diamond: How societies can grow old better (TED2013)
*
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
at

The Earth Institute {{Infobox organization , name = The Earth Institute , image = Ei blue1.gif , map_size = , map_alt = , map_caption = , map2 = , type = , tax_id ...

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

, April 2007 * at the Center for Religion and Civic Culture,

University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in C ...

PBS – Guns, Germs and Steel
at

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

(with full transcripts)
What can we learn from traditional societies?
at

Royal Institution The Royal Institution of Great Britain (often the Royal Institution, Ri or RI) is an organisation for scientific education and research, based in the City of Westminster. It was founded in 1799 by the leading British scientists of the age, inc ...

, October 2013
Hammer Conversation with Jared Diamond and John Long

Hammer Museum The Hammer Museum, which is affiliated with the University of California, Los Angeles, is an art museum and cultural center known for its artist-centric and progressive array of exhibitions and public programs. Founded in 1990 by the entrepreneur- ...

, March 16, 2010
Interview with Jared Diamond and James A. Robinson about ''Natural Experiments of History''
at '' New Books in History'' *
Conversation With Jared Diamond: To Solve a Crisis, We Have to Acknowledge It First
{{DEFAULTSORT:Diamond, Jared 1937 births 20th-century American biologists 20th-century American non-fiction writers 21st-century American biologists 21st-century American non-fiction writers 21st-century American writers Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge American biophysicists American geographers American people of Moldovan-Jewish descent American physiologists American science writers American skeptics Evolutionary biologists Harvard College alumni Harvard Fellows Human evolution theorists Jewish biophysicists Jewish American writers Jewish American social scientists Living people MacArthur Fellows Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences National Medal of Science laureates American non-fiction environmental writers Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction winners Roxbury Latin School alumni Theorists on Western civilization University of California, Los Angeles faculty Wolf Prize in Agriculture laureates Writers from Boston Writers from California 21st-century American Jews Members of the American Philosophical Society Members of the National Academy of Medicine

''Natural Experiments of History'' (2010)

''The World Until Yesterday'' (2012)

''Upheaval'' (2019)

Personal life

Boards

Awards and honors

Selected bibliography

See also

References

External links