The Maori were much more aggressive than the Moriori, because the island they inhabited did not have as many resources. The Maori were forced to become competitive and warlike, and this actually enabled them to invade and conquer the peaceful Moriori's island rather quickly. This is what Diamond calls a natural experiment in history. Diamond is careful to use non- American examples when explaining his theories, which is actually very interesting and almost refreshing since we have such an ethno-centric culture that tends to focus on European examples. Diamond uses the Spanish invasion and conquest of the Incas in South America to illustrate how European diseases aided the Spanish in their victory against and obviously powerful society. He uses micro level examples to explain situations on the macro level.
The next section discusses the many factors of food production, and the importance of food production to the advancement of societies. Diamond discusses the origin of food production, why it occurred in certain areas, and at what points in time they occurred there. He concluded that only a few areas or the world developed food production independently, and at different points in time, and that tools, geography, and climate dramatically affected the diffusion of food production. He basically argued that the diffusion of the knowledge of food production occurred much more rapidly from east to west, than from north to south, because the climate, environment, and geography is more similar laterally, than longitudinally throughout the world. This is one of the factors that helps to explain why Europe was able to advance faster than Africa, even though Africa had a head start.
Section three basically discusses the rise ofcivilization.? The Eurasian societies were able to master food production at a faster pace than the societies of Africa and Australia. Because they could produce a surplus of food, they had more time to specialize in other areas such as tool production and invention.
