What podcasts say about Jared Diamond
Every statement, with the speaker, the exact quote and the moment it was said.
What Jared Diamond has said on podcasts
33 statements · 19 positive · 6 negative · 2 mixed · 6 neutral
Leaders need favorable timing and location to make a difference.
“A leader has to be at the right time and place.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 6:18
Exceptional rainfall during Genghis Khan’s birth decade aided Mongol expansion.
“the wettest time in the last 2,000 years. Was the decade of Genghis Khan's birth.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 8:24
Historical opportunities require both favorable circumstances and exceptional personal qualities.
“At a given time and place, That may be the occasion for someone to emerge, but who emerges depends upon the personal qualities.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 12:48
Christianity’s spread required both Jesus’s message and Paul’s organizational leadership.
“Jesus had a particularly good message, but it took— a good message isn't enough. It took St. Paul as the organizer.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 16:23
Mormonism spread partly because of strong organization and socially attractive practices.
“the Mormons were very well organized under Brigham Young and the social features of the Mormon religion”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 20:09
Christianity grew partly because Christians had higher fertility than Roman pagans.
“The Christians outbred pagans in the first couple of centuries of the Roman Empire because Roman religion had a low view of women.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 23:27
Early Christians had lower mortality and longer lives than Roman pagans.
“when you look at tombstones from the first couple of centuries of the Roman Empire, Christians lived longer and they were less likely to die than were pagans”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 24:10
Islam spread primarily through organization, motivation, military power, social ties, and possibly favorable weather.
“the organization, the motivation, the military spirit, the family and social connections, and maybe, although we don't know, something about the weather in Saudi Arabia during Muhammad's lifetime. Those rather than theological beliefs I see as the reason behind Islam's spread.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 25:41
Jesus and Muhammad had unusually enduring influence through their religious beliefs.
“The beliefs of Jesus and the beliefs of Muhammad, those individuals had a long-lasting effect.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 29:52
Religions require economic and demographic support to become global.
“religion, to become worldwide, religion needs what one could call an economic and demographic engine”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 31:39
Books were an ideal initial online retail product because they are standardized.
“books were an ideal thing to start out with. All books are uniform.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 34:59
Online and general-purpose everything stores would have emerged without Jeff Bezos.
“Without Jeff Bezos, we would still have everything stores.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 36:48
Alternative paths to developing everything stores existed before and after Bezos.
“what we know for sure is that there were before and there were afterwards other ways to develop an everything store.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 37:42
Stock markets would have emerged even without a specific historical inventor or accident.
“if we didn't have a stock— if stock markets hadn't developed, stock markets would have developed.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 40:47
Steve Jobs distinguished Apple phones through emphasis on appearance and simplicity.
“Steve Jobs put a distinctive face on cell phones and that he cared a lot about appearance and he cared a lot about simplicity”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 42:42
Xerox PARC’s 1970s simultaneous-translation effort failed because language and translation technology were insufficiently understood.
“The reason was there were 2 things that were complicated that were not understood in the 1970s.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 56:59
The Greek term logos denotes both “word” and “rational system.”
“The Greek word logos means word, but it also means rational system.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 59:32
Perfect translation between languages is impossible.
“we know that you cannot translate perfectly from one language into another language.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 1:09:59
Hangul enables Koreans to read faster than people using other writing systems.
“Koreans can read faster than anybody else in the world because of this wonderful writing system.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 1:19:58
Cuneiform, Mexican writing, and Chinese writing arose independently.
“we have 3 independent inventions of writing. Writing, namely cuneiform in the Fertile Crescent, Mexican writing, and then Chinese writing”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 1:28:46
The causes of the Bronze Age collapse remain uncertain, with invasion, climate change, and weapons proposed.
“we don't know whether the collapse of the Bronze Age was because of invaders from the sea. Or whether it was because of climate change or whether it was because of invention of new weapons.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 1:31:46
Egyptian hieroglyphs may reflect diffusion of the writing idea, not copying of cuneiform.
“We suspect that hieroglyphs were idea diffusion, that Egyptians got the idea of writing from the Fertile Crescent and then they developed their own writing system.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 1:34:42
King Sejong personally invented Hangul around 1430.
“King Sejong invented Han-gul himself at a bang.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 1:36:46
Military conscription fostered national identity in many countries.
“In many cases, that national identity was fostered by the draft.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 1:40:05
Children of pidgin-speaking workers spontaneously develop more complex creole languages.
“The children of these workers who now want to talk with each other and have a normal life, the pidgin language is not adequate and the children spontaneously made the pidgin more complex.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 1:54:48
Tok Pisin can express complex subjects, including the second law of thermodynamics.
“with New Guineans, they and I can discuss anything in pidgin.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 1:59:00
Kuru transmission is associated with eating uncooked brain tissue.
“That's right, eating the uncooked brain.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 2:06:01
Prions can survive temperatures of several hundred degrees.
“they certainly survive a couple of hundred degrees.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 2:06:16
Kuru likely spread among the Fore after one person’s Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease entered cannibalistic transmission.
“it's all thought to have arisen with one foray person who had quite full Yakut and died of it in around 1910, but was then eaten by others who were in turn eaten still by others, so that kuru, Kwetschuel jakob, then exploded among the Fore.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 2:09:40
Kuru deaths continued until 2009 despite funeral feasts ending in 1959.
“The last death due to Kuru was in 2009. The last funeral feast was 1959.”
Open the episode · #2549 - Jared DiamondListen at 2:14:46
Statements are attributed to the speaker as said on the episode and reflect their view at the time, not PodLume's. They are not advice.