Friday, January 28, 2005

Jared Diamond at MSR

I went today to a talk at Microsoft Research by Jared Diamond about his latest book. The new book, Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed gives interesting examples of both failure and success. Easter Island is given as an example of a spectacular failure and Japan is praised for its wisdom wo avoid deforestation in 17th century. There are many reviews of his new book on the Internet but the place I found to read about the new book is the transcript of a ABC Radio National Background Briefing program. You can read there about many of the examples, including the Anasazi and Norse Greenland.
I am looking forward to reading the Collapse. I really liked Guns, Germs and Steel that I read in my Bay Area book club.

Comments:
Hey Michal...

My name is Chris O'Connor and I run an online nonfiction book discussion community called BookTalk.org. This is an invitation for you to check us out and hopefully get involved in the book discussion. We read almost exclusively science too!

We're currently reading Collapse and expect to have a live online chat session with Professor Diamond near the end of June. You and your friends are invited and encouraged to join us in the discussion and chat session.

Here is a list of past authors that we've read and had as guests in our chat room...

Upcoming Author Chats
A. C. Grayling - pending
Jane Goodall - pending
Howard Bloom - pending
Jared Diamond - pending

Chat and Interview Transcripts
Howard Bloom - Reinventing Capitalism
Lee Harris - Civilization & Its Enemies
Ann Druyan - Pale Blue Dot
Michael Shermer - How We Believe
Matt Ridley - The Red Queen
Stephen Pinker - The Blank Slate
Massimo Pigliucci - Rationally Speaking
Richard Dawkins - Unweaving the Rainbow
Howard Bloom - Global Brain
Howard Bloom - The Lucifer Principle


Feel free to ask questions or simple visit the following links... And please spread the word to your science-minded friends.

http://www.booktalk.org/index.php Home
http://pub141.ezboard.com/bbooktalk Forums
http://p090.ezboard.com/fbooktalkfrm87 Collapse forum
http://p090.ezboard.com/fbooktalkfrm51 Guns, Germs And Steel forum

Chris

Chris O'Connor
BookTalk.org - the freethinkers book discussion community
http://www.booktalk.org
chris@booktalk.org

PO Box 4624
Clearwater, FL 33758

Chris
 
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