# Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond

7 Hacker News commenters recommended Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond and 5 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 4 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** People recommend it as a readable account of why Eurasian societies came to dominate, driven by geography, though critics call its thesis weak and say newer scholarship has overtaken it.

## Why people recommend it

- Explains history through geography, not genetics (3 comments): "Diamond says that the reasons Europeans colonised South America (rather than vice versa) is largely due to geographic factors, not due to any inherent genetic superiority" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49712954)) "I remember Diamond writing specifically about the relative lack of domesticable animals in sub-Saharan Africa" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49713554)) "is a great book that explores geographic determinism" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50132274))
- Good read for general audiences (4 comments): "i dont really think there is a better option for a popular audience that will answer the question" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49926547)) "if you are interested you should read Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49923840)) "It's a good read if anyone is interested in how Eurasia got so dominant." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46079487))

## What people warn about

- Many errors and unsound claims (2 comments): "Jared Diamond's whole thesis in Gun, Germs etc is post hoc ergo propter hoc." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49712482)) "That book has some many errors in it" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49924590))
- Pseudoscientific claims about populations (2 comments): "That book is so garbage, psudoscientific, empirically wrong, sinophobic" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49712371)) "Diamond makes broad genetic/intelligence claims about whole populations" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49713832))
- Called a bad, awful book (2 comments): "Jared diamonds an idiot and "guns germs and steel" is among the worst books written in human history" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47033194)) "Guns, Germs, and Steel is a famously awful book." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47712806))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter](https://hackerapproved.com/p/g-del-escher-bach.md): 47 recommend
- [Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman](https://hackerapproved.com/p/thinking-fast-and-slow.md): 17 recommend
- [Thinking in Systems by Donella Meadows](https://hackerapproved.com/p/thinking-in-systems.md): 17 recommend
- [The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins](https://hackerapproved.com/p/selfish-gene.md): 14 recommend
- [Cosmos by Carl Sagan](https://hackerapproved.com/p/cosmos.md): 13 recommend

## Where to get it

- [See price on Amazon](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0393354326?tag=hackerapprove-20) (affiliate link)
- [Bookshop.org](https://bookshop.org/a/130825/9780393354324) (affiliate link)

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond", https://hackerapproved.com/p/guns-germs-and-steel/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).