IP Blog

The proximate cause that is the most important contributory element to the rise and spread of domesticables is an east-west axis.  According to Jared Diamond’s book, Guns, Germs, & Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, an east-west axis is widely responsible for the development of food production among certain peoples and the lack thereof among others.  When faced with a question regarding the rapid spread of crops from the Fertile Crescent, Diamond replied, “The answer depends partly on that east-west axis of Eurasia” (183).  Diamond goes further in explaining this by mentioning that different regions thousands of miles apart, but with the same latitude, are closer in climate to each other than regions a thousand miles north or south (183).  This would naturally enable a domesticable capable of living or growing in a certain climate to be able to thrive in a region thousands of miles away, if the axis of the landmass allowed.  An east-west axis not only affects the rise and spread of domesticables and food production, it affects all other innovations and sophistications and levels that a society can have.  It is the basic building block for having a civilized, stratified society, and it all starts with farmers on an east-west axis.  That is why the most important contributory element to the rise and spread of food production and domesticables is an east-west axis.

Imagine a banana tree growing in Siberia, or lichen in the rainforests of Ecuador.  This idea strikes the mind as ridiculous, as everyone knows bananas are tropical and wouldn’t survive in any drastically different climate, which may be only 300 miles north or south.  However, the same banana tree would grow 5,000 miles east or west of the region on the same latitude.  With this in mind, it makes much more sense that a landmass oriented east and west would offer many more opportunities for domestic growth.  The domesticable wouldn’t need to adapt drastically to the new environment, as it is already familiar with the climate and geography in most instances.  Therefore, it only makes sense that landmasses like Eurasia, which has an east-west axis, got a head start in food production, as domesticables were easily able to spread and grow.  “[Domesticates] were already adapted to the climates of the regions to which they were spreading” (185).  It also only makes sense that residents of North and South America and Africa found it hard to grow and spread domesticables because their major axes are north-south.  The climate change would be too different for a plant to easily survive and adapt.  Here is one such example: at first glance, it may seem like a great idea to a Canadian farmer trying to add variety to his diet to plant corn that he got in Mexico.  When the farmer toils and sows the corn seeds, only to have them thrust up shoots under feet of snow in March, it suddenly seems like a horrendous idea.  All that time and energy lost, only to have a food product that will die, if not from the climate, from lack of resistance to northern diseases (184).

The spread of food production and domesticables relies mainly on an east-west axis.  A region can have a great climate and many domesticables available to it, but if it is not able to spread, the region is limited to what it has.  This region can’t grow as well, and has no other sophisticated neighbors that they con conquer with their guns, germs, and steel that only a society with food production can have.  Even if they spread to these nomadic regions occupied by hunter-gatherers, there is no land immediately suitable for the types of crops they have already firmly established.  Contrast this with the land that has ample room for growth, and its neighbors also do.  The power of this stratified farmer society can grow exponentially, all because it has an east-west axis, instead of a confining, restricting north-south axis with climate barriers.  For instance, farming spread rapidly “from the Philippines east to Polynesia (at 3.2 miles per year)” (178).  Compare this with the growth of food production from Mexico to the United States southwest at an average rate of 0.2 miles per year (178).  Clearly an east-west axis is a huge advantage in the rise and spread of domesticables and food production.

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