Summary Of The World As Polder By Jared Diamond

Throughout the chapter I read from Jared Diamond's book, “The World as Polder: What Does It Mean to Us Today”, he describes the ways that our advanced society is different from the past societies. Societies such as the Mayans or the Easter Islanders had difficulties surviving and ultimately went extinct because of their downfalls. These societies, like many others, had to deal with climate changes, over harvesting, or building cities in dry areas. They weren't able to see their mistakes and it ultimately led to their societies collapse. Diamond explains that we are developing fast and it is leading to what will be our demise. He believes that our differences from past societies are going to be the downfall of our society. Diamond believes that

He mentions that we need to adapt to the changes like the Dutch did after they faced devastation in 1953. The Dutch now pay attention to the environment around them and because of that they were able to come up with solutions to the problems they were facing. Such as the example Diamond gave. In 1953, there was a huge storm that hit Zeeland Province that drowned over 2000 Dutch people. This storm washed over their homes and lands, putting them all in danger. The storm caused the tides to rise at a quick rate washing over their town. After all the water settled, the Dutch made the decision to ensure it would never happen to them again. So the Dutch chose to create barriers for when the tides get high and put their lives at risk. Diamond states that the Dutch is an example of a society that is minimizing the risks that threaten their society. He goes on to mention how technology could be used as an asset to our society. He says that we are fortunate enough to be connected by technology that we are able to spread the word about the problems we are facing, so everyone can start helping to solve the problems. By being so connected we are able to talk to one another to come up with more solutions. After naming the many reasons as to why our society could crash at any moment, Diamond did say that the “modern world's inter-connectedness” could be our societies saving grace (Diamond

Diamond states, “The U.S. Is the world's leading importer nation,” (Diamond 20). Meaning that we are connected to other countries because we send and receive goods from all over the world. This makes it less probable that we would run out of resources like past societies, but it is still possible. So long as we don't use the resources faster than they are created we will be able to continue growing. Between technology and our nation's allies overseas, we will be able to solve our man made problems in their tracks. We just have to be smart about