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The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies?The bestselling author of Collapse and Guns, Germs and Steel surveys the history of human societies to answer the question: What can we learn from traditional societies that can make the world a better place for all of us? "As he did in his Pulitzer Prize winning Guns, Germs, and Steel, Jared Diamond continues to make us think with his mesmerizing and absorbing new book." Bookpage Most of us take for granted the features of our modern society, from
The bestselling author of Collapse and Guns, Germs and Steel surveys the history of human societies to answer the question: What can we learn from traditional societies that can make the world a better place for all of us? "As he did in his Pulitzer Prize-winning Guns, Germs, and Steel, Jared Diamond continues to make us think with his mesmerizing and absorbing new book." Bookpage Most of us take for granted the features of our modern society, from air travel and telecommunications to literacy and obesity. Yet for nearly all of its six million years of existence, human society had none of these things. While the gulf that divides us from our primitive ancestors may seem unbridgeably wide, we can glimpse much of our former lifestyle in those largely traditional societies still or recently in existence. Societies like those of the New Guinea Highlanders remind us that it was only yesterday--in evolutionary time--when everything changed and that we moderns still possess bodies and social practices often better adapted to traditional than to modern conditions.The World Until Yesterday provides a mesmerizing firsthand picture of the human past as it had been for millions of years--a past that has mostly vanished--and considers what the differences between that past and our present mean for our lives today. This is Jared Diamond's most personal book to date, as he draws extensively from his decades of field work in the Pacific islands, as well as evidence from Inuit, Amazonian Indians, Kalahari San people, and others. Diamond doesn't romanticize traditional societies--after all, we are shocked by some of their practices--but he finds that their solutions to universal human problems such as child rearing, elder care, dispute resolution, risk, and physical fitness have much to teach us. Provocative, enlightening, and entertaining, The World Until Yesterday is an essential and fascinating read.Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Penguin Group
Published: 10/29/2013
ISBN: 9780143124405
Pages: 498
Weight: 0.99lbs
Size: 8.44h x 5.48w x 1.18d
Review Citations: New York Times Book Review 12/01/2013 pg. 32
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4.1 ★★★★★
Based on 1774 reviews
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Product Reviews
★★★★★ 5
Fascinating Book
Format: Audiobook
This incredible book tells the story of people's experiences being abducted by Aliens. It includes information from many abductees, not just the author's. I have never read a book like this, and although I don't know about aliens, I believe these people experienced something horrific. Their experiences must be investigated. Bravo to the author for sharing his experiences with his readers.
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Reviewed in the United States on February 1, 2025
★★★★★ 3
I had heard of this book when it made a splash in 1987, I did not have time then...
Format: Paperback
I did not have time to read this book when it came out because I was a young father, and I was at the beginning of my professional career. Now, almost 40 years later, I am a grandfather and I within months of the end of my professional career. So I made time to read it, finally.
What instigated me to do so now, is all the recent activities concerning UAPs and the unexplained sightings of UAPs in the night skies over military bases in New Jersey and, also, in England. Put simply, I was in the mood to give this book a chance.
The "story" starts strong with Whitley Strieber's descriptions of his apparent contact with the "visitors." He is a talented fiction writer and that comes through, but after the first 60 or so pages, the story drags and becomes increasingly repetitive, and hard to read. The penultimate chapter may have read well in 1987, with its buzziness, and the power of three....but in 2025 it doesn't. It just sounds so out-of-date like an Oldsmobile Cutlass with a T-top. (Yes that was a real car...Google it.) Then, there are chapters that are nothing more than transcripts of what Whitley, and his late wife, Anne, had said while in sessions under hypnosis; they are barely understandable, let alone readable. The allusions to quantum mechanics later in the book adon't fit very well, and seem to be an afterthought and are very hard to take. Clearly, Streiber's ideas are not grounded in the science, but in a kind of typical layman's misunderstanding of quantum mechanical "concepts." That is there is an extension of the theory into things it is not meant to explain, and proves that having a little knowledge about something is dangerous. All-in-all, I suffered through the "last," 229 pages (including two appendices), but I can say I have read it from cover to cover.
What is my opinion of the abduction story? I hate to be unkind, but it seems more like the memory of a hallucination, or of a very bad and graphic dream, than something that actually happened. It seems to be the product of a fertile and creative mind of a talented author. Yes, there are other people who also claim to have been abducted, and there are some commonalities among their claims, and I know that their numbers should add credibility to their stories, and I know it is unkind to doubt them, but I do and I remain skeptical.
So did Whitley Streiber write this book knowing full well that is was actual a work of fiction while claiming it was non-fiction, or did he write it honestly thinking that he was sharing objective truths? On this, it is very hard to know...it is plausible that he really believes these things happened to him, and that he wrote about them sincerely. The author himself seems never to be sure. His lie detector results seem to indicate that he is telling something that he truly believes, but one never knows for sure.
To sum up, I am glad the book is no longer a mystery to me. My curiosity was satisfied and that is enough for me, but it took work.
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Reviewed in the United States on February 8, 2025
★★★★★ 5
Read this book to begin your study!
Format: Kindle
If you can read only one book on UFO abductions, read this one! This book is amazing and will give you a very good idea about what these UFO abductees are experiencing. This is the book that launched me on an ongoing UFO study which has led to my obtaining and reading tons of books on UFO and abductions. While not an abductee myself and, in fact, I have arguably never even seen a UFO, I know that there is something to this phenomenon that we do not understand. The interest seen in the public square now and the government's greater focus on the UFO phenomena leads one to conclude that what is happening is real and unknown. While I personally believe that the UFO phenomena is a spiritual one involving the unseen spirit world, that is just one of the many theories out there. Read this book and embark on a fascinating journey for yourself.
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Reviewed in the United States on May 14, 2022
★★★★★ 5
Loved the book
Format: Paperback
Awesome book. Great reading
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Reviewed in the United States on November 19, 2025
★★★★★ 4
Classic in the UFO Lore
Format: Paperback
Fascinating read about the abduction phenomena from a first hand account.
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Reviewed in the United States on June 2, 2026