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A review by bellatora
The Third Chimpanzee by Jared Diamond
3.0
I've read Diamond's Collapse and Guns, Germs and Steel and had never heard of this book before, so when I saw it at the bookstore I picked it up because I thought it was his new book. It wasn't. It was his first book, and it shows. This is basically a primer for the rest of his books, since all his other books are expansions of chapters/sections in this one. Why is Sex Fun? is Chapter 3, Guns, Germs and Steel is Part 4 and Collapse is Part 5.
My problem with this book, besides the fact that I'd read some of it before, was that while most of his arguments were interesting, some weren't convincing. He sometimes kinda relied on personal anecdotes--mostly from his New Guinea friends--and broad generalizations instead of facts. The chapter I had the biggest issue with was "Why Do We Smoke, Drink, and Use Drugs?" His answer is: because, like peacocks' tails and other seemingly useless/potentially dangerous displays, it shows others that I can have/do this crap and still survive, so obviously there's enough awesome about me that it outweighs this stupid thing I do, so you don't want to mess with me if you're a predator/you should want to mate with me if you are a female. He states that "Now, let's test my theory...if it's valid, [it:] should apply to other societies as well." So he brings up this one guy he knows in Indonesia who drinks kerosene as a test of strength. Okay...and that proves your theory how exactly? To be fair, he also mentions Native American tribes that used drug enemas, but still. He doesn't address other possible factors, such as the benefits people feel they get out of drugs and alocohol (mood boosts/escapism/whatever) or their addictive nature. That entire chapter seemed like a 10th grade paper: lots of suppositions, little to concretly back it up.
The book did bring up ideas I'd never thought about before, and made me feel less special as a human being, but I'd still say just read Diamond's later, better books and skip this one.
My problem with this book, besides the fact that I'd read some of it before, was that while most of his arguments were interesting, some weren't convincing. He sometimes kinda relied on personal anecdotes--mostly from his New Guinea friends--and broad generalizations instead of facts. The chapter I had the biggest issue with was "Why Do We Smoke, Drink, and Use Drugs?" His answer is: because, like peacocks' tails and other seemingly useless/potentially dangerous displays, it shows others that I can have/do this crap and still survive, so obviously there's enough awesome about me that it outweighs this stupid thing I do, so you don't want to mess with me if you're a predator/you should want to mate with me if you are a female. He states that "Now, let's test my theory...if it's valid, [it:] should apply to other societies as well." So he brings up this one guy he knows in Indonesia who drinks kerosene as a test of strength. Okay...and that proves your theory how exactly? To be fair, he also mentions Native American tribes that used drug enemas, but still. He doesn't address other possible factors, such as the benefits people feel they get out of drugs and alocohol (mood boosts/escapism/whatever) or their addictive nature. That entire chapter seemed like a 10th grade paper: lots of suppositions, little to concretly back it up.
The book did bring up ideas I'd never thought about before, and made me feel less special as a human being, but I'd still say just read Diamond's later, better books and skip this one.