Search
3 interviews · 5 quotes
In conversation
In this interview, I spoke to Professor Jared Diamond, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Guns, Germs, and Steel, about when individual leaders genuinely change outcomes. We discussed discretion, timing, his Hamlet Test for…
Elsewhere in the archive
In these exclusive interviews, we speak to Jeff Raikes (Founder, Raikes Foundation and former CEO of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation), Eli Broad (Founder of the Broad Foundations), Sir Ratan Tata…
In this interview, I spoke to Professor Anthony Kaldellis, who argues the eastern Roman Empire was no absolutism but a polity governed by consent, where rulers who misread the public mood were…
From the archive
Geography has a big effect on long-term, large-area history, whereas leaders have a big effect on short-term, small-area history.
— Jared DiamondThe intrinsic disadvantage of a dictatorship is that a dictator does not get feedback, and so there is not a chance to make corrections.
— Jared DiamondHe was born at the right time. He was born at the right place. If he had been born 20 years earlier and 200 miles to the south, nobody would ever have known about Genghis Khan.
— Jared DiamondBill Gates was a very successful leader, but he doesn't pass the Hamlet Test.
— Jared DiamondLife is complicated, and usually the single most important thing is to avoid looking for the single most important thing.
— Jared DiamondMore conversations
