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To: fork@spamassassin.taint.org
Subject: Re: Al'Qaeda's fantasy ideology: Policy Review no. 114
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From: harley@argote.ch (Robert Harley)
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Date: Mon, 19 Aug 2002 01:56:42 +0200 (CEST)

>See Jared Diamond's excellent "Guns, Germs, and Steel" for the story.

Yeah, I know the party line.  The evidence for it is extremely meagre.
New Worlders had two entire continents and tens of millions of people,
which is a plenty big enough reservoir for infectious diseases to thrive
in.  Their records show that they were plagued with them long before 1492.

Take Ireland in the early 1800s.  Assume a population of circa 8
million.  Take Ireland around 1900.  Assume a population not much
above 3 million.  Ignore natural variations between mortality and
natality.  Omit emigration.  Observe the Great Famine in the middle.
Deduce that it killed 5 million (actually about 1).  Transpose to 16th
century Mexico.  Grossly inflate estimates of pre-contact population,
because nobody has a damn clue what it was anyway.  Underestimate
later population levels.  Deduce that 10's of millions died.  Lather,
rinse, repeat.

R
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