Date: 24 March 2019
Location: Bob & Linda
Fourteen bookers gathered to discuss Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Harari. This is a big book with a lot of information and many thought-provoking ideas. Not all of us actually made it all the way through the book, but most watched some of his TED talks and YouTube videos.
In Sapiens Harari describes what he refers to as the three main revolutions in the rise of Homo sapiens: the Cognitive Revolution, which began about 70,000 years ago and kick-started history; the Agricultural Revolution, starting around 12,000 years in the past; and the Scientific Revolution, which began about 500 years ago and which “may well end history and start something completely different”. He presents arguments as to the cause of these different revolutions and their effects on sapiens and on the world.
We were all impressed with Harari’s incredible breadth of knowledge and his ability to present his ideas in clear and entertaining ways. One simple example was his discussion on the importance of wheat in the emergence of agriculture and his claim: “We did not domesticate wheat. It domesticated us.”
Throughout the book, Harari gave many examples similar to this where he presented information and ideas from a different perspective. He placed a great deal of emphasis on what he referred to as the fictions invented by sapiens: countries, states, human rights, religion, money, etc. He also made surprising claims such as:
“The hunter-gatherer way of life differed significantly from region to region and from season to season, but on the whole foragers seem to have enjoyed a more comfortable and rewarding lifestyle than most of the peasants, shepherds, labourers, and office clerks who followed in their footsteps.”
Statements such as this led to one of the main criticisms from some of the Bookers: Often Harari would state something as fact, when clearly it was not a provable fact but was essentially his opinion on the matter. Others of us disagreed with this criticism since he frequently included some sort of qualifier, such as ‘seem to’ in the above quotation. But even without such qualifiers, he presents his ideas as he perceives them; and, in a book of this size and scope, it is unnecessary to repeatedly add ‘in my opinion’ to every paragraph.
His wrap-up in the book’s ‘Afterword: The Animal that Became a God’ was sobering and down-right scary. His very last sentence was especially thought-provoking:
“Is there anything more dangerous than dissatisfied and irresponsible gods who don’t know what they want?”
Harari has a remarkable mind, and we all agreed that it would be great to have him for a history teacher.
After a lively and stimulating discussion about this remarkable book, we adjourned to an excellent meal with corned beef, cabbage, and lots of other goodies.
—Bob