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saumith's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
informative
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
5.0
abbyoreilly's review against another edition
4.0
obviously there are going to be issues w macro histories intended for a wider audience in terms of losing nuance but do I feel knowledge-saturated and powerful? yes. do I feel humbled by our human lineage? yes. am I anxiety-ridden? yes. no further questions, read it rn
laura_corsi's review against another edition
5.0
Obviously I'm late to this one, but I'm glad I waited until now to read this. In a time of turmoil and injustice, it is comforting to read that this is all par for the course in the history of mankind. We are used to reading through a lens of right v. wrong, whereas this book simply says this is what happens, this is how humans are with no judgment or approbation. Thought provoking and inspiring in some cases. I've already got this one marked to re-read.
aliciagw's review against another edition
informative
slow-paced
4.0
Interesting nonfiction about Homo Sapiens and their role on Earth throughout time and possibilities for the future.
It is a mashup of evolutionary biology, history, modern issues, and future prediction. It is rather broad in scope, and includes some factual scientific information along with some theoretical ideas, which the author does a relatively good job in distinguishing between the two. I think this book was panned by scholarly scientific people, but I personally believe it is a wonderful book for the majority of people to get a better understanding of topics related to humanity. It isn't always easy to read heavily scientific books, and this was relatively easy to read and understand for those who don't have a hard science background. It was written in a relatively engaging way. I think those are good things.
I found some parts of it extremely interesting, and some parts somewhat dry and dull. I think that was just due to my personal interests. Being broad in scope, the book covered quite a few topics and not all of them were of interest to me. I really enjoyed the first part of the book, kinda checked out in the middle, and reengaged in the final portions of the book. I would say the book leaves you with interesting things to ponder.
It is a mashup of evolutionary biology, history, modern issues, and future prediction. It is rather broad in scope, and includes some factual scientific information along with some theoretical ideas, which the author does a relatively good job in distinguishing between the two. I think this book was panned by scholarly scientific people, but I personally believe it is a wonderful book for the majority of people to get a better understanding of topics related to humanity. It isn't always easy to read heavily scientific books, and this was relatively easy to read and understand for those who don't have a hard science background. It was written in a relatively engaging way. I think those are good things.
I found some parts of it extremely interesting, and some parts somewhat dry and dull. I think that was just due to my personal interests. Being broad in scope, the book covered quite a few topics and not all of them were of interest to me. I really enjoyed the first part of the book, kinda checked out in the middle, and reengaged in the final portions of the book. I would say the book leaves you with interesting things to ponder.
savaging's review against another edition
2.0
I'll tell you what I liked:
That Harari insists on calling all species of the genus Homo "human." And that when he's diving into our deep past as a species, he resists the generalizations and just-so stories of other pop-science ('we're naturally jealously monogamous!' 'we're naturally bonobo polyamorists!' etc.). Instead he leaves open the full diverse bizarrities of our past.
Also, it's kind of nice that Harari is skeptical of many forms of 'progress,' and takes note of the way other species are devastated in our 'advanced' cultures. He retains a little shudder of horror when he talks about our possible futures as a species.
And I'll tell you what I didn't like:
Once you get through the first bit on early humans, Harari serves up an all-you-can eat buffet of evo-psy-tinged nonsense. All the writers who steal and expound on each other -- Steven Pinker, Malcolm Gladwell, Jonathan Haidt -- get their stupidest unifying theories regurgitated here.
And the worst of these is the pseudo-sophisticated moral equivalency argument for empire. You know the one: well, empires were bad, sure. Sure they killed a lot of people. BUT, if you THINK ABOUT IT -- if you're brave enough to put your moral repugnance aside and look it full in the face -- they are also good! The four-part argument goes like this:
1) Because of Empire we have culture! (as though indigenous people don't have culture. As though mass genocide is a necessary fertilizer for pretty art and new ideas) How can you say you're against Empire if you're saying that sentence in an imperial language like English, hmmmm? (Gotcha)
2) Throw in some Steven Pinker line about how everyone's safer and less violent now that they're ruled by white people.
3) Every culture destroyed by Empire was itself an empire, just a smaller one. Some are simply better at this game than others. (Which carries the implication: if white people didn't do this first then everyone else would have done it to us and you'd all be speaking Algonquin now! Meaning: genocide is our natural state of affairs, and the ones who do it best and quickest probably deserve the reward; and the ones who do it worst and slowest probably deserve annihilation).
4) Even the language used to fight against empire is an imperial construct. (As though the bullies single-handedly invented an idea of 'human rights,' and no other cultures have been able to express 'don't enslave rape pillage murder us please because that's messed up.')
There are real, material, current, horrific consequences to this reasoning. The fact that the author is from Israel, site of cutting-edge ethical equivocation over stealing land and resources from brown people, was additionally haunting within this empire-boosterism book.
This is what made Sapiens unredeemable for me. But since I went through all the trouble to read this heavy glossy tome, here are some more grievances:
-In the drive to connect science and empire in a unified theory (both are born from a radical willingness to admit ignorance), Harari suggests others didn't genocide the Europeans first because they just weren't curious enough.
-Harari talks about economics through thought experiments more than real history and anthropology. This is a favorite trick of economists, and allows them to say shit like:
"Capital trickles away from dictatorial states that fail to defend private individuals and their property" (pg. 318). Harari then concocts a make-believe scenario about why this is the case ('imagine that Joe Smith lends blah blah to Mr. Jones blah blah'). As for history, he then shows how Dutch companies got filthy rich while Spain stagnated, and claims that's because the Dutch respected individual rights. The actual history here is the Dutch invaded Indonesia, and with love of freedom, individual rights, and private property in their hearts, ended the freedom, smashed the individual rights, and stole the property of the Indonesian people. By 'respect for property', Harari should clarify that he means 'respect for white property.'
In sum: I'm sick of tries at moral equivalency between imperial genociders and the genocided. Yes, the people who have been murdered aren't pure and perfect, but I'm so tired of people who hunt down and glory in those imperfections to dodge the overwhelming moral weight of our own histories. I'm sick of people who think they sound daring, nuanced, and clever by crafting gotcha sentences to make us admire empire, war, and exploitation.
In an aside, Harari mentions the people of Tasmania, who were systematically hunted down and eradicated by white colonizers. He has an image of Truganini, the last native Tasmanian alive. Her dead body was put on display in colonizer's museums, her skin and hair were held at the English Royal College of Surgeons until 2002. This page, admitting a clear and brutal story, was a powerful one in the middle of the nonsense. But the fact that he can speak Truganani's name, invite us to look at her face, and then set her and the other murdered ones up on a scale, with 'culture' and 'inevitability' on the other side, and proclaim that the two sides balance -- this made the book nearly unreadable for me.
That Harari insists on calling all species of the genus Homo "human." And that when he's diving into our deep past as a species, he resists the generalizations and just-so stories of other pop-science ('we're naturally jealously monogamous!' 'we're naturally bonobo polyamorists!' etc.). Instead he leaves open the full diverse bizarrities of our past.
Also, it's kind of nice that Harari is skeptical of many forms of 'progress,' and takes note of the way other species are devastated in our 'advanced' cultures. He retains a little shudder of horror when he talks about our possible futures as a species.
And I'll tell you what I didn't like:
Once you get through the first bit on early humans, Harari serves up an all-you-can eat buffet of evo-psy-tinged nonsense. All the writers who steal and expound on each other -- Steven Pinker, Malcolm Gladwell, Jonathan Haidt -- get their stupidest unifying theories regurgitated here.
And the worst of these is the pseudo-sophisticated moral equivalency argument for empire. You know the one: well, empires were bad, sure. Sure they killed a lot of people. BUT, if you THINK ABOUT IT -- if you're brave enough to put your moral repugnance aside and look it full in the face -- they are also good! The four-part argument goes like this:
1) Because of Empire we have culture! (as though indigenous people don't have culture. As though mass genocide is a necessary fertilizer for pretty art and new ideas) How can you say you're against Empire if you're saying that sentence in an imperial language like English, hmmmm? (Gotcha)
2) Throw in some Steven Pinker line about how everyone's safer and less violent now that they're ruled by white people.
3) Every culture destroyed by Empire was itself an empire, just a smaller one. Some are simply better at this game than others. (Which carries the implication: if white people didn't do this first then everyone else would have done it to us and you'd all be speaking Algonquin now! Meaning: genocide is our natural state of affairs, and the ones who do it best and quickest probably deserve the reward; and the ones who do it worst and slowest probably deserve annihilation).
4) Even the language used to fight against empire is an imperial construct. (As though the bullies single-handedly invented an idea of 'human rights,' and no other cultures have been able to express 'don't enslave rape pillage murder us please because that's messed up.')
There are real, material, current, horrific consequences to this reasoning. The fact that the author is from Israel, site of cutting-edge ethical equivocation over stealing land and resources from brown people, was additionally haunting within this empire-boosterism book.
This is what made Sapiens unredeemable for me. But since I went through all the trouble to read this heavy glossy tome, here are some more grievances:
-In the drive to connect science and empire in a unified theory (both are born from a radical willingness to admit ignorance), Harari suggests others didn't genocide the Europeans first because they just weren't curious enough.
-Harari talks about economics through thought experiments more than real history and anthropology. This is a favorite trick of economists, and allows them to say shit like:
"Capital trickles away from dictatorial states that fail to defend private individuals and their property" (pg. 318). Harari then concocts a make-believe scenario about why this is the case ('imagine that Joe Smith lends blah blah to Mr. Jones blah blah'). As for history, he then shows how Dutch companies got filthy rich while Spain stagnated, and claims that's because the Dutch respected individual rights. The actual history here is the Dutch invaded Indonesia, and with love of freedom, individual rights, and private property in their hearts, ended the freedom, smashed the individual rights, and stole the property of the Indonesian people. By 'respect for property', Harari should clarify that he means 'respect for white property.'
In sum: I'm sick of tries at moral equivalency between imperial genociders and the genocided. Yes, the people who have been murdered aren't pure and perfect, but I'm so tired of people who hunt down and glory in those imperfections to dodge the overwhelming moral weight of our own histories. I'm sick of people who think they sound daring, nuanced, and clever by crafting gotcha sentences to make us admire empire, war, and exploitation.
In an aside, Harari mentions the people of Tasmania, who were systematically hunted down and eradicated by white colonizers. He has an image of Truganini, the last native Tasmanian alive. Her dead body was put on display in colonizer's museums, her skin and hair were held at the English Royal College of Surgeons until 2002. This page, admitting a clear and brutal story, was a powerful one in the middle of the nonsense. But the fact that he can speak Truganani's name, invite us to look at her face, and then set her and the other murdered ones up on a scale, with 'culture' and 'inevitability' on the other side, and proclaim that the two sides balance -- this made the book nearly unreadable for me.
iulia_marc's review against another edition
4.0
Cartea nu prea mai are nevoie de prezentare, așa că arunc doar câteva idei aici:
- Poate fi o bună introducere și o bună analiză a istoriei omenirii, potrivită pentru cei care habar n-au, dar ar vrea să înțeleagă una-alta, să aibă o privire de ansamblu asupra evoluției Homo Sapiens;
- Nu e cea mai obiectivă carte din lume și am observat că pe unii îi irită abordarea autorului; atât timp cât îți amintești că citești o perspectivă asupra istoriei, nu un adevăr absolut, s-ar putea să-ți placă (până la urmă, nu asta e cam tot ceea ce putem avea, dacă e să fim onești?);
- Nu am domesticit noi grâul. El ne-a domesticit pe noi. O idee atât de simplă, atât de puternică – care transcende grâul, bineînțeles.
- Nimic din lumea biologică nu poate fi „nenatural”. Biologia permite; ne folosim de cultură să interzicem. Îmi lipsea simplitatea acestui argument în viață. “Culture tends to argue that it forbids only that which is unnatural. But from a biological perspective, nothing is unnatural. Whatever is possible is by definition also natural. A truly unnatural behaviour, one that goes against the laws of nature, simply cannot exist, so it would need no prohibition.”
- E de citit? Da. Mi-a fost greu să-mi mențin entuziasmul pe parcursul întregii cărți? Da. Cred că lipsea o astfel de abordare a istoriei bipezilor care suntem? Da. Și cred că meritul cărții e tocmai faptul că a reușit să atingă o mare masă de oameni, dar și niște coarde sensibile.
- Poate fi o bună introducere și o bună analiză a istoriei omenirii, potrivită pentru cei care habar n-au, dar ar vrea să înțeleagă una-alta, să aibă o privire de ansamblu asupra evoluției Homo Sapiens;
- Nu e cea mai obiectivă carte din lume și am observat că pe unii îi irită abordarea autorului; atât timp cât îți amintești că citești o perspectivă asupra istoriei, nu un adevăr absolut, s-ar putea să-ți placă (până la urmă, nu asta e cam tot ceea ce putem avea, dacă e să fim onești?);
- Nu am domesticit noi grâul. El ne-a domesticit pe noi. O idee atât de simplă, atât de puternică – care transcende grâul, bineînțeles.
- Nimic din lumea biologică nu poate fi „nenatural”. Biologia permite; ne folosim de cultură să interzicem. Îmi lipsea simplitatea acestui argument în viață. “Culture tends to argue that it forbids only that which is unnatural. But from a biological perspective, nothing is unnatural. Whatever is possible is by definition also natural. A truly unnatural behaviour, one that goes against the laws of nature, simply cannot exist, so it would need no prohibition.”
- E de citit? Da. Mi-a fost greu să-mi mențin entuziasmul pe parcursul întregii cărți? Da. Cred că lipsea o astfel de abordare a istoriei bipezilor care suntem? Da. Și cred că meritul cărții e tocmai faptul că a reușit să atingă o mare masă de oameni, dar și niște coarde sensibile.