Review Of "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind" (Part 1)

Review of “Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind” by Daniel H Chew

Book: Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (London, UK: Penguin Random House, 2011)

Outline:

Part One: Introduction, Overview, and Overall Evaluation

Introduction

Yuval Noah Harari is a historian at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and he has written a book on human history. At first glance, such is nothing out of the ordinary. But with endorsements by global elite such as Bill Gates and Barack Obama, the book deserves a closer look. At a manageable size of 466 pages, Harari’s book is marketed at the white-collar executive who wants to get the gist of human history without getting bogged down in the details, and thus this “brief history of humankind” is intended to give the white-collar executive an overview of history in his readings throughout his busy day. It would not be surprising if this would be the only history book, or one of a few, that executives would read in their entire lives. Thus, while not considered “academic,” it seems helpful to review this book and see how human history is portrayed in it.

I will first provide an overview of the book, then an overall evaluation, followed by specific points of critique. Specifically, I would look at the history of science, the issue of human development, the interpretation of Christian Scripture, the issue of religion and the problem of induction. Lastly, I will move to a general critique on a history of ideas, concerning the future, and an evaluation of Harari’s project as a whole. It is hoped that this review might help the reader to understand the futurist worldview and see its flaws, noting that we have nothing to fear from the futurist who distort the truths of General Revelation in their exceptionally brilliant intellectual idolatry.

An Overview of the Book

A Brief History of Humankind is indeed a brief history, split into five parts covering what Harari thinks of as the four revolutions in the history of humankind: the Cognitive Revolution, the Agricultural Revolution, the Unification of Humankind, and the Scientific Revolution; and the last part on the future. It is through these four revolutions that humankind has developed the way it has. Unlike other history books, Harari’s book integrates natural history with human history in a holistic fashion, thus it exudes confidence and scientific certainty. Harari’s prose is excellent, and thus this book presents itself almost as the book on the history of ALL humankind, with all the virtues such an appeal to science and humanity in general, and internationalism in particular, points to— all points that would sit well with global-connected executives.

The book begins with a timeline of history starting from the Big Bang at 13.8 billion years ago, and ends with “the present” and “the future” (pp. ix-x). The first part on the Cognitive Revolution begins with human evolution from “the great apes” (p. 5), the emergence of Homo sapiens (Modern Man), the discovery of fire, language and religion, and the impact of humans on the natural world. The second part on the Agricultural Revolution deals with the emergence of agriculture, the creation of cities and civilization, the emergence of writing, and the emergence of social inequality. The third part, just called “the Unification of Humankind,” deals with growing contacts among different cultures and parts of the world, the emergence of money, the rise of empires and the supposed “law of religion” (Chapter 12). Fourthly, the part on the Scientific Revolution starts with the “willingness to admit ignorance” (p. 279), the marriage of science and imperialism, a development and defense of capitalism, the industrial revolution, and growing peace in the world, ending with the quest for happiness. Lastly, Harari moves to the future and speaks about current trends which might come to pass, in a chapter that seems to predict the end of humankind itself with our technology surpassing us human beings (Chapter 20).

Harari’s book is an audacious and ambitious endeavor, and it certainly covers a lot of ground. It is also one of the few books that aims to integrate natural history and human history. But how well does the book actually tell history?

Overall Evaluation

It must be said that this book is not a typical history book, and this is more than saying it is not an academic book. Rather, this book is not a typical history book in that it does not actually narrate human history. Historical events are told so broadly that people play an insignificant part in the story. It is thus a history of events and ideas, not of people, something which shall be spoken of later.

This book has much to be commended. Harari does right in rejecting the [post-] modern social sciences in their attacks on imperialism and capitalism. Here, Harari is a thorough-going Enlightenment modernist, for all the good and ill that comes with that disposition. On Western Imperialism, Harari states: “…neither the narrative of oppression and exploitation nor that of “the White Man’s burden’ completely matches the facts. The European empires did so many different things on such a large scale, that you can find plenty of examples to support whatever you want to say about them” (p. 337), thus rejecting both narratives for and against Western Imperialism. Harari also rejects communism for capitalism, while using the historical event of the emergence of the slave trade to point out capitalism’s key weakness: free-market capitalism is amoral, thus it “cannot ensure that profits are gained in a fair way, or distributed in a fair manner” (p. 370). While acknowledging the growing ecological challenges in the modern world, Harari also rightly points out that the hysteria about destroying nature is nonsensical (p. 393), and changes in the world will not destroy nature but may just destroy us, in the same way that the asteroid that supposedly hit earth 65 million years ago destroyed the dinosaurs yet Earth persevered.

Harari’s modernist and dispassionate slant is indeed helpful in keeping to the facts, and it is a refreshing read in light of the extremely subjective activism and revisionism happening in much of society. But it is a myth that modernism is fully objective, and although Harari aims for objectivity, errors of facts and inferences persist, especially when he approaches topics that lie within the blind spots of liberal modernity.

The assertion that Harari has erred on certain major themes is a big assertion. In order to prove my case, I will start with errors that can be more clearly seen, and with evidence more acceptable even for a secular mind, and move my way down to cover more and more controversial issues. Thus, the first thing to be looked at is the history of science.