Reading "Sapiens"

Resonating on Many Levels

A couple of weeks ago I began reading Yuval Naoh Harari’s 2014 book, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. Harari’s has a PhD in History from Oxford and is a lecturer at Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Certainly, Harari has received a considerable amount of criticism regarding this book from numerous academics, including Darshana Narayanan (neuroscientist), Marlene Zuk and Mike Wilson (anthropologists), Galen Strawson (philosopher), Charles C. Mann (science journalist), and, Avi Tuschman (evolutionary anthropologist). The main criticisms include overgeneralization, scientific inaccuracies, conflation of concepts, Eurocentric perspective, and neglect of nuance.

However, numerous academics wrote very positive reviews of what is a trade book written for the general public, not for academic specialists. Some of these reviewers include Jared Diamond (the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Guns, Germs, and Steel and Professor of Geography at UCLA), Daniel Kahneman (the Nobel Prize-winning psychologist and author of Thinking, Fast and Slow), Sir Colin Renfrew (British archaeologist and fellow of the British Academy), Nick Bostrom (philosopher at Oxford University and author of Superintelligence), and John Gray (political philosopher and author). They praised the book because of its synthesis of disciples, its “big history” approach, its challenge of common narratives, and its accessibility.

I’m about 2/3 of the way through the book and while I question some of what Harari writes, mostly (so far) I have found it readable, provocative, thought-provoking, and (for me) surprisingly affirming of some ideas that I’ve been exposed to or have already embraced. There are numerous quotes that I could share that have resonated very strongly with me, some of which I hope share and comment on in further posts. Right now I want to finish the book and then give Harari’s total message some more thought, and discussion with a few of my friends who have also read the book.

But, even before I finish it, I would recommend it. Readable and deeply thought-provoking. As everyone says today, “Enjoy!”