A select company of three met to discuss this month’s book, "Homo Deus: a Brief History of Tomorrow" by Yuval Noah Harari. This is a
follow-up to our look at Harari's previous work, "Sapiens, A Brief History of
Humankind".
Since we did not wish to diminish the scope of our discussion by
33.3%, we did not have a blogger for the evening. Hence the notes that
follow are a brief (briefer anyway than Yuval Noah Harari’s definition of the
word) summary of the proposer’s preparatory notes.
The proposer felt that this is a book that invites discussion
and debate. Like ‘Sapiens’, it stimulated him to run its ideas past
whoever happened to be nearby when he was reading it. It also stimulated
reflection on his own life decisions. The text is engagingly written, and
frequently provokes the reader to interact with it, weighing the plausibility
of the various arguments presented.
The first part of the book is to some extent a re-run of the
content of ‘Sapiens’ – perhaps a necessary exercise in order to set a context
for Harari’s account of the new projects of mankind. He defines these new
projects as immortality, happiness and divinity, and argues that famine, plague
and war are largely problems whose solution now lies in our own hands, rather
than being beyond our control. These assertions, deliberately
provocative, stimulated much discussion on the evening.
The writing throws up some great metaphors and similes.
For example: “terrorists are like a fly that tries to destroy a china shop’
(they have to enrage a bull), or the illustrative use of the history of lawns.
Harari also uses catchy section headings that provide a
memorable framework for his ideas – for example ‘Organisms are Algorithms’ and
‘Why Bankers are different from Vampires’. The proposer also enjoyed the
snippets of history and accounts of scientific experiments with which the
writer illustrated his themes. For example the Pharoahs’ creation of a
huge artificial lake and the city of ‘Crocodilopolis’, and the experiment with
rats placed in flasks of water (not so enjoyable for the rats, of course).
The cover of the paperback edition was not great in terms of
graphic design, but the little thumbprint/electronic circuit image was a clever
interpretation of one of the book’s important themes. We noted too that
it hinted at the shape of an acorn, also appropriate. The use of images
in the book itself, while sparing, is very effective. The proposer
particularly enjoyed the ‘Humanism in Five Images’ pages.
In conclusion, the proposer found the book somewhat
overwhelming, in that each proposition opens up numerous new lines of
enquiry. However, by identifying the quests for immortality, happiness
and divinity as themes for investigation, Harari provides a useful framework to
combat passive or heedless acceptance of ‘the way things are going’.
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