Yes, it allowed civilizations to thrive, but on an individual level, he writes, we were much better off as hunter-gatherers.
Sapiens A Brief History Of Humankind Audiobook Verification Link SentClick verification link sent to this email address or resend verification email.I had just finished the book and I was dying to talk to her about it.Its so provocative and raises so many questions about human history that I knew it would spark great conversations around the dinner table.
In fact, in the weeks since weve been back from our holiday, we still talk about Sapiens. Ive always been a fan of writers who try to connect the dots and make sense of the sweep of history. Probably no one has done it better than David Christian in his Big History lectures, which distill 13.7 billion years of history, from the Big Bang on, into a manageable framework that spans biology, physics, humanities, and the social sciences. While Harari concerns himself with a shorter time frame, the last 70,000 years of human history, his job is no less difficult. He sets out to explain how we, Homo sapiens (Latin for wise person), came to dominate the Earth and what may lie ahead for our species. But Harari reminds us that long before we built the pyramids, wrote symphonies, or walked on the moon, there was nothing special about us. The most important thing to know about prehistoric humans, Harari writes, is that they were insignificant animals with no more impact on their environment than gorillas, fireflies or jellyfish. Just as today we see different species of bears or pigs, there were different species of humans. While our own ancestors lived mainly in East Africa, our relatives Homo neanderthalensis, better known as Neanderthals, inhabited Europe. Another species, Homo erectus, populated Asia, and the island of Java was home to Homo soloensis. Some were big, fearsome hunters, while others were dwarf-like plant gatherers. As different as each species may have been, there is evidence of interbreeding among them. Scientists mapping the Neanderthal genome, for example, discovered that people of European origin today have a small percentage of genes from their Neanderthal ancestors. That will make an interesting addition to many family trees). How did we Homo sapiens become so successful and others did not Harari believes it was our unique cognitive abilities that made the difference. About 70,000 years ago, Homo sapiens underwent a cognitive revolution, Harari writes, which gave them the edge over their rivals to spread from East Africa across the planet. Sapiens A Brief History Of Humankind Audiobook How To Organize OurselvesWe know how to organize ourselves as nations, companies, and religions, giving us the power to accomplish complex tasks. ![]() Baboons, wolves, and other animals also know how to function as a group, of course, but their groups are defined by close social ties that limit their groups to small numbers. Homo sapiens has the special ability to unite millions of strangers around commons myths. Ideas like freedom, human rights, gods, laws, and capitalism exist in our imaginations, yet they can bind us together and motivate us to cooperate on complex tasks. For example, Harari sets out to prove that the agricultural revolution was one of the biggest mistakes in human history.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |