A Thrilling Tale of Humankind
Who would have thought history could be this interesting…

Yuval Noah Harari’s Sapiens A Brief History of Humankind is the most thought-provoking book I’ve ever read in my life. Seriously, it is that good. It brings out a whole new different perspective on the facts that we already know. If you are planning on reading this, you better put aside all your preconceived notions and biases and start with an open mind.
The idea of this post is not to summarize what’s in the book but to highlight some of the mind-boggling ideas presented by Yuval Noah Harari and maybe it will make you want to read it. Most of the questions about our history still baffle us to this day and Harari provides a fantastic case against many.
- The first part of the book talks about the cognitive evolution of homo(man) sapiens(wise); yes that’s us. Just like there are different species of foxes, pigs etc.. there walked the earth different types of human species some hundred millennia ago. What happened to them? How did they vanish leaving only us?
- Every animal has some sort of language. Monkeys know how to warn others of danger, parrots can mimic sounds, whales, elephants they all have some way to communicate with each other etc… So what’s so special about our sapiens language?
- According to the sociological research, it is shown that the maximum size of a group that can function properly is 150. Once this threshold is crossed things can no longer work the way they are. It destabilizes the social order. Then how on earth the sapiens manage to run empires with millions of people? Is it the secret of believing in common myths? Gods, nations, money, law… Do these things really exist or just an imagination of human beings? Harari goes on to show how these communal beliefs helped humans to cooperate at large scale with some really good examples.
- One very interesting fact that I cannot get my mind off is the strong case he made against the agricultural revolution. He paints a wholly different picture that I have not thought of before. He points out how the hunter-gatherers might have lived a way more interesting lives than those of us living even today. In his own words,
Foragers knew the secrets of nature long before the Agricultural revolution since their survival depended on an intimate knowledge of the animals they hunted and the plants they gathered. Rather than heralding a new era of easy living, the Agricultural Revolution left farmers with lives generally more difficult than those of foragers. Hunter-gatherers spent their time in more simulating and varied ways, and were less in danger of starvation and disease. The Agricultural Revolution centaintly enlarged the sum total of food at the disposal of humankind, but the extra food did not translate into a better diet or more leisure. Rather, it translated into population explosions and pampered elites. The average farmer worked harder than the average forager, and got a worse diet in return. The Agricularal Revolution was the history’s biggest fraud.
Then he goes on to answer who was responsible and why the humans have not abandon farming when the plan backfired. Moreover, he draws out how to this day we still repeat the same mistake in the pursuit of an easier life.
This is just a fraction of what you might find in this amazing book. He has a lot to say about the fate of animals which is heartbreaking, how the imagined order shaped our lives, what is natural and unnatural when it comes to culture and biology, where the history is moving and a lot more. You just have to read this book to really appreciate what’s in it.
