Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

by Yuval Noah Harari

studying the inner workings of the human organism have found no soul there. They increasingly argue that human behaviour is determined by hormones, genes and synapses, rather than by free will

in all frankness, how long can we maintain the wall separating the department of biology from the departments of law and political science?

can describe how Christianity took over the Roman Empire, but they cannot explain why this particular possibility was realised. What

Aw

describe ‘how’ means to reconstruct the series of specific events that led from one point to another. To explain ‘why’ means to find causal connections that account for the occurrence of this particular series of events to the exclusion of all others. Some

is an iron rule of history that what looks inevitable in hindsight was far from obvious at the time.

cultures are mental parasites that emerge accidentally, and thereafter take advantage of all people infected by them. This

assumes that, just as organic evolution is based on the replication of organic information units called ‘genes’, so cultural evolution is based on the replication of cultural information units called ‘memes’.1

turning point came in 1747, when a British physician, James Lind, conducted a controlled experiment on sailors who suffered from the disease. He

Yes james!

Cook’s ship a scientific expedition protected by a military force or a military expedition with a few scientists tagging along? That’s

:'(

remains of the wall built by WIC to defend its colony against Native Americans and British are today paved over by the world’s most famous street – Wall Street. As the