Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

by Yuval Noah Harari

further divided into several bands.2 Each tribe had its own

The big beasts of Africa and Asia learned to avoid humans, so when the new mega-predator – Homo sapiens – appeared on the Afro-Asian scene, the large animals already knew to keep their distance from creatures that looked like it. In contrast,

Once people get used to a certain luxury, they take it for granted. Then they begin to count on it. Finally they reach a point where they can’t live without it.

something that very few people have been doing while everyone else was ploughing fields and carrying water buckets.

The French Revolution was spearheaded by affluent lawyers, not by famished peasants. The Roman Republic reached the height of its power in the first century BC, when treasure fleets from throughout the Mediterranean enriched the Romans beyond their ancestors’ wildest dreams.

there are no such things as rights in biology. There are only organs, abilities and characteristics. Birds fly not because they have a right to fly, but because they have wings.

Most sociopolitical hierarchies lack a logical or biological basis – they are nothing but the perpetuation of chance events supported by myths.

money is the most universal and most efficient system of mutual trust ever devised.

Money and trust

The first coins in history were struck around 640 BC by King Alyattes of Lydia,

An empire is a political order with two important characteristics. First, to qualify for that designation you have to rule over a significant number of distinct peoples, each possessing a different cultural identity and a separate territory.

Empires were one of the main reasons for the drastic reduction in human diversity.