I read the forerunner to his volume, Sapiens, a couple of years ago. This sequel examines what might happen to the world when old myths are coupled with new god-like technologies, such as artificial intelligence and genetic engineering.
Humans conquered the world thanks to their unique ability to believe in collective myths about gods, money, equality and freedom – as described in Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. In Homo Deus, Prof. Harari looks to the future and explores how global power might shift, as the principal force of evolution – natural selection – is replaced by intelligent design.
What will happen to democracy when Google and Facebook come to know our likes and our political preferences better than we know them ourselves? What will happen to the welfare state when computers push humans out of the job market and create a massive new “useless class”? How might Islam handle genetic engineering? Will Silicon Valley end up producing new religions, rather than just novel gadgets?
As Homo sapiens becomes 'Homo deus', what new destinies will we set for ourselves? As the self-made gods of planet earth, which projects should we undertake, and how will we protect this fragile planet and humankind itself from its own destructive powers? The book Homo Deus gives us a glimpse of the dreams and nightmares that will shape the 21st century.
Summary: The book sets out to examine possibilities of the future of Homo sapiens. The premise outlines that during the 21st Century, humanity is likely to make a significant attempt to gain happiness, immortality and God-like powers. Throughout the book, Harari openly speculates various ways that this ambition might be realised in the future based on the past and present.
Homo Sapiens conquers the world
The first part of the book explores the relationship between humans and other animals, exploring what led to the former's dominance.
Homo Sapiens gives meaning to the world
- Since the verbal/language revolution some 70,000 years ago, humans live within an "intersubjective reality", such as countries, borders, religion, money and companies, all created to enable large-scale, flexible cooperation between different individual human beings. Humanity is separated from animals by humans' ability to believe in these intersubjective constructs that exist only in the human mind and are given force through collective belief.
- Humankind's immense ability to give meaning to its actions and thoughts is what has enabled its many achievements.
- Harari argues that humanism is a form of religion that worships humankind instead of a god. It puts humankind and its desires as a top priority in the world, in which humans themselves are framed as the dominant beings. Humanists believe that ethics and values are derived internally within each individual, rather than from an external source. During the 21st century, Harari believes that humanism may push humans to search for immortality, happiness, and power.
Homo Sapiens loses control
- Technological developments have threatened the continued ability of humans to give meaning to their lives; Harari suggests the possibility of the replacement of humankind with a super-man, or "homo deus" (human god) endowed with abilities such as eternal life.
- The last chapter suggests a possibility that humans are algorithms, and as such homo sapiens may not be dominant in a universe where big data becomes a paradigm.
- The book closes with the following question addressed to the reader:
"What will happen to society, politics and daily life when non-conscious but highly intelligent algorithms know us better than we know ourselves?
What did I think:
I read this as an audio book on Audible. It was a good medium through which to try and absorb all the information that Prof. Harari sets out for us. It will take some re-reading, selected chapters were packed with examples of what the future might hold in relation to the power of computer techonology and AI and how it could impact humans. Quite scary stuff really.
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