3.5 out of 5 stars

The publisher provided a copy of this, free of charge, in return for an honest review.

Where does humanity see ourselves in 10, 20 or even 50 years’ time? Will we wipe ourselves off the planet? Will AI put us all out of work, and we’ll starve to death? Or will climate change do a combination of those things and eradicate humanity?

Who knows?

Well, no one really. But many people have theories and speculate based on current trends; this is what Harari tried to do in this book.

As my long-retired father regularly reminds me, work is a four-letter word. He’s not wrong… Harari explores where the working man and woman are at, at the moment and where we might be in the world of work after the algorithm, AI, and robots have fully arrived. He considers the universal basic income and the policies that Scandinavian countries are putting in place to protect workers rather than specifically jobs.

I thought that his chapter on liberty was very interesting. We like to think of ourselves (at least in the Western hemisphere) as being free in all regards, but even in our so-called free society, we have contracts (!!!) over what we can and can’t say. Thankfully, we are not as heavily restricted in what we can say or do if we were living under a dictator or in an authoritarian society.
Churchill once said that ‘democracy is the worst political system in the whole world, except for all the others’. Our ability to choose who or what to vote for is great in principle. However, most people rely on their irrational feelings when voting and surprise, surprise, AI is muscling in on this with all of its pre-built in flaws and biases.

He moves neatly onto equality in the next chapter. He proposes that the most equal society that humans have had was the hunter gatherer. I didn’t really agree with this, as even then, there would have been some form of hierarchy. Since then, most societies have rarely been equal. People are split because of class, wealth, land and power, with those having some or all of those things generally being in charge of those who didn’t have them. He envisages a terrifying future where the haves can accelerate the negligible differences between humans.
How will the 21st century address communities? No one can be absolutely sure what the future holds, but I am not sure that social media (or anti-social media, as it should be called) will play a part. It can have its positive moments, but sadly, they are few and far between as the algorithms drive outrage for their revenue.

How do we define civilisation? Is the Western way best? A secular society, or religious, choosing from Christianity, Islam, or Hindu or Buddhism? It is almost impossible to say as they all have good and bad points. I tend to think that a good society is one that allows a range of views, supports those less fortunate, promotes peace and harmony and holds all members of society to high standards. Societies that promote division and seek to anger certain parts of society, with that anger aimed at particular sections, i.e. immigrants, are societies that are doomed.

So is nationalism the answer? No. The introspective navel gazing that is, along with the self-importance and exclusion of others, has never done any good to those countries that have adopted it. Harari subtitles this chapter, Global Problems need Global Answers.

Harari’s next chapter is on religion, and he sets about trying to answer the question: Does religion have the answers to the problems facing the world at the moment? Er, no. It doesn’t. Sadly, it does have the ability to cause more strife, conflict and misery amongst people still.

He finishes this section on immigration, a touchy subject, as anyone who follows current political discourse will know. I think that he does get to the nub of the problem with his Coldlandia and Warmlandia example. He explains how people in each of his made-up countries manage when they have emigrated to the opposing country.

Terrorism, war and violence have been significant factors in human history for as long as two people have disagreed over something or other. He explores how these things have changed and contemplates how they will change in the future.

To have humility is to have freedom from pride and arrogance. There are some countries with this, but sadly, they are few and far between. Mostly it is the geopolitical equivalent of willy waving, and it is not big, and it is not clever…

Harari ventures briefly into the thorny world of religion and secularism. I thought that he had some interesting perspectives on this, but I didn’t always agree with him.

Where I think he is right is on how ignorant we are these days. He uses the example of how few people understand exactly how a zip works. Even the simplest product, i.e. a toaster, needs experts in electrics, moulding, metalwork, plating and mechanisms.

Is there a just way of doing life? Harari suggests that we can just do it by making ethical decisions on things that we do and know. As is the way of modern life, most things are hidden from us, either deliberately or just because the modern world is far too complex for us, and anyone else, for that matter, to understand.

From there he moves onto the post-truth age, going from the outright lies told by political leaders nowadays to the more common mix of half-truths and fiction that most politicians spout and that to most people sounds plausible. The advice that he gives is that if you want to find a reliable and trustworthy source of information, then you will probably need to pay for it. Free almost never means good these days.

Science fiction is a way of imagining the future. Some of these stories are grim, i.e. 1984 and The Handmaid’s Tale, and others are more utopian. Reading them can put you in the mindset of someone else, and it gives you empathy with them as you live their experiences.
I spent a long time in education and graduated at the age of 26, having completed a part-time degree. I had a useful qualification and was in paid work that was relevant to that. Children today don’t have that opportunity; instead, they will end up changing jobs over the course of their careers and often retraining, or worse, having gig economy jobs as the elites de-skill and commodify every job in the rapidly changing modern economy.

I thought that this was an interesting book. He has some good ideas and makes some very good points about the possible futures that humanity could have. However, there were some points that I didn’t really agree with, and there were more than a few that I thought he was utterly wrong about. But I think the point of these books is that they are the beginning of a discussion, not a hard and fast roadmap of where we are going. I think that he is a fairly good writer and that he is pretty good at conveying his ideas in a clear and succinct way. I was underwhelmed by his first book, Sapiens, but think this is equally good as his previous book, Homo Deus. It is worth a read if you have a chance.

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