Reddit reviews Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
We found 22 Reddit comments about Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.
New York Times Bestseller now available as a beautifully packaged paperbackA Summer Reading Pick for President Barack Obama, Bill Gates, and Mark ZuckerbergFrom a renowned historian comes a groundbreaking narrative of humanity’s creation and evolution—a #1 international bestseller—that explores the ways in which biology and history have defined us and enhanced our understanding of what it means to be “human.”One hundred thousand years ago, at least six different species of humans inhabited Earth. Yet today there is only one—homo sapiens. What happened to the others? And what may happen to us?
I've been reading the book Sapiens, by Yuval Harari. It explains a lot about human behavior on a grand scale. Tribalism is part of our genetic makeup.
Here is a few:
Starship Troopers - the book, not the movie
https://www.amazon.com/Starship-Troopers-Robert-Heinlein/dp/0441783589/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1522947608&sr=1-1&keywords=starship+troopers
Man's Search for Meaning
https://www.amazon.com/Mans-Search-Meaning-Viktor-Frankl/dp/080701429X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1522947637&sr=1-1&keywords=mans+search+for+meaning
Sapiens
https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/dp/0062316117/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1522947665&sr=1-3&keywords=sapiens+a+brief+history+of+humankind
12 rules for life an antidote to chaos
https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_8?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=12+rules+for+life+an+antidote+to+chaos&sprefix=12+rules%2Cstripbooks%2C199&crid=1I6JP76TCR7PC
I made a list based on where you can purchase them if you want to edit it onto your post:
This Month's Book
January:
by Iain Banks]
(https://www.amazon.com/Consider-Phlebas-Culture-Iain-Banks/dp/031600538X)
by Aldous Huxley]
(https://www.amazon.com/Brave-New-World-Aldous-Huxley/dp/0060850523)
by Ray Bradbury
by Oscar Wilde
by Adrian Tchaikovsky
by Jordan B. Peterson]
(https://www.amazon.com/12-Rules-Life-Antidote-Chaos/dp/B0797Y87JC)
February:
by Richard Matheson
by Frank Herbert
by Haruki Murakami
by Bret Easton Ellis
by Max Tegmark
by Friedrich Nietzsche
March:
by Ernest Hemingway
by Herman Melville
April:
(https://www.amazon.com/Dice-Man-Luke-Rhinehart/dp/0879518642)
https://www.amazon.com/Stoner-York-Review-Books-Classics/dp/1590171993)
(https://www.amazon.com/Crime-Punishment-Fyodor-Dostoyevsky/dp/0486415872)
https://www.amazon.com/No-Longer-Human-Osamu-Dazai/dp/0811204812)
May:
https://www.amazon.com/Spring-Snow-Sea-Fertility-1/dp/0679722416)
(https://www.amazon.com/Runaway-Horses-Sea-Fertility-2/dp/0679722408)
November
Books Pewds suggested but hasn't talked about in any of the episodes yet:
linking pewds to see this u/pewpewpewPEWdie
According to the book Sapiens the Maori wiped out around 60% of NZ's native species before Europeans arrived. Similar story with the Aborigines in Australia.
Yes they like to claim they lived on the land harmoniously, but they first caused a lot of damage before they learnt to do so.
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind: This is the best book I have read in a very long time. This is about how our cultures, religions, and values were formed based on biology and psychology theories. I know that sounds boring but it is very interesting.
A Higher Loyalty: If you believe Comey your opinion will not change and if you do not believe Comey your opinion will not change. Meh, skip it.
[Dune] (https://www.amazon.com/Dune-Frank-Herbert/dp/0441172717/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1524527285&sr=1-1&keywords=dune) I do not read a lot of Sci-Fi but with the expected move coming u in a few years I thought I might get ahead if it. It was interesting but not exactly action-packed.
Leonardo Da Vinci The Walter Isaacson biographies about "geniuses" Steve Jobs, Ben Franklin, Albert Einstein are all interesting.
For anyone interested, Sapiens is a good book to start.
Sapiens is a general history book about humanity, not so much traditional countries' history. It explores things like how did agriculture and warfare start, why is homo sapiens the only surviving human species etc.
For fun reading about history, I recommend anything written by Robert K. Massie. This is not general history; he wrote mostly about Tsarist Russia, but Dreadnought: Britain, Germany and the Coming of the Great War is a good starter for pre-WW1 European history.
I say "a good starter" because Massie's approach is very biographical - he mostly tells the story through the lives and actions of the decision makers, with less "modern" emphasis on economic factors etc. But he's a really good writer and it's the kind of history book you can read on a beach.
There are two great books that talk about exactly this.
In his book, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, the author speculates on this question. Check the "Cognitive Revolution" section.
Brain size, use of fire for cooking and communication were all part of the explanation.
Sapiens
I'm a few chapters into it; so far it's been an explanation of how many human species there initially were, how they interacted, and how ours (Homo Sapiens) came to be the only one still present. It's good reading on a topic that interested me, but it hasn't really grabbed me, so I'll pick it back up after we finish Come As You Are.
Read these books in this order:
This mini library is a sort of behind the scenes peek into humanity, religion in general, and the Bible specifically. You’ll never look at these things the same way again.
Now, after reading these, return and report and give us word.
I highly recommend both Sapiens, and also The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined by Steven Pinker (which Bill Gates calls "the most inspiring book I've ever read")
They'll make you think (a lot) but they're good reads and super interesting.
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062316117/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_9xo3Cb2Y2WCV5
You are taking the story, or at least one of the stories, of the garden of Eden literally. Hence, all your questions are unanswerable questions. Or at least unanswerable with any certainty.
I like the idea I first read in Yuval Harari's book Sapien: A Brief History of Humankind
The garden of Eden story is about man going from a hunter gatherer to a farmer. As a hunter gatherer he would work a few hours a day hunting animals for food. The women would spend some time each day collecting nuts, fruits, other edible plants. They would then spend the rest of the day basically relaxing. When man began to cultivate the soil, to grow crops, he now had to work from sun up to sun down, toiling all day long. Women as a part of the hunter gatherer society, needed to keep up with the men as they did the hunting. With all the daily traveling women had thin, fit bodies and were able to give birth rather easily. They needed to give birth and still keep up with the men. Once women no longer used their muscles as they did in the hunter gatherer life style, the birth canal got smaller and having babies became much more difficult, more painful, and much more deadly for the mother and the child.
When viewed this way, and I'm sure I did not give it justice the way Harari did in his book, the garden of Eden story is a beautifully poetic and metaphoric account of our human history.
​
I can’t take credit. The book “Sapiens”, by Yuval Harari uses it to describe the way human beings use imaginary ideas to control our collective and individual behavior:
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062316117/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_Q.JkDb8CW5K7E
If you really like History (or you want to understand the world in a very useful way), find a copy of Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind and see where it takes you.
I am a particular fan of the Atheist Experience. It is a weekly call in show that takes calls from theist and atheists to discuss whatever is on their mind.
I am currently reading [Sapiens](sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062316117/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_Y-SKBbFXAPM0Y). This books takes a deep dive into the origins of humanity. It's not particularly about religion but it does make some mention of it. I really like this book because it addresses why Humans are the way we are, what seperated us from our ancestors, how the way we think influences every aspect of our society today.
Talk Origins is an excellent resource that has cited knowledge for just about any topic you could think of.
I am not gay and don't have any real insight into that situation nor have I done much reading or research into that. I do know that the Bible is not friendly to the LGBT+ community, particularly those of the Baptist variety.
Never stop looking for the truth. Evaluate whether the facts you find mesh with your beliefs, if they don't, evaluate your beliefs to see if that is something you can actually believe in.
Remember your parents may never come to accept you as you. I hope they are able to see past their beliefs to still love you but they might not. I have been unable to convince my Father, who is an otherwise brilliant man, that evolution is an actual fact and that the earth is older than 6,000 years old. And I might not ever be able to. You cannot allow your families unwillingness to seek truth and accept you as you to dictate your life. The people I consider my family now are unrelated to me, my brothers and sisters are the ones I have chosen.
Remember, even if you conclude that Christianity is the truth, there is not a single atheist I know that will condemn you for being you. We may argue against beliefs we view as false, but that will not change your value as a human being.
tl;dr seek out facts, evaluate your beliefs against the facts. Repeat till you die. Find people worthy of your time that respect you for you, not their vision of you.
Yeah I agree.
It's also really, really unnatural.
A lot of people don't believe it, but with every human step we actually had to work more. Initially a farming society might have worked less than a hunterer & gatherer society, but after a few decades they actually had to WORK MORE than earlier, mainly because of the growing living standard and society. Same goes for the industrialisation.
If you compare our live to that of a stone-age civilization, you'd actually find that we work far more than them. Obviously that has granted us a FAR higher living standard, but it's still unnatural.
Source: https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/dp/0062316117/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2Z3M16F84J3NM&keywords=a+short+history+of+humankind&qid=1556869021&s=gateway&sprefix=a+short+history+of+human%2Caps%2C255&sr=8-1
https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/dp/0062316117/ref=sr_1_1
Homie you must have gotten the cliff notes version.
Amazon Link
For the record I listened to it on Audible so I didn’t know it had 464 pages, I just knew it was about 15 hours long.
> How do you explain the beginning of human civilisation? Did it automatically start?
We were discussing the origins of the universe, not human civilization. Why the hard left turn? However, unlike the origins of the universe, which we know almost nothing about, the development of human civilization is better understood. I imagine you’re a young person. Can I suggest that you read Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, and Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind? They’re both brilliant. I’d send you copies of both if you were in the US.
The short version is that we evolved as social, tribal, animals. We were nomadic, hunter-gatherers for tens of thousands of years. But, after the discovery of agriculture, we could settle in one place. This allowed specialization of work. People no longer had to do everything. Hunting was done by those good at hunting, for the whole group. Farming was done by those good at farming, for the whole group. And, maybe most importantly, this created more time to innovate. To test out new ways of doing things without jeopardizing the tribe. Out of this, civilization was born.
“Sapiens” by Yuval Noah Harari night have what you’re looking for.
https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/dp/0062316117/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?keywords=sapiens&qid=1566280973&s=gateway&sr=8-1