A new belief in accordance with the book "Sapiens"
In the book "Sapiens" by Noah Harrari he states for world wide society to continue functioning we need to develop new fictions just as religion and money are fictions. The US dollar is a matter of faith just as belief in God xyz is a matter of faith according to the book.
What are some things that would be important in this new world wide religion or system of beliefs?
What are some things that would be important in this new world wide religion or system of beliefs?
Comments (41)
thats fair. If you have a belief system you would like to post then do it. He states that we need a fiction because he states in the book that all that really is important is human happiness. He states this all through out the book. Is there anything offensive in this statement. Human happiness is a basic idea.
This is not limited to a religion. You are more than welcome to post a belief system. Harrari actually practices a form of yoga as his belief system. Many naturalists recognize that the human body is condusive to forming a naturalist form of spirituality (work with me here).
Isn't Peugot a type of car or company? He said Peugot was what you call a legal fiction. Religion doesn't have to be bad if it follows certain premises is what the book argues. On a personal level i see money as somewhat of a religion and the book acknowledges that to some extent.
If you want to get probed I’m sure you could find an accommodating sapien.
Anyway, I’m about two thirds of the way through the book so I can’t say what the author concludes about the future of sapiens.
The author claims that ideologies or shared fictions, in all forms (such as money, a business brand, or religion), allow sapiens to operate cooperatively in a large scale. A scale that can extend from a tribe, to a nation, or across an empire.
He goes so far as to suggest that it’s this one facility, that sapiens developed first, by mere chance, that allowed them to essentially exterminate all other humanoid species. The neanderthals, for example, were physically stronger and had larger brain mass than sapiens, so one might wonder why they didn’t come out on top.
As far as Neanderthals are concerned many groups of people across the world (i have Black people in my family who have Neanderthal dna) especially Europeans have Neanderthal dna. Neanderthals never died out they just combined into other Cro Magnons or modern humans. If you would like i could find several articles that attest to this.
My understanding from the book is that the percentage of neanderthal dna is far too low to rule out genocide.
I don't remember that but i would agree that genocide is something very often practiced by humans. However the biggest difference between human dna and a Neanderthal is phenotype. Phenotype is less than 1% of the human dna. Apes and humans have 95% or higher similarity in dna. My own opinion is that Neanderthals were never really a separate species and that they really were arbituarly classified that way.
I doubt your paraphrasing of the book, but I haven't read that far.
Yes, I recall that he doesn't rule it out. It is very much still on the table.
its not uncommon on a online forum for people to dislike each others opinions. Thanks for sharing.
He even says alot of this stuff in his videos on youtube.
I said that I doubted your paraphrasing, not that I dislike your opinion, and I wasn't suggesting that you're completely off track. It is an issue of accuracy. If you can quote him saying that "happiness is all that really matters", then that would reduce my doubt about the accuracy of your paraphrasing. What I suspect is that he would've said something more sophisticated than that, based on what I have read so far, but it's possible I'm wrong.
Again, you still haven't provided [i]any[/I] quotes from the book. Why? I think that that's pretty damn important in a discussion like this.
thats fair. I'll post quotes in a couple days or i'll quote from one of his youtube videos so i can pull the information right off the internet.
Some quotes from the book. I'll post more later. As far as people wanting to be happy, my logic circuits tell me that everybody wants to be happy and i'm sure most (keyword most) people would agree thats logical. Maybe most people like me are complete morons.
“You could never convince a monkey to give you a banana by promising him limitless bananas after death in monkey heaven.”
? Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
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“How do you cause people to believe in an imagined order such as Christianity, democracy or capitalism? First, you never admit that the order is imagined.”
? Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
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“Culture tends to argue that it forbids only that which is unnatural. But from a biological perspective, nothing is unnatural. Whatever is possible is by definition also natural. A truly unnatural behaviour, one that goes against the laws of nature, simply cannot exist, so it would need no prohibition.”
I imagine that Noah Harrari’s logic circuits would tell us that everybody wants whatever their shared narrative tells them they want, such as wealth, status, and a 50” high definition flatscreen tv.
thats fair.
In the chapter on happiness, he doesn't claim that it's the most important thing. He makes the case that despite all the developments that have occurred since the time of hunter-gatherer society our subjective happiness or life satisfaction hasn't improved. The belief that wealth, status, and pleasure-seeking leads to happiness or life satisfaction is, sadly, a myth. In that regard, we are all idiots to some degree.
Second to the last chapter he makes the interesting point that we basically have unlimited energy and resources at our disposal, but we're too ignorant to use it responsibly.
Last line of the book:
“Is there anything more dangerous than dissatisfied and irresponsible gods who don’t know what they want?”
Well you should reread the first 4 chapters and also i you watch his videos on youtube i can quickly prove he does say that the present world needs a new fiction to believe in. I'm not sure how you came to this conclusion?
"Why humans run the world" + Noah Harrari + youtube
So, what part of the video does he say something like that? How many minutes/seconds into it?
Quoting christian2017
If Neanderthals and Denisovans had just merged into the Homo sapiens species, it seems to me one would see much higher levels of Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA than we do. I might be wrong about that, but it seems to me reasonable to suppose that it would be higher than 1 or 2%. They could and did breed with Homo sapiens, but there were apparent differences that stood in the way of a species merger--life style factors, ability to tolerate cold, fertility, etc.
Neanderthals were a separate species, so were Denisovans. But that doesn't mean they were radically different. If they had been radically different, they wouldn't have interbred. You know, birds of different species quite often mate producing hybrids that may or may not be fertile. Obviously eagles and hummingbirds are not going to mate (size problem), and parrots and hawks aren't going to mate -- even if they lived in the same tree, their habits, wings, beaks, etc. are incompatible.
Christians and Moslems have been trying to convert everyone to their religions all over the world for a combined number of 3400 missionary years, and have so far not exceeded the half way mark. So, were we to have a new religion (or belief system) that could save us from whatever, it will have to spread a lot faster than Abrahamic religions have.
One belief system that has spread very fast is Capitalism. It's pretty much the going thing among most people, whether they like it or not. Communism/socialism hasn't been able to make anywhere close to the same dent.
If some prophet can come up with something as persuasive as Capitalism, then it might become the new world belief system. However, like Capitalism, it might be the very last thing we need more of.
Note to Harrari: Be careful what you wish for. You might get it.
Well i read it in his book and i've seen it in several of his videos. I assume you watched the video i showed you.
Here is an article that says the same thing and the article is about Harrari:
https://www.wired.com/2018/09/geeks-guide-yuval-noah-harari/
The way scientists classify species or separate species sometimes is arbituary. There are 5 types of griizzly bears but one of those types can breed fertile offspring with Polar bears. This basically means they are the same species and Polar bears are designated as a different species than grizzlies.
It has been proven that Neanderthal's dna is in European and other modern humans. Most Ape like species have almost identical dna. We're talking less than 3% difference between an Ape and a human. Most difference between humans is phenotype and phenotype comprises of less than 1% of our dna.
Thats fair.
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=noah+harrari+%2b+youtube&&view=detail&mid=126061F8E57458130A15126061F8E57458130A15&&FORM=VDRVRV
1:59
I know its in the book but here it is in a video at 1:59.
yeah thats one of the things i got from the book
I think you might be taking the belief in fiction thing a bit too far, in seeing things that aren’t there.
Perhaps. But i remember reading in the book several times. I'll eventually reread it in the book if it is there.
With transparency and openness being promised by many who are running for office, future religionists, if there are any, and given that atheists and other secular people are opening what could be called Mystery Schools, as they were called in the past, atheist church today, then any religion worthy of the name, and this is directly from god, they will have to think more demographically and sign
The more stupid religions today that are based on lies and hidden things, will have to stop badmouthing the sign of the beast, which is ones position in a given in or on a socio economic demographic pyramid.
With computerization and globalization coming in the relatively near future, people will see that that is the only way to end with a much fairer and peaceful co-existence with everyone.
We will have to get past this, hopefully, our last stupid period in history, where we have pussy grabbers and pedophile protectors for presidents and popes.
Stupid and immoral is as stupid and immoral does.
Regards
DL
thats fair.
I like a man who can discern fairness.
Regards
DL
in the book he argues humans work together due to "legal fictions" and fictions. If you have a local library i suggest you atleast read the first 4 chapters or watch one of his youtube videos.
Thanks again for recommending the video+book.
i agree it is an odd concept.
To the intelligentsia, wee already have.
Regards
DL