Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind - Yuvel Harari

⭐ 4.0/10

(Originally written by Joseph)

Much like Blood, Germs and Steel, this book initially blew me away as they challenged my assumptions and forced me to think in totally new ways. With BG&S, it petered out a bit for me by the end because I found it a bit boring. Nothing was boring about Sapiens, but by the end I just found it entirely ridiculous.

My main issue with the book is that the author speaks as if he's an expert of essentially every major academic discipline, including history, anthropology, philosophy, religion, biology, chemistry, psychology, ethics, economics and agriculture, and then disguises his biased opinions on each subject as commonly accepted fact. I found his writing style funny at first, but by the end was worn out by his hubris and arrogance. He caricaturizes most existing belief systems in order to refute them, and then makes sweeping assumptions for his own. I just found there to be a lack of academic integrity, especially with common academic taboos such as assuming causal relationships and the aforementioned strawmen.

ANYWAYS I still gave it a few stars because it was still super interesting and definitely forces you to think. It had some great big-picture ideas that I will not soon forget. I just don't agree that this is any type of academic book. It's just pseudo-scientific conjecture that would be a great hit among first year arts students.