But we can work to close that gap and reduce the time it takes for innovation to spread. The private market in particular serves the needs of people with money and, left to its own devices, often misses the needs of the poor. I agree that, as innovation accelerates, it doesn’t automatically benefit everyone. He argues that humanity’s progress toward bliss, immortality, and divinity is bound to be unequal-some people will leap ahead, while many more are left behind. But I am more optimistic than he is that this future is not pre-ordained. Harari does a great job of showing how we might arrive at this grim future. He foresees a potential future where a small number of elites upgrade themselves through biotechnology and genetic engineering, leaving the masses behind and creating the godlike species of the book’s title where artificial intelligence “knows us better than we know ourselves” and where these godlike elites and super-intelligent robots consider the rest of humanity to be superfluous. Here is Harari’s most provocative idea: As good as it sounds, achieving the dream of bliss, immortality, and divinity could be bad news for the human race. Advances in science and technology will help people live much longer and go a long way toward ending disease and hunger. War and violence are at historical lows and still declining. What would the world be like if we actually achieved those things? This is not entirely idle speculation. Taking these goals to their logical conclusion, Harari says humans are striving for “bliss, immortality, and divinity.” We have organized to meet basic human needs: being happy, healthy, and in control of the environment around us. So far, the things that have shaped society-what we measure ourselves by-have been some combination of religious rules about how to live a good life, and more earthly goals like getting rid of sickness, hunger, and war. Homo Deus argues that the principles that have organized society will undergo a huge shift in the 21 st century, with major consequences for life as we know it.
I don’t agree with everything the author has to say, but he has written a thoughtful look at what may be in store for humanity. Rather than looking back, as does, it looks to the future.
Harari’s new book is as challenging and readable as Sapiens Sapiens. So when Homo Deus came out earlier this year, I grabbed a copy and made sure to take it on our most recent vacation. It sparked conversations over our dinner table for weeks after we both read it. Melinda and I loved Harari’s previous book, Sapiens, which tries to explain how our species came to dominate the Earth. I’m still thinking about those weighty questions after finishing Homo Deus, the provocative new book by Yuval Noah Harari. What gives our lives meaning? And what if one day, whatever gives us meaning went away-what would we do then?
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