Homo Deus: A History of Tomorrow - Yuval Noah Harari - ★★

AUTHOR: Yuval Noah Harari

GENRE: Nonfiction.

PUBLICATION DATE: January 1, 2015.

RATING: 2 stars.

Outlier Review Alert!

I don't what is it about Harari's books that always inspire food metaphors in me. With Sapiens, it was masala chai vs. coffee. This time, it is an Eid special, as this review is coming to you on Eid! Wanna know more? Read on!

Imagine being served a scrumptious biryani. Everything smells great and looks great. But when you start eating it, you realise that the meat (sorry, vegetarians!) isn't upto the mark and has been left raw in some places. No matter how flavourful the rest of the biryani is, the meat has spoiled its entire taste. To me, that is Homo Deus in a nutshell.

Homo Deus literally means "Man God", man trying to be God. Part 1 of the book talks about man dominating animals in order to emerge as a superior species. In Part 3, Harari dexterously covers humankind's attempts to govern the world with their technological advancements. But what would happen if technology attempts to dominate us tomorrow? (Or has it already begun?) That is also covered in depth and is slightly scary too. You might just end up becoming a bit paranoid after reading this last section. I really enjoyed these two parts of the book (speaking only in a broad sense; there were some flaws in here as well.) But the second part left me utterly irritated.

Part 2 talks about various forms of religion, both actual and assumed. Harari includes Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Liberalism, Communism, Aryanism, Capitalism, Humanism,.. all under the umbrella tag of religion. How these "religions" impacted human decision towards progress or towards disaster, how religious dogmas affected human thinking and human freedom, how collective belief in a particular religion restricted human progress - everything is detailed out based on Harari's presumptions. And this is where he falters badly.

Harari claims that past religious interpretations cannot be judged currently as technology wasn't the same at the time and human consciousness develops with time. And yet, he ends up doing this consistently. Most modern believers know that religious texts aren't supposed to be taken literally but read with their proper deeper interpretation. But Harari seems to be reading these texts only at face value. All of us are aware of atrocities committed in the name of religion both in the past and present. But using that to attack the faith itself is bound to offend believers, whether they are religious or merely spiritual.

Furthermore, when I read a scientific non-fiction, I would expect the author to keep away his personal prejudices while writing and present a factual opinion based on accurate research and/or justified hypotheses. However, just by reading this book, you can guess a lot about Harari's personal beliefs. That is a big NO! You can be whatever you want in your personal life, no problem. But using that to make negative claims about those who don't follow the same ideologies is not expected from such a respected and educated person. Additionally, facts that go with Harari's beliefs are presented convincingly. And facts that don't support his beliefs are conveniently ignored. It is said that half-information is dangerous. This book proves it.

Homo Deus is all about Harari trying to be a Homo Deus himself, a human pseudo-god who is intent on making predictions about current and future human behaviour without realising that he has stumbled many times along the way. Sapiens seemed entirely factual, Homo Deus seems partly fictitious. Sapiens was perceptive, Homo Deus is pompous.

Many readers might still enjoy Homo Deus. It definitely has some extremely astute observations. I just wish Harari had taken care with the rest of his assertions. Let me take an excerpt from the book itself to show you what I think of Homo Deus:

"Each of us has a sophisticated system that throws away most of our experiences, keeps only a few choice samples, mixes them up with bits from movies we saw, novels we read, speeches we heard, and from our own daydreams, and weaves out of all that jumble a seemingly coherent story about who I am, where I came from and where I am going. This story tells me what to love, whom to hate and what to do with myself. ... Some people live a tragedy, others inhabit a never-ending religious drama, some approach life as if it were an action film, and not a few act as if in a comedy. But in the end, they are all just stories."

That's what Homo Deus is. A Yuval Noah Harari story. 🙄