pbk.
Published July 30, 2011 by Harper.
(p.010)
Harper Perennial
A hardcover edition of this book was published in 2015 by HarperCollins Publishers.
Copyright (c) by Yuval Noah Harari.
Printed in Canada.
First Harper Perennial edition published 2018.
ISBN 978-0-06-231611-0 (pbk.)
Some very interesting ideas and a lot of information for a graphic novel treatment of this subject.
The proper title is "Sapiens: A brief history of humankind's beliefs".
La historia de la humanidad, desde un acercamiento biológico y antropológico. Sostiene un análisis casi neutral y semi lineal. La voz escribe en tercera persona lo que juega un papel interesante en la no identificación de la especie humana, y generar mayor comprensión de nuestra naturaleza.
Listened to the audio book. It's about 15 hours. It's so, so interesting. It's well written and easy to understand. It will have you looking at the world and yourself a little differently. The whole book is an exercise in thought. I really enjoyed it.
There's a bookstore/coffeeshop I used to go to where I once heard another customer expound in an initially impressive and interesting manner that started to sound like BS after a while. I bought this book at that store and had the same experience reading it. Initially, it's informative and entertaining in the style of science books I usually enjoy, but after a while the author just sounded like the coffee shop arguer who loves to hold forth and after a while you can't believe anything he says. After some passages of there-are-some-other-theories-but-I-just-don't-buy-it, and self contractory grand statements like all those authoritarian conquerors really thought they were doing good, and later, all those authoritarian conquerors, they lied, I started wondering if this guy is for real, checked wikipedia and saw despite the celebrity endorsements (thanks, Obama), there are a lot of academic criticisms, and that was enough for me. As with …
There's a bookstore/coffeeshop I used to go to where I once heard another customer expound in an initially impressive and interesting manner that started to sound like BS after a while. I bought this book at that store and had the same experience reading it. Initially, it's informative and entertaining in the style of science books I usually enjoy, but after a while the author just sounded like the coffee shop arguer who loves to hold forth and after a while you can't believe anything he says. After some passages of there-are-some-other-theories-but-I-just-don't-buy-it, and self contractory grand statements like all those authoritarian conquerors really thought they were doing good, and later, all those authoritarian conquerors, they lied, I started wondering if this guy is for real, checked wikipedia and saw despite the celebrity endorsements (thanks, Obama), there are a lot of academic criticisms, and that was enough for me. As with the coffee shop arguer, I just stopped paying attention and abandoned the book after a few chapters.
5/10
Was an excellent book except for the part about the agricultural revolution
It's very convincing and I really appreciate the ideas and perspective on religion especially. I learned long after reading it about the complete disregard for evidence and accuracy.
Bon llibre que fa un repàs, evidentment succint, a la història de la humanitat des de l'inici fins, més o menys, ara, des d'un punt de vista molt crític al capitalisme, al liberalisme i a la forma de gestionar-ho tot que tenim els humans en general. Una molt bona, a estones densa, lectura.
Verrta dėmesio knyga apie žmonijos istoriją, kaip mes čia esam ir kodėl mes esam tokie kokie esam. Galima pamąstyti jei kam rūpi ka nors veikti žmonijos labui :)
Unfortunately I didn't find any new to me insight in this book. Because of the size of the subject matter, it oversimplifies many things - perhaps I can use it to tell me what I need to learn more about because I didn't notice a simplification. It might be a good start for someone else to learn, at best. Furthermore, the author seems to have a bias that Buddhism has the Right Answers, which will never fail to annoy me.
Amaze
I can't really speak to the value of its scholarship, but this book zips along at a wonderful pace. It is extremely readable. That said, it does make a lot of superficial arguments. I wouldn't say that it is particularly deep.
I think this one is good fun for a high school senior thinking about starting a BA in History who wants an overview of potential study areas. The citations at the back of the book might also get them started down more specific paths.
Está genial
I can see why everyone from Bill Gates to Barack Obama was raving about it. It's an extremely compelling, accessible history - almost like a novelization - of humankind.
