After letting this one marinate a bit, and with the pandemic still raging, this book has become even more timely and important. Trying to take every wAfter letting this one marinate a bit, and with the pandemic still raging, this book has become even more timely and important. Trying to take every word to heart.
*All, save a very few, find life at an end just when they’re getting ready to live.*
“They lose the day in expectation of the night, and the night in fear of the dawn.”
“Putting things off is the biggest waste of life: it snatches away each day as it comes, and denies us the present by promising the future. The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow, and loses today. You are arranging what lies in fortune’s control, and abandoning what lies in yours. What are you looking at? To what goal are you straining? The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately.”...more
I will definitely be revisiting this one—it's almost like a long, cool drink of water.
“You have to disconnect in order to better connect with yourselfI will definitely be revisiting this one—it's almost like a long, cool drink of water.
“You have to disconnect in order to better connect with yourself and with the people you serve and love. People don’t have enough silence in their lives because they don’t have enough solitude. And they don’t get enough solitude because they don’t seek out or cultivate silence. It’s a vicious cycle that prevents stillness and reflection, and then stymies good ideas, which are almost always hatched in solitude.”
Excellent summary with takeaways and quotes right here.
The only reason I didn't give it 5 stars was because of the chapter titled “Accepting a Higher Power.” Just because many people believed things in the past does not make it true, as Holiday implies. This sentence was the final nail in the coffin for the fifth star: “Perhaps you’re not ready to do that, to let anything into your heart. That’s okay. There’s no rush. Just know that this step is open to you. It’s waiting. And it will help restore you to sanity when you’re ready.”
I'm not even going to get into it because everyone is entitled to their opinion and otherwise this is such a peaceful book. HOWEVER—insinuating that people aren't sane until they "accept a higher power" though is ... mildly insane. ...more
“In our reasonings concerning matter of fact, there are all imaginable degrees of assurance, from the highest certainty to the lowest species of moral“In our reasonings concerning matter of fact, there are all imaginable degrees of assurance, from the highest certainty to the lowest species of moral evidence. A wise man, therefore, proportions his belief to the evidence."
Best summary I've seen:
*As intriguing today as when it was first published, Hume's An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding is a fascinating exploration into the nature of human knowledge. Using billiard balls, candles and other colorful examples, Hume conveys the core of his empiricism—that true knowledge can only be gained through sensory experience. No other philosopher has been at the forefront of the mind than David Hume; physics, psychology, neuroscience—connections to Hume are everywhere. Here is the book that Immanuel Kant confessed to have awoken him from his "dogmatic slumber."*
In a way, it reminded me of A BriefER History of Time as Hawking also used billiard balls as explanatory props.
Especially loved the ending:
"If we take in our hand any volume of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance, let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to the flames, for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion.”...more
*2020* UpdateI find myself referencing and recommending this book to people quite often. Might need to do a reread soon.
Similar in many ways to both *2020* UpdateI find myself referencing and recommending this book to people quite often. Might need to do a reread soon.
Similar in many ways to both The 48 Laws of Power and Mastery. Lots of short "common tendencies" vs any true or rock solid "laws." Still very interesting, I can see myself revisiting this one in the future.
In fact, I've decided I want to add this one to my physical collection. A good book to jump in and out of.
Here's an excellent overview of the 18 laws Greene covers in the book: Summary
"If man were never to fade away like the dews of Adashino, never to vanish like the smoke over Toribeyama, but lingered forever in the world, how things would lose their power to move us! The most precious thing in life is its uncertainty." — Yoshida Kenkō
"We can also expose ourselves to places on the planet where all our normal compass points are scrambled—a vastly different culture or certain landscapes where the human element seems particularly puny, such as the open sea, a vast expanse of snow, a particularly enormous mountain. Physically confronted with what dwarfs us, we are forced to reverse our normal perception, in which we are the center and measure of everything.
In the face of the Sublime, we feel a shiver, a foretaste of death itself, something too large for our minds to encompass. And for a moment it shakes us out of our smugness and releases us from the deathlike grip of habit and banality.
In the end, think of this philosophy in the following terms: Since the beginning of human consciousness, our awareness of death has terrified us. This terror has shaped our beliefs, our religions, our institutions, and so much of our behavior in ways we cannot see or understand. We humans have become the slaves to our fears and our evasions.
When we turn this around, becoming more aware of our mortality, we experience a taste of true freedom. We no longer feel the need to restrict what we think and do, in order to make life predictable. We can be more daring without feeling afraid of the consequences. We can cut loose from all the illusions and addictions that we employ to numb our anxiety. We can commit fully to our work, to our relationships, to all our actions. And once we experience some of this freedom, we will want to explore further and expand our possibilities as far as time will allow us."
"Let us rid death of its strangeness, come to know it. Let us have nothing on our minds as often as death. At every moment let us picture it in our imagination in all its aspects ... It is uncertain where death awaits us; let us await it everywhere. Premeditation of death is premeditation of freedom ... He who has learned how to die has unlearned how to be a slave. Knowing how to die frees us from all subjection and constraint." — Michel de Montaigne
“You like to imagine yourself in control of your fate, consciously planning the course of your life as best you can. But you are largely unaware of how deeply your emotions dominate you. They make you veer toward ideas that soothe your ego. They make you look for evidence that confirms what you already want to believe. They make you see what you want to see, depending on your mood, and this disconnect from reality is the source of the bad decisions and negative patterns that haunt your life. Rationality is the ability to counteract these emotional effects, to think instead of react, to open your mind to what is really happening, as opposed to what you are feeling. It does not come naturally; it is a power we must cultivate, but in doing so we realize our greatest potential.”...more
One of my favorite books of 2019 — I recommend this one often, alongside his latest book, This is Your Mind on Plants. Looking forward to more MichaelOne of my favorite books of 2019 — I recommend this one often, alongside his latest book, This is Your Mind on Plants. Looking forward to more Michael Pollan!!
*So perhaps spiritual experience is simply what happens in the space that opens up in the mind when “all mean egotism vanishes.” Wonders (and terrors) we’re ordinarily defended against flow into our awareness; the far ends of the sensory spectrum, which are normally invisible to us, our senses can suddenly admit. While the ego sleeps, the mind plays, proposing unexpected patterns of thought and new rays of relation. The gulf between self and world, that no-man’s-land which in ordinary hours the ego so vigilantly patrols, closes down, allowing us to feel less separate and more connected, “part and particle” of some larger entity. Whether we call that entity Nature, the Mind at Large, or God hardly matters. But it seems to be in the crucible of that merging that death loses some of its sting.*
Initial Thoughts: Overly generalized and vague, you'll be hard pressed to find many concrete "lessons"— although there's a fair amount of astute insigInitial Thoughts: Overly generalized and vague, you'll be hard pressed to find many concrete "lessons"— although there's a fair amount of astute insights and quotable aphorisms.
“In a world deluged by irrelevant information, clarity is power.”
Based on all the rave reviews, I thought at first maybe I had missed something until Bill Gates' 3 star review confirmed my initial opinion.
In fact, the whole book is fascinating—but seems to be built more upon Harari's own opinions, mass generalizations, and factual cherry picking than any hard science or research. Technically, you might argue that all nonfiction books have these same qualities, however, next to books such as The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power which is utterly stacked with backed up facts ... this one pales in comparison.
Instead of "lessons," Harari could easily have swapped in "questions," each of which are addressed/confronted in the 21 chapters:
Part I: The Technological Challenge 1. DISILLUSIONMENT The end of history has been postponed 2. WORK When you grow up, you might not have a job 3. LIBERTY Big Data is watching you 4. EQUALITY Those who own the data own the future
Part II: The Political Challenge 5. COMMUNITY Humans have bodies 6. CIVILISATION There is just one civilisation in the world 7. NATIONALISM Global problems need global answers 8. RELIGION God now serves the nation 9. IMMIGRATION Some cultures might be better than others
Part III: Despair and Hope 10. TERRORISM Don’t panic 11. WAR Never underestimate human stupidity 12. HUMILITY You are not the centre of the world 13. GOD Don’t take the name of God in vain 14. SECULARISM Acknowledge your shadow
Part IV: Truth 15. IGNORANCE You know less than you think 16. JUSTICE Our sense of justice might be out of date 17. POST-TRUTH Some fake news lasts for ever 18. SCIENCE FICTION The future is not what you see in the movies
Part V: Resilience 19. EDUCATION Change is the only constant 20. MEANING Life is not a story 21. MEDITATION Just observe
By the end of the book, Harari has fallen into repetitive religion bashing and his main "answer" / overall summary as a solution ... meditation. Okay ... Now I'm not a fan of organized religion by a long shot, but this last portion gave me strong editorial rant vibes, and, I'm all for meditation—but as a cure all? I guess I just had higher hopes for this book.
"Silence isn't neutrality; it is supporting the status-quo."
It's almost like Harari used up all his academic prowess in Sapiens, with each book moving farther afield from sound research to personal tirades and guesstimations.
Sweeping and almost all encompassing, this is still an entertaining read.
"Questions you cannot answer are usually far better for you than answers you cannot question."
Some things to think about:
"For as the pace of change increases, not just the economy but the very meaning of 'being human' is likely to mutate. Already in 1848 the Communist Manifesto declared that 'all that is solid melts into air.' Marx and Engels, however, were thinking mainly about social and economic structures. By 2048, physical and cognitive structures will also melt into air, or into a cloud of data bits."
"Terrorists are masters of mind control. They kill very few people but nevertheless manage to terrify billions and rattle huge political structures such as the European Union or the United States. Since September 11, 2001, each year terrorists have killed about 50 people in the European Union, about 10 people in the United States, about 7 people in China, and up to 25,000 people elsewhere in the globe (mostly in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nigeria, and Syria). In contrast, each year traffic accidents kill about 80,000 Europeans, 40,000 Americans, 270,000 Chinese, and 1.25 million people altogether. Diabetes and high sugar levels kill up to 3.5 million people annually, while air pollution kills about 7 million people per year. So why do we fear terrorism more than sugar, and why do governments lose elections because of sporadic terrorist attacks but not because of chronic air pollution?"
"In the twentieth century, industrialized civilization depended on the 'barbarians' for cheap labor, raw materials, and markets, and it often conquered and absorbed them. But in the twenty-first century, a post-industrial civilization relying on AI, bioengineering, and nanotechnology might be far more self-contained and self-sustaining. Not just entire classes but entire countries and continents might become irrelevant. Fortifications guarded by drones and robots might separate the self-proclaimed civilized zone, where cyborgs fight one another with logic bombs, from the barbarian lands where feral humans fight one another with machetes and Kalashnikovs." ...more
This was an encouraging, uplifting look at many of the successes and bright spots that often get overlooked.
However, it's clear things need to be takThis was an encouraging, uplifting look at many of the successes and bright spots that often get overlooked.
However, it's clear things need to be taken with a large grain of salt. I admit, my initial five star rating was more out of the hopefulness associated with the book. Hopefulness that the world isn't really going to hell in a handbasket, and hopeful that the mass generalizations and questionable analysis of facts/statistics had a firm foundation.
“It is how we choose what we do, and how we approach it, that will determine whether the sum of our days adds up to a formless blur, or to Flows well.
“It is how we choose what we do, and how we approach it, that will determine whether the sum of our days adds up to a formless blur, or to something resembling a work of art.”
Still enjoyable, yet looking forward to the extended version.
“To pursue mental operations to any depth, a person has to learn to concentrate attention. Without focus, consciousness is in a state of chaos.”...more
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