Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

The output of science and what is done with research outcomes is largely dependent on economic realities and capitalistic interests. Small European countries that had an ideology of exploration and search for knowledge were those that discovered, conquered, and formed world empires that still have worldwide influence, even though the Chinese, Indians, and Middle Easterners had equivalent technology at the start of the Scientific Revolution. 

Since the dawn of capitalism, per capital production has risen sharply. The exploding growth is due to the creation of credit, which allows private citizens and governments to borrow against the future in the belief that the future will be better and more abundant for all. Increasing private profits promotes reinvesting of those profits and thereby increases wealth and prosperity for the society as a whole.

The main tenet of capitalism is that economic growth is needed to secure freedom, happiness, and justice, and with justice, happiness, and freedom comes economic growth. Capitalism cannot function without science, as scientific and technological discoveries ensure the ongoing growth of the human economy. 

Industries grow when they create wealth not just for investors but for a community or members of a nation. Historically, this process of growth was slow to start, as all growth was subject to solar energy and to man and animal power, which were limited by food supplies, which were in turn limited by photosynthesis. When other energy sources and raw materials were harnessed to create wealth and increase investments, the world moved quickly to industrialization, and growth skyrocketed.

The emotional psyche of both humans and animals has suffered greatly due to this rapid and unnatural growth. As evolutionary psychology argues, needs and desires shaped into our DNA have not disappeared, even though they may no longer be necessary for survival and reproduction. Harari uses the example of a caged calf, whose strong urge to bond with its mother and with other calves stems from the necessities of survival and reproduction in the wild, where a mother’s milk and care would be needed for survival, and fellow calves would be needed to reproduce. Without those evolutionary necessities—the caged calf will be inoculated against disease and artificially inseminated—the calf’s urges will still be strong, and the animal will suffer if they are not met. 

More people die each year from accidents and suicide than from war and violent crime. Most people in the world today live in relative peace and security, free from the threat of war. While civil wars and skirmishes remain, all-out international war has become expensive and the economic benefits have been reduced, with lucrative international trade preferred instead. The proliferation of nuclear weaponry makes large-scale war collective suicide and therefore of little use. Today countries are guided by the need to create wealth and gain resources to meet the needs of their populace.

History has never sought to determine whether all the changes, all the fluctuations, and all the progress or lack thereof have made people happier. While historians do not seek answers to such questions, religion and philosophy do. If happiness is based on feelings of pleasure, then increasing happiness comes from increasing the release of biochemicals that cause these feelings of pleasure. If happiness is based on finding meaning and purpose to life, then increasing happiness is merely a delusion.

Religion gives present life meaning because of belief in an afterlife. Scientific research tells us that happiness comes from the release of hormone molecules and neurotransmitter chemicals in the brain. Buddhists align their beliefs a little more closely to that of science than do other religions with the philosophical assurance that happiness is not based on things and circumstances that happen to you but, at the same time, not based on your feelings either. Feelings are feelings; event are events. Happiness for Buddhists comes when one can separate oneself from the need to constantly pursue one’s desires. When you understand your needs, you understand yourself, and you are happy.

For four billion years, life on Earth has developed and changed according to the impulses of evolution. This process has changed as humans have begun not to just evolve but to change under the direction of intelligent design—not the design of a creator, but the design of humans’ own making. Many of the humans who are here today, passing on their genes, are not the ones who would have been naturally selected.

Genetic engineering and advances in personalized medicine are breaking the laws of natural selection. These advances will soon enable us to program needs and desires. The next stage in human history will be marked not just by technological changes but by adaptations to human identity. These changes will make us question the very meaning of the word “human.” Overcoming natural selection has the potential to turn humans into gods—gods who are unhappy and do not know what they want. Homo sapiens are at a point in history at which we must ask ourselves what we want to become and what legacy we want to leave, as our contributions up to this point have not been inspirational.