53 Yuval Noah Harari Quotes for You to Enjoy

Yuval Noah Harari

Israeli Historian

Born: Feb 24, 1976

Intelligence People Power Will World You

Related authors: Alexis de Tocqueville Hannah Arendt Henry Adams Herodotus Tacitus Tara Westover Thucydides Will Durant

There is a saying that if you get something for free, you should know that you're the product. It was never more true than in the case of Facebook and Gmail and YouTube. You get free social-media services, and you get free funny cat videos. In exchange, you give up the most valuable asset you have, which is your personal data. Yuval Noah Harari

Funny Saying You Facebook Videos Valuable Free YouTube Valuable Asset Case Give Something Data More Cat Exchange Never True Know Most Up Than Get Personal Which Should Product Your Asset Services

Censorship no longer works by hiding information from you; censorship works by flooding you with immense amounts of misinformation, of irrelevant information, of funny cat videos, until you're just unable to focus. Yuval Noah Harari

Funny You Censorship Videos Focus Immense Unable Hiding Cat Misinformation Longer Until Irrelevant Just Information Works Flooding Amount

Humans have an amazing capacity to believe in contradictory things. For example, to believe in an omnipotent and benevolent God but somehow excuse Him from all the suffering in the world. Or our ability to believe from the standpoint of law that humans are equal and have free will and from biology that humans are just organic machines. Yuval Noah Harari

God Suffering World Law Amazing Will Free Example Free Will Organic Believe Biology Omnipotent Our Benevolent Machines Ability Somehow Excuse For Example Equal Him Contradictory Just Capacity Standpoint Things Humans

Traditionally, life has been divided into two main parts: a period of learning followed by a period of working. Very soon, this traditional model will become utterly obsolete, and the only way for humans to stay in the game will be to keep learning throughout their lives and to reinvent themselves repeatedly. Yuval Noah Harari

Life Game Learning Will Become Way Has-Been Stay Followed Only Divided Throughout Main Soon Obsolete Period Parts Traditional Been Repeatedly Very Model Themselves Working Keep Lives Reinvent Utterly Humans Two

The key to victory lies more in manipulation and cooperation than in exceptional personal skills. Yuval Noah Harari

Key Victory Lies More Exceptional Than Personal Manipulation Skills Cooperation

Nothing should be taken for granted, even if everybody believes it. Yuval Noah Harari

Nothing Everybody Taken Taken For Granted Should Granted Even Believes

Our bodies and minds evolved and were adapted for hundreds of thousands of years for tasks like climbing a tree and picking apples, or hunting rabbits, or looking for mushrooms in the forest. They were not adapted to the very gruelling work that is involved in field work - ploughing, harvesting, bringing water, digging weeds - things like that. Yuval Noah Harari

Work Water Looking Field Tree Mushrooms Digging Our Minds Hundreds Hundreds Of Thousands Harvesting Evolved Hunting Thousands Thousands Of Years Weeds Picking Like Involved Climbing Were Years Forest Very Tasks Rabbits Bodies Apples Things Bringing Adapted

The truly unique trait of 'Sapiens' is our ability to create and believe fiction. All other animals use their communication system to describe reality. We use our communication system to create new realities. Of course, not all fictions are shared by all humans, but at least one has become universal in our world, and this is money. Yuval Noah Harari

Reality Communication World Money Animals Become Believe Other Our Our World System At Least One Ability Shared New Course Least Truly Trait Fiction Fictions Realities Create Use Sapiens Unique Describe Universal Humans

Intelligence is the ability to solve problems, and consciousness is the ability to feel things and have subjective experiences. Yuval Noah Harari

Intelligence Problems Solve Ability Feel Subjective Experiences Things Consciousness

When the first humans reached Australia about 45,000 years ago, they quickly drove to extinction 90% of its large animals. This was the first significant impact that Homo sapiens had on the planet's ecosystem. It was not the last. Yuval Noah Harari

Fundamentally, mankind was unimportant in the ecological system. Then, in one fell swoop, an evolutionary blink of an eye, the human race is transformed from something unimportant to the most important thing in the world. Yuval Noah Harari

World Important System Evolutionary Eye Something Ecological Most Fell Most Important Thing Blink Important Thing Human The Most Important Transformed Race Mankind Then Unimportant Human Race Thing Fundamentally

Ignorance is not too dangerous. If you combine it with power, then this is a toxic mix. Yuval Noah Harari

You Ignorance Dangerous Power Too Combine Toxic Mix Then

If you take 10,000 chimpanzees and cram them together into Wembley Stadium or the Houses of Parliament, you will get chaos. But if you take 10,000 people who have never met before, they can co-operate and create amazing things. Yuval Noah Harari

The widespread assumption is that somehow, the brain produces the mind; somehow millions of neurons fire signals at one another create or produce consciousness... but we have no idea how or why this happens. I'm afraid that in many cases, people in the tech world fail to understand that. Yuval Noah Harari

People World Mind Fire Assumption Signals No Idea Somehow Cases Neurons Fail Idea Another Understand How Brain Afraid Happens Produce Create Produces Many Tech Why Consciousness Millions Widespread

You have to know how to co-operate with other people if you want to stay alive and raise children. And to do that, you need to know something about them. You need to know who loves whom, who hates whom, who is sleeping with whom. Who is honest, who is a cheat. Yuval Noah Harari

People already have bionic arms and legs that work by the power of thought. And we increasingly outsource mental and communicative activities to computers. We are merging with our smartphones. Very soon, they will just be part of the body. Yuval Noah Harari

In the 1990s and 2000s, the liberal story shaped not only the foreign policy of the United States and its allies, but also the domestic policies of governments across the world, from South Africa to Indonesia. Yuval Noah Harari

In 1989, with the end of the Cold War and the collapse of communism, it seemed that the liberal story had won. The liberal story says that humankind is inevitably marching towards a global society of free markets and democratic politics. Yuval Noah Harari

Politics War Communism Free Society Cold Cold War Liberal Markets Collapse Says Seemed Free Markets Had Towards Global Democratic Inevitably End Won Story Marching Humankind

Everybody since the '60s has been saying the nation is a fiction - the nation is an imaginary unity - but people didn't connect the dots and say all human endeavours sprang from the same principle. Yuval Noah Harari

Saying People Nation Unity Everybody Say Has-Been Since Principle Been Same Human Fiction Dots Connect Imaginary

As a historian, I'm sceptical about conspiracy theories because the world is far too complicated to be managed by a few billionaires drinking scotch behind some closed doors. But I do think that the voters are correct in sensing that they're really losing power. And in reaction, they give the system an angry kick. Yuval Noah Harari

Angry World Complicated Losing Conspiracy Drinking Power Closed Few Doors Think Too Kick Correct System Some About Give Sceptical Voters Reaction Because Historian Scotch Closed Doors Behind Sensing Far Really Theories Billionaires

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