“Many anthropological and archaeological studies indicate that in simple agricultural societies with no political frameworks beyond village and tribe, human violence was… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Whereas in ancient agricultural societies human violence caused about 15 per cent of all deaths, during the twentieth century violence caused only… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Today, the global average is only 1.5 per cent, taking war and crime together. During the twentieth century, only 5 per cent… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Nor could wheat offer security against human violence. The early farmers were at least as violent as their forager ancestors, if not… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“During the second half of the twentieth century this Law of the Jungle has finally been broken, if not rescinded. In most… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“The figures for 2002 are even more surprising. Out of 57 million dead, only 172,000 people died in war and 569,000 died… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“For similar reasons, archaic humans did not initiate any revolutions. As far as we can tell, changes in social patterns, the invention of new… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Today the main source of wealth is knowledge. And whereas you can conquer oil fields through war, you cannot acquire knowledge that way.” — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“How do you cause people to believe in an imagined order such as Christianity, democracy or capitalism? First, you never admit that the order… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
I think the basic thing that happened is we have lost our story. Humans think in stories, and we try to make sense of… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Whereas chimpanzees spend five hours a day chewing raw food, a single hour suffices for people eating cooked food. The advent of cooking enabled… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Whereas liberalism merged with the milder versions of nationalism to protect the unique experiences of each human community, evolutionary humanists such as Hitler identified… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Corporations, money and nations exist only in our imagination. We invented them to serve us; why do we find ourselves sacrificing our lives in… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Small children in affluent societies often dislike showering, and it takes them years of education and parental discipline to adopt this supposedly attractive custom.… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Ever more scholars see cultures as a kind of mental infection or parasite, with humans as its unwitting host. Organic parasites, such as viruses,… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Soviet Communism was a fanatical and missionary religion. A devout Communist could not be a Christian or a Buddhist, and was expected to spread… — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
“Whereas religion asks us to believe in something, money asks us to believe that other people believe in something” — Yuval Noah Harari Copy Share Image
