In the conclusion of his substantial work, the author discusses the censorship of past centuries, where information was once blocked, while today in the 21st century, people are flooded with information that is often useless and not very relevant. Thus, by drowning the public in scoops, we kill information.
This is a perfect summary of his book where Yuval Noah Harari develops his thesis of the mutation of the human being from Homo Sapiens to Homo Deus.
In simple terms, he deifies man, a man becoming immortal, a man stronger than Faust. God is dead, he tells us, indeed, but since nature abhors a vacuum, God must be replaced.
Here, from the outset, he errs in dimensions by basing his analysis on the economic plane. Consumption becoming the driver of progress can neither stop nor slow down but instead accelerates.
While recent developments in progress, particularly in medicine and electronics, seem to support his ideas, he overlooks the human dimension, the human scale. It’s true in his scheme he deifies man, but is this man happy? That is another question, outside the scope of his thesis.
Homo Deus is a very interesting book on a historical level, and its analysis of the evolution of humanity is very relevant. We will make only one criticism: Yuval Noah Harari goes against the aspirations of society, which seems to want something other than a capitalist consumer society.
Certainly, in a way, he criticizes it while describing the necessary consumerist pursuit to prevent the halt of scientific progress. Should we sacrifice human happiness for the stock market, the bank, and the shareholders? This is his error, reasoning on a materialistic level and thus unable to consider a spiritual consciousness of man.
This book deserves to be read; it raises many questions and especially makes one aware of the inquisitive character of new sources of information. It’s a bit like the tree that hides the forest or, in other words: the overabundance of information kills information.
by Thierry Jan
