After reading a Brief History of Mankind

I have just finished reading the last page, and I close the book with, like most people, a general idea of the progress of mankind from ancient times to the present day. And kudos to Yuval Harari, a young writer. With a large and clear historical knowledge reserve and understanding of philosophy, what is more valuable is that the history and philosophy and part of biology can be combined together, this is not so boring history books, no wonder this new world history can be like this!

The book is divided into four parts, Part 1, the Cognitive Revolution. Part 2: The Agricultural Revolution. Part 3, Human integration and unity. Part 4: The Scientific Revolution.

Part 1:

Like jellyfish, flies, and cockroaches, the ancestors of man long ago were merely creatures of the earth, without any particularly significant impact on the vast natural and ecological world. However, in the course of human evolution, there was a sudden or accidental difference between humans and other species.

When most mammals are born, they are already mature and can walk or run within a few hours. But when we're born, we're like a glass that's just melted, and we're much more malleable, and we don't know what's going to happen. Humans began to get used to the use of the brain, began to learn to use fire and master fire. Animals may use fire directly or indirectly, while humans can actively use and control fire for their own survival.

Then humans finally broke away from the small groups of most mammals and started living in large groups. And the premise of living in large groups is that everyone has to believe in something that doesn't exist, which forces people to start making things up. So there are witches, there are chiefs, there are Kings, there are gods. So much so that we think of today's economy, banks, careers, countries, the world, morals, etc., as things that we make up, but that we all believe in, so that we are all happy and we are all bound. So our ancestors started to cooperate, started to cooperate in large groups. The power of cooperation is great, we can change the face of nature, we can change the number of species.

But all of us are based on the most primitive genes, and we may still have a little bit of the original genetic memory of our ancestors, thousands of years ago. For example, we still like to eat sweet food, like highly fried food, because in ancient times, our ancestors had little access to this kind of food. When given the chance, they take as much as they can.

Then we began to domesticate animals to provide us with better productivity, freeing up our own physical strength. So we kill donkeys that don't like grinding or are too smart, or dogs that are aggressive, leaving only those that are obedient, those that obey our will, and their descendants, to be passed on from generation to generation. Why do we need to take more and more? One of the reasons is because our brains use so much energy that we pay a price for being smart.

But all of the above is our imagination, and we can only guess at the state of things by looking at the relics or signs left behind. But their thoughts, their language, their social organization, are all gone, and that's what we need to know about their lives, so we can only guess. So when we see the hand hole in Argentina, we can imagine that it's our ancestors expressing warm, welcome, up, Shouting, venting, crying for help, etc. But all this conjecture is based on our current experience, it is possible that they are just idle on a rainy day, randomly pressed on the handprint. So if that were true, how much would human history change?

Our ancestors got smarter, they invented vehicles, they learned to use boats, they learned to use the wind to expand their territory, to spread out. Every place like death to destroy the local environment, destroy the local ecology.

Within a few thousand years of our ancestors arriving in Australia, 23 of the 24 large animals were wiped out. Nature could never have imagined that the Homo sapiens he created would have such power to sweep the world!

Our ancestors were curious and powerful, expanding east, west and east, even reaching Siberia. They learn how to kill woolly mammoths to get lots of animal protein and fat. We also worked together to make the most feared saber-toothed tiger extinct. The saber-toothed tiger, who has always been at the top of the biological chain, could never have imagined how this group of bouncing, short monkeys could have so much energy. In a very short time, our ancestors rose to the top of the food chain. That's the blink of an eye in the evolutionary history of all living things. The three known waves of animal and plant extinctions in Earth's history have all been caused by us.

Part 2:

All of us could not believe that the agricultural revolution might have been one of the great regressions in our human history, not progress, to put it mildly.

You know, the agricultural revolution we learned to farm, we learned to farm, we learned to settle, we tamed a lot of plants. But it creates problems.

The food that we domesticated, often had to live in a specific area, under a specific ecology to grow. But this often means leaving behind the nomadic jungle life of our ancestors and settling down. It also meant that we couldn't eat as much food as we used to, which led to malnutrition and disease in our ancestors, as well as tooth decay, which led to all kinds of diseases, from lumbar disc herniation to arthritis. The main thing is that our own domesticated wheat is enclosed in this fixed place. If Mads had a mind, would he think, look at these stupid monkeys, I've domesticated them in my territory, and they can't go far anymore? So wheat went from being a common weed on Earth to becoming a staple food product everywhere today.

And one of the biggest problems with domesticated plants is that this single production of food, if met with natural or man-made disasters, can be fatal. So we're going to have to grow more and work harder, and we're going to have to store enough food this year for next year. This would have seemed extremely foolish to our ancestors. Because people in agricultural societies work much longer hours than our forebears who lived in the jungle.

Of course, there are many benefits to being an agrarian society. For example, the survival rate of newborns is higher, and we don't have to worry too much about the invasion of dangerous beasts. We spend more time with our families, we have a family model, and we can develop some artistic products.

The rise of the agricultural revolution forced us to come up with more norms not just moral, but legal. For example, the Code of Hammurabi. The great king prescribed three classes of human beings, and we took them for granted.

Our king needs strong rule. He taxes us and builds himself a great palace. The king needs to pass on his glory to the next generation. But our ancestors, who could only pass the word by mouth, came into being and created writing.

Part 3, Human Integration and Unity:

Our ancestors gave rise to different cultures in different parts of the globe, interacting and colliding with each other during this period, and of course bloodshed and death were the norm. We even often encounter places where our thoughts are in conflict with new ones. Medieval Europe, for example, could not resolve the conflict between chivalry and Christianity, but at the same time they believed in both. In the morning we listened to the priest, we do not love vanity, do not love wealth, to be a great man, if someone hits you on the left cheek, turn the right cheek also. In the evening, when we were at dinner, we heard the Duke say that our chivalry would not be dishonored, and that if anyone beat us, we would make him pay for it!

So it was a very dark time, but as the strife receded, we knew that the direction of history was divided. So there is unity. Unity of currency, unity of empire, unity of religion.

Money is the most successful virtual thing in human history. It doesn't exist. If all of us didn't believe that this red bill could buy five bags of flour, money would have no value, and all of us did.

The trust system of money and the credit system developed rapidly, so there was lending, there was original investment. Without the advent of credit, many entrepreneurs would be lying in bed wondering what would happen if their business succeeded, but it would never happen, and society would never develop again because of it.

The Empire, it's a massive virtual system. At the same time, humans are greedy and need to keep expanding outwards. Around the world, wars are raging. Colonization of all kinds. Most people today speak in the language of conquerors who used to hold a knife to our ancestors, and none of us care. We distinguish between them and us. But slowly, they became us. For example, the Taj Mahal in India, is that Indian culture? Or the culture of an alien Muslim empire? Anyway, if you ask the current Indians to tear down the Taj Mahal, they will never agree.

Religion, this is a more sacred, more do not allow others to insult the imagination. Idolatry is good and convenient to rule. It also allows us to regulate our behavior in this world. But different religions have different practices and they argue with each other. Christian missionaries in those days could not have imagined that they could become such a large religious group in the world today!

Part 4, The Scientific Revolution:

Willing to admit their ignorance, and work hard, is the premise of human progress. Hence the world travel, hence the theory of evolution.

When science and empire marry, they are powerful. Especially in Europe, so why just Europe, and not Asia or even China, which was powerful at the time?

European values, stories, judicial systems, and the political structure of society determined that it would be different from other societies at that time. They are good at summarizing and organizing, open to learning, and have a strong mind of conquest. Zheng He did not intend to invade other countries when he went to the Western Seas. Every European voyager had the ambition to land on an unknown land and claim it as his country's territory. Therefore, the royal families and Kings of their countries were happy to provide them with money to sail around the world, because it brought them great benefits.

European navigators and scientists were digging into scientific knowledge and mapping the world, while at the same time invading different places. Plant their country's flag everywhere on earth. Because of their advanced thinking and strong sense of war, a few people were able to conquer tens of thousands of local people. So the genocide began again. All this seems to be the case today. Why didn't people know that?

Because the hard rule of history is that what seems inevitable in hindsight always seems unexpected at the time!

Then came capitalism, which sought to maximize profit, which sought a credit system. This system was especially advantageous for economic development, and then stock exchange came into being. But the stock trading without control in the early stage, the profits are high and the risks are high.

By the time the Mississippi bubble burst, the French financial system was printing money to no avail, resulting in the French Revolution.

The nature of capitalism to pursue interest and economy is becoming more and more obvious. All products can be commercialized, even war. And they pursue the freedom of the market, hoping that the government will not interfere in their market, they can obtain greater profits.

If the state no longer controlled the economic market, they could do whatever they wanted, so a lot of slaves were persecuted.

Capitalism has made the world what it is, and only he can keep it going. They still have a little luck, with a little more patience, heaven will come.

Modern economies grow so fast because we trust the future. If no one invests in the shoemaker, he will not start a bigger company and will not do his part for the economic development of the world. With the power of the Industrial Revolution, Britain became the workshop of the world. The Industrial Revolution was all about energy conversion, and before the Industrial Revolution, nobody wanted to fight over oil. If for a peach tree by the river, it is understandable.

The rapid development of the industrial revolution has brought about many problems. And the industrial revolution this is probably a false proposition, because many people believe that the industrial revolution, in fact, is the second agricultural revolution.

Our industrial revolution demands speed, demands efficiency, as the dominant human beings, we determine the life and death of many animals and plants, determines their living conditions. We decided that cows must be constantly pregnant in order to produce a lot of milk, and that the calves they give birth to will be taken away from their mothers as soon as they are born. We don't imagine the emotional state of cows that have lost their babies.

We can conclude that the industrial age of animals. We have been emphasizing his objective needs and neglecting the subjective needs of the animal itself. It is certainly callous.

Because the efficiency of the industrial age produced a lot of resources. These are resources that we, as humans, can't use up, so there's a whole host of things that encourage us to use up, like advertising.

But I have to say, it also brings us a lot of benefits. There are no global wars anymore because they are too expensive and people have less and less to get out of them. We were able to control a lot of diseases that we couldn't control before, like smallpox, whooping cough, diphtheria. We have antibiotics. We have penicillin. In the days before these drugs, soldiers who took an arrow in the arm had to have it amputated because we couldn't stop the bacteria from infecting the wound. Imagine the army doctors after the war. How many were recruited temporarily from the local butcher? Because the tools of surgery back then were hacksaws and knives.

We can't help but ask, are people getting happier now? We have enough to eat, we can read our favorite books, we can pursue our favorite people, and we can enjoy the convenience of fast travel. But we are also more and more busy, more and more mental stress, there is no time, like ancient ancestors, hug each other, to catch each other lice.

We become more and more critical, we become more and more needy, we become extremely sensitive, we don't know what happiness is. What biologists mean by happiness is three chemicals: serotonin, dopamine, and oxytocin. These technologies represent lust, excitement, happiness. But if we rely on this biology to explain our own happiness, it is inevitably too sad.

From physics to chemistry, to biology, to history. This is the general framework of the book and the entire history of our species. We don't know what kind of life form will succeed us in the future, and whether they will think of us as naive and difficult to understand, just like we think of our ancient ancestors now, such as modern art creation and art sculpture.

We now have the power of God, but irresponsible and insatiable. Completely not fulfilling God's duty to fulfill, index finger, only hope that our future will be better and better.