I’ve been reading Yuval Noah Harari’s Sapiens.
My reaction so far has amounted to, “This is what so much conspiratorial hubbub is about?” I’m about 50 pages or so in, and finding the writing style insufferable – such that every time I put it down, I swear I’m done with it.
The prime offense is that it reads like it was intended for an audience with an eighth-grade reading level – if that. Harari uses short, simple sentences. He waters down complex concepts. He uses some big words, but not too big. And a lot of repetition. Did I mention the simple sentence structure?
Yeah. He’s no Carl Sagan, let alone a Silas Hudson.
What probably ought to be the prime offense, however, is his extensive use of unsupported (because unsupportable) conjecture, presented as fact. Sure, I understand where he’s ultimately going with his assertion that prehistoric foragers led more rewarding or satisfying lives than we moderns (they owned nothing and were happy, you might say), but he can’t possibly know this as fact. It’s not something that can be known as fact when comparing two different extant cultures, where those who make up those cultures can be interrogated extensively about how contented they are – there are simply too many ways to look at the question to establish who is in fact happier.
I’m disappointed. I was expecting a more noodly piece of writing, with much to chew on with regards to technocracy and transhumanism and the like – so much so that I bought Sapiens bundled with Homo Deus and 21 Lessons. Now I’m going to have to decide whether to waste my time reading them or waste my money by not.