Sapiens – Yuval Noah Harari

Detailed Description of the Book

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind is an ambitious, interdisciplinary work that traces the journey of Homo sapiens from insignificant hunter-gatherers to the most dominant species on Earth. Harari explains human history through four major revolutions:

1. Cognitive Revolution – ability to create shared myths, beliefs, and stories

2. Agricultural Revolution – shift to farming, surplus, hierarchy, and inequality

3. Unification of Humankind – empires, money, religion, law

4. Scientific Revolution – science, capitalism, modern state, technology

The core idea of the book is that human societies are built on shared fictions—nations, money, laws, human rights, corporations—which exist because people collectively believe in them. Harari challenges romantic ideas of progress and shows that technological and economic advancement do not automatically lead to happiness, justice, or moral progress.

For OPSC, Sapiens is extremely powerful because it helps you:

• Explain institutions as social constructs

• Analyse power, inequality, and dominance historically

• Critically assess development, progress, and modernity

• Write philosophical yet grounded Essays

• Add depth to Ethics (GS-4) and Governance (GS-2) answers

The following extracts may be used in OPSC answer writing:

“The real difference between us and chimpanzees is the ability to believe in shared myths.”→ Essay / GS-4 Ethics: Social cohesion, legitimacy of institutions, imagined orders

“Large numbers of strangers can cooperate successfully by believing in common myths.”→ GS-2 Governance / Essay: Nation-state, Constitution, rule of law, citizenship

“Human rights are just like heaven, God, and money—stories we have invented.”→ GS-4 Ethics / Essay: Moral philosophy, rights as social constructs
(Use carefully with explanation, not denial of rights.)

“The Agricultural Revolution was history’s biggest fraud.”→ GS-3 / Essay: Development critique, inequality, rural distress
“Luxury tends to become a necessity and to spawn new obligations.”→ GS-3 / GS-4: Consumerism, sustainable development, ethical living

“History began when humans invented gods, and will end when humans become gods.”→ Essay: Power, technology, limits of humanity

“Money is the most universal and efficient system of mutual trust ever devised.”→ GS-3 Economy / GS-2: Markets, trust, financial systems

“Empires have been the world’s most common form of political organisation.”→ GS-1 / GS-2 / Essay: State formation, imperial legacies, governance structures

“Culture tends to argue that it forbids only that which is unnatural.”→ GS-4 Ethics / Essay: Social norms, morality, cultural relativism

“Biology sets the limits, but culture shapes the choices.”→ GS-1 / GS-4: Nature vs nurture, social conditioning

“Despite constant technological progress, human happiness has not increased.”→ Essay / GS-4: Growth vs well-being, quality of life

“We study history not to know the future but to widen our horizons.”→ Essay: Value of historical understanding in policymaking