DISCONTINUED: Council of Science Editors Book Club discussion

Hi all,

I hope you all have had time to dive into the first few chapters of the book. The story takes us on a journey, traveling back 14 billion years ago. Before a period, which Harari refers to as, “a time before matter, energy and time came into being.” Harari lays the foundational understanding of the biological relatedness of Sapiens, Neanderthals, and Denisovans. We are introduced to some powerful examples of the “grey areas” of biological reality. And additionally, we are presented with evolutionary theories that derived from gaps in understanding left by those "grey areas." We learn how a few of those theories begin to create massive chaos in our modern-day world, giving rise to racial conspiracy theories that became the voice of notorious historical figures. Leaving that behind we begin to explore how the expansion of our species included major development such as our brains growing nearly double in size and reconfiguration of genomic composition, to shifts in our language to accommodate growing social and cultural initiatives like social constructs and gossip.

Based on what you’ve read in the first two chapters thus far, and thinking about one of Harari’s own questions left unanswered…

What kind of cultures, societies and political structures would have emerged in a world where several different human species coexisted?