The debates

Is Sapiens good history?

Galen Strawson wrote in 2014 that the book’s strengths were overwhelmed by “carelessness, exaggeration and sensationalism”. Anthropologist Christopher Hallpike called it infotainment and not a serious contribution to knowledge. In 2022 neuroscientist Darshana Narayanan listed errors on animal language and chimpanzee behaviour. She said he “sacrifices science for sensationalism”.

No point-by-point reply to these reviews was found. He has said he chooses the everyday word over the specialist term even at some cost to nuance. His website says he hopes people read his books “as books of questions more than as books of answers”.

The Guardian: Galen Strawson reviews Sapiens (11 September 2014) · Wikipedia: Yuval Noah Harari · Current Affairs: The Dangerous Populist Science of Yuval Noah Harari (July 2022) · ThePrint: Is Yuval Harari a real scholar? (17 July 2022) · The New Yorker: Yuval Noah Harari gives the really big picture (17 February 2020) · Yuval Noah Harari: FAQs

The Russian edition of 21 Lessons

In 2019 readers found the Russian translation had been changed. Examples of Russian disinformation over Crimea were swapped for false statements by Donald Trump. “Occupation” became “annexation”. The dedication called his husband a partner. The New Yorker said the edits made the book more palatable to Putin’s government.

He said he approved changes to examples so the book could be published in a leading global power. He said he did not authorise changes to the main arguments or any untrue statements. He said the book stayed critical of the regime without naming names. He said he did not approve the change to the dedication and objected to further edits.

JTA: Harari defends omitting Putin criticism from Russian translation (26 July 2019) · The Forward: Harari insists the Russian edition doesn’t change the facts (July 2019) · The New Yorker: Yuval Noah Harari gives the really big picture (17 February 2020)

Are his AI warnings overstated?

Steven Poole wrote in the Guardian that he was credulous about AI. Poole said no one has seen a chatbot create new ideas. In Reason Corbin Barthold said Nexus stacks the deck against human agency and rests on speculation. Barthold wrote that he was “just spitballing”.

He says he stresses the dangers because AI already has many advocates. He calls his darkest scenarios possibilities and not prophecies. He says history and technology are not deterministic. He told a Mumbai audience that the future is the outcome of decisions people make today.

The Guardian: Steven Poole reviews Nexus (11 September 2024) · Reason: Corbin Barthold on Nexus (10 September 2024) · ThePrint: Harari and Aamir Khan discuss the dangers of AI (9 December 2024) · Yuval Noah Harari: FAQs · Yuval Noah Harari: Nexus

The useless class and the conspiracy clips

The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung saw an “icy deterministic touch” in his books. Clips of him have spread online with false captions calling him a lead adviser to the World Economic Forum. Fact-checkers at PolitiFact and Lead Stories found he was warning about outcomes and not proposing them. They found he holds no WEF leadership role.

He says he coined provocative phrases such as “hacking humans” and “the useless class” to draw attention to real dangers. He says he is not a post-humanist and thinks using AI to change humans is extremely dangerous. He asks people to unite against shared threats and not to blame any group.

Wikipedia: Yuval Noah Harari · PolitiFact: No, the WEF isn’t advocating for AI to rewrite the Bible (23 June 2023) · Lead Stories: Video does not show a WEF adviser revealing a plan (November 2023) · Yuval Noah Harari: FAQs

A brand close to the powerful

Critics say he has become a brand. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung described a product cosmos of comics and children’s books built by Itzik Yahav. Darshana Narayanan said leaders from Mark Zuckerberg to the head of the IMF undercut their own authority by seeking his answers. The New Yorker noted his appeal to Silicon Valley executives.

He told The New Yorker he does not try to be a threat to tech leaders and thinks much of what they do is good. His office says he offers his time to many audiences on a voluntary basis. His website says it is dangerous to idolise anybody including scholars.

Wikipedia: Yuval Noah Harari · Current Affairs: The Dangerous Populist Science of Yuval Noah Harari (July 2022) · The New Yorker: Yuval Noah Harari gives the really big picture (17 February 2020) · Yuval Noah Harari: About · Yuval Noah Harari: FAQs

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