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Comment by youdontknowtho | Hacker News Reader

I personally found Sapiens to be just like this blog post.

It seemed to gloss over major historical factors in a way that presented them as accepted wisdom. This often hides implicit assumptions about those historical factors that reinforce modern systems.

I just didn't find Sapiens to be that interesting once it got out of discussions about pre-history. The rest of it's views on human development seem to really be focused on explaining the "rightness" of how we currently already see the world. I'm probably not explaining myself well here.

The overwhelming praise for Harari also makes me suspect. The people praising Sapiens are people that I don't trust. So...yeah, that's me being a weirdo.

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So this seems to be the thread for the malcontents. I was recommended this book enthusiastically and dropped it after only a few chapters.

My issue with it is basically this: Harari's original insights and opinions are only mildly interesting. There is no single thesis presented (at least as summarized) that justifies an entire book. By grafting those ideas on to what is otherwise a rather dull exposition of mainstream anthropology, he impresses the less educated audience with knowledge, while lulling the more educated into an agreeable attitude by restating the well-known, at length.

It's a common persuasion and marketing tactic: Fact, fact, conjecture. Fact, fact, conjecture. Fact, fact, fact, bold conjecture.

And of course, being unwilling to slog through the filler, I'll be written off by Harari's acolytes as ignorant. But that's OK. I'm starting to regard the rejection of pop phenomena like this one a necessary self defense of my own time and attention.

definitely overhyped. definitely presented speculations as fact. definitely too ambitious for its own good (what it tried to cover is insanely large) and does a mediocre job at best.

i know a lot of people that loved it and recommend it (and later books) left and right. my best guess is that it’s trendy and some sort of status symbol. i wish people could look past the hype

Harari keeps repeating "this is just an hypothesis" or "we can't be sure of what happened at that time" during the whole book. He highlights multiple hypothesis as well in all chapters, to compare them.

Actually the blog post literally shows that, by repeating "We’re not sure".

I can imagine many critics to the book, but presenting speculations as fact is definitely not one of them.

This is what impressed me the most about the book, and why I’m so confused as to how this can be the main criticism of it that I see.

I’d like to see a speculation stated as fact, but have yet to see a satisfactory example.

ha. sure, one can see it this way. or you can read it, think that it makes sense and take it as a fact. i can tell you all day that's a hypotesis, when I'm focusing on the hypotesis you're going to go with it.

i also fundamentally disagree with speculating on what might have happened 10000 years ago. If you're going to speculate present at least 2-3 plausible scenarios.

On the other hand, there are several instances where he presents pretty big counterexamples to his theories, dismissing them as "the exception that confirms the rule".

This makes no sense (and reflects a complete misunderstanding the expression).

I wasn't referring to his hypothesis. I was referring to how he covered some historical movements as just the received wisdom regarding them. It was like "Time-Life covers human history". There were somethings that can't be divorced from their historical context. It's the same way that people lump all of something into a generic pile...like all Islam is basically Whabism (not saying that he said that but many people do) or things like that. Like I said, I'm probably not expressing myself very well here.

"I just didn't find Sapiens to be that interesting once it got out of discussions about pre-history."

Quick question: Why do you think its version of pre-history is better than its history? (Or are you familiar with pre-historical archaeology and find it to be good there?)

I guess that I felt like it was speculative enough to cover a time period like that...but you're right. That part could be bad too. I just felt like it was a good narrative at that point in the book? It was entertaining. I wouldn't say that I put a whole lot of stock in popular literature.

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