Think Week 2021: WHEW this book is a doozy!

It's a worthwhile read and an important one. I really appreciated revisiting a lot of history (that I learned from white teachers in American schools) from a much broader context and a non-Western centering lens. A great reminder that, even though this is how I currently view the world, it has not always been that way. But a delight to revisit history through a modern lens (+1 for using the female pronoun when a person’s gender is unknown. -1 for not using the Oxford comma, HARARI, HOW DARE YOU!)

This book primarily asks questions. Sure, Harari draws some conclusions, and the synthesis required here is remarkable. But his main goal seems to be showing how both positive and negative consequences came out of every major decision in history. He leaves some moments completely up for debate (see the discussion on patriarchy). If you can power through the first third of the book, definitely keep going (and not only because there are some great Harry Potter easter eggs in it!)

I would spend some time with this book if you can. It takes a long time because it's both a) pretty textbook-y (especially if you're out of practice) and b) it interrogates every fact it presents. The scope itself is incredible, and Harari just stops himself from continuing his questioning into the future (I believe he does that in his later books). I think I only gave it 4 stars because it took me SO LONG to read it, but it does require time and space to let its questions do their work.

Harari does not end on what I would call a *positive* note, but his recommendation that everyone should become a Buddhist vegan is pretty hard to ignore.