The Peripatetic Philosopher shares a book review - HOMO DEUS:

A Brief History of Tomorrow

Homo Deus

A Brief History of Tomorrow

Yuval Noah Harari

James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D.

© August 7, 2018

Formerly, when religion was strong and science was weak, men mistook magic for medicine; now when science is strong and religion weak, men mistake medicine for magic.

Thomas Szasz (1920 – 2012), Hungarian American psychiatrist

BACKGROUND

The reader may not be familiar with Psychiatrist Thomas Szasz who always thought outside the box and developed ideas that invariably went against the grain of popular wisdom including the notion that mental illness was a disease whereas he considered it a metaphor for labeling people of difference into convenient little boxes. 

When I reviewed Yuval Noah Harari’s “Sapiens,” I recognized he had the research of 70,000 years of man-like animals on earth with which to hang his ideas, along with an uncanny ability to make such ideas enchanting, entertaining and credible (see review July 4, 2018, theperipateticphilosopher.blogspot.com). 

GETTING THE READER’S ATTENTION

In “Homo Deus,” alas, this author does not have that same luxury.  Nonetheless, he demonstrates, once again, an ability to get our attention, while entertaining and challenging or reinforcing our sense of things.  To wit:

For the first time in history, more people die today from eating too much than from eating too little; more people die from old age than from infectious disease; and more people commit suicide than are killed by soldiers, terrorists and criminals combined.  In the early 21^st century, the average human is far more likely to die from bingeing at McDonald’s than from drought, Ebola or an al-Qaeda attack. 

Professor Harari goes on to say:

Half of humankind is expected to be overweight by 2030.  In 2010 famine and malnutrition combined killed about 1 million people whereas obesity killed 3 million. 

None of this information is new, but that is not the premise of this volume.  It is a warning that we are on our way out as a species and that 90 to 95 percent of those driven by traditional humanistic verities will be part of  “the useless class” if they still exist, superseded by what Nietzsche called “Superman” (German Übermensch); Hitler called the “Master Aryan Race”; and Harari now calls “Homo Deus” (Latin for “man as God”) or a superhuman robotic computer driven species. Stated another way, he sees Homo sapiens reduced to biochemical impulses that track data and algorithms generated by this new species on supercomputers.
The author uses statistics to show Homo sapiens is not in its finest hour:

In 2012 about 56 million people died throughout the world (war killed 120,000 people, and crime killed another 500,000). In contrast, 800,000 committed suicide, and 1.5 million died of diabetes. Sugar is now more dangerous than gunpowder.

Admittedly, Homo sapiens is not a happy camper; he has lost his moral compass, and thus his way. Wealth is no longer isolated to wheat fields, gold and oil wells, but to what we as a species know. So, why is the Homo sapiens species on track to extinction? Well, that is the body of this book as this author sees our species great days behind us, and now robotics, artificial intelligence, and sophisticated computers taking over what before was assumed to be human consciousness.

Now that religion is weak, as Thomas Szasz reflects, science and medicine are the new magic. No need to worry about heaven and hell much less reincarnation as these beliefs are relegated to old mythology. We are rushing to replace this with a new mythology and this is the anthem of Dr. Harari’s international best seller as he puts words to this theme.

Indeed, no need to wait for a Second Coming to overcome death.  It was once the domain of priests, rabbis and Muslim priests, but engineers have now taken over.  The Silicon Valley is now in charge with the writing on the wall: equality is out; death is irrelevant; immortality is in . . . In seeking immortality humans are in fact trying to upgrade themselves to gods.

The new human agenda, according to Harari, is happiness which is as ambivalent to define as consciousness is to perceive. We are still seemingly chasing ghosts only now they are being defined by biochemists and neurophysiologists, pharmacologists and psychiatrists.

We have become a pill popping nation as we jump from stress to boredom and back again with hardly a moment of what we would call “happiness.” Soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan took sleeping pills and antidepressants to cope with daily life at the warfront. Harari writes:

The biochemical pursuit of happiness is also the number one cause of crime in the world.

If this appears as a truisms, it is because too many of us experience this in our daily lives as the capitalist juggernaut defines us, and in so doing defines happiness as well, which is pleasure and pleasure is often reduced to a pill. Harari eases us into this:

With each passing year our tolerance for unpleasant sensation decreases, and our craving for pleasant sensation increases. Both scientific research and economic activity are geared to that end, each year producing better pain killers, new ice cream flavours, more comfortable mattresses, and more addictive games for our smartphones, so that we will not suffer a single boring moment while waiting for the bus.

THE BOOK OF DARWIN, THE NEW BIBLE

Professor Harari had ample research data to state and justify his case in SAPIENS. Much to the author’s chagrin, however, that does not seem to be the case with HOMO DEUS as 40 percent of students with a BA degree still believe in the biblical story of creation. Obviously, early programming and inculcation speaks to this while a full 25 percent with MA and Ph.D. credentials cling to similar beliefs.

Belief in God, despite all the evidence to the contrary, apparently has given comfort to their souls. Not surprisingly, professor Harari goes to great lengths to disprove the existent of God or the actuality of a soul. Small wonder why so many still cling to such beliefs in this Scientific Age.

Elsewhere I’ve written: faith is freedom; belief is a stop sign. Faith in God has given me solace in my own quiet. On the other hand, I find the Bible great literature but only in that context and distinction. Likewise, I credit my Irish Roman Catholic early parochial school training as being indispensable to me in my development while realizing and accepting the fact that it is a flawed human institution.

You will see in “Homo Deus” that the author sees Homo sapiens are doomed for extinction but cautions, not to assume that this will occur any time soon:

Homo sapiens is not going to be exterminated by a robot revolt. Rather, Homo Sapiens is likely to upgrade itself step by step merging with robots and computers in the process, until our descendants will look back and realize that they are no longer the kind of animal that wrote the Bible, built the Great Wall of China and laughed at Charlie Chaplin’s antics.

But then he jumps to the premise in HOMO DEUS that all organisms are simply algorithms, or systemic data driven calculators that have no room for God, for soul, for free will or for intuition, but in the final analysis have the complexity of a vending machine with nano-robotics running through the bloodstream gauging the activities of hormones, neurotransmitters and neural networks that autonomously diagnose problems and repair damage.

In the late 18th century as the Industrial Revolution took hold, man became a replaceable part in a giant machine. Now, according to this assessment, man has gravitated to be simply a machine himself.

Likewise, there is no apologies for absolutes in this treatise:

99 percent of our decisions – including the most important in our life choices concerning spouses, careers and habitats – are made by the highly refined algorithm we call sensation, emotions and desires. 99 percent of bodily activities, including muscle movement and hormonal secretions, take place without any need of conscious feelings.

HUMANISM, THE NEW FACE OF THE SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION

A good third of the book is dedicated to exposing what the author considers the new god of conventional religion, humanism. Humanists worship humans, and Harari is as disenchanted with this orientation as he is with theism.

We see the humanist template in liberalism, communism and fascism. Humanism buys into the idea of soul; the idea that the individual is unique; that the customer is always right; that every individual regardless of his status in society deserves sufficient welfare to preserve his physical, social, emotional and economic integrity; that human feelings are the source of all meaning and authority; and that one man one vote and democracy is the savior of civilization.

The author counters:

Having dismissed the overblown notion that Homo Sapiens exists on an entirely different plain from other animals, or that humans possess some unique essence like soul or consciousness, we finally climb down to the level of reality and examine the particular physical or mental abilities that give our species the edge . . . no matter how you define intelligence, it is quite clear that neither intelligence nor toolmaking by themselves can account for the Sapiens conquest of the world . . . Twenty thousand years ago, the average Sapiens probably had higher intelligence and better toolmaking skills as a species . . . Modern schools and employers may test our aptitude . . . (but) the welfare state always guarantees our basic needs . . .

What is surprising in HOMO DEUS that was not apparent in SAPIENS is that there is often an absolutism to the author’s language as if the reader is to accept the notions expressed on face value. It becomes quite apparent in the balance of the book that Homo sapiens is on the way out. In the not too distant future, evolution on steroids will find 90 percent (yes 90 percent) of us not sufficient to exist as computers, algorithms and data will launch a new race of man who will be superior to existing Homo sapiens today.

For instance, the only thing science believes is that sensations and emotions are biochemical data processing algorithms with dataism generated from this activity the new god. Science will admit Homo sapiens has a conscious mind, but that mind is something very different from soul. Paradoxically, while there is no proof of a soul, science admits to knowing precious little about either the mind or what is consciousness.

That said the life sciences believe that life is all about data processing and that organisms are simply machines for making calculation and taking decisions. Harari admits the analogy between organisms and algorithms can be misleading. In the 19th century the mind was viewed as if it were a steam engine, seeing the mind and body as if pipes and cylinders, valves and pistons that build and release pressure and thereby producing movement and action.

Sigmund Freud’s psychological models, he says, were marked with this mechanized influence. Now we have computers and the sophisticated technology that have replaced this mindset. Alas, like the steam engine, we have a whole new jargon in the soft and hard sciences to replicate the blessedness of this new mystical tool, the computer that 200 years ago belonged only to the steam engine.

WHERE THE AUTHOR IS RIGHT

Professor Harari is right when he says, “All large scale human cooperation is ultimately based on our belief in imagined order.” Think about it a moment: a nation is a mythical construct as is a corporation as is a government as is the New York Stock Exchange as is the family and the community, and as is the state and the church. Trust and the reality of our imagination has given these entities providence over our destiny although a case could be made that they are simply the imaginings of what we deem reality.

Elaborate symbols, rites and passages, ceremonies and belief systems are all inventions in support of our sacred notions and crucially dependent on manifested trust. This could all disappear in a moment should convention, conformity, dependence or fear that is holding us to such constructions suddenly dissolve into myth.

People weave a web of belief and meaning with all their hearts. Eventually, over time, these inevitably unravel, and then the author states, we can hardly imagine how anyone could have thought that way.

“A hundred years hence,” he writes, “our belief in democracy and human rights might look equally incomprehensible to our descendants.” He continues, “Sapiens rule the world because only they can weave an intersubjective web of meaning: a web of laws, forces, entities and places that exist purely in their common imagination.”

On December 21, 1989, Nicolae Ceausescu, communist dictator of Romania, organized a mass demonstration of support in the center of Bucharest. Previously, the Soviet Union had withdrawn its support as the Berlin Wall had fallen and revolution was sweeping through the Communist Block.

Ceausescu resisted this trend by mobilizing a rally by busing in 80,000 people to the city’s center to demonstrate to all Romanians and to the world at large that he was firmly in charge. The crowd was enthusiastic and cheering as the dictator and his wife appeared on a balcony mounted in the square. For eight minutes, he praised the glories of Romanian socialism, and then someone booed. He ignored the boo and attempted to continue his speech when others throughout the crowd started to boo. Then the mass audience started to whistle and shout abuses. The television audience throughout Romania heard the booing crowd, while Ceausescu kept frantically yelling, “Hello! Hello! Hello!” Suddenly, the people of Romania recognized the old man in the fur hat had no power over them. In that instance, totally unplanned or anticipated, his reign came to a crashing end.

The author explains that there are two kinds of reality: subjective and objective. Subjective reality depends on our personal beliefs and feelings; objective reality exists independent of such beliefs and feelings, such as gravity. This was subjective reality on display.

HUMANISM MAY BE ABSURD, BUT WHAT OF DATA RELIGION?

Professor Harari must be applauded for not worrying about stepping on uncooked eggs. That said the balance of the book is equally entertaining and confounding as was the first three quarters if you are stalwartly defending humanism as the legitimate replacement of traditional religion.

Science is today where religion was a millennium ago. The professor is careful not to offend the new religion. He writes:

Meaning and authority always go hand in hand. Whoever determines the meaning of our actions – whether they are good or evil, right or wrong, beautiful or ugly – also gains the authority to tell us what to think and how to believe.

That platform now belongs to science, and Harari is a willing acolyte in its dominion. For example, humanism assumes that each human has a single authentic inner self. He attacks this with science with the aplomb of a data religiousness. He writes:

The yang and yin of modernity are reason and emotion, the laboratory and the museum, the production line and the supermarket. People often see only the yang, and imagine that the modern world is dry, scientific, logical and utilitarian – just like the laboratory and the factory. But the modern world is also an extravagant supermarket. No culture in history has ever given such importance to human feelings.

While nodding, and saying, I suppose that is true, the author a few pages later rubs salt into that wound:

When I try to get in touch with my inner self, I am more likely to fall into one or another capitalist trap. My current political views, my likes and dislikes, and my hobbies and ambitions do not reflect my authentic self. Rather, they reflect my upbringing and social surroundings. They depend on my class, and are shaped by my neighborhood and my school. Rich and poor alike are brainwashed from birth. The rich are taught to disregard the poor while the poor are taught to disregard their true interests. No amount of self-reflection or psychotherapy will help, because the psychotherapists are working for the capitalist system.

If you grant a modicum of truth to this, beware because the author is building a case to show how religion and the humanities have lost touch with the technological realities of the day forfeiting their ability to question what will happen in the job market and the social fabric of society when it finds that artificial intelligence has come to outperform humans in most cognitive tasks.

The author asks:

What will happen to human society when biotechnology enables us to have designer babies, and to open unprecedented gaps between the rich and the poor? You will not find the answers to any of these questions in the Qur’an or sharia law, nor in the Bible or in the Confucian Analects, because nobody in the medieval Middle East or in ancient China knew much about computers, genetics or nanotechnology . . . in order to navigate a storm you need a map and a rudder rather than just an anchor.

This author sees radical Islam far worse than the Christian West, which he sees also anchored in the past, while radical Islam has yet to come to terms with the Industrial Revolution much less the Scientific Revolution.

Christianity (the author admits) was responsible for important economic and technological innovations. The Catholic Church established medieval Europe’s most sophisticated administrative system, and pioneered the use of archives, catalogues and other techniques of data processing. The Vatican was the closest thing twelfth century Europe had to Silicon Valley.

THE QUEST FOR MEANING IN THE AGE OF SCIENCE

Now the author goes for the jugular which is meant to garner our attention in the waning days of Homo sapiens. Our species is seen to be atavistic and as protective, elaborate and pervasive as humanistic themes may be to reassure us, they are anachronistic. The author writes:

Science undermines not only the liberal belief in free will, but also the belief in individualism . . . over the last several decades the life sciences have reached the conclusion that this liberal story is pure mythology. The single authentic self is as real as the eternal soul, Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny.

He goes on to say:

Not only governments fall into this trap. Business corporations often sink millions into failed enterprises, while private individuals cling to dysfunctional marriages and dead-end jobs. Our narrating self would much prefer to continue suffering in the future, just so it won’t have to admit that our past suffering was devoid of meaning . . . We see then that the self too is an imaginary story, just like nations, gods and money . . . Humans are in danger of losing their economic value because intelligence is decoupling from consciousness.

[Readers of some of my works as well as those of Richard Dawkins and Steven Pinker will see similar cautionary tales, as we do not buy totally into evolutionary biology or brain science with the absolutism of this author and therefore are alleged to be anchored in the ethical, moral, cultural and political ideas of Locke, Rousseau and Jefferson of 18th century wisdom. Indeed, none of these authors have predicted the extinction of Homo sapiens as a species as does this author.]

This denouement is represented by the emerging “useless class” where the majority of Homo sapiens will lack sufficient skill or mind to compete. This author points out that only 2 percent of Americans work in agriculture and 20 percent in industry, while 78 percent work as doctors, webpage designers and so forth. He adds, “When mindless algorithms are able to teach, diagnose and design better than humans, what will we do?” He writes:

We might end up with an algorithmic upper class owning most of the planet . . . most of the planet is already legally owned by non-human intersubjective entities, namely nations and corporations . . . If gods can possess land and employ people, why not algorithms? . . . Once Google, Facebook and other algorithms become all-knowing oracles, they may well evolve into agents and ultimately into sovereigns.

Professor Harari’s assessment has teeth to it as today, 2018, 1 billion people earn less $1 per day while another 1.5 billion earn between $1 and $2 per day. What is worse, some 62 people who are the richest in the world are worth as much as the poorest 3.6 billion people on the planet. With the world’s population in excess of 7 billion, these 62 billionaires hold as much wealth as the entire bottom half of humankind.

In the future this professor sees algorithms as god in the new data religion where technological progress has a very different agenda than humanism:

It doesn’t want to listen to our inner voices. It wants to control them. Once we understand the biochemical system producing all these voices, we can play with all the switches, turn up the volume here, lower it there, and make life much more easy and comfortable. We’ll give Ritalin to the distracted lawyer, Prozac to the guilty soldier and Cipralex (an antidepressant) to the dissatisfied wife . . . The humanist recommendation to listen to ourselves has ruined the lives of many a person whereas the right dosage of the right chemical has greatly improved the well-being and relationships of million . . . According to modern psychiatry, many ‘inner voices’ and ‘authentic wishes’ are nothing more than the product of biochemical imbalances and neurological diseases . . . (people suffering) clinical depression walk out on promising careers (as) biochemical glitches makes them see everything through dark-colored lens.

If this sounds like a psycho-pharmaceutical commercial, it is nothing compared to this author’s Dataism as the new religion:

Dataism was born from the explosive confluence of two scientific waves. In the 150 years since Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species, the life sciences have come to see organisms as biochemical algorithms . . . the same mathematical laws apply to both biochemical and electronic algorithms. . . If humankind is a single data-processing system . . . The supreme value of this new religion is ‘information flow’ . . . According to Dataism, human experiences are not sacred and Homo sapiens isn’t the apex of creation or a precursor to some future Homo deus. Humans are merely tools for creating the Internet of All Things . . . This cosmic data-processing system would be like God. It will be everywhere and will control everything, and humans are destined to merge into it.

As Yuval Noah Harari cannot escape his programming in his short life of some forty two years to date, it is obvious he is a creature of our times with a well-developed point of view, a view that the reader is rewarded with if he reads and ponders his entire treatise, and does not stop, and say “enough already.” Professor Harari does not limit himself to the discipline of history, but enters an arena of disciplines looking back 70,000 years and forward into our present millennium to assess what the future would seem to suggest. In this new Data Religion with super-super computers, the human brain is helpless to fathom much less master new and ever expanding algorithms.

Perhaps the Oracle of Las Vegas sits at the end of the Yellow Brick Road processing these data and algorithms, calling all the shots as the Internet of All Things. We cannot predict the future, as Harari admits, as technology is not deterministic, but this prophetic predictor residing in Las Vegas has made a career of predicting the outcome of sporting events, why not Data Religion?

That said 50 years from now, when many of us are gone, and most likely Dr. Harari as well, this book may be considered either silly or prophetic. That is the nature of having a point of view.