I enjoy looking through your reading suggestions. I am currently reading "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind" by Yuval Noah Harari, and I am curious to know if you have read it, and have any thoughts on it. While it is easy to read and enjoyable, it seems to me a bit pedestrian and lacking "bite". At times it takes too long to explain simple concepts (like money and why it is useful) and easily confuses speculation and opinion with facts. But its greatest flaw seems to me to accept moral relativism while adhering to modern concepts like equality to make a moral case for a certain point of view. It is a bit like sophisticated atheist intelligent design. I have not finished the book (which I feel like I now must-- I have gone too far), but while I was entertained and it was not painful, I think I could have read something better. I don't plan on reading his next book, nor re-reading it.
Somewhat off topic but have you considered interviewing Stefan Milo? He shares a lot of the same interests in prehistory as you. Also as a Byzaboo, I would love if you could do a podcast episode/essay on Byzantium. Consider inteviewing Robin Pierson(History of Byzantium podcast)/Professor Anthony Kaldellis.
Any takes on Philip Ball's "How Life Works"? I thought I came across it here, but searching for it, unsuccessfully, I guess not.
I found it incredibly detailed; having finished it about a month ago and not being a biologist, only broad brush strokes of the presentation remain with me. My summary: he argues that the current emphasis or fascination with genetics/genomics is too reductionist and that while reductionist approaches like this can be productive for a while, it is time or close to time to step back. Life is (and living beings are) too complicated to be explained solely with reference to genes and their behavior.
A parallel that I believe is my own (so if it needs correcting, it should not be attributed to him): quantum mechanics cannot usefully explain (much of) the behavior of atoms, much less molecules or living cells. It can restrict what is possible as well as delineate patterns at higher levels of organization but not explain what is going on in a way that we find intellectually useful. Similarly, genes place a heavy thumb on the scale determining the proteins that a cell will generate in response to different environmental stimuli. A good deal of randomness that exists both within and outside of the cell, however, influences this. Furthermore, proteins have "behavioral rules" of their own about what they respond to and how they respond. This is true as we climb the ladder from genes through proteins, cells, tissues, organs, organisms and species. It's turtles all the way up.
A deep understanding of what individual genes do/enable requires a deeper understanding than we currently have on processes at these other levels. Denying or ignoring that will radically slow the development of further knowledge.
The far right fantasizes about race war? My friend, it is the far-left at least as much, maybe more. Read Richard Delgado’s, “The Coming Race War”, that’s one of the guys who founded CRT. He’s out of his mind and wields huge influence in academia, not like an Aryan warrior type..
Hey Razib, I have a book suggestion for you: "Climate Change and the Course of Global History: A Rough Journey", by John L. Brooke.
This is interdisciplinary Big History on the grandest scale. Brooke is not a climate scientist, but a historian in my own field of pre-Civil War American history. He has made a thorough study of the scientific literature which is exhaustively footnoted, and synthesizes geology, climatology, paleontology, archaeology, and traditional historical scholarship from the formation of the Earth to the modern Anthropocene.
Brooke’s major theme is the determinative impact of climate change and epidemic disease on human evolution and the rise and fall of human societies. He makes the case for the Little Ice Age and the Black Death as the jumping off points for the ever more accelerated development of the modern world. Yet Brooke also argues that this breakthrough to modernity would not have been possible without the cumulative development of human capacity between c. 3000 BC and 1350 AD. A period often looked upon as one of static agrarian economies under the jackboot of rigid autocratic states.
Here is the money quote. Referencing the work of several world historians, Brooke concludes: “These world historians take a long, developmental view for good reason; sustained modern economic growth did not and could not erupt out of the palace economies of the Bronze Age, any more than it could out of the Neolithic. Thus these historians focus on the cumulative development of human intellectual, technological, and sociopolitical capacities as forging a springboard for modernity.”
Given the detail of his work and the nature of his topic, Brooke’s writing can be dense and academic at times. This makes it heavier reading than Brian Fagan’s "The Long Summer." But it is well worth the effort. I keep going back to it, and Brooke’s ideas have influenced how I now teach my college history courses. Considering our current brushes with COVID and climate change, I cannot recommend it highly enough.
Razib, I read your piece on the Bantu expansion. In plain terms, this was a fairly large invasion and essentially ethnic cleansing of central and South Africa. Am I reading that correctly?
I enjoy looking through your reading suggestions. I am currently reading "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind" by Yuval Noah Harari, and I am curious to know if you have read it, and have any thoughts on it. While it is easy to read and enjoyable, it seems to me a bit pedestrian and lacking "bite". At times it takes too long to explain simple concepts (like money and why it is useful) and easily confuses speculation and opinion with facts. But its greatest flaw seems to me to accept moral relativism while adhering to modern concepts like equality to make a moral case for a certain point of view. It is a bit like sophisticated atheist intelligent design. I have not finished the book (which I feel like I now must-- I have gone too far), but while I was entertained and it was not painful, I think I could have read something better. I don't plan on reading his next book, nor re-reading it.
Somewhat off topic but have you considered interviewing Stefan Milo? He shares a lot of the same interests in prehistory as you. Also as a Byzaboo, I would love if you could do a podcast episode/essay on Byzantium. Consider inteviewing Robin Pierson(History of Byzantium podcast)/Professor Anthony Kaldellis.
1491 really needs a new edition
Any takes on Philip Ball's "How Life Works"? I thought I came across it here, but searching for it, unsuccessfully, I guess not.
I found it incredibly detailed; having finished it about a month ago and not being a biologist, only broad brush strokes of the presentation remain with me. My summary: he argues that the current emphasis or fascination with genetics/genomics is too reductionist and that while reductionist approaches like this can be productive for a while, it is time or close to time to step back. Life is (and living beings are) too complicated to be explained solely with reference to genes and their behavior.
A parallel that I believe is my own (so if it needs correcting, it should not be attributed to him): quantum mechanics cannot usefully explain (much of) the behavior of atoms, much less molecules or living cells. It can restrict what is possible as well as delineate patterns at higher levels of organization but not explain what is going on in a way that we find intellectually useful. Similarly, genes place a heavy thumb on the scale determining the proteins that a cell will generate in response to different environmental stimuli. A good deal of randomness that exists both within and outside of the cell, however, influences this. Furthermore, proteins have "behavioral rules" of their own about what they respond to and how they respond. This is true as we climb the ladder from genes through proteins, cells, tissues, organs, organisms and species. It's turtles all the way up.
A deep understanding of what individual genes do/enable requires a deeper understanding than we currently have on processes at these other levels. Denying or ignoring that will radically slow the development of further knowledge.
I would find your response interesting. / Thx
The far right fantasizes about race war? My friend, it is the far-left at least as much, maybe more. Read Richard Delgado’s, “The Coming Race War”, that’s one of the guys who founded CRT. He’s out of his mind and wields huge influence in academia, not like an Aryan warrior type..
Hey Razib, I have a book suggestion for you: "Climate Change and the Course of Global History: A Rough Journey", by John L. Brooke.
This is interdisciplinary Big History on the grandest scale. Brooke is not a climate scientist, but a historian in my own field of pre-Civil War American history. He has made a thorough study of the scientific literature which is exhaustively footnoted, and synthesizes geology, climatology, paleontology, archaeology, and traditional historical scholarship from the formation of the Earth to the modern Anthropocene.
Brooke’s major theme is the determinative impact of climate change and epidemic disease on human evolution and the rise and fall of human societies. He makes the case for the Little Ice Age and the Black Death as the jumping off points for the ever more accelerated development of the modern world. Yet Brooke also argues that this breakthrough to modernity would not have been possible without the cumulative development of human capacity between c. 3000 BC and 1350 AD. A period often looked upon as one of static agrarian economies under the jackboot of rigid autocratic states.
Here is the money quote. Referencing the work of several world historians, Brooke concludes: “These world historians take a long, developmental view for good reason; sustained modern economic growth did not and could not erupt out of the palace economies of the Bronze Age, any more than it could out of the Neolithic. Thus these historians focus on the cumulative development of human intellectual, technological, and sociopolitical capacities as forging a springboard for modernity.”
Given the detail of his work and the nature of his topic, Brooke’s writing can be dense and academic at times. This makes it heavier reading than Brian Fagan’s "The Long Summer." But it is well worth the effort. I keep going back to it, and Brooke’s ideas have influenced how I now teach my college history courses. Considering our current brushes with COVID and climate change, I cannot recommend it highly enough.
Razib, I read your piece on the Bantu expansion. In plain terms, this was a fairly large invasion and essentially ethnic cleansing of central and South Africa. Am I reading that correctly?
Is there a blog or podcast that recapitulates the gist/data covered in the talk Razib presented at natalism conference?