Your Stitch in the Great Fabric

Threading the Needle

Is water wet?

Are you a soul? 

When a raindrop falls from the sky and hits your coat, seeping in, making it wet, what has happened? When wetness crawls up a tissue dipped in a bowl, what has happened? When droplets of water slide off a plastic bag, what has happened? When ice floats on water, what has happened? 

Water is made up of many small molecules that push and pull on one another. These molecules are little magnets, so they pull on their opposites and push on their matches. They move vibrantly between and with each other, moving faster if they are warm and slower if they are cold. These little rules, their speed, and their magnetism are very small. One little water molecule has these rules, but they cannot do much on their own. If they are attracted to a magnet on a different material, they don’t do much. If they are slowed down by the cold, they don’t do much. But put two, or three, or four little water molecules together and they can do so much more. 

They can freeze into place creating solid ice, which is less dense than the liquid it came from. This is emergence. 

They can defy gravity by leapfrogging over each other up a porous substance like tissue or xylem. This is emergence. 

They can make something wet by holding onto it. This is emergence. 

Now, when you think about yourself, wondering if you are good enough or if you can make it through the day, what has happened? When others look at you and judge you according to what you do or look like, what has happened? When you are hurt or lost, what has happened? 

            You are made up of many tiny pieces that push and pull on one another. These pieces are your cells, your scars, your neuron pathways. They are your genes, your experiences, your fears.  They are the colour of your skin, the genitals that you’ve discovered on your body, the colour of your eyes. They are your family, your heart, and your dreams. They connect and disconnect with each other forming tissue and organs and thoughts. They move vibrantly between and with each other, moving faster if they are warm and slower if they are cold. One little piece of you has these rules, but they cannot do much on their own. One of your cells cannot dream about a beautiful person. One of your experiences cannot transform your body. One of your fingers cannot hold a lover without the rest of you. But put these little pieces of you together and they can do so much more.

They can wonder about their own existence. This is emergence. 

They can love themselves, their neighbour, and their land. This is emergence. 

They can have a name. This is emergence. 

The Great Fabric

Many people, themselves whole, want to make sense of the world and so they try to break everyone down into pieces. This is not wrong. People are made of many little pieces and trying to understand the pieces can help you understand the whole.  

Many people, themselves little pieces, want to make sense of the world so they try to put everyone together into wholes. This is not wrong. People come together to form wholes all the time, and trying to understand the whole can help you understand the pieces. 

But your name cannot be left simplified. 

It is big and small. The molecule’s rules are themselves emergent of the atoms that make them up. The fears you tremble with are themselves emergent of the moments that defined them. Water’s rules are part of systems far larger than one droplet. Your relationships are part of groups that are far larger than any one person. You are emergent, and we recognize that through your name. When we call you by your name we are not speaking to your eye, your skin, or your genitals, though fools may forget this. When we call you by your name we are speaking to all of you at once. When your mother says your name, an announcer at an event, or a friend after a night of talking, your response is a promise that your name contains a matrix of experiences, thoughts, and objects that you will share according to your will. For you are all of these things, and yet also more than their sum. 

You can transform your name.  You are elevated above it, casting magics according to your will to transform what fills your name or replace it outright.  The power that flows from your name and your will can be contributed to larger names that you believe in, that you think will build a better world.  You can use your name to give names to others that need one, a child, a pet, or a lake.  You can use your name to power the magic of these spirits, to take care of them.  That power makes you a soul; you can change your name and others.

 

More is different. Less is different. Move up and down, side to side, bigger and smaller. You are both gloriously unique and powerfully common. Your uniqueness and your commonness are not contradictory.  Both-and.  Your uniqueness connects you downwards into the earth and land. Your commonness connects you upwards into the group and society.  Your discoveries about yourself will teach you how special, and common, you truly are.  You have the power to name spirits and be part of a god’s name.  Your power can only come as a stitch in the Grand Fabric; a place where energy flows from the smallest atomic relationships to the greatest policies of nations, or from the biggest ideas of our gods to the smallest dramas of a clover.  You are magical because, and only because, you are entangled in the universe.

The Stitch

When the journey upwards and downwards through the layers of reality comes to an end and you are left with your body, your experiences, and your relationships; you are you. Your body connects you to love, your experiences connect you to yourself, your name connects you to magic.

This is your soul, mind, heart, your personhood. You; this mind that is thinking, this soul that is feeling, this heart that is beating, and this person that is being.  You are your name; you are over, under, and through it.  You are beautiful.

The Myth of Objectivity

Science's Core Myth

    God (in the theist sense) is unnecessary to reach the gnostic nectar of scientific objectivity. But God’s throne is completely necessary.  

    Faith in God’s perspective is the foundation of science.  This does not mean that God has to exist.  Rather, science requires the faith that, at some point, God’s perspective can be attained.  The ultimate goal of (positivist) science is a comprehensive understanding of the universe, the ability to look down from outside the cosmos and fully comprehend all mechanisms with the clarity of an outside observer.  Sometimes called a theory of everything, sometimes called God, this perspective is core to the scientific method.  

    This is not to say that science is theistic.  Belief in God is not required to conduct good science.  However, every scientist has faith in objectivity, whether that faith is implicit or explicit.  There is the underlying assumption that outside their individual bias or limited perspective, there is always a comprehensive, discoverable answer.  Objectivity assumes that a perspective outside the universe can be achieved, and that this perspective is knowable.

    There are a few approaches to this foundation.  Some may covet God’s throne for themselves, wishing to sit upon it and gain complete knowledge of the universe.  Such pursuits are atheistic, where God is vehemently rejected and humanity uplifted as the only candidate worthy of the throne.  Others may approach the throne with reverence, wishing to build a close relationship with the god they believe sits upon it.  Still others may strive with a mixed attitude, seeking to become one with this God; to taste the overwhelming sensations of gnosis.  

    Revealing this foundation should come as no surprise.  Science requires “how” questions to function, using them to determine the relationships between entities and avoiding the influence of the observer as much as possible.  All advancements in science seek to remove humanity from it, expunging bias and error through the use of computers and peer-review.  Fact is heralded as crystalized objectivity, the purest form of truth, a glimpse at the universe from the outside.  Facts update because they are a better form of that perspective, a cleaner lense for the all seeing eye.  Every time your “how” question can be answered accurately by the omniscient internet, science has done what it set out to do.  And yet who saw this answer you read on the wikipedia article?  Certainly not the researchers, they do everything in their power to remove their personal bias from their observations.  If the answer was the scientist’s personal perspective they wouldn’t have done their job.  It isn’t the scientist’s computers or tools, for they are only extensions of the scientist, or mechanisms to remove bias further.  Instead, it is the theories and models of objectivity, this grand matrix of thought that a single researcher is only a small part of.  These models and theories are all in the service of looking at the problem from the outside; from the throne of God.  

Science is Sacred

    This process should be celebrated.  Objectivity is a myth, and that is ok.  All syntheists, and Terrans by extension, understand that a myth is not a lie.  It is a powerful, useful, fruitful tool.  Objectivity does not exist, and it never will, but that does not make it any less useful.  No one will sit upon the throne to look back omnisciently upon the universe.  No one will finish science.  No one will be God to answer all our questions.  But striving for objectivity remains the best way we have of understanding the universe. We must have faith in it.

    Terrans embrace science as the most sophisticated way we have of discovering the universe.  Science is one of humanity’s most potent magics, and that deserves respect.  All beliefs should be founded in the best scientific understanding of the world, as it is presented by the scientific establishment.  Scientific facts should never conform to beliefs.  To force a fact into a belief is to violate it; to destroy its sacred status.  For objectivity is sacred, it is set aside by humanity for special purposes.  It is the perspective of the furthest and most supreme kind of god we can imagine.  To glimpse that perspective, however fleeting, is to transcend your eyes, fingers, and feelings; to touch a collective mind with the rest of humanity; to sit upon the divine throne.

    We made that throne, and it is beautiful.

Syntheism - Creating God in the Internet Age :: REVIEW

 Introduction

One of the foundational texts of the Syntheist movement is Alexander Bard and Jan Söderqvist’s book Syntheism: Creating God in the Internet Age.  As the only book with the word Syntheism in the title, Bard and Söderqvist’s work is foundational for the modern syntheism movement as a trailblazing exploration of what it means to be a self-identified syntheist.  Historically the authors of this book are not the first syntheists per se, since syntheistic positions and arguments are not new (though they may not have been called syntheist).  Where this book distinguishes itself is by self-identifying as syntheist and trying to give a theological body to syntheistic beliefs. 

Quotes

“The passion for activism is the very foundation of syntheistic ethics” (pg. 38).

“...syntheistic systems assume that all gods are necessary, human constructs; historically determined projections on existence that engender supra-objects that are shaped by and adapted to the social situation” (pg. 41).

“Syntheism’s entire driving force is its offer of a kind of sanctuary and protection against capitalist and consumptive stress, its utopic vision of a new and radically different way of thinking and continuing to exist” (pg. 59).

“The syntheistic mission recieves its eschatological fuel from the approaching ecological apocalypse, which is itself an unavoidable consequence of a world without faith in a relevant divinity” (pg. 60).

“Syntheism should absolutely not be understood as a compromise between theism and atheism - in Hegelian dialectics, a synthesis is something considerably more sophisticated than just a banal coalescence of thesis and antithesis - rather, it is a necessary continuation of theism’s and atheism’s combined dichotomy, the only possible way out of the paralysing deadlock that arises when theism and atheism are pitted against each other.  As the logical synthesis of this pair of opposites (theism versus atheism), syntheism offers a possibility for the atheist to go further and uncompromisingly deepen atheism” (pg. 91).  

“...atheism’s problem is that it inherits the tragic remains that are the leftovers from Abrahamic religion when it retires, but does not succeed in building any independant platform of its own” (pg. 92).

“The syntheist response to rationalism does not entail any flight back to the irrational.  It instead continues dialectically to transrationalism: the idea that reasoning first and foremost must embrace the insight of one’s own built-in limitations in relation to one’s environment” (pg. 128). 

“Atheos is the potentiality, Pantheos is the actuality, Entheos is the transcendence and Syntheos is the virtuality” (pg. 142).  

“Atheos, Pantheos, Entheos, and Syntheos do not recieve their enormous potency as some kind of long-lived giant beings from parallel universes...but as dramatically useful metaphors for the structure of existence” (pg. 145).

“Where classical atheism is merely reactive - always awaiting new theist innovations to attack and thus being dependent on the gods it so eagerly denies - syntheist atheism is active and thereby offers an existential substance which classical atheism lacks” (pg. 153).

“On the whole syntheist onto-epistemology is not well-served by any eternal truths in a Platonist sense; its utopia is imperfect rather than perfect” (pg. 173).  

“Because of Bohr, as early as 1935, it is a given that the physical world’s primary building blocks are not objects, but that the world is instead made up of entanglements: intra-acting, fundamentally plural phenomena, rather than isolated, discrete objects” (pg. 176).

“Thus, there is no need for sacrifice in syntheism, what is demanded is rather the direct opposite of sacrifice: the syntheist rituals about coalescence and entanglement; partly between people, partly between the human being and her environment” (pg. 192)

“The syntheist utopia is thus first and foremost a society where ideas are free and are not owned by anybody, where the memes form memeplexes that wander freely from human to human, from network to network, and are transformed during these movements without being met with any resistance whatsoever anywhere, apart from the lack of attention that sifts out all memetic losers” (pg. 280).  

“It is the network that gives the agent her value in a relationalist society and not the other way around” (pg. 349).

“According to syntheism, self-love is truth as an act above all others.  Love yourself, without involving any emotions whatsoever, because you have no choice.  Just act.  Out of this conscious and logically cogent self-love as truth as an act flows love to everything else that exists in an intensely pulsating, creative Universe” (pg. 385).  

“Therefore by necessity spirituality is a practice rather than a doctrine” (pg. 391).  

“All truths are a kind of myth, but all myths are not equally functional in the recurring confrontation with existence around us” (pg. 424).

“But this balanced state in nature is a myth.  Syntheist ecology therefore begins with the insight that everything in existence, including nature, is process and constant motion…” (pg. 425).  

Summary

The core ideas of the book are the implications of network thinking, and the impending social revolution the internet will spur.  The authors view syntheism as the new metaphysical paradigm that will frame the future.  As such, they have a very holistic definition of what syntheism is, spanning a metaphysical worldview to their personal religious doctrines.  To support their worldview they draw from modern physics, established philosophies, technology, and a take on history that emphasizes information mediums.  There is a prophetic element to the book, obtuse writing intended for academics, and a vaguely ecstatic tone. 

My take on what the authors wish the readers understand can be summed up as: the internet will change the world and syntheism will be the framework by which we make sense of that change.   The book is a theological work.  The authors announce that theology is more fundamental than philosophy in humanity’s hierarchy of truth (pg. 38).  They claim that their work outlines the fundamentals of a new metaphysical paradigm which in turn informs a new philosophical paradigm. 

An fascinating (and revealing) aspect of their theology is what they call the “syntheological pyramid”.  They name four gods which they assert are metaphors for the universe’s structure: Atheos, Pantheos, Entheos, and Syntheos.  Atheos is the void, Pantheos is the cosmos, Entheos is change, Syntheos is emergence.  These four gods compose the syntheological pyramid.

Criticism

An aspect of this book that I appreciate but have difficulty endorsing is the conflation of their philosophical stances and their theological stances.  The authors do this deliberately in the name of defining a new kind of metaphysics.  To this end, they make some engaging arguments about how metaphysical notions about the universe are more fundamental than the scientific study of physics itself and use this reasoning to justify their fluid boundary between their philosophy and theology.  While I enjoy their insights into the foundational nature of metaphysical narratives, I do not see this as a sufficient justification of their conflation of theology and philosophy.  As I outlined in my What is Syntheism? post, the distinction between a syntheistic philosophy and theology is as distinct as between theistic philosophy and Islamic or Christian theology.  This distinction is crucial for the reconciliation between different syntheological myths, and the ability for syntheists to engage compassionately with each other.  

The reason as to why is hinted at in the book itself: “Paganism uses survival as its metaphysical engine, while monotheism’s metaphysical engine is eternity and that of individualism is progress.  Syntheism’s metaphysical engine is the event” (pg. 74), “ [Monotheism’s] law’s external and eternal values are pitted against the internal and arbitrary values of chaos.  And the idea follows on from the principle, which says that the values of metaphysics must be external and eternal in order for the narrative to hang together, that mankind must be offered the possibility of becoming one with the law, that mankind should be able to become external and eternal in relation to the internal, mental limitation and physiological transience that she/he experiences existentially every day of the week.  The idea of eternal life as the reward for the law-abiding citizen for his/her demonstrated fidelity and reliability throughout life is born, and with this essential prerequisite in place, monotheistic metaphysics, which revolves around the idea of eternity, arrives with full force,” (pg. 77).  Syntheism is not in the business of making laws like the dominant monotheistic traditions of the past have been.  Syntheistic ideas tend to lean towards what Bard and Söderqvist call the event, an idea that works very differently from monotheism’s eternity.  In fact, the syntheism which Bard and Söderqvist espouse seems to shun the rigidity of eternity in principle.  But ironically, by defining a particular set of theological tenets in their syntheological pyramid they make the mistake of confining syntheism, the philosophy, within their pyramid, a theology.  Such oversight could encourage their followers to be absolute in their understanding of syntheism and approach other syntheistic traditions as heretical rather than an example of religious diversity.  People like myself, who appreciate Bard and Söderqvist’s pyramid of gods but find them too obtuse and impersonal, cannot fit within the syntheist framework as presented by Bard and Söderqvist.  I feel no desire to contribute my “truth as an act” (pg. 38, 379) (what most people call “faith”) to the author’s pyramid of gods because they have no power to speak to (with, through, and by) me; they were designed that way by the authors.  Does that make me less of a syntheist?  While I don’t believe Bard or Söderqvist would answer “yes”, their syntheology does not say “no” as far as I can tell.  If they had made a clear distinction between the particular tradition they were trying to establish and their philosophy of syntheism as a whole, their book might have inferred a compassionate “no”, but this is not the case.

A clear way to make this distinction is to be a bit more conservative in the use of the word “syntheism”.  Bard and Söderqvist use the word loosely to define the philosophical, social, technological, political, theological, etc. as it pertains to a movement, person, and themselves.  Again, this is intentional.  They clearly want to build a brand new matrix of interdependent ideas that can provide them the framework necessary to build a new metaphysical paradigm.  Their definition of syntheism cannot be summed up in a dictionary, it must be experienced by reading through their book and then allowing the various ideas to coalesce into a simulacrum of the worldview they hold.  There is nothing wrong with this approach.  However, I feel such an approach is better suited for a self-recognizing claim at creating a particular theology rather than defining a new metaphysical paradigm.  If the author’s form of syntheists engage with me, a Terran, and assert that my theology is wrong because I do not use the syntheological pyramid, it is because they believe the syntheological pyramid is all of syntheism.  

What is fascinating is that the authors put so much effort into defining a body for syntheism as a metaphysical idea, but also put considerable effort into defining their own doctrine in the form of syntheistic gods.  They call syntheism a “metareligion...the religion about and of religion per se” (pg. 90), and yet go through so much trouble to pigeon-hole themselves into a particular doctrine.  The truth is that all religions are “metareligions”, they all claim to explain the others; this is nothing new.  Most religions have cute names for other religions that neatly explain how they fit into the universe, words like blasphemers, heretics, apostates, gentiles, infidels, godless, heathens, damned, devils, possessed, etc.  The authors severely limit themselves by linking their metaphysical ideas so closely with their theological doctrines.  If they wanted to make a “theory of everything” about religion, they should have just stuck with their syntheist metaphysics as an interpretation of history and the zeitgeist.  If they wanted to make a new religion, they should have hunkered down and developed their mythology around the syntheological pyramid, utopia, process rituals, etc., more deeply.  Instead, they created an uncomfortable mass which can simultaneously be read as a metaphysical paradigm, or as a new religious doctrine; which makes them, fittingly, just like other prophets.

*    *    *    *    *

Something I truly struggled with is their treatment of utopia (which likely means I didn’t understand them). On page 93 they say, “...it is utopia and not the fall of Man in classical religion that needs to be won back.  And winning back the utopia and turning it into an immanent divinity is, with contemporary physics’ revolutionary advances, quite plausible.  Meillassoux’s God, as a synonym for the utopia, is of course syntheism’s Syntheos.”  The authors try to define utopia (God/syntheos) as non-platonic and “imperfect” (pg. 173), which seems paradoxical to me.  But it doesn’t seem to matter, because they then describe what their utopia would look like (pg. 280), defining a platonic ideal, just with extra steps.  They simultaneously use utopia as a necessary theological construct to give people hope and also present it as a theoretically attainable state (much like classical monotheism).  Sure, their model of utopia includes constant change, but such a model implies a stable metaphysical and infrastructural establishment that ensures such memeplexes are always free (pg. 280), regardless of their content.  It’s almost as if they think the memes they describe are inconsequential.  Imagine if these memeplexes contained a totalitarian ideology (or a hitherto undiscovered form of evil) which could destroy the very establishment that fostered its existence.  In order for this utopia to persist with such a threat, it would have to manipulate this “free” movement of memeplexes in the service of an eternally stable meme ecology that never threatened its own infrastructure.  Sure, it would be meta compared to similar infrastructures of the past, but eternal nonetheless.  It seems to me that if the authors are going to take their own ideas seriously, they need to reject utopia or change it even further.  Perhaps they should shift the idea of change and transience from within utopia to without, and assert that all utopias are achievable, but doomed to collapse.  Instead of saying utopia is ever-changing, perhaps utopias are best viewed as transient.  Or perhaps, we should just move on to a different word.  

I find myself suspicious of utopias since many of the most brutal regimes in history claim to be crafting a utopia.  In order to have a utopia that can support actionable goals, it needs to be defined in some way.  What’s unfortunate is such definitions exclude people.  The Garden of Eden is a classic utopia that excludes the LGBTQ+ community, diverse diets, diverse relationships with animals, and those who need metropolitan lifestyles.  Nazism defined a utopia which made exclusions based on race, disability, and sexual orientation.  Communism defined a utopia which made exclusions based on religion, disability, and whoever was too far to give potatoes to.  Every utopia is someone else’s dystopia.  Based on my limited understanding of history, utopias seem more trouble than they’re worth.  My hunch is that the authors were onto the solution to this problem when they talked about process theology.  Perhaps the solution lies in ritual, and engagement with the present.  Are utopias a necessary double-edged sword or can we move past them?  The book touched on this issue but never engaged with it satisfactorily for me since they think utopias are essential.  This has ignited my imagination and has given me a lot to think about.  I’m currently reading The Mushroom at the End of the World by Anna Tsing and I have a feeling it contains the solution or at least a blueprint for it.  Staying with the Trouble by Donna Haraway also seems promising in this problem and I should spend some time rereading it.

Personal Takeaways

I approached this book as a way to “check my work” so to speak.  I have been engaged with the ideas of syntheism for a few years on my own and figured it was time to see if I had gone off the deep end or remained on a path shared by others.  In that light, this book is encouraging.  I have found ideas that echo mine, while also noticing differences that engage rather than rattling me.  Concepts like “truth as an act”, emergence, “the event”, ecological eschatology, relief from consumerism, pushing back against alienation, and the value of myth are all ideas that have become privately important to me.  It was wonderful to see them articulated by the authors, sometimes with greater insights than I had gained on my own.

Since it appears that the authors were trying to articulate a new metaphysical paradigm I do not consider myself a “follower” of theirs.  In fact, Bard himself is a Zoroastrian, so it doesn’t seem the book was intending to establish a new religious tradition at all.  I remember being initially disappointed (long before I read the book) when I learned Bard’s religious affiliation.  I find his decision odd, considering there are already better syntheistic alternatives like The Satanic Temple in the US, and various neo-pagan and atheist Wiccan covens that are fairly easy to find on the internet.  I find it even more surprising after reading the book since he and Söderqvist defined a new pantheon of gods in their syntheological pyramid.  As I said earlier, by defining syntheism as a “metareligion” they merely set up the beginnings of a normal religion since all religions are meta.  So, from here on out, I’ll refer to the author’s version of syntheism as “Quad” syntheism in reference to their four gods.  From how it’s presented in the book, this particular version is a stillbirth since the authors are affiliated with an entirely different religious tradition and their seminal text is not public-friendly.

This book has given me a dense but reliable benchmark to measure Terranism by.  Through what I like and what I dislike, this book is an important step on the syntheological path.

Further Reading and Viewing:

Syntheism - Creating God in the Internet Age by Alexander Bard and Jan Söderqvist

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXA7TewF53w&t=30s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbXvlV8Mhf4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X02NKiY38Kg

Sapiens - A Brief History of Humankind :: REVIEW

 Introduction

Yuval Harari’s bestselling work, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, is an essential part of any syntheist library.  It goes through the history of human development with a particular focus on the role of fiction.  Harari lucidly explains how fictions are humanity’s most powerful tools and how they permeate every part of our life.  Understanding the core relevance of fictions for humanity is essential to syntheist thinking; it allows a person to move beyond theism or atheism and engage thoughtfully with the fictions in their life.  Terranism recognizes the principles laid out in Harari’s work as the foundation for their doctrine of magic.  

Quotes

“...fiction has enabled us not merely to imagine things, but to do so collectively.  We can weave common myths such as the biblical creation story, the Dreamtime myths of Aboriginal Australians, and the nationalist myths of modern states.  Such myths give Sapiens the unprecedented ability to cooperate flexibly in large numbers” (pg. 25).

“As time went by, the imagined reality became every more powerful, so that today the very survival of rivers, trees and lions depends on the grace of imagined entities such as gods, nations, and corporations” (pg. 32).

“We believe in a particular order not because it is objectively true, but because believing in it enables us to cooperate effectively and forge a better society.  Imagined orders are not evil conspiracies or useless mirages.  Rather, they are the only way large numbers of humans can cooperate effectively” (pg. 110).

“For the imagined order is not a subjective order existing in my own imagination - it is rather an inter-subjective order, existing in the shared imagination of thousands and millions of people” (pg. 117).  

“There is little sense, then, in arguing that the natural function of women is to give birth, or that homosexuality is unnatural.  Most of the laws, norms, rights and obligations that define manhood and womanhood reflect human imagination more than biological reality” (pg. 148).

“Cognitive dissonance is often considered a failure of the human psyche.  In fact, it is a vital asset.  Had people been unable to hold contradictory beliefs and values, it would probably have been impossible to establish and maintain any human culture” (pg. 165).

“Money is more open minded than language, state laws, cultural codes, religious beliefs, and social habits.  Money is the only trust system created by humans that can bridge almost any cultural gap, and that does not discriminate on the basis of religion, gender, race, age or sexual orientation” (pg. 186).

“For although money builds universal trust between strangers, this trust is invested not in humans, communities or sacred values, but in money itself and in the impersonal systems that back it” (pg. 187).

“Today religion is often considered a source of discrimination, disagreement and disunion.  Yet, in fact, religion has been the third great unifier of humankind, alongside money and empires” (pg. 210).

“We study history not to know the future but to widen our horizons, to understand that our present situation is neither natural nor inevitable, and that we consequently have many more possibilities before us than we imagine” (pg. 241).

“Modern-day science is a unique tradition of knowledge, inasmuch as it openly admits collective ignorance regarding the most important questions” (pg. 252).  

“To channel limited resources we must answer questions such as ‘What is more important?’ and ‘What is good?’ And these are not scientific questions.  Science can explain what exists in the world, how things work, and what might be in the future.  By definition, it has no pretensions to knowing what should be in the future.  Only religions and ideologies seek to answer such questions” (pg. 273).

“The European empires did so many different things on such a large scale that you can find plenty of examples to support whatever you want to say about them” (pg. 302).

“The fact is, it’s not a deception, but rather a tribute to the amazing abilities of the human imagination.  What enables banks - and the entire economy - to survive and flourish is our trust in the future.  This trust is the sole backing for most of the money in the world” (pg. 307).

“In the new capitalist creed, the first and most sacred commandment is: ‘The profits of production must be reinvested in increasing production’”(pg. 312). 

“Some religions, such as Christianity and Nazism, have killed millions out of burning hatred.  Capitalism has killed millions out of cold indifference coupled with greed” (pg. 331).

“Ecological degradation is not the same as resource scarcity” (pg. 350).

“In fact, ecological turmoil might endanger the survival of Homo sapiens itself” (pg. 351).

“Yet all of these upheavals are dwarfed by the most momentous social revolution that ever befell humankind: the collapse of the family and the local community and their replacement by the state and the market” (pg. 355).

“Millions of years of evolution have designed us to live and think as community members.  Within a mere two centuries, we have become alienated individuals” (pg. 360).

“During this period humankind has for the first time faced the possibility of complete self-annihilation and has experienced a fair number of actual wars and genocides.  Yet these decades were also the most peaceful era in human history - and by a wide margin” (pg. 366).  

“The decline of violence is due largely to the rise of the state” (pg. 367).

“When things improve, expectations balloon, and consequently even dramatic improvements in objective conditions can leave us dissatisfied” (pg. 383).

“Rather, happiness consists in seeing one’s life in its entirety as meaningful and worthwhile….As Nietzsche put it, if you have a why to live, you can bear almost any how” (pg. 391).

Summary

Sapiens is a lucid history of humanity focusing on the role of fiction.  It is not a comprehensive history by any stretch, but it sometimes feels like it with erudite observations and cutting truths.  The book begins with humanity’s primitive stages and then sweeps the reader through to the present day.  While broadly chronological, the book has a topical quality, each chapter dealing with a particular class of fiction at a time.  The organization usually follows the most important fictions that dominated an era of human existence, along with the technological and evolutionary elements that defined it.  If there is one primary takeaway from the book it is: everything you believe is a fiction, and that’s ok.

Personal Thoughts

I will not try to conduct a criticism section since the book has such a personal significance to me and I wouldn’t be able to critique it well anyway.  Sapiens sparked a new period in my life.  I read it a few years ago now and it still remains one of the most influential books I have ever read.  As I read it I wrote this passage in my journal, “GOD IS REAL BUT IT DOES NOT EXIST,” which was my first syntheist belief long before I encountered the word.  I believe that I became a syntheist at that moment.  

The epiphany Sapiens gave me was far deeper than the simple notion that gods are man-made.  I realized that the spiritual experience I grew up with, my Christianity, was not a blemish on my life.  Those moments of spiritual ecstasy and peace I had when I felt close to Christ were valid and true.  I didn’t need to look back on them embarrassed about my childishness and superstitious beliefs.  They were good parts of my life, worthy of remembering fondly.  But most importantly, I could accept them as a part of myself.  There was no need to shove them under the rug or rationalize them away.  They were a vitally human experience, and I can be proud to have them.  Sapiens gave me that, and I’m grateful.

Another important gift Sapiens gave me was empathy for my religious family and friends.  By recognizing the role religion played in my life and in history, I was able to recognize that, while I may have no more use for the Christian god, other people did.  There was no shame in it, I didn’t need to evangelize atheism to them (what a detestable notion).  I could respect their truths as important tools they use to navigate their lives.  Some people would benefit from using more updated tools, and it seems clear to me that my beliefs are those kinds of tools.  But if their tools are working well for the tasks they need them for, why interfere?  Just as my spiritual practice was valid before I left the church, so was theirs.  This empathy impresses me as the core of syntheistic beliefs.  

Naturally, I would recommend the book to everyone.  It is a difficult book, sharply true and potentially destabilizing, but entirely worth the risk.  There is a clarity to it that shines through whatever opinions Harari might bring to the table.  The core premise, that fiction is vitally important to humanity, rings so true that it is difficult not to be swept up in its momentum.  I felt like things finally made sense when I read it, like I discovered the core principles I had been searching for.  It contextualized me, humbled me, and helped make the world clear.  

Sapiens is a core text in the Terranic canon.