Yuval Noah Harari’s Biography: The best-selling author of Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, and Sapiens: A Graphic History is Prof. Yuval Noah Harari, a historian and philosopher. He is regarded as one of the most important public intellectuals in the world today and his books have sold more than 40 million copies in 65 different languages.
Books
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind is a book written by Yuval Noah Harari, published in 2011. The book explores the history of the human species, from its early beginnings to the present day. It covers a wide range of topics, including the evolution of human biology and cognition, the development of human societies and cultures, and the rise and fall of empires. The book has been widely praised for its accessible and engaging writing style, and for its insights into the complex and fascinating history of our species.
Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow
Published in 2015. It is a follow-up to his previous book, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. In Homo Deus, Harari explores the future of the human species, and examines how advances in technology, science, and artificial intelligence are likely to shape our lives in the coming decades. The book covers a wide range of topics, including the potential implications of AI, the future of work, the impact of biotechnology on human health, and the possible emergence of new forms of government and society. Like Sapiens, Homo Deus has been widely praised for its engaging writing style and thought-provoking ideas.
Early Life
One of three children born to Shlomo and Pnina Harari, Yuval Noah Harari was born and reared in Kiryat Ata, Israel. His family has origins in Lebanon and Eastern Europe and was a secular Jewish family. His mother worked as an office manager, while his father was an armaments engineer hired by the government. At age three, Harari began teaching himself to read. From the age of eight, he attended a class at the Leo Baeck Education Center in Haifa for children who were academically talented. In order to complete his university studies as part of the Atuda programme, he postponed his obligatory military duty in the Israel Defense Forces. However, he was eventually excused from serving his full term of obligation due to health problems. He enrolled at the Hebrew University to study history and international relations.
Personal Life
Harari, who is homosexual, met his partner Itzik Yahav in 2002 and has referred to him as “my internet of all things.” Yahav served as Harari’s personal manager as well. They were wed in Toronto, Canada during a civil ceremony.
Harari started practising Vipassana meditation in Oxford in 2000, and in 2018, he claimed it “changed my life.” As of 2017, he practiced for two hours everyday (one hour at the beginning and conclusion of his workday), undertook a 30-day or longer silent meditation retreat without the use of any books or social media, and worked as a meditation assistant instructor. [He added that without the concentration, serenity, and understanding obtained through practicing Vipassana for fifteen years, he would not have been able to write Homo Deus, dedicating it to “my teacher, S. N. Goenka, who kindly taught me vital things.” Additionally, he views meditation as a method of inquiry.
According to Harari, who claims that becoming a vegan was the outcome of his studies, the dairy industry’s main principle is the dissolution of the mother-calf link. Harari didn’t have a smartphone as of May 2021.In a 2020 interview, Harari talks about his place of residence and states, “I live in a middle-class suburb of Tel Aviv.” Following former US President Donald Trump’s reduction in WHO funding during the COVID-19 pandemic, Harari declared that he and his husband will make a $1 million donation to the organization through Sapienship, his social impact enterprise.
Awards and Recognition
In 2009 and 2012, Harari won the Polonsky Prize for “Creativity and Originality” twice. He received the Moncado Award for outstanding military history articles from the Society for Military History in 2011. He was chosen to join the Young Israeli Academy of Sciences in 2012.
For 96 consecutive weeks, Sapiens spent time in the top 3 of The New York Times BestSeller list. Harari delivered the first TED Talk in 2018 using a computer avatar.
Homo Deus won the 2017 German Economic Book Award from Handelsblatt for being the most insightful and significant economic book of the year. Harari presented at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos in 2018 and 2020.
Controversy
The Russian edition of Harari’s third book, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, was extensively criticized in July 2019 for having various deletions and changes, as well as for employing a softer tone when discussing Russian authorities. The cautionary phrase was used by Leonid Bershidsky in the Moscow Times, while Nettanel Slyomovics in Haaretz asserted that “he is surrendering the same liberal values that he presumes to represent.” Harari responded by saying that he “had been warned that because of these few examples the Russian censorship would not allow distribution of the Russian translation of the book” and that he was therefore “faced with a dilemma”, namely that “these few examples whether to replace or not. other examples, and publish the book in Russia,” or “Don’t change anything, and don’t publish anything.” Harari said he “preferred publication, because Russia is a major global power and it seemed important that the ideas of the book should reach Russia.”
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