Yuval Noah Harari emphasizes the ability to communicate and cooperate as the reason for human domination of the planet, but it can be argued that intelligence, tool-making, and walking upright also played a role. Human ingenuity cannot be explained by communication and cooperation alone, but rather by a combination of evolutionary traits and a variety of abilities that have evolved in the face of nature.
In his book Homo Deus, Yuval Noah Harari argues that the human trait that has allowed humans to dominate the planet is the ability to communicate and cooperate. Yuval Noah Harari’s argument that the ability to communicate and cooperate is a fundamental trait that distinguishes humans from other creatures is based on two main arguments.
First, the ability to flexibly adapt to different situations is an important reason why humans have risen to the top of the food chain. Yuval Noah Harari argues that this is made possible by our ability to handle the complexity of human communication, which is far superior to that of other organisms. This has allowed humans to go beyond simple survival strategies and form complex social structures and develop cultures and civilizations. For example, early human societies were not simply family units or small groups, but gradually formed larger groups and communities, which can be attributed to our unique ability to communicate. Our ability to communicate goes beyond the simple transmission of information and allows us to effectively share emotions, ideas, and complex concepts.
Yuval Noah Harari also argues that humans have been able to dominate other creatures because of the possibility of large-scale cooperation. Without large-scale cooperation, he argues, humans would still be competing with other creatures, or at least not to the same degree. This shows that humans have faced many crises and challenges throughout history, and have been able to overcome them by working together toward a common goal. The scope of this cooperation was not just for survival, but was instrumental in advancing civilization by enabling cultural and technological progress. This allowed humans to go beyond mere survival to create their own unique cultures and pass them on to future generations.
Yuval Noah Harari’s argument seems convincing enough, and given the nature of humanity as we know it, it doesn’t seem too far-fetched. However, Yuval Noah Harari doesn’t provide any specific, objective evidence to support his claim that the biggest thing that makes humans special is our ability to communicate and collaborate. To some extent, I agree with Yuval Noah Harari that the ability to handle complexity in communication and the potential for large-scale cooperation in order to be flexible and adaptable are traits that distinguish us from other animals. However, the idea that these traits are the only ones that have allowed humans to dominate the planet is a subjective one. In fact, throughout human history, communication and cooperation have not solved all problems, and have even led to conflict and war. Considering this, it is somewhat limiting to explain human ingenuity through communication and cooperation alone.
Yuval Noah Harari’s assertion that intelligence and toolmaking have not played a significant role in the rise of humans to dominate the planet is also not well-founded. A large body of research supports the idea that intelligence and toolmaking have been as much a part of our unique traits as communication and cooperation. Traditional research suggests that the ability to walk upright, more than anything else, is what makes humans unique because it allowed us to use both hands to make and use tools, which in turn allowed our brain capacity to grow and our intelligence to develop. Australopithecus afarensis, the so-called first hominid, was able to make and use simple tools with his hands. Homo habilis, which appeared 2 million years ago, is a tool-using human, as its name implies. Importantly, it wasn’t until Homo habilis that we developed a language center in our brains, and language is the most important factor in human communication and cooperation. Eventually, with the development of upright walking, intelligence and tool-making skills, which can be trained, the brain becomes more free to use language.
This process is one of the defining moments in human evolution, and it’s what sets us apart from other animals. The development of tools, in particular, has influenced all human activities, from simple survival tools to art, science, and civilization building. The ability to communicate and cooperate is a byproduct of the development of superior intelligence. Therefore, it is contradictory to argue for communication and cooperation while denying intelligence as a special human ability. Instead, we should focus on what fundamentally distinguishes humans from other animals: upright walking. This is because walking upright gives us unique abilities in intelligence, toolmaking, communication, and cooperation. I am by no means convinced that upright walking is the reason humans came to dominate the planet. I’m merely refuting Yuval Noah Harari’s idea that communication and cooperation are the only things that make us special.
Yuval Noah Harari argues that this is why ants and bees, which have been cooperating in an organized manner since much earlier than Homo sapiens, have not dominated humanity or the planet. He cites the inability of ants and bees to communicate, criticize, and improve their social institutions, even though they are characterized by cooperation in very sophisticated ways. A classic example is their inability to guillotine the queen bee and start a revolution and establish a republic in the face of new environmental threats or new opportunities. But I would argue that it’s not just because humans are so good at communicating that we were able to start the French Revolution, develop the internet, etc. and communicate on a much broader scale and faster than ever before. I think that Yuval Noah Harari’s opinion that ants and bees are fundamentally good at cooperation but not at communication is also unfounded. First of all, ants and bees, which are much better at cooperating than humans, cannot create the Internet. This can only be interpreted as a difference between the intelligence to think of something that can connect the world through radio waves like the Internet and the ability to build a tool called a computer. If ants or bees had the intelligence and tool development capabilities to create the Internet, they would have evolved to do so.
Furthermore, human civilization has evolved out of the challenges and responses to nature. Human dominance of the planet is not just a result of communication and cooperation, but also of our ability to understand nature and transform it to suit our needs. Therefore, it is arguable that communication and cooperation are the only things that make humans special.
For these reasons, evidence, and data, I completely disagree with Yuval Noah Harari that the fundamental and unique trait of humans that has allowed us to dominate the planet is our ability to communicate and cooperate.
