How humans made the world
Discover how people’s actions change the planet.
Professor Yuval Noah Harari’s new children’s book, Why the World Isn’t Fair, from his Unstoppable Us series, is about how humans learned to control the world, starting with the agricultural revolution of around 10,000BC. From deciding where a field of wheat should grow, humans have gone on to create a world of cars, planes and smartphones. “What starts with trying to control wheat led to controlling animals, weather, other people and the future,” Harari tells The Week Junior. It also led to greater fear of others, because “no matter how much you have, you always fear it will be taken away”.
People nowadays can learn from the hunter gatherers who existed before the agricultural revolution, Harari says. Hunter gatherers got their food by hunting animals, fishing and collecting food that grew in the wild, rather than farming. They “adapted to the world, they didn’t try to change it to fit their own desires,” Harari says, adding that human attempts to make the world work for us has had many results. These include climate change and animals dying out as humans have taken over land and polluted the air and water.
Unstoppable Us, the title of the book series, reflects the fact that “nothing can stop humans if we want something”. He explains, “We can’t stop ourselves because whatever we achieve, we always want more.”
If we want to change things about the world we have created, he says, the most important first step is “to open your eyes and ears and try to understand others and their experiences”. By including everyone and being kind to those around us we can do things to help others and make the world better.