Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: Superior algorithms will render democracy and free markets completely obsolete
“And once you have an external entity, An algorithm that knows me better than I know myself. This is the real turning point. This is the point when individualism as we've known, it doesn't make any sense when democracy in the free market become completely obsol…”
Opinion
Harari: Swearing on the Bible is like swearing on Harry Potter
“And even when people testify in court, I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, they swear on the Bible, which is so full of fictions and myth and error. It's like you can swear on Harry Potter just the same.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: Corporations and governments will soon understand individuals better than themselves
“What we will see with regard to the individual is that at a certain point, external entities, whether it's corporations or whether it's governments, they will have enough data, especially biometric data, and enough computing power to be able to understand me b…”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: Humanity is on the verge of creating inorganic life forms
“So after four billion years of evolution, of organic life forms, we are really on the verge of creating the first inorganic life forms, and if this happens, It's the greatest revolution in the history of life since the very beginning of life.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Harari: Neuroscience shows there is no single authentic self
“Science now tells us that when you look inside, you don't find any single authentic self. You find a cacophony of different conflicting voices that Well, none of which is your true self. There is just no such thing.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: The breakup of the individual will collapse democracy and capitalism
“If in the 20th century, the big fear for individualism was that the individual will be crushed from outside, now the threat comes from the opposite direction. The individual will break up from inside, and then the entire structure of individualism and democrac…”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: Neo-nationalism is a temporary phase incapable of solving global problems
“The present stage of neo-nationalism or tribalism, I think it's just a phase. It's a backlash against globalization, and the main problem, it doesn't have any solutions to the deep problems of the 21st century. All the major problems of humankind in the 21st c…”
Insight
Harari: Decision-making authority is shifting from humans to tech cloud systems
“Now we are entering a post-humanist era. Authority is shifting away from humans. If in the last 300 years we saw authority descending from the clouds, To earth, to humans, now authority is shifting back to the clouds, but not to God, but to the Google cloud, t…”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: Biotechnology could convert economic inequality into permanent biological inequality
“However, in the 21st century it might be possible for the first time to translate economic inequality into real biological inequality. And once this starts, it becomes almost impossible to close the gap.”
Insight
Harari: Religion functions as a virtual reality game with imaginary rules
“Religion is a virtual reality game that provides people with meaning by imposing imaginary rules on an objective reality.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Harari: Most people today have absolutely no military value
“Most people today have absolutely no military value.”
Insight
Harari: Governments lose incentive to fund public services without military need
“But if you don't need them as soldiers or workers, then the incentive to build hospitals and schools and so forth diminishes.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: 21st century's main products will be bodies, brains, and minds
“I think the main products of the 21st century will be bodies and brains and minds.”
Insight
Harari: Technology amplifies society's foundational fictions and illusions
“Thousands of years, human society have been built on shared fictions and shared illusions, and there is nothing new about that. It's just that with technology, actually our fictions and illusions become more powerful than ever before.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: Algorithmic authority's major breakthrough will rely on biometric data
“I think the big breakthrough will come with biometric data. So far, most of these algorithms, whether it's Amazon or Netflix or whatever, they work mainly on the basis of data external to my body. They follow me around in space, see where I go, which places I …”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: AI teachers will personalize learning and dismantle traditional educational barriers
“An AI teacher that studies you while it is teaching you and adapting to your particular strengths and to your particular weaknesses, also breaking down all the traditional limitations and barriers of modern education.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: Techno-religions will increasingly rise and promise earthly immortality
“I think we are seeing, and we will see more and more the rise of kind of techno religions, religions based on technology that make all the old promises of traditional religions. They promise justice and happiness and even immortality and paradise.”
Prediction Open · timeframe Feb 2022
Harari: AI will surpass humans at diagnosing human emotions
“It will have much better sources of data coming from within your body. So their ability to diagnose emotions will be better than the ability of most, if not all humans.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Harari: AI civilian economy transition will occur within 20 to 40 years
“We are talking in terms of decades. And once the transition takes place, especially in the civilian economy, in the military, it already happened. We are there. In the civilian economy, maybe we have 20 years, 30 years, 40 years, nobody really knows.”
Insight
Harari: Technology is never deterministic in shaping political systems
“Technology is never deterministic. You can build very different kinds of political and social systems with the same kind of technology.”
Insight
Harari: AI disruption requires global solutions, but UBI proponents think nationally
“And a disruption of the economy, say by the rise of AI, will require a global solution. And most people who think about universal basic income, they think in national terms. Universal for them means US citizens.”
Insight
Harari: Knowledge prevents physical limits on economic growth
“We have a third kind of asset, which is knowledge. And the more knowledge you have, the more energy and raw materials you also have because you discover new sources of energy and new sources of raw materials.”
Insight
Harari: Inorganic life forms do not require physical co-location
“Now, with inorganic life, there is absolutely no reason why all parts of the life form must be at the same place at the same time.”
Yuval Noah Harari