Homo Deus: a brief History of Tomorrow

Knowledge  =  Experiences  ×  Sensitivity.  If  we  wish  to  know  the  answer  to
any ethical question, we need to connect to our inner experiences, and observe
them with the utmost sensitivity. In practice, that means that we seek knowledge
by spending years collecting experiences, and sharpening our sensitivity so we
could understand these experiences correctly.
What exactly are ‘experiences’? They are not empirical data. An experience is
not made of atoms, molecules, proteins or numbers. Rather, an experience is a
subjective  phenomenon  that  includes  three  main  ingredients:  sensations,
emotions  and  thoughts.  At  any  particular  moment  my  experience  comprises
everything I sense (heat, pleasure, tension, etc.), every emotion I feel (love, fear,
anger, etc.) and whatever thoughts arise in my mind.
And what is ‘sensitivity’? It means two things. Firstly, paying attention to my
sensations,  emotions  and  thoughts.  Secondly,  allowing  these  sensations,
emotions and thoughts to influence me. Granted, I shouldn’t allow every passing

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breeze to sweep me away. Yet I should be open to new experiences, and permit
them to change my views, my behaviour and even my personality.
Experiences  and  sensitivity  build  up  one  another  in  a  never-ending  cycle.  I
cannot  experience  anything  if  I  have  no  sensitivity,  and  I  cannot  develop
sensitivity  unless  I  undergo  a  variety  of  experiences.  Sensitivity  is  not  an
abstract  aptitude  that  can  be  developed  by  reading  books  or  listening  to
lectures.  It  is  a  practical  skill  that  can  ripen  and  mature  only  by  applying  it  in
practice.
Take  tea,  for  example.  I  start  by  drinking  very  sweet  ordinary  tea  while
reading  the  morning  paper.  The  tea  is  little  more  than  an  excuse  for  a  sugar
rush. One day I realise that between the sugar and the newspaper, I hardly taste
the  tea  at  all.  So  I  reduce  the  amount  of  sugar,  put  the  paper  aside,  close  my
eyes and focus on the tea itself. I begin to register its unique aroma and flavour.
Soon I find myself experimenting with different teas, black and green, comparing
their  exquisite  tangs  and  delicate  bouquets.  Within  a  few  months,  I  drop  the
supermarket labels and buy my tea at Harrods. I develop a particular liking for
‘Panda Dung tea’ from the mountains of Ya’an in Sichuan province, made from
leaves of tea trees fertilised by the dung of panda bears. That’s how, one cup at
a  time,  I  hone  my  tea  sensitivity  and  become  a  tea  connoisseur.  If  in  my  early
tea-drinking  days  you  had  served  me  Panda  Dung  tea  in  a  Ming  Dynasty
porcelain goblet, I would not have appreciated it much more than builder’s tea in
a paper cup. You cannot experience something if you don’t have the necessary
sensitivity, and you cannot develop your sensitivity except by undergoing a long
string of experiences.
What’s  true  of  tea  is  true  of  all  other  aesthetic  and  ethical  knowledge.  We
aren’t  born  with  a  ready-made  conscience.  As  we  pass  through  life,  we  hurt
people  and  people  hurt  us,  we  act  compassionately  and  others  show
compassion to us. If we pay attention, our moral sensitivity sharpens, and these
experiences  become  a  source  of  valuable  ethical  knowledge  about  what  is
good, what is right and who I really am.
Humanism thus sees life as a gradual process of inner change, leading from
ignorance  to  enlightenment  by  means  of  experiences.  The  highest  aim  of
humanist  life  is  to  fully  develop  your  knowledge  through  a  large  variety  of
intellectual, emotional and physical experiences. In the early nineteenth century,
Wilhelm  von  Humboldt  –  one  of  the  chief  architects  of  the  modern  education
system  –  said  that  the  aim  of  existence  is  ‘a  distillation  of  the  widest  possible
experience of life into wisdom’. He also wrote that ‘there is only one summit in
life – to have taken the measure in feeling of everything human’.
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This could well
be the humanist motto.

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According  to  Chinese  philosophy,  the  world  is  sustained  by  the  interplay  of
opposing but complementary forces called yin and yang. This may not be true of
the  physical  world,  but  it  is  certainly  true  of  the  modern  world  that  has  been
created  by  the  covenant  of  science  and  humanism.  Every  scientific  yang
contains  within  it  a  humanist  yin,  and  vice  versa.  The  yang  provides  us  with
power,  while  the  yin  provides  us  with  meaning  and  ethical  judgements.  The
yang  and  yin  of  modernity  are  reason  and  emotion,  the  laboratory  and  the
museum,  the  production  line  and  the  supermarket.  People  often  see  only  the
yang, and imagine that the modern world is dry, scientific, logical and utilitarian
– just like a laboratory or a factory. But the modern world is also an extravagant
supermarket.  No  culture  in  history  has  ever  given  such  importance  to  human
feelings,  desires  and  experiences.  The  humanist  view  of  life  as  a  string  of
experiences  has  become  the  founding  myth  of  numerous  modern  industries,
from  tourism  to  art.  Travel  agents  and  restaurant  chefs  do  not  sell  us  flight
tickets,  hotels  or  fancy  dinners  –  they  sell  us  novel  experiences.  Similarly,
whereas  most  premodern  narratives  focused  on  external  events  and  actions,
modern novels, films and poems often revolve around feelings. Graeco-Roman
epics  and  medieval  chivalric  romances  were  catalogues  of  heroic  deeds,  not
feelings.  One  chapter  told  how  the  brave  knight  fought  a  monstrous  ogre,  and
killed  him.  Another  chapter  recounted  how  the  knight  rescued  a  beautiful
princess from a fire-spitting dragon, and killed him. A third chapter narrated how
a wicked sorcerer kidnapped the princess, but the knight pursued the sorcerer,
and  killed  him.  No  wonder  that  the  hero  was  invariably  a  knight,  rather  than  a
carpenter or a peasant, for peasants performed no heroic deeds.
Crucially, the heroes did not undergo any significant process of inner change.
Achilles,  Arthur,  Roland  and  Lancelot  were  fearless  warriors  with  a  chivalric
world view before they set out on their adventures, and they remained fearless
warriors with the same world view at the end. All the ogres they killed and all the
princesses  they  rescued  confirmed  their  courage  and  perseverance,  but
ultimately taught them little.
The  humanist  focus  on  feelings  and  experiences,  rather  than  deeds,
transformed  art.  Wordsworth,  Dostoevsky,  Dickens  and  Zola  cared  little  for
brave  knights  and  derring-do,  and  instead  described  how  ordinary  people  and
housewives  felt.  Some  people  believe  that  Joyce’s  Ulysses  represents  the
apogee  of  this  modern  focus  on  the  inner  life  rather  than  external  actions  –  in
260,000 words Joyce describes a single day in the life of the Dubliners Stephen
Dedalus and Leopold Bloom, who over the course of the day do . . . well, nothing
much at all.
Few  people  have  actually  read  all  of  Ulysses,  but  the  same  principles

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underpin  much  of  our  popular  culture  too.  In  the  United  States,  the  series