Yuval Noah Harari quotes
1976 – · Israel, 20th–21st century · historian and author
About Yuval Noah Harari
Born in Kiryat Ata in 1976, Harari studied history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and took a DPhil at Oxford in 2002 on war, memoir and identity. A professor at the Hebrew University, he moved from medieval and military history to broad, popular syntheses (Sapiens, Homo Deus, 21 Lessons) exploring how information and technology reshape politics and society.
Works: Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind; Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow; 21 Lessons for the 21st Century; Nexus
Quotes
“Though the challenges are unprecedented, and though the disagreements are intense, humankind can rise to the occasion if we keep our fears under control and be a bit more humble about our views.”
Source: 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, p. 157 (2018) · Check the source
Verified attributionWhat we know
- What is documented
- The passage is reliably attributed to Yuval Noah Harari and appears in the concluding material of 21 Lessons for the 21st Century.
- What remains uncertain
- Attribution is secure, but the supplied wording adds qualifiers (e.g., “technological,” “political”) that are not present in the commonly reproduced sentence from the book.
Harari urges a measured response to our era’s upheavals: keeping fear in check and adopting epistemic humility makes collective action more likely to succeed amid rapid technological and social change. This recommendation appears in the conclusion of 21 Lessons for the 21st Century as a call against panic.