Humanist thinkers such as Rousseau convinced us that our own feelings and desires were the ultimate source of meaning and that our free will was, therefore, the highest authority of all.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the significance of individual feelings and free will in determining meaning in life.
Yuval Noah Harari discusses the influence of humanist thinkers like Rousseau, who posited that personal emotions and desires are the primary sources of meaning in our lives. This perspective elevates free will to the highest authority, suggesting that individuals have the power to define their own purpose and values, rather than relying on external dictates or traditional beliefs.
In practice
In a discussion about personal philosophy, one might quote Harari to highlight the importance of individual agency.
We control the world basically because we are the only animals that can cooperate flexibly in very large numbers. And if you examine any large-scale human cooperation, you will always find that it is based on some fiction like the nation, like money, like human rights.
I titled the book 'Homo Deus' because we really are becoming gods in the most literal sense possible. We are acquiring abilities that have always been thought to be divine abilities - in particular, the ability to create life. And we can do with that whatever we want.
The notion of superhumans is using bioengineering and artificial intelligence to upgrade human abilities. If they use the power to change themselves, to change their own minds, their own desires, then we have no idea what they will want to do.
Techno-humanism aims to amplify the power of humans, creating cyborgs and connecting humans to computers, but it still sees human interests and desires as the highest authority in the universe.
The most important question in 21st-century economics may well be, 'What should we do with all the superfluous people, once we have highly intelligent non-conscious algorithms that can do almost everything better than humans?'
Take Google Maps or Waze. On the one hand, they amplify human ability - you are able to reach your destination faster and more easily. But at the same time, you are shifting the authority to the algorithm and losing your ability to find your own way.
When you've understood this scripture, throw it away. If you can't understand this scripture, throw it away. I insist on your freedom.
Very well, then, where do we arrive? Where do we arrive with our respect, our homage, our filial affection? At Adam! At Adam, every time. We can't build a monument to a germ, but we can build one to Adam, who is in the way to turn myth in in fifty years and be entirely forgotten in two hundred. We can build a monument and save his name to the world forever, and we'll do it!
Spires whose "silent finger points to heaven."
Truth is a remarkable thing. We cannot miss knowing some of it. But we cannot know it entirely.
The world is nothing but my perception of it. I see only through myself. I hear only through the filter of my story.
Some go to sleep in an organization and never wake up, and those who do wake up put them selves to sleep again by joining another. This acquisitive movement is called expansion of thought, progress.
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