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Bari Weiss, Op-Ed staff editor and writer at The New York Times, will join Yuval Noah Harari, historian, philosopher and international best-selling author of “Sapiens” and “Homo Deus” for a thought-provoking evening of conversation. Harari’s new book, “21 Lessons for the 21st Century” untangles political, technological, social and existential issues. It clarifies the most important questions humankind faces today, and empowers all of us to help answer them. His provocative insights on the most pressing issues of the day have won him fans ranging from Bill Gates and Barack Obama to Natalie Portman and Janelle Monáe.
Filmed live at TheTimesCenter.
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Harari argues that humanity faces an unprecedented crisis requiring global cooperation on three existential threats (nuclear war, climate change, AI/biotech disruption), but nationalism and outdated stories prevent the necessary coordination; distinguishing fiction from reality and developing emotional resilience are essential for navigating this transformation.
- The three big problems (nuclear, climate, technological) cannot be solved by individual nations and require unprecedented global trust and cooperation
- Nationalism, while weaker than a century ago, resurges precisely when we need transnational coordination most, driven by nostalgia and inability to adapt stories to new technological realities
- The ability to distinguish between fictional constructs (nations, corporations, human rights) and actual suffering entities (humans, animals) is the foundation for wise decision-making in an age of manipulation technologies
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Tribalism is natural to humans and imprinted by evolution, but nationalism—which requires loyalty to millions of strangers you've never met—is a cultural construction that required massive educational and propaganda efforts to establish, and therefore is not eternal or natural despite common claims that it is.
“you hear a lot of talk about like nationalism it's in our genes it was imprinted by evolution in homo sapiens going against it is going against nature this is absolute nonsense but tribalism is natural tribalism is natural”
Nationalism is much weaker today than it was a century ago, measured by willingness to die for national ideals; a century ago major territorial questions like Scottish independence or British membership in European blocs required military conflict with hundreds of thousands of casualties, whereas today they are settled by referendums with almost no violence.
“nationalism is still much much weaker than it was a century ago you just need to count bodies a century ago Europeans were killing each other by the million over national conflicts in the in the First World War today if you look say at Europe for all the talk about the rise of nationalism very few Europeans are willing to kill or be killed for nationalist ideals”
The history of religions shows that the most intolerant ideologies come from religions of love and compassion (Christianity, Buddhism), because wonderful ideas about love when scaled from small ashrams to millions of people tend to produce violence, persecution, and instruments like the Inquisition and Crusades.
“we have a lot of examples from history from for how you know the best ideas about love and compassion more people were killed and persecuted in the name of the religion of love Christianity then in the name of any other idea in human history it's the most that the region of love turned out to be the most intolerant religion in human history and Buddhism has its own share of skeletons in the closet and in the basement in all kinds of places it's just humans are so difficult things that look wonderful on a small scale when you're just is some cave in the Himalayas so in a small ashram with a couple of other monks so in a monastery in the Syrian desert when you try to scale it up to millions and billions of people all kinds of strange things like the Inquisition and the Crusades tend to crop up”
The future is not deterministic; technology will change humanity in unprecedented ways, but how exactly is still up to us, and the same technology can create completely different kinds of societies—paradise or hell depending on choices made now.
“it should be very very clear that the future is not deterministic nobody has any idea how the future how the world would actually look like in in 50 years and it's still up to us yes technology is going to change the world in dramatic ways that's that certain AI and bioengineering will change the world will change us humanity in unprecedented ways but how exactly this is still up to us and you can use the same technology to create completely different kinds of societies”
The end of the Cold War without nuclear war was a major achievement of human cooperation and was enabled largely by Soviet decisions to give up power, particularly Gorbachev's choice to relinquish control despite having overwhelming military force at his disposal—possibly the greatest voluntary power relinquishment in human history.
“when I look at the end isn't the answer that they knew they were losing lots of people when they know they are losing they don't give up and you know at the time that the Soviet leadership at least part of it gave up they were still in control of the most powerful conventional army that ever existed and this army was loyal if Gorbachev gave the order to fire they would have fired they had enough nuclear power nuclear weapons to destroy the whole of the world several times over”
There is one universal agreement across all human cultures when it comes to engineering and science regardless of religion or politics; Israelis and Iranians disagree on almost everything but agree on physics, nuclear engineering, and biology because these are objective domains not subject to cultural interpretation.
“I would say that today almost all the world in many important fields is belongs to a single civilization when it comes to building a hospital or building a bomb there is new almost universal agreement about how to do it irrespective of religion if you go to a hospital in tel-aviv or in Tehran or in Tokyo or in New York it's more or less the same thing and if you go to a nuclear reactor the same they have a total agreement about nuclear physics the Israelis and the Iranians so disagree but they all agree that e equals MC square”
Human rights, individualism, and free will are not biological realities written in human DNA but are fictional stories invented by humans, similar to Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, yet these fictions have reduced suffering and are therefore valuable.
“liberalism and its belief in things like free will and like individualism and like human rights even though these things as far as our scientific understanding goes there are just myth like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny so there is a real awesome human right is just a story we tell ourselves they are not a biological reality they are not written in our DNA it's not part of nature that Homo sapiens has a right to this or has a right to that it's just a story we invented and tell ourselves and there is nothing wrong with it”
Religion has lost most of its traditional practical functions (healing the sick, controlling weather, managing economic crises) to science and engineering, and now plays a primarily identity-shaping role, though in modern times religion has mainly become the handmaiden of nationalism rather than a source of global cooperation.
“it gave up most of oilcloth not gave up it lost most of its practical powers a thousand years ago when people needed rain when people faced an economic crisis when people faced the war and people faced an epidemic they would go to the priests they would pray to the gods and gradually religion lost almost all of these roles today even the religious people when there is an epidemic they first of all go to the doctors when there is no rain they first of all go to the to the engineers”
Stories are the fundamental unit of human cognition; humans do not think in facts, statistics, or equations, but in narratives, which makes stories necessary for organizing societies and creating shared identity.
“stories are tools humans think in stories we are restoring animal we don't think in facts we don't think in statistics we don't think in equations we think in stories so if you want to organize people together if you want to have an effective society you need to tell people a story that they can grasp easily and identify with”
Global cooperation is necessary to solve the three big problems facing humanity—nuclear war, climate change, and technological disruption (AI and bioengineering)—because no single nation, however powerful, can prevent these threats by itself.
“the key is to have global cooperation because whatever you do in order to be effective it has to be done on the global level this is not something that any particular nation however powerful can do by itself”
The danger of blind faith in free will is that in an age where technology can hack and manipulate human desires, people who believe their choices reflect mysterious free will become the easiest to manipulate because they don't question their desires or remain skeptical of external influence.
“in a world where nobody has a technology to HAC human beings to decipher human beings and to predict their choices and manipulate their desires this story was excellent and it brought a lot of benefits to humankind but once you have the technology to hack humans to decipher and manipulate their desires a blind faith in free will becomes more and more dangerous because the easiest people to manipulate are the people who believe that other decisions reflect some mysterious for the will”
The criterion for evaluating stories should not be whether they are true but whether they reduce suffering in the world, because truth functions like acid that dissolves any stable social order, whereas effective stories create social cohesion.
“throughout history you have this big debate that all scholars in all civilizations had to confront whether your aim is the truth or whether your aim is social cohesion and social harmony and almost all power all the at least the powerful and successful scholarly establishments reach the conclusion that social harmony is much more important than truth truth is like an acid mmm anything you put in it dissolves”
The best test for distinguishing fictional entities from real ones is whether they can suffer; a nation, corporation, or currency cannot suffer even if it loses, whereas humans and animals are real because they genuinely suffer.
“if you want to know whether an entity is real or whether it's just the hero of a fictional story you should ask can it suffer a nation cannot suffer even if a nation loses a war it doesn't suffer it doesn't have a mind it has no consciousness it has no feelings similarly a cooperation cannot suffer currency like the dollar or the euro even if it loses half its value it doesn't suffer all these things our stories we created important stories powerful stories but they are just stories human beings are real animals are real they really suffer”
Autonomous weapon systems (killer robots) cannot be effectively regulated through unilateral national bans or even signed international agreements without enforcement mechanisms, because unlike nuclear weapons, AI development is much easier to hide and would require unprecedented levels of trust between nations like the US and China.
“if the u.s. unilaterally says ok we are banning the development of autonomous weapon systems in the US this will not be binding on other nations like China or like Russia so what do you do 20 years from now if the Chinese are developing killer robots do you just say and do just say ok we are sticking with our band we don't we don't mind being left behind and even if you sign some global agreement on banning killer robots it's a dead letter it's very easy to just sign a piece of paper but how do you make sure that different nations actually live up to their commitments and you know when it comes to something like killer robot it's much it's far more difficult but with nuclear weapons with nuclear weapons if some nation has a nuclear weapons program like Iran or like North Korea they can't really do it in secret you know that something is happening but with developing new types of AI it's much easier to do it in secret”
There is a contradiction between telling people they should become more aware of their thoughts and emotions while simultaneously arguing that consciousness and the mind will be technologically manipulated; this contradiction suggests a gap between understanding consciousness and ability to manipulate emotions.
“one of your solutions so that people should become more aware than but I think if they do not think of themselves as bodies if they think of themselves as mental apparatus which could be which could be manipulated technologically then you have a tremendous contradiction there”
Humans are far from understanding consciousness and the mind, but are making tremendous and frightening advances in understanding the brain and manipulating emotions; this gap between manipulative capacity and genuine understanding creates a dangerous situation where humans are conducting experiments on billions without knowing consequences.
“I think we are very far from understanding consciousness in the mind and our mental experiences but we are making tremendous and in ways frightening advances in understanding what is happening on the level of the body and of the brain and there very often in history in the history of science this this huge gap between our ability to manipulate and our ability to understand the consequences of the manipulations and we are becoming frightening ly good in deciphering and manipulating human emotions while we are not good at all in really understanding the human mind and what the consequences will do we are basically now conducting experiments on billions of human guinea pigs without any idea what the consequences will be”
An AI arms race is beginning and will likely accelerate over the next several years as governments worldwide recognize AI as the key technology for dominating the 21st century; if this arms race continues, whoever wins, humanity will lose.
“if we enter an AI arms race and this is what what's been happening over the last two or three years five years ago almost nobody cared about it but over the last two three years more and more governments around the world realize that this is happening this is big this is the key perhaps too dominating the 21st century and we are at the beginning of an AI arms race and if this continues then whoever wins the AI arms race humanity will lose”
Technology enabling the hacking and manipulation of human desires requires two prerequisites that humans now possess: very good understanding of human biology and the brain, plus massive computing power to analyze large datasets—these two technologies combined for the first time in history enable unprecedented human manipulation.
“in order to hack a human being you need to have a very good understanding of human biology and especially of the brain and you need a lot of computing power to amass and analyze all the relevant data we never had it before so it wasn't a big problem but now all very soon we will have it”
A legal system that recognizes the lack of free will should shift from punishing people for bad choices to either protecting society from dangerous brains, using deterrence (since brains still calculate consequences when making decisions), or providing therapy to help people with brains that make harmful decisions.
“we still need a legal system so bill cosby couldn't control his choices but we don't punish him for bad choices we can we and we should send him to jail for several other things first of all if you have the kind of brain that makes these decisions then you should then Society should be protected against you it's not a punishment for free choices but you need to protect people and secondly deterrence the brain when it makes its calculations takes into account what society does if you do this or if you do that so deterrence still works and thirdly and most importantly therapy if you have the kind of brain that makes these kinds of decisions that harm other people and that harm you we should try and help you we should try and kill you”
The danger that understanding neuroscience and having access to individual data creates a slippery slope toward eugenics or preventive detention based on brain type (rather than actions) is unavoidable and cannot be solved by simply denying that the problem exists; instead it must be directly confronted as technology becomes more powerful.
“that couldn't very easily we don't send somebody to jail just because he has this type of brain and we think that in the future he will make or she will make these kinds of decisions no it could easily lead to that in a culture in which we have tons of data everyone in know every yes that's one of the dangers but this danger will not go away just because we say oh we believe in a free will so we don't care about it the more data we amass about individuals and the better we understand what's really happening inside the brain the temptation to go in those dangerous directions is going to get bigger and bigger and we will have to deal with it”
The educational system is facing a crisis of irrelevance because it must decide what to teach today while preparing students for 2040, a future it cannot predict, and we do not yet have the answers for how to reform education at scale despite successful small experiments.
“there are many experiments being done and they work some of them quite well on a small scale but it's very difficult to scale it up from the level of the experimental small school to the level of an entire system with millions of teachers and tens of millions of students”
The risk of internal ecological collapse of human mental systems through emotional manipulation parallels the external ecological collapse caused by human manipulation of natural systems before understanding them.
“in the past we did it on the planet we gained the ability to manipulate the ecological system to cut down forests and drain swamps and so forth without understanding the complexity of the ecological system and the result is that the ecological system is now collapsing the same thing might happen this is one of my fears on the internal level of the internal ecological system we are very far from understanding the complexities of the human mind but we are becoming very good in manipulating emotions and thoughts and so forth and this gap may result in an internal ecological collapse of our mental system”
Young people entering university should understand the job market in 2050 is unknowable and they will need to reinvent themselves repeatedly throughout their careers, so the best investment is in emotional intelligence, mental resilience, and the ability to learn and adapt rather than specialized technical skills.
“nobody has any idea how the job market would look like in 2050 anybody who tells you that they know how the job market will be and what kind of skills will be needed there are probably either deluded or mistaken or whatever so just start with the understanding that it is unknown and that most probably you will have to reinvent yourself repeatedly throughout your career not just the idea of a job for life but the idea of a profession for life this is our outdated if you will want to stay in the game you will have to reinvent yourself repeatedly and you don't know what kind of skills you'll actually need so the best investment is to invest in emotional intelligence and mental resilience or mental balance”
The psychological and existential challenges of reinventing yourself repeatedly throughout a longer career (as humans live longer and work longer) will be more difficult than acquiring new technical skills, making mental balance and emotional stability the most important assets.
“the may be the most difficult problems will actually be psychological anxiety and stress yes I mean it's so difficult to reinvent yourself to learn new skills I mean it's difficult when you're 20 it's much much more difficult when you're 40 and to think that you have to do it again every day minion 15 a gamma neo 60 because you have longer lines lifespans and longer careers so emotional intelligence and mental stability mental balance I think will be the most important assets”
The singularity is best understood not as a physical phenomenon but as a point beyond which human imagination fails to predict—humans are approaching a singularity in 50-100 years beyond which what happens is unimaginable, partly because the technologies in question (brain engineering, genetic modification) will change human imagination itself.
“singularity I I try to remain calm with it I mean to take it into account yes it is likely that we are reaching an inflection point beyond which our imagination fails we cannot say anything to anything meaningful about how the world would look like a hundred years from now this is how I understand the singularity not in terms of some Big Bang or laws of physics or something like that but the point beyond which you just can't look”
The humanities and philosophy have become more relevant than ever before because technological power is creating practical versions of philosophical thought experiments; people will face real decisions about modifying themselves that were previously hypothetical.
“a lot of questions are going to kind of migrate from the Department of Philosophy to the Department of engineering in the Department of Economics and questions like what do you really want to do with your life you are going to become far more practical than ever before given the immense powers that technology is giving us and and the ability to change yourself to change your body to change your brain is going to put enormous philosophical challenges in front of the average person you need to make the kind of decisions that for most of history were the stuff of thought experiments by philosophers what would you do if you could be this or you could be that I mean for almost everything you couldn't it was impossible so why should I care about it but in 20 years or 50 years maybe you can”
Global cooperation may be the only way to solve major problems like climate change and AI regulation, but this does not guarantee humans will actually achieve it; the necessity is not the same as possibility.
“it's going to be difficult and maybe we'll fail but we have to try because I don't I just don't see how you can the fact that this is the maybe only way to solve our major problems doesn't guarantee will actually succeed maybe it's the only way and we won't be able to do it but I just don't see how you can solve something like climate change or like are the dangers of bioengineering unless you have substantial global agreement substantial global cooperation on these issues”
Going from loyalty to millions of people you don't know (a nation) to 8 billion people you don't know (global species) is far easier than the initial jump from tribal loyalty to national loyalty, because the cognitive architecture is already established.
“I mean to go from being loyal to a hundred people you know 200 million people you don't know that's very difficult to go from a hundred million people you don't know to eight billion people you don't know that's far easier”
Meditation can help people observe their own minds and develop skepticism about their desires, but meditation should not be understood as a solution to humanity's problems; even if 8 billion people began meditating, it would not solve technological disruption, climate change, or nuclear war.
“I don't think especially because I meditate myself I I meditate for two hours every day I go every year for a 60 days because yeah I know how difficult it is I am under no illusions that eight billion people are going to start meditating anytime soon and even if they do start meditating for many of them they will take it in all kinds of very problematic directions”
The most compelling and effective stories currently being told are nostalgic fantasies (make America great again, religious fundamentalism, nationalism) appealing to people in an age of accelerating change by offering the promise of eternal unchanging truths, rather than visions for how to address future challenges like AI and climate change.
“who is telling the most compelling stories compelling in the sense of making people convincing keep convincing people a compelling story and the good story is totally different things okay what what we see now is a resurgence of a lot of nostalgic fantasies coming from make America great again of nationalism and of religion as the stories that were dominant in the 20th century are our collapsing or are in danger of collapsing then nostalgia becomes very very tempting and in this sense it's very compelling especially in an age of accelerating change when you come to people and say no there is an eternal truth that never changed and will never change it doesn't matter what happens with AI it doesn't matter what happens with biotechnology it doesn't matter what happens with climate change these truth will be there forever this is who you really are we don't need to care about this is now very very tempting the problem is that it doesn't offer any serious vision for the future of humankind and for how to deal with these problems”
Brexit debate in Britain focused on 19th century concerns and showed lack of interest in impact on the world or on regulating AI and biotechnology, despite Britain's role as a permanent Security Council member and major power.
“I was watching the brac see debate in Britain and Britain is still one of the most important powers in the world it still has a seat on the Security Council I mean I would say to the British you don't want you don't care about the world ok give back your secure your place on the Security Council give it to somebody who really cares about the world give it maybe to Germany give it to Brazil give it to India you want to be out of it ok but give it up right I mean and when I watched at the brexit debate I was amazed not only by the lack of interest in the impact on the rest of the world but also in the fact that it was also like you know 19th century stuff”
The historical parallels between the British opium trade with China in the early 19th century and the contemporary opioid epidemic in the USA are striking, suggesting recurring patterns in how substances are weaponized or exploited for profit.
“I just read a very interesting book about the opium war between Britain and China in the early 19th century I think it doesn't call it's not considered a news anymore I mean opioids yeah actually this is very one of the of the new books that I've just downloaded I listen to books on on audio is about the opioid epidemic now in the USA and the the similarities between China in the early 19th century in the USA today suddenly becomes quite quite striking”
Barry Weiss is amazed that nobody in the 2016 US election was talking about AI or biotechnology, despite their profound significance, instead focusing on conventional issues like immigration and the border wall.
“I was following the last u.s. elections in 2016 and I was amazed that nobody was talking about AI and about biotechnology you heard Donald Trump saying things like the Mexicans will take real jobs but he didn't say the robots will take away jobs why not”
Harari does not have children and has no intention of having them, partly for reasons he can discuss but also for reasons that were not prompted by external consideration of children as an option.
“I don't have any children and my husband and me have no intention of bringing any is that why hmm is that why there are many reasons why”
Harari's primary accomplishment in his books has been helping readers see ordinary humans in a new way—as animals despite clothes and technology—and recognizing that humans might be radically different in 100 years due to technological change.
“you've all I think that one of the most amazing things that you've been able to accomplish in your books is sort of helping me see a room of people in a new way that we are animals despite you know the clothes on our backs and the iPhones in our pockets and in a hundred years from now we might be something radically different so that I just think that that's an amazing accomplishment”
Humanity already has enough problems on planet Earth (nuclear war, climate change, AI disruption) to unite around without additional external threats, and the question of whether aliens would help unite us is less pressing than solving terrestrial existential risks.
“I think we have enough on our plates on planet Earth even without aliens coming and adding more I think that again nuclear war and climate change and the threat of technological disruption should be enough to unite our species if not we may not live long enough to encounter the aliens”
The ability to distinguish between fictional stories and reality was foundational to Harari's intellectual development as a scientist and researcher, driven by frustration with being repeatedly told fictional stories when asking large questions about the meaning of life.
“it's just that I I got fed up of being repeatedly told these fictional stories when I was asking you know these big questions about the meaning of life and what are we doing here and what's what's what's the point of all that and you get again and again all these fictional stories and I just really got fed up with it”
Harari does not read newspapers or follow the news cycle, instead reads long-form books, because he thinks in terms of centuries rather than days and distrusts short texts without deep context.
“I tend to read long books III distrust and you don't have a smartphone I don't have a smartphone I tend to distrust short texts does that mean you're not a New York Times subscriber I I hardly hardly read newspapers at all I I just I read books written by some new New York Times journalists but I don't tend not to follow the the immediate news cycle I think more in centuries than ours”
The future described in Harari's books appears bleak because of ecological collapse, nuclear war, and the possibility of a biological caste system where a few become gods and the rest become useless, which raises the question of whether one should have children.
“the future that you lay out for us in your work including your most recent book twenty-one lessons is very bleak to my mind and not just because of ecological meltdown or potential nuclear war but especially because of this kind of biological caste system you lay out in which a few of us may be the lucky few of you are in this room will become kind of like gods and the rest of us will become useless kind of left behind”
If extraterrestrial life were discovered to threaten humanity, this would provide a shared external enemy that could unite the human species in ways internal problems (nuclear war, climate change, AI disruption) have not.
“had there been if we found that there is extraterrestrial life extraterrestrial okay yes it will get and and they come not necessarily with an olive branch but you know and I will that is a possibility that can unite”