Humankind: A Hopeful History

To this day, many remain convinced that the resilience the British people showed during the Blitz can be chalked up to a quality that is singularly British. But it’s not singularly British. It’s universally human.

In 2010, researchers at the University of Amsterdam found that the effects of oxytocin seem limited to one’s own group.2 The hormone not only enhances affection for friends, it can also intensify aversion to strangers. Turns out oxytocin doesn’t fuel universal fraternity. It powers feelings of ‘my people first’.

Is it any wonder, then, that loneliness can quite literally make us sick? That a lack of human contact is comparable to smoking fifteen cigarettes a day?39 That having a pet lowers our risk of depression?40 Human beings crave togetherness and interaction.41 Our spirits yearn for connection just as our bodies hunger for food. It’s that longing, more

Le Bon’s book gives a play by play of how people respond to crisis. Almost instantaneously, he writes, ‘man descends several rungs in the ladder of civilization’.3 Panic and violence erupt, and we humans reveal our true nature.

On one night in Dresden, more men, women and children were killed than in London during the whole war. More than half of Germany’s towns and cities were destroyed.

An old man says to his grandson: ‘There’s a fight going on inside me. It’s a terrible fight between two wolves. One is evil – angry, greedy, jealous, arrogant, and cowardly. The other is good – peaceful, loving, modest, generous, honest, and trustworthy. These two wolves are also fighting within you, and inside every other person too.’ After a mome

Peter returned to Sydney, resigned from his father’s company and commissioned a new ship. Then he had the six boys brought over and granted them the thing that had started it all: an opportunity to see the world beyond Tonga. He hired Sione, Fatai, Kolo, Tevita, Luke and Mano as the crew of his new fishing boat. The name of the boat? The Ata.

‘One day, in 1977, six boys set out from Tonga on a fishing trip. […] Caught in a huge storm, the boys were shipwrecked on a deserted island. What do they do, this little tribe? They made a pact never to quarrel.’9

It’s time we told a different kind of story.

the ultimate placebo? Surgery! Don a white coat, administer an anaesthetic, and then kick back and pour yourself a cup of coffee. When the patient revives tell them the operation was a success. A broad review carried out by the British Medical Journal comparing actual surgical procedures with sham surgery (for conditions like back pain and heartbur