Fictions: History and It's Role in The Rise of Civilization

WARNING: Some of ideas here may be sensitive to some beliefs, mostly because this is a modern taste philosophy. There’s no intention to strike any particular belief

Now, I am reading Homo Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, an anthropology book by Yuval Noah Harari. Some of the ideas it offers are interesting yet unsettling. It tickles my mind - makes me wonder about the human role in the universe and what our belief actually is. There are some ideas, including:
  1. Human place in the food hierarchy is climbing gradually. At the first place we weren’t the highest predator.
  2. We at some point in the past were much less insignificant as animals.
  3. What distinct us with vast majority member of animals kingdom is our social and communication capabilities.
  4. What makes our social capabilities prominent is that we can create fiction: something that doesn't physically exists. we live in two realities; physical and imagined reality.

The imagined reality that we live in enables us to cooperate efficiently and in a large scale.

The idea of number four is actually agitates me the most, and I think the majority of us will experience the same. Let me explain it briefly. Some animals have social abilities, but they are too limited. For instance, a band of chimpanzee is at most consists of fifty or hundred members. And a chimpanzee can engages in a commerce, but it is limited to a few intimate friends. What actually strict them to engage in wider commerce is that they can't trust unfamiliar chimpanzees.

Yet we humans can cooperate even with unknown people because we believe in the same belief. this believe enables us to trust each others. Two unfamiliar true believer of Islam can help each other because they have the same religion. Thousands of independence warriors of Indonesia could align together to kick off the colonialist regime even if they don’t know each other, all because they believe in the same nationalism. Hundreds of thousand employees in a company could cooperate one another in order to run it.

Why we can? Mostly thanks to our ability to develop fiction. okay, before we delve deeper, let's make clear what is the definition of fiction. according to oxford dictionary, fiction is "invention or fabrication as opposed to fact." well let's take some example. the law of gravitation is a fact, it is not a human invention. actually, even if no one believes in law of gravitation, in every place above this earth surface, every thing will fall in the acceleration of 10 m/s2. human law is not a fact. it is human invention. imagine, if no one had believed on the law, so as the low will be disappeared. and yeah, law is exist in our imagination, because we all believe in it. so, if we don't believe in it it will be extinct. but human law is a shared fiction. so if just me disbelieve the law, it don't alter the law at all, because the rest billions of people still believe in it. 

well, this shared believe among us, give us some, advantage, like for instance, just as what i have explained before, it enables us to cooperate efficiently. another instance is  money. well money intrinsic value is far below it's written value. but because we all believe in the money, or more precisely, in the organization which published it, bank indonesia, u.s. bank, v.o.c, etc. and this really help us make deals. 

So if you are inquisitive, you might wonder "Okay, we can develop fiction, but, why only we homo sapiens that can create it?" Good question. Actually, no one know. seriously, even the most advanced anthropologist and biologist today is still looking for the answer. but archeo-anthropologist says that the ability of invent fiction is granted to us approximately 70.000 - 30.000 years ago. they call it as the Cognitive Revolution. it is caused by many complex factors, such as genes mutation and, even, accidentally happened.

Anyway, saying that law is a fiction, is not the same as saying it is useless. However, this shared belief among humans enables us to cooperate efficiently, and make the better society.

So, It Is safe to conclude, that differences among human beliefs is a very part of our natural and historical account. This, i hope, makes us understand more about this ultra complex dynamics of the evolving belief and religions along the history. and i hope we can more accept and tolerate the diversity among religions and ideologies. 

And before this article ends, I wanna hear your peers and question about this, so just comment below if you wish. Okay, that’s all today. See you guys!👋👦


Comments

  1. When law was said as a fiction, should we still obey the law?

    Law is an order made by men based on what they see on the reality. Corruption, murder, theft are the crime and they are so real, exist. So, the law about them must be real then.

    When law is a fiction, we don’t have to believe it, right? So, the idea about fiction is very mistaken.

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    2. okay, before we delve deeper, let's make clear what is the definition of fiction. according to oxford dictionary, fiction is "invention or fabrication as opposed to fact." well let's take some example. the law of gravitation is a fact, it is not a human invention. actually, even if no one believes on law of gravitation, in every place above this earth surface, every thing will fall in the acceleration of 10 m/s2. human law is not a fact. it is human invention. imagine, if no one had believed on the law, so as the low will be disappeared. and yeah, law is exist in our imagination, because we all believe in it. so, if we don't believe in it it will be extinct. but human law is a shared fiction. so if just me disbelieve the law, it don't alter the law at all, because the rest billion of people still believe in it. well, i admit, my definition of "fiction" above is incomplete, and when you read my reply, i should have fixed it. thanks for your feedback. :)

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    3. According to your explanation, I want to divide the invention into 2 kinds. First, the invention about things that has been in the world even before we find those. Such, a gravitation, like you said, or the thing kind a new species of ant, chimera, etc. Second, its the things that created by human intelegence and imagination, we call them creation or inovation. Such laws, robots, mobile, those are something that never exist before human creates them. But, the creation or the inovation although comes from the imagination they are still real. When you said, 'fiction is the opposite to fact' that means fiction is not the fact, but fake. When something becomes fake, should we go with them?

      In fact, we can't live without law. And you are being involve with law consciosly. Which I said, it proves that law is exist even when you deny or try to deny it.

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    4. well, i have no argument that law is important to human society. but as you said that law, however, is human invention. and it's exist, but just in our imagination. yet, this is the merit of humankind, they able to live in two realm, imagined reality, and physical reality. that's what differ us from other organism. for instance a monkey, they can't live in such imagined reality as human does. you can not ever to convince a monkey to give their banana, because there is a heaven of banana, or because there's a wisdom of sharing with others, their capacity limited to the physical reality. well true, it is exist, but just in our imagined reality. it's real just in our imagination, just like i have said. it has no physical basis. well, the problem is that we oftenly mixed about reality and imagination, because the fact is yes, we live in both reality. it is our advantage. and yeah it's fake, but we trust it, because we all agree that law is true, so it becomes true, because we all believe in them. when the trust faded, so as the law will be faded.

      so i think the conclusion is the law is just exist in the imagined reality we lived in. and about it is important or not, yeah it is important, because with these trust, we can manage the society better. CMIIW.

      ignoramus - i don't know.

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    5. well, i admit, your insights, arise some question in my head. and maybe, i can't answer it now. i still need to learn more. i will answer later. thanks, anyway.

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