This blog post critically examines the relationship between animals and humans, focusing on the concept of animism as presented in Homo Deus.
In his book Homo Deus, Yuval Noah Harari compares animism with the Bible, arguing that animism treats animals as equal to humans. This is most clearly illustrated in the early part of Part 1, ‘Children of the Serpent’. Yuval Noah Harari describes how, according to anthropological and archaeological evidence, primitive hunter-gatherers likely believed in animism. They did not perceive an essential gap between humans and other animals. They believed the world belonged to all the animals living there, and that all must follow shared rules.
However, in Jean Cazès’ book, The Etiquette of Animals, we see tribes with animistic worldviews interpreting and judging animals according to their own perspective. This is the exact opposite of the animism Yuval Noah Harari envisions. So, is it really true that animism treats animals and humans as equals?
A more precise definition of animism is “belief in spiritual beings.” Many tribes practicing animism as a faith believed that souls existed not only in humans, animals, and plants, but in all natural objects, including natural phenomena and other natural entities. Therefore, they worshipped nature and sought to live in harmony with all its elements. Hearing this description, one might imagine animals and humans sharing space, sharing food, and living in mutual respect. However, there is a significant gap between imagination and reality. The root of this discrepancy lies in the fact that the notion of “living in harmony with nature” was a human-centered interpretation. This was partly because communication between humans and nature was impossible, and partly because humans have a strong tendency to interpret things to suit their own interests.
In Homo Deus, Yuval Noah Harari awarded the title of ‘regarding animals and humans as equals’ to tribes, including the Nayaka, merely because some animistic attitudes existed among them. However, I believe this stems from a lack of understanding of the tribes’ lifestyle, ritual culture, and animism at the time. Jan Kazej’s book, which considers the animal’s perspective more deeply, can be used to refute Yuval Noah Harari’s argument.
The Blackfoot Indian tribe of Montana, USA, interpreted nature from a human-centered perspective and was a prime example of an animistic tribe seeking harmony with nature. Their bison hunting method starkly reveals this human-centered interpretation. Their preferred hunting method involved driving the bison off a cliff’s edge, forcing them to throw themselves off. The bison that fell to the bottom suffered severe injuries and died in agony, and the Indians took the dead bison. What was peculiar was their interpretation: the Indians believed the bison died through self-sacrifice. They believed the bison leaped from the cliff of their own accord, obeying the command of the ‘Original Bison,’ the legendary leader of the bison herd. Thus, to the Blackfoot Indians, the bison was seen as a “voluntary sacrifice offering its flesh as human sustenance.” Through this anthropocentric interpretation, the Blackfoot Indians likely gained the conviction that they lived in harmony with nature, including the bison.
The Ainu people of Japan’s northern islands were also an animist tribe with a human-centered interpretation. They had a tradition of capturing a black bear cub in the mountains and bringing it to the village. The cub received the love of the human family, especially the mother’s care. As the bear grew and became fierce, it was confined in a wooden pen and fattened for two years. When the time finally came to eat the bear, it was considered good news for everyone involved. Eating the bear during the ‘Bear Sending’ festival was seen as sending the bear back to the mountains. It was believed the bear returned happily, and through this farewell ritual, people expressed their respect for the bear and their discomfort at killing it.
Looking at these two tribes, did they perform these rituals because they viewed animals and humans as equals? Probably not. They too would surely have felt anger and sorrow if they were in the position of the bison or the bear. Then we must consider why they committed these acts in the name of animism. I believe the reason is precisely because they were human. Regardless of whether we divide it into animism, the Bible, or humanism, ultimately, because they were human, humanism inevitably had to be included. Even if both nature and humans were seen as beings with souls, they interpreted the positions of other souls favorably toward their own species, ‘human,’ or toward their own tribe, such as the ‘Blackfoot Indians’ or the ‘Ainu people.’ Moreover, nature could not communicate directly with humans, so it could not refute their biased interpretations. This shows they absolutely did not regard animals and humans as equal. Although they themselves may have believed they regarded animals and humans as equal and respected animal spirits, the actual treatment of animals did not support their claims. The proposition in Homo Deus that “animism regards animals and humans as equal” was false. While it may be more moderate than the overtly human-centric view of animals seen in biblical times, the fundamental difference between the two faiths lies in the fact that neither placed animals and humans on the same plane.
Homo Deus mentions the Nayaka tribe in southern India, who maintain an animistic worldview to this day. The Nayaka tribe appears to share a worldview positioned somewhere between humanism and animism. When encountering dangerous animals in the jungle, they approach and speak to them. They leave elephants that killed their tribesmen alone and even attempt to understand the elephant’s feelings. However, what is truly fascinating about the Nayaka is not this animistic attitude, but their attitude toward cultivated plants and domesticated animals. They insist that cows, chickens, and tea trees are not part of the great tree. They argue that cows must be led around by them, and tea trees are cultivated to buy necessities from stores, so they are not Man-san. Seeing this argument, the Nayaka tribe outwardly maintains the framework of animism, but in reality, they possess an extremely humanistic mindset that changes their attitude based on whether something is necessary to them or not. Although they may have excluded livestock or cultivated crops from Man-san to alleviate their own guilt, it is precisely this act of “exclusion from Man-san” that marks a noticeable difference from earlier tribes like the Blackfoot Indians. Earlier animist tribes did not separate nature. Even if they applied human-centered and discriminatory interpretations to explain nature arbitrarily, nature remained nature. However, for the Nayaqa tribe, not all natural objects become ‘nature’ as defined under animism. Some elements not directly useful to the Nayaqa tribe become ‘man-san’, or ‘nature’, while the remaining natural objects used by the Nayaqa tribe are reduced to the level of objects far below humans, much like animals in biblical times.
This reveals that the Nayaqa tribe does not treat animals and humans as equals. If Yuval Noah Harari chose animism to represent respect for animals, I would argue it was a misguided choice. Specifically, using the Nayaqa tribe as an example was an error. Had he wished to reference the Nayaqa, omitting the concept of Man-san would have been more effective in conveying his argument to readers. However, the concept of Mansan was overly anthropocentric to explain the animism Yuval Noah Harari envisions, leaving room for deeper reflection on animism.
Thus, the ‘animism where animals and humans are equal’ claimed in Homo Deus does not exist. Even if we grant animals souls, such souls are meaningless if humans arbitrarily interpret them or decide which animals possess them. Therefore, from this perspective, today’s animal-respecting attitudes should be considered more important. Individuals or groups adopting animal-respecting attitudes at least view animals as animals themselves, centering their thoughts on non-human animals to understand their situations and problems. If Yuval Noah Harari worries that when Homo sapiens becomes Homo deus, our attitude toward each other might resemble how we treat laboratory animals or livestock, then considering today’s steadily evolving animal-respecting attitude, we can expect a situation that, while perhaps not completely equal, is at least better than the present.
