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Humans

A Brief History of How We F*cked It All Up

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About this listen

 'This book is brilliant. Utterly, utterly brilliant' Jeremy Clarkson

'F*cking brilliant' Sarah Knight

READ FOR YOU BY CRITICALLY ACCLAIMED COMIC AND HUMAN NISH KUMAR, THIS IS AN EXHILARATING JOURNEY THROUGH THE MOST CREATIVE AND CATASTROPHIC F*CK-UPS OF HUMAN HISTORY.

In the seventy thousand years that modern human beings have walked this earth, we've come a long way. Art, science, culture, trade - on the evolutionary food chain, we're real winners. But, frankly, it's not exactly been plain sailing, and sometimes - just occasionally - we've managed to really, truly, quite unbelievably f*ck things up.

From Chairman Mao's Four Pests Campaign, to the American Dustbowl; from the Austrian army attacking itself one drunken night, to the world's leading superpower electing a reality TV mogul as President... it's pretty safe to say that, as a species, we haven't exactly grown wiser with age.

So, next time you think you've really f*cked up, this book will remind you: it could be so much worse...


FURTHER PRAISE FOR HUMANS:

'Very funny' Mark Watson

'A light-touch history of moments when humans have got it spectacularly wrong... Both readable and entertaining' The Telegraph

'Chronicles humanity's myriad follies down the ages with malicious glee and much wit ... a rib-tickling page-turner' Business Standard

'A timely, irreverent gallop through thousands of years of human stupidity' Nicholas Griffin, Ping-Pong Diplomacy: The Secret History Behind the Game That Changed the World

(P)2018 Headline Publishing Group Ltd©2018 Tom Phillips Anthropology Social Sciences Funny Witty Thought-Provoking Imperialism Latin American Africa
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Most relevant
optimism bias, my favourite bias, makes me think that I and all mankind will learn. we won't.

oh dear

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Extremely entertaining and depressing in equal measure. Do you enjoy history, quirky stories, and social sciences? Well, this could be the book for you. As one would expect from a former Buzzfeed writer, ‘Humans’ has is written in a very informal, conversational style. Tom Phillips packs his book with well researched eclectic examples from human history of our desire to make disastrous mistakes. He presents these in no particular order, and turns the oft-used narrative upside down. By touching upon only the critical elements needed to construct the mental final picture of each historical event, he enriches the text by adding lots of examples to send a compelling message in each chapter. Nish Kumar narrated, which helped to convey the grim sarcastic humour. Whether we learn from these errors or not is a different matter entirely and as this book illustrates, it's not always as easy or black and white as it seems.

Loads of facts and history but very funny too

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loved this book. Nish was perfect as the reader. definitely recommend this audio book to all.

Great book and brilliantly read

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best narrator ever! the irony and sarcasm was present without exaggeration and the tone was always on point!

fverry good and surprisingly funny!

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Well, how many ways can you think of, on how to F*** it up? This book covers some of the big ones. A warning to those who have just the right answer to that nagging problem. No good deed goes unpunished and all that, although those punished may not have anything to do with anything.

Sumed up in a word Hubris

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