The best take I've read on the situation in Israel was written by Yuval Noah Harari, author of "Sapiens"[a], for the Financial Times[b]:

"To understand events in Israel, there is just one question to ask: what limits the power of the government? Robust democracies rely on a whole system of checks and balances. But Israel lacks a constitution, an upper house in the parliament, a federal structure or any other check on government power except one — the Supreme Court. This Monday, the Netanyahu government plans to pass the first in a series of laws that will neutralise the Supreme Court. If it succeeds, it will gain unlimited power.

Members of the Netanyahu coalition have already disclosed their intention to pass laws and pursue policies that will discriminate against Arab people, women, LGBTQ people and secular people. Once the Supreme Court is out of the way, nothing will remain to stop them. In such a situation, the government could also rig future elections, for example by banning Arab parties from participating — a step previously proposed by coalition members."

A government whose power is not limited by checks and balances is called an authoritarian government.

Sigh.

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[a] https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/d...

[b] https://www.ft.com/content/b027a525-05b1-45fc-a2c2-f131d341b...

I recommend anyone who's interested in early humans and human development to read the book Sapiens: https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/d... I really enjoyed it!

> but I had no idea about humans 200,000 years ago using tools.

You might be interested in Sapiens.

https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/d...

Fantastic list, and thanks for the links.

Personally, I would put "Sapiens - A brief History of Humankind"[0] in the list rather than it's successor "21 Lessons for the 21st Century".

While some people have some gripes about The 48 Laws of Power and Robert Greene's other books, in my opinion, they serve as a really valuable tool for understanding how most medium and large companies work. And for anyone interested, a great way to dip your toes into it is by having a look at Derek Sivers' book notes - https://sivers.org/book/48LawsOfPower

[0] https://www.amazon.co.uk/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari...

VOC (Dutch East India Company) was more powerful than most nations at the time. I asked this question on Quora once and got interesting answers [0]. VOC was an incredible enterprise, and there are a few today too, imo, they exist as conglomerates (Samsung, P&G, Amazon), political entities (CIA, CPC), monopolies (Maersk, Google), syndicates (DeBeers [1], NeoAristocrats [2], BigPharma, BigBank, BigSugar, BigOil), and cults (ISIS). These select few have an immeasurable and uncontrolled sway over the globe-- its environment [3], its inhabitants [4], its future [5], its past [6], its present [7].

The greed unrelenting [8], the game rigged [9][10].

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[0] https://www.quora.com/What-are-some-companies-that-are-power...

[1] http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/02/have-you...

[2] https://youtu.be/d_zt3kGW1NM

[3] https://theintercept.com/2015/08/11/dupont-chemistry-decepti...

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_surveillance_disclosure...

[5] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16208421

[6] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ICN066A

[7] http://money.com/money/3994949/wikipedia-paid-editors/

[8] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil-storage_trade

[9] https://www.amazon.com/dp/1593764278

[10] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_Papers

edit: links

"Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind" by Yuval Noah Harari https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/d...

I actually don't recall where I read that. It was one of the following 2 books:

https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/d...

https://www.amazon.com/Tribe-Homecoming-Belonging-Sebastian-...

I wouldn't be surprised if the book derived that number from the link you gave either.

I live in a world where 90% of my friends and family believe that they came from the sins of a woman who decided to eat an apple. I recently read a book called Sapiens, this book really drilled into my mind that we homo-sapiens are a derivative of a single great ape that had two daughters, one that became the ancestor of all chimpanzees and the other all humans.

If human origin interests you there is a great 10 minute video from the Youtube Kurzgesagt channel that lead me to read Sapiens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGiQaabX3_o

https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/d...

All great apes have hierarchical, territorial, aggressive societies.

Most don't have maps though.

Humans primarily distinguish themselves by their creative abstractions and rationalizations to justify fighting/killing other tribes...also imaginary friends in the sky who demand it, nonexistent differences in DNA, etc., etc. Territorial disputes are the least imaginary of the lot.

(Desmond Morris's 'The Naked Ape' is an interesting look at how human behavior relates to apes - spoiler alert, a lot of similarities https://www.amazon.com/Naked-Ape-Zoologists-Study-Animal/dp/... ... I've heard good things about 'Sapiens' as well https://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-Humankind-Yuval-Noah-Harari/d... )

1. http://www.amazon.com/Sapiens-A-Brief-History-Humankind/dp/0...

2. http://www.amazon.com/Meditations-New-Translation-Marcus-Aur...

3. http://www.amazon.com/Surely-Youre-Joking-Mr-Feynman-ebook/d...

4. http://www.amazon.com/Book-Five-Rings-linked-TOC-ebook/dp/B0...