Even what people take to be their most personal desires are usually programmed by the imagined order.
Interpretation
Our desires are often shaped by societal influences rather than being entirely personal.
This quote by Yuval Noah Harari suggests that even our innermost desires are not entirely our own; they are influenced and shaped by the societal structures and norms that we grow up with. It highlights the complex relationship between individuality and the collective beliefs and values of society, urging us to reflect on how our aspirations and wants might be constructed by external factors rather than being purely inherent to us.
In practice
In a discussion on consumerism, one might use this quote to illustrate how marketing shapes our desires.
We control the world basically because we are the only animals that can cooperate flexibly in very large numbers. And if you examine any large-scale human cooperation, you will always find that it is based on some fiction like the nation, like money, like human rights.
I titled the book 'Homo Deus' because we really are becoming gods in the most literal sense possible. We are acquiring abilities that have always been thought to be divine abilities - in particular, the ability to create life. And we can do with that whatever we want.
The notion of superhumans is using bioengineering and artificial intelligence to upgrade human abilities. If they use the power to change themselves, to change their own minds, their own desires, then we have no idea what they will want to do.
Techno-humanism aims to amplify the power of humans, creating cyborgs and connecting humans to computers, but it still sees human interests and desires as the highest authority in the universe.
The most important question in 21st-century economics may well be, 'What should we do with all the superfluous people, once we have highly intelligent non-conscious algorithms that can do almost everything better than humans?'
Take Google Maps or Waze. On the one hand, they amplify human ability - you are able to reach your destination faster and more easily. But at the same time, you are shifting the authority to the algorithm and losing your ability to find your own way.
If you do not think well of Him because His qualities are beautiful then think well of Him because of the way He treats you.
People are crying up the rich and variegated plumage of the peacock, and he is himself blushing at the sight of his ugly feet.
In the morning a man walks with his whole body; in the evening, only with his legs.
Whenever and wherever men have engaged in the mindless slaughter of animals (including other men), they have often attempted to justify their acts by attributing the most vicious or revolting qualities to those they would destory; and the less reason there is for the slaughter, the greater the campaign for vilification.
My job is not to save 'The Wheel of Time', to fix 'The Wheel of Time', or anything like that. My job is not to screw it up.
The tourist transports his own values and demands to his destinations and implants them like an infectious disease, decimating whatever values existed before.
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