Words Are the Most Powerful Drug | Origins: The Journey of Humankind

less than 1m read

·Nov 11, 2024

Humans stand alone in the animal kingdom. Our power over nature is unparalleled. What separates us? What is it that makes us human? The answer lies in our mastery of communication: the power to express complex thoughts and ideas; to organize and think collectively. These are the engines of our success, driving our ascent from hunter-gatherers to a global civilization.

Communication is everywhere. Our technology has propelled us to a new age of interconnectedness. Waves of data pass through us at the speed of light. Music, language, art, the written word—through these tools, the boundless human imagination has been given a voice. They give us self-expression and collective knowledge.

But they have a dark side. These tools are so powerful that they distort our very perception of reality. They can subvert and corrupt, and even manipulate entire populations. Communication is what makes us, us. How did it emerge? How did it transform us into a creature that could dream, into a creature that could imagine, where millions could eventually learn to cooperate, to overcome, to transcend?

This is the story of how our world came to be; how communication defined our species and created the modern age. How it connected humanity and sent our voice on a course for the stars. This is Origins.

Worked example: Determining an empirical formula from percent composition data | Khan Academy

Marginal and conditional distributions | Analyzing categorical data | AP Statistics | Khan Academy

View All

In high jump, your centre of mass goes under the bar

[Applause] I am about 1.75 m tall, but some of the world’s best high jumpers can clear more than half a meter above. [Applause] [Music] That this is Josh Lodge, an Australian high jumper. What’s your personal best high jump? 2 minutes 22? That’s pretty h…

What Credit Card Companies Don’t Tell You

What’s up guys? It’s Graham here. So it’s that time again, and that’s time for another credit card video. Now even though most of us by now know how to properly use a credit card, we understand the concepts. We know to pay off our bill in full every singl…

Critiquing Startup Websites With Instacart's First Designer

In this video, a special guest and I will be taking a look at companies funded by Y Combinator and giving our feedback on the design of their company’s website. Welcome to Design Review! My guest this week is Zayn Ali. He was the first product designer at…

Orthopedic Horseshoe | Diggers

So I’m going along on this nice even ground and I get a great hit. Now there’s something there—sounds pretty solid. So I drop down, dig a hole, roll the plug out and finally locate; oh, I got roundness! I just found something awesome. I just pulled up an …

15 Habits You Need To Stop Doing Immediately

Here’s a hard pill to swallow: we’ve all got 24 hours in a day. So how is it that some manage to find success while others struggle in despair? Well, it all boils down to one thing: habits. Make no mistake, what you do on a daily basis will dictate your d…

The Call of the Land: Meet The Next Generation of Farmers | Short Film Showcase

Well, there’s no other real choice, is there, but to fix what we have? It’s kind of like you don’t have that much control over what you’re passionate about. We’re not really used to hard work, a lot of people. We didn’t grow up on farms; we didn’t grow wi…

Words Are the Most Powerful Drug | Origins: The Journey of Humankind

More Articles