Q 01/05

Which crop does Sapiens say domesticated humans, not the reverse, turning foragers into dawn-to-dusk field hands?

A) Rice

B) Wheat

C) Maize

D) Potatoes

Answer · why

B) Wheat

Wheat was a wild grass confined to the Middle East 10,000 years ago, and the book argues it spread by putting people to work clearing, weeding and wat...

Q 02/05

Sapiens suggests the first name in recorded history belongs not to a king or poet but to someone in which job?

A) A mercenary

B) A stonemason

C) A court musician

D) An accountant

Answer · why

D) An accountant

An accountant, it seems: a 5,000-year-old Mesopotamian clay tablet tallying 37 months of grain deliveries is signed Kushim, a name or possibly a job t...

Q 03/05

Which French carmaker with a lion badge does Sapiens use to show that a company is a legal fiction?

A) Peugeot

B) Renault

C) Citroën

D) Bugatti

Answer · why

A) Peugeot

Peugeot would survive, the book argues, even if every car, factory and worker vanished, because the company exists only in law and shared belief, as i...

Q 04/05

Sapiens presents a theory, built on Robin Dunbar's work, that human language evolved mainly as a way of doing what?

A) Hunting

B) Bargaining

C) Gossiping

D) Courting

Answer · why

C) Gossiping

Gossiping let early humans keep track of who in the band could be trusted, the theory goes, so groups could grow well beyond the size of a chimpanzee ...

Q 05/05

Which creed, built on faith in endless economic growth, does Sapiens call the most successful religion ever invented?

A) Nationalism

B) Capitalism

C) Communism

D) Liberalism

Answer · why

B) Capitalism

Capitalism counts as a religion in the book because it runs on trust in the future: lending only makes sense if people believe tomorrow's pie will be ...