The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason

Amazon.com

Sam Harris cranks out blunt, hard-hitting chapters to make his case for why faith itself is the most dangerous element of modern life. And if the devil's in the details, then you'll find Satan waiting at the back of the book in the very substantial notes section where Harris saves his more esoteric discussions to avoid sidetracking the urgency of his message.

Interestingly, Harris is not just focused on debunking religious faith, though he makes his compelling arguments with verve and intellectual clarity. The End of Faith is also a bit of a philosophical Swiss Army knife. Once he has presented his arguments on why, in an age of Weapons of Mass Destruction, belief is now a hazard of great proportions, he focuses on proposing alternate approaches to the mysteries of life. Harris recognizes the truth of the human condition, that we fear death, and we often crave "something more" we cannot easily define, and which is not met by accumulating more material possessions. But by attempting to provide the cure for the ills it defines, the book bites off a bit more than it can comfortably chew in its modest page count (however the rich Bibliography provides more than enough background for an intrigued reader to follow up for months on any particular strand of the author' musings.)

Harris' heart is not as much in the latter chapters, though, but in presenting his main premise. Simply stated, any belief system that speaks with assurance about the hereafter has the potential to place far less value on the here and now. And thus the corollary -- when death is simply a door translating us from one existence to another, it loses its sting and finality. Harris pointedly asks us to consider that those who do not fear death for themselves, and who also revere ancient scriptures instructing them to mete it out generously to others, may soon have these weapons in their own hands. If thoughts along the same line haunt you, this is your book.--Ed Dobeas

Book Description

An impassioned plea for reason in a world divided by faith.

This important and timely book delivers a startling analysis of the clash of faith and reason in today's world. Harris offers a vivid historical tour of mankind's willingness to suspend reason in favor of religious beliefs, even when those beliefs are used to justify harmful behavior and sometimes-heinous crimes. He asserts that in the shadow of weapons of mass destruction, we can no longer tolerate views that pit one true god against another. Most controversially, he argues that we cannot afford moderate lip service to religion—an accommodation that only blinds us to the real perils of fundamentalism. While warning against the encroachment of organized religion into world politics, Harris also draws on new evidence from neuroscience and insights from philosophy to explore spirituality as a biological, brain-based need. He calls on us to invoke that need in taking a secular humanistic approach to solving the problems of this world.

Natalie Angier wrote in the New York Times: "The End of Faith articulates the dangers and absurdities of organized religion so fiercely and so fearlessly that I felt relieved as I read it, vindicated….Harris writes what a sizable number of us think, but few are willing to say."

Customer Reviews:

A Guru for the 21st Century.......2007-10-08

Morally speaking, are Bronze-Age myths as good as it gets?

Sam Harris doesn't think so and he argues brilliantly for a
new religious paradigm to shepherd us through the 21st Century.

Like a Spanish Inquisitor Harris ruthlessly examines the shaky philosophical justification for Abrahamic theism and finds it wanting.

But Harris doesn't just convince us that there really is no Santa Claus, he offers us a new way forward. He proves conclusively that science and reason do not necessarily have to be divorced from spiritual inquiry and revelation.

Some of his detractors have said that Harris is angry at God, but
that of course assumes a fact not in evidence (the existence of God).

After hearing him speak at Aspen Colorado,
'angry' is not quite the adjective that comes to mind.
http://svayam8.blogspot.com/2007/07/sam-harris-at-aspen-ideas-festival.html

As hard as it may be for theists to accept, many disbelievers really are being intellectually honest.

Sam Harris is one of those. He isn't angry, he's just right.
Thank you Sam for being a beacon of reason in a dangerously
darkened world.

Letter to a Christian Nation

Something that will keep us pondering for a long time.......2007-10-07

Well, this book is one of those that you come across with an argument so solid that you cannot stop pondering about its ideas. Mr. Harris has laid down a set of ideas that for a long time will haunt us, and the generations to come. Mr. Harris exposition of his thesis is simply monumental. His lurid writing style and his exquisite manners have brought forth a fundamental issue.

Mr. Harris as in the moving The Kingdom have presented us a sordid reality. Either we continue with religions and destroy humanity or we dispose of religion and avoid genocide. Muslims wants us dead and we do not want Islamic doctrines in our life. Further, more 9-11 have presented us with the issue of Abrahamic Religions and their stupidity. Because of them we lost 500 years, The Dark Ages and because of them we are losing our freedom and technological progress.

Some rabble-rouser long ago hid truth from us. [...] God created man. [...] men create God. That is the way it is in the world - men make gods and worship their creation. It would be fitting for the gods to worship men! Gospel of Philip 71:34; 72:1-4 Nag Hammadi Texts

Fanaticism and Fundamentalism of the religious realm have ruin freedom and life itself! Both should be eliminated and replaced by logical processes, which will warrant freedom, progress, technological development, world peace and happiness to every single human being. Religious moral varies from religion to religion. Logical morality does not need to vary! 1+1=2 in USA and in China too! Morals should be in the same manner.

Mr. Harris has begun a movement that will be here long after he parts. It is a movement of personal right to live a life as one please and not as a few wants you to live. It is also a movement toward World Peace!

I do recommend this book to everyone!

Harris dares to imagine no religion.......2007-09-26

This book is so much fun to read I read it twice. Harris writes with passion, erudition, and razor-sharp wit. His book has forced so-called religious moderates to begin taking responsibility for the zealots they unintentionally shelter, and he has demonstrated that a world with powerfully destructive technologies, such as ours, can no longer afford the luxury of basing policy on tribal superstitions and on supernatural claims that cannot possibly be substantiated with evidence. Highly recommended.

About the same as fellow atheists Dawkins and Hitchens but a tad more reasonable.......2007-09-22

Sam Harris like Hitchens and Dawkins is a master at setting up religious straw-men and then knocking them down. It is more fun and sells more books than taking on the real thing. Then it becomes balanced and boring. The author looks at the great evils in the world, the cause of which many others have attributed to nationalism, capitalism, lack of "lebensraum" etc. and claims that religion was the real cause. "Knowingly or not Nazis were agents of religion."... "Stalin and Mao killed millions because "communism was little more than a political religion." Why are the millions killed by Paul Pot not mentioned was he not trying to please God like Stalin, Mao and Hitler? Looking at Webster's definition of religion it is clear that these three ruthless dictators were not great religious leaders.
The author is using words incorrectly to make false accusations. A "political religion" is not religion if it does not profess a belief in an after life and God. But the author ignores that fact, because he is out to pin as many bad things on the word "religion" as possible..
Unlike Hitchens Sam Harris is an atheist who does see bigger differences among religions. He thinks Islam, for example, is especially bad ("cult of death").
I did not know that Noam Chomsky was any kind of religious thinker but the author takes a swipe at Noam by stating that Chomsky's view of moral equivalence is a big mistake." It is not clear how that fits in with his attacks on religion, but he gets the third star for that anyway.

The End of Bad Arguments? Unfortunately Not.......2007-09-19

Sam Harris's "The End of Faith" is an assault upon religion, blind faith, and fundamentalist violence. However, clear thinking Christians have little to fear from Harris's social critique.

The majority of the book is an exposition of the evils, real or imagined, produced by religion. Harris discusses current atrocities, including September 11 and suicide bombings in Israel, as well as past atrocities, including the Inquisition and the Salem Witch Trials. This leads to the natural question- if Harris (an atheist) is so critical of religious horrors, how can he explain the atheistic regimes of Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot, which collectively were responsible for millions of deaths? Harris claims that, while they may not have been explicitly religious, these evil regimes were the result of poor thinking. He states in his afterword-

"While some of the most despicable political movements in human history have been explicitly irreligious, they were not especially rational. The public pronouncements of these regimes have been mere litanies of delusion- about race, economics, national identity, the march of history, or the moral dangers of intellectualism." [231]

Thus, we see that The End of Faith does not really support atheism or oppose religion, it simply supports reason and opposes blind faith. Otherwise, his critique of religion is completely arbitrary, as he admits in this quoted passage that the real enemy is not simply religious faith, but irrationality itself. Thus, Harris needs to demonstrate that Christianity inherently necessitates irrational faith if he wishes to demonstrate that it should be rejected. Throughout the book, Harris merely assumes that so-called "fundamentalist" Christians can only exist through blind faith, but his assumption is both unproven and incorrect. Despite railing on about the supposed irrationality of religion, Harris never once deals with any of the arguments offered by Christians either historically or in the present day. There is no critique of the Cosmological Argument, no consideration of the evidence for the empty tomb, no critique of biblical passages or doctrines. Harris simply assumes that Christianity requires blind faith, argues that blind faith is both stupid and dangerous, and declares victory. The problem is that he has never shown that Christianity requires blind faith.

The other problem with Harris's approach is a common one- he assumes that the misdeeds of religious followers invalidates the religion itself.

Thus, the majority of Harris's book is simply not relevant for intelligent Christians. Surprisingly, however, there is some value in The End of Faith. For example, he discusses morality and makes a good case for charitable giving, and discusses politics and law, and makes a good case for the legalization of (some) drugs as a matter of public policy. However, as a critique of religion in general, and Christianity in particular, "The End of Faith" fails quite miserably.

Average customer rating:

Good ideas but a socialist agenda
OH MY GOD!......You Gotta Read This!
thought provoking
Great Book for Our Times; A Must Read!
Good book, too much lenght

The Assault on Reason
Al Gore
Manufacturer: Penguin Press HC, The
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1594201226
Release Date: 2007-05-22

Amazon.com

The first question many people ask when hearing of a new book from Al Gore is, "Is it about the environment?" The answer is yes, but it's not (or, rather, not only) the kind of environment he wrote about in Earth in the Balance and of course painted such a vivid picture of in his Oscar-winning documentary (and companion book), An Inconvenient Truth. It's the political environment he's concerned about in The Assault on Reason: the way we debate and decide on the critical issues of the day. In an account that balances theoretical discussion of the foundations of democracy with a lacerating critique of the Bush administration, Gore argues that the marketplace of reasoned debate our country was founded on is being endangered by a variety of allied forces: the use of fear and the misuse of faith, the distractions of our entertainment culture, and the concentrations of power in the national media and the executive branch. In his essay and answers to our questions below, he introduces the crisis he sees, as well as the opportunity for its solution he envisions in the open forums of the Internet.

A Message from Al Gore to Amazon.com Readers

I've dedicated my book, The Assault on Reason, to my father, Senator Albert Gore Sr., the bravest politician I've ever known. In the 1970 mid-term elections, President Richard Nixon relied on a campaign of fear to consolidate his power. I was in the military at the time, on my way to Vietnam as an army journalist, and I watched as my father was accused of being unpatriotic because he was steadfast in his opposition to the War--and as he was labeled an atheist because he dared to oppose a constitutional amendment to foster government-sponsored prayer in the public schools. The 1970 campaign is now regarded by political historians as a watershed, marking a sharp decline in the tone of our national discourse--a decline that has only worsened in recent years as fear has become a more powerful political tool than trust, public consumption of entertainment has dramatically surpassed that of serious news, and blind faith has proven more potent than truth.

We are at a pivotal moment in American democracy. The persistent and sustained reliance on falsehoods as the basis of policy, even in the face of evidence to the contrary, has reached levels that were previously unimaginable. It's too easy and too partisan to simply place the blame on the policies of President George W. Bush. We are all responsible for the decisions our country makes.

Reasoned, focused discourse is vital to our democracy to ensure a well-informed citizenry. But this is difficult in an environment in which we are experiencing a new pattern of serial obsessions that periodically take over the airwaves for weeks at a time--from the O.J. Simpson and Michael Jackson trials to Paris Hilton and Anna Nicole Smith.

Never has it been more vital for us to face the reality of our long-term challenges, from the climate crisis to the war in Iraq to the deficits and health and social welfare. Today, reason is under assault by forces using sophisticated techniques such as propaganda, psychology, and electronic mass media. Yet, democracy's advocates are beginning to use their own sophisticated techniques: the Internet, online organizing, blogs, and wikis. Although the challenges we face are great, I am more confident than ever before that democracy will prevail and that the American people are rising to the challenge of reinvigorating self-government. It is my great hope that those who read my book will choose to become part of a new movement to rekindle the true spirit of America.

Questions for Al Gore

Amazon.com:Of all I've read and seen on climate change, I don't think anything has had quite the impact on me that those vivid maps of shrinking coastlines did in An Inconvenient Truth. You've spent years trying to communicate the threat of climate change and you've learned how to use compelling images to tell that story, but in this book you're very wary of the power of visual images to overwhelm reason with fear. How do you spur people to action in a crisis like this without using fear?

Gore: I often open the slideshow by talking about the "climate crisis." The English meaning of the word "crisis" conveys alarm, but the Chinese and Japanese expressions use two characters together: the first means danger, but the second means opportunity. The animations do help to convey some of that sense of danger--but the opportunities are enormous. We are beginning to see companies taking advantage of the new markets that are emerging as they innovate and put to market the technologies that we need to solve this crisis. Some have become ubiquitous, like the hybrid electric engine and compact fluorescent light bulb. There are thousands of opportunities like this all around us if governments will show the type of bold leadership that we need--and work with industry to exploit these opportunities.

Amazon.com: You describe two problems with television culture: it's a top-down system in which, as you say, "Individuals receive, but they cannot send," and its physiological vividness allows it to bypass our reason. The user-created communities that seem so promising on the Internet would seem to solve the first problem, but what about the second?

Gore: There are a number of barriers for individuals who want to communicate over TV. The major networks won't give average Americans a voice, and it is virtually impossible to start a channel. One solution, that I have worked on with my partner, Joel Hyatt, is the creation of Current TV, where viewers can submit content over the Internet to air on the channel.

With regards to the Internet, anyone with access to a computer and broadband can create a website or blog and post content. They can send information into the public forum. Of course, we need to continue to work to bridge the digital divide, to ensure that we expand the access of people to the Internet, but the threshold for entry is much lower than that of television.

Amazon.com: You're the chairman of Current TV, the interactive cable channel aimed at young people. Can you talk about the challenges of constructing a platform where the kind of substantive dialogue you are looking for can take place?

Gore: One of the things I talk about in the book is infotainment--the "well-amused" audience that is bombarded with the latest programming about O.J. Simpson, or JonBenet Ramsey, or Anna Nicole Smith. What we are trying to do, in part, is to provide a public forum for viewers to submit content about issues of concern to them. And they have, by the thousands, on issues from the war in Iraq to the environment to education and others. I am continually amazed by both the quality of the submissions and the breadth and depth of the subject matter.

Amazon.com: You have a chapter on the importance of checks and balances in government (in a sense, that's what the whole book is about), and we're seeing the effect that active oversight from Congress is having right now. For most of your eight years in office, you and Bill Clinton had to work with a Republican Congress. I'm sure that at times (say, 1998) that had its frustrations, but do you think it was valuable to have that balance, or did it prevent you from doing what you came into office to do?

Gore: Checks and balances are vital to the functioning of our system of government. Of course it can have its frustrations, but the Founders intended that we have a system whereby no one branch has too much control over the others. Ultimately, it is up to voters to decide the control of Congress and the White House and then for elected officials to work to serve the public interest and to try to implement policies that serve the country. These are core values that are at the heart of who we are as a nation.

Amazon.com: I wanted to ask about the Office of the Vice President. I think it's safe to say that the last two vice presidents, you and Dick Cheney, have been the most powerful and influential in our history. Why do you think that is?

Gore: I think the answer is very different in the two administrations, but in a world that is truly globalized, with a broader information ecology, with challenges ranging from a more complex system of international issues ranging from the climate crisis to asymmetric attacks, it is not a surprise that a President might choose to draw upon more advice from the office of the vice president than in the past. This is a trend that I would expect to continue under future presidents, as the range of the demands on the presidency will not diminish over time.

Book Description

A visionary analysis of how the politics of fear, secrecy, cronyism, and blind faith has combined with the degration of the public sphere to create an environment dangerously hostile to reason

At the time George W. Bush ordered American forces to invade Iraq, 70 percent of Americans believed Saddam Hussein was linked to 9/11. Voters in Ohio, when asked by pollsters to list what stuck in their minds about the campaign, most frequently named two Bush television ads that played to fears of terrorism.

We live in an age when the thirty-second television spot is the most powerful force shaping the electorate's thinking, and America is in the hands of an administration less interested than any previous administration in sharing the truth with the citizenry. Related to this and of even greater concern is this administration's disinterest in the process by which the truth is ascertained, the tenets of fact-based reasoning-first among them an embrace of open inquiry in which unexpected and even inconvenient facts can lead to unexpected conclusions.

How did we get here? How much damage has been done to the functioning of our democracy and its role as steward of our security? Never has there been a worse time for us to lose the capacity to face the reality of our long-term challenges, from national security to the economy, from issues of health and social welfare to the environment. As The Assault on Reason shows us, we have precious little time to waste.

Gore's larger goal in this book is to explain how the public sphere itself has evolved into a place hospitable to reason's enemies, to make us more aware of the forces at work on our own minds, and to lead us to an understanding of what we can do, individually and collectively, to restore the rule of reason and safeguard our future. Drawing on a life's work in politics as well as on the work of experts across a broad range of disciplines, Al Gore has written a farsighted and powerful manifesto for clear thinking.

Customer Reviews:

Good ideas but a socialist agenda .......2007-10-08

The tome starts well with excellent commentary on current politics. Unfortunately, it clearly illustrates what social circles Mr. Gore thrives. The strident complaining about the unfair treatment of the left is amazing. At times, I thought I was reading a Richard Nixon book after he was forced to resign. One of the problems Gore has is Bush is so close to him in thinking despite the philosophical differences. He blunders on and on about how bad Republicans are yet his own party does exactly the same thing when in power. Despite the early pious quotes, his socialist agenda comes clearly through. Many problems are cited but no real solutions except government ones. I recommend the book to see how elite leftist views the "unfair" world.

OH MY GOD!......You Gotta Read This!.......2007-10-08

Loved It.......This book makes you question authority, especially what has been going on for the past 6 1/2 years.....Tis book will make you mad, and you will want to write a letter to your public officials....some of the information will make you sick to your stomach: why does this current President let these things happen....WOW...

thought provoking.......2007-10-04

I'd like to ask all the candidates whether they have read this book, carefully. (The right answer would be "yes". It is like a college course, with so many ideas that it is a slow read, but it is worth the effort. I almost didn't read it because of a negative David Brooks column, but he is quite wrong in dismissing this book.

Great Book for Our Times; A Must Read!.......2007-10-03

In "the Assault on Reason," Al Gore clearly and successfully identifies the core battle between Faith and Reason going on currently within the United States politically and culturally.

Good book, too much lenght.......2007-10-03

A good book with great idea but a politician is not a phylosopher and Al Gore losts himself in lenghty description and easy parallels. The reader can fells bored really quick. So far I've listened as good if not better comments on the green mouvement that we need : Y. Chouinard Patagonia founder speech at Stanford (look on iTunes) ...

The Victory of Reason: How Christianity Led to Freedom, Capitalism, and Western Success

Average customer rating:

Reason?
Defense of Western Civilization
Outstanding description of the role of rational theology
Great book that places many opinions in one package.
The Bright Ages

The Victory of Reason: How Christianity Led to Freedom, Capitalism, and Western Success
Rodney Stark
Manufacturer: Random House Trade Paperbacks
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0812972333
Release Date: 2006-09-26

Book Description

Many books have been written about the success of the West, analyzing why Europe was able to pull ahead of the rest of the world by the end of the Middle Ages. The most common explanations cite the West’s superior geography, commerce, and technology. Completely overlooked is the fact that faith in reason, rooted in Christianity’s commitment to rational theology, made all these developments possible. Simply put, the conventional wisdom that Western success depended upon overcoming religious barriers to progress is utter nonsense.

In The Victory of Reason, Rodney Stark advances a revolutionary, controversial, and long overdue idea: that Christianity and its related institutions are, in fact, directly responsible for the most significant intellectual, political, scientific, and economic breakthroughs of the past millennium.

In Stark’s view, what has propelled the West is not the tension between secular and nonsecular society, nor the pitting of science and the humanities against religious belief. Christian theology, Stark asserts, is the very font of reason: While the world’s other great belief systems emphasized mystery, obedience, or introspection, Christianity alone embraced logic and reason as the path toward enlightenment, freedom, and progress. That is what made all the difference.

In explaining the West’s dominance, Stark convincingly debunks long-accepted “truths.” For instance, by contending that capitalism thrived centuries before there was a Protestant work ethic–or even Protestants–he counters the notion that the Protestant work ethic was responsible for kicking capitalism into overdrive. In the fifth century, Stark notes, Saint Augustine celebrated theological and material progress and the institution of “exuberant invention.” By contrast, long before Augustine, Aristotle had condemned commercial trade as “inconsistent with human virtue”–which helps further underscore that Augustine’s times were not the Dark Ages but the incubator for the West’s future glories.

This is a sweeping, multifaceted survey that takes readers from the Old World to the New, from the past to the present, overturning along the way not only centuries of prejudiced scholarship but the antireligious bias of our own time. The Victory of Reason proves that what we most admire about our world–scientific progress, democratic rule, free commerce–is largely due to Christianity, through which we are all inheritors of this grand tradition.

From the Hardcover edition.

Customer Reviews:

Reason?.......2007-10-03

"Professor Stark is still a lonely voice in the academic wilderness, calling for us to embrace reason ... and honor the faith that has supported it for 2000 years." - reviewer

The tenets of Christian faith are antithetical to reason. The Bible as THE word of God, a fall from perfection in Eden that necessitated the death of a divine savior centuries in the future, the virgin birth, vicarious atonement by a divine savior resulting in the redemption of sinners from punishment required by the commission of original sin, resurrection from death of both savior and believers, and ascension into heaven of a living being are not the products of reason, but of melting-pot traditions of ancient tribal worldviews. The embrace of reason is a terrific idea; such tenets, however, aren't the products of reason, so it's difficult to see how belief in them as the basis for Christian faith could have led to a triumph of reason in the world at large---except through creative minds leaving them behind, and/or personally reinterpreting them in modernist ways while institutional creeds are left intact. As for the triumph of capitalism, its ultimate accomplishment may well prove to be the destruction of the planet.

Defense of Western Civilization.......2007-09-30

In an era of post-modernism and cultural relativism, Rodney Stark's thesis that because Christianity accepted reason and logic, commerce and freedom were able to take root and flourish in Western Europe.

The Christian God was not like Zeus sitting on Mt. Olympus ruling the world based on a whim. He is immutable or unchanging. Because the Christian God was immutable, its adherents saw coherency and consistency in their world. Think of it this way. The world's other great belief systems emphasized mystery, obedience, or introspection. Their world view did not include a perfect, unchanging God. The world could change on a whim. Science can not take root in a universe without coherence and consistency. That's the difference with the Christian God. As a result, the people of the Middle Ages began to become forward-thinking and predicative. Science was able to discover immutable laws that control the physical universe such as the Laws of Thermodynamics. The world was rational.

This rationality and reason also fostered the development of democracy and capitalism. Stark correctly points out that St. Augustine approved of commerce. In this world of rationality, the recognition of natural rights such as life, liberty and property occurred. This formed the basis of Western Civilization. In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson essentially borrowed from John Locke's Second Treatise on Government (1690)--the rights accorded by "Nature and Nature's God." In the Declaration, these are described as "unalienable" rights. Western Civilization's sense of individualism would not exist without Christianity.

While post-modern, secularists will decry Christianity and all the evils they contend it portends, the reason they can is because of it. Stark makes the case eloquently and logically shattering myths along the way.

Outstanding description of the role of rational theology.......2007-08-02

Professor Stark, a Baylor University social sciences professor, has written a book that should complement recent works by men like Jared Diamond or Victor Davis Hanson, in explaining why the West, and especially why particular forms of Christianity have led to unique successes for its adherents around the present world. Stark has written to especially critique ideas in the famous book, the Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Instead he argues that Christianity in general has led to forms of government and capitalism that have met with rounds of worldwide success.

Stark backs up his thesis with example and statistical analysis to show why western Christianity's core beliefs, that man knows God by further investigation and expanision of knowledge and that diversification of ideas and roles led to spin off ideas among industry, the family and government throughout Europe.

Reason for Stark is a direct child of Christianity. Greek philosophy may have had a lot to say about reason, and with the rise of Islam, much of Greek thought may have been preserved, but it was the special combination of Christian faith using reason, which led to things unforeseen in the world. In actuality, Irish monks had more access to ancient writings, often by a ration of 8:1 than did Islamic scholars. And what the Middle and Far East may have had in raw knowledge, they were able to do less with more because there was not application for reason in their faith, unlike western Christianity.

Two areas of history receive excellent examination by Stark: the middle ages, which according to his analysis, proved to be more rational and better equipped to handle the world than the later Renaissance, was the creator of international finance, multiple practical technological inventions and free institutions which later faded away as the high middle ages embraced reason without faith.
Finally, Stark compares and contrasts British North America with Latin America to attempt to show why these two regions are so different in wealth, general freedom and technological innovation. Probably the book uses statistics at its best with its comparison between feudal Latin America and capitalistic Anglo America. Because Christianity was separated from the state, the church flourished in ways it never did in the south, in active members and in influence on society. Stark attirbutes the economic output of Anglo America largely to the embrace of rational theology that began centuries ago, that ran through northern Italy, the low countries, Britain and later America and the rest of the Anglo nations.

Stark does not cheer lead for any particular side, but is very effective to show through his research that reason, Christianity, democratic reforms and capitalism are usually inseparable from each other. The author closes by asking if capitalism needs Christianity in today's world, and whether globilization has made capitalism's reliance on rational theology relevant. The conclusion is that they are forever linked, as evidenced by the explosion in the growth of the Christian faith and rational theology as the same time as globilization has spread the blessings of capitalism and freedom.

Great book that places many opinions in one package........2007-07-29

The book has few original ideas or beliefs, but it takes many opinions of many authors and places them in a book that appeals to people in today's society.

I would recommend it to anybody that wishes to educate themselves. The book takes common misconceptions to Western dominance of the modern world and reveals the true roots of western dominance.

It is a great tool useful in understanding how the economic and religious history of the Western world were and are related.

The Bright Ages.......2007-06-10

In the Acknowledgments, Rodney Stark says he intends this book for the general reader. If he means the casual reader, I'd say not quite. It's a bit too textbooky. I found myself engrossed by his thesis, and then kept reading to find evidence of it, of which there is plenty. Once he actually got into the nuts and bolts of Capitalism, and the history thereof, I got somewhat bogged down.

What I mainly learned from this book, to quote a Firesign Theatre record title, is that everything I know is wrong. I'm one of the few who learned the wrong things almost from their original sources, having read them in classes at college. These wrong things are generally believed, but most people never actually read these sources. One of them is that Capitalism arose from the Protestant work ethic after the Reformation. The other is the sustaining myth of the modern world, the Enlightenment (who named it that?) invention of the Dark Ages. What else didn't I know? That slavery was virtually wiped out of Europe by the end of the tenth century, and that when it returned in the New World, the pope excommunicated anyone who trafficked in slaves. The Enlightenment writers didn't mention that fact, since they were slave owners.

For me, the word "Capitalism" summons up the sort of abuses that Chesterton was always arguing against. But Stark, in very lengthy passages, explains its theory so that even this reader, with zero economic prowess, can grasp it. He shows that it can only flourish in a relatively free society, hence the "Western Success" of the subtitle. He also considers the paradox of "religious economies", concluding that state- established churches stagnate, while religious belief thrives in an environment of freedom and pluralism. The common core underlying that belief in the West is that the Creator has made a reasonable world that can be discovered by reason, a radically liberating idea that led to "Freedom, Capitalism, and Western Success" in the Bright Ages.

Descartes' Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain

Average customer rating:

Too much speculation
Tom Cruise for President.
Thoughtful analysis of how the mind works.
Damasio concludes: "I am, Therefore I think."
A Biological Basis for Emotion and Logic

Descartes' Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain
Antonio Damasio
Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 014303622X

Book Description

Since Descartes famously proclaimed, "I think, therefore I am," science has often overlooked emotions as the source of a person's true being. Even modern neuroscience has tended, until recently, to concentrate on the cognitive aspects of brain function, disregarding emotions. This attitude began to change with the publication of Descartes' Error in 1995. Antonio Damasio—"one of the world's leading neurologists" (The New York Times)—challenged traditional ideas about the connection between emotions and rationality. In this wondrously engaging book, Damasio takes the reader on a journey of scientific discovery through a series of case studies, demonstrating what many of us have long suspected: emotions are not a luxury, they are essential to rational thinking and to normal social behavior.

Customer Reviews:

Too much speculation.......2007-03-23

If you want to read about scientific facts this is not the book for you. The scientific underpinnings of this speculative book are briefly mentioned and not elaborated upon in much detail. It's better to just read his paper on the somatic marker hypothesis (which is disputed by the way). Without a background in neuroscience it is difficult to evaluate his ideas in a serious way, and anyway he asks for introspection (a la William James) from the reader more than anything else.

Tom Cruise for President........2007-02-24

If Dr. Damasio is so smart then why doesn't he admit that his thesis implies phrenology? A: because he knows that it is a pseudoscience.

Thoughtful analysis of how the mind works........2006-10-30

The French philosopher René Descartes could not have been more wrong, according to Antonio Damasio, a neurologist at the University of Iowa College of Medicine. Descartes thought the mind was completely separate from the body - an immaterial "thinking thing," the essence of which was cool conscious reasoning untainted by base physical influence. Through his research on patients with prefrontal cortex damage, Damasio discovered that reason, like almost all mental processes, is "embodied," that is, based in the human being's physical self. Emotions and other states that are rooted in physicality profoundly influence not only what people reason about, but how they reason. Without them, people either can't make decisions or they make self-defeating ones. This book tells how Damasio created, developed and tested his theory of embodied cognition, which is now widely influential in psychology, neuroscience and behavioral economics. We recommend this refreshingly nuanced, conversationally told (though sometimes desultory) narrative of scientific invention and discovery to readers who want to learn about this profound, influential set of ideas from the source. You will never think about your mind the same way again.

Damasio concludes: "I am, Therefore I think.".......2006-09-09

"Descartes' Error" begins with the classic head-injury tale of Phinaes Gage - a man who lost a large section of his brain, and lived. "Gage was no longer Gage" his friends said after the accident. Gage's soul, his identity drastically changed. This, Damasio argues, proves materialism. There is no mind/body duality; the mind and the body are one.

The best parts of the book are the stories told of various brain injury cases which Damasio investigated. One patient had a brain tumor removed - and all of his emotions were removed with it. Intellectually, the patient was fine. But he was incapable of caring about anything. As a result, he had a terrible time making future plans.

The trouble with "Descartes' Error" is Damasio's tendecy to go on academic rants, spinning theories on how emotions create character traits in our brains by using feedback loops... (add technical words here, followed by medical terms) etc. I skimmed the chapters on emotion. These theories about how emotions are the seat of the soul - are rife with rambling, dry, academic speculations.

Too bad only half the book is devoted to neurological oddities - such as, a patient whose entire left side of his body is paralyzed, but incapable of realizing that anything is wrong. This stuff I find endlessly fascinating.

If you wish to read a book about weird neurological happenings, check out "A Brief Tour of Human Consciousness: From Impostor Poodles to Purple Numbers" by V. S. Ramachandran. If you want brain philosophy, read Daniel Dennett.

A Biological Basis for Emotion and Logic.......2006-08-16

Damasio attempts nothing less than the quantification of the soul by identifying the likely structures of the brain -- the prefrontal lobes among others -- responsible for logic, reason, emotion and personality. He recounts several stories of patients with prefrontal damage and the peculiar symptoms they display -- then tests his theories with a number of clever experiments carried out in his lab at the University of Iowa. His conclusions are persuasive and well-thought out, and will cause you to re-evaluate much of what you THINK you know about the role of emotion in logical reasoning.

However, the book is flawed in a couple of different directions.

1. The text alternates between well-written, smooth-flowing, extremely readable sections and dense, highly-technical, grammatically-gnarled sentences such as, "In terms of the prefrontal cortices, I am suggesting that somatic markers, which operate on the bioregulatory and social domain aligned with the ventromedial sector, influence the operation of attention and working memory within the dorsolateral sector, the sector on which operations on other domains of knowledge depend [page 198]." Too many sentences of this opacity slowed reading speed to a crawl, and made me wonder about his intended audience.

2. Numerous and frequent references are given to other researchers in the field, but he very rarely elaborates on the directions or results of their research. As a non-academic I am not going to dig out the original articles for myself, and would have preferred Damasio himself provide the summaries.

3. One researcher frequently cited is named "Hanna Damasio" (who coincidentally is also the illustrator of the book) but no mention is made of her relationship to the author. A courtesy explanation would have been in order.

4. The author expresses the usual scientific caution about over-generalizing or drawing broader implications from his work. However, it seems to me the most exciting possibility deriving from his research is exactly that, a biological basis for emotion. I think he would have been forgiven for throwing caution to the winds in the last chapter or two and speculating wildly about the connections between emotional exuberance and brain structure abnormalities, or oppositely emotional monotony and the biologic cause. As it is, his work is solid but measured, which downplays the truly groundbreaking nature of it.

Labyrinths of Reason: Paradox, Puzzles, and the Frailty of Knowledge

Average customer rating:

Thought-provoking treatment
great read
A good starter
Great book on logic and the meaning of 'knowing'
Brain Workout in a Nutshell

Labyrinths of Reason: Paradox, Puzzles, and the Frailty of Knowledge

Manufacturer: Anchor
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0385242719
Release Date: 1989-12-01

Amazon.com

We conceive of and describe the world in ways that usually work just fine, but in the far corners of the labyrinth of reason, our best intentions fold back on themselves, and we end up trapped in an intractable loop or tumbling down a chute of infinite regress. Labyrinths of Reason is a collection of classic philosophical thought experiments and other imponderables that push reason and language to their logical limits. Beyond just idle brainteasers, William Poundstone shows that these mental exercises have profound implications for such fields as cryptography, decision theory, subatomic physics, and computer programming. But most of all, they're good, clean philosophical fun!

Book Description

This sharply intelligent, consistently provocative book takes the reader on an astonishing, thought-provoking voyage into the realm of delightful uncertainty--a world of paradox in which logical argument leads to contradiction and common sense is seemingly rendered irrelevant.

Customer Reviews:

Thought-provoking treatment.......2007-10-02

Though LoR covers well-worn ground, it does so both ably and entertainingly. The paradoxes Poundstone discusses are of the ages and for the ages; as long as humans think, they will never cease to fascinate, confound, and inspire. Anyone interested in language and reasoning and the relationship between mind and the external "objective" world will find much to chew on between the covers of LoR. LoR provides a gentle introduction to some very difficult topics in the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of science. It is well worth a read.

great read.......2006-01-29

You should be math-oriented to get the most out of this book - but some of the paradoxes are dandy and the 'prisoner's dilemma' is always worth a review.

A good starter.......2004-09-04

I enjoyed this book, but one should realize the audience for this work. I was a novcie to logic when I read this book and felt quite satisfied with the content and structure.

Labytinths does not overwhelm the reader; it introduces a fair amout of classic logic problems, scenarios, etc. Many of the examples offered would serve well in a high school math class.

Great book on logic and the meaning of 'knowing'.......2004-02-29

I have to confess - I bought this book after reading Mr. Poundstone's book 'How would you move mount Fuji?' I probably never would have bought this book otherwise - and I'm glad I did.
So first of all - this is not a riddle book. Its a philosophy book trying to dismantle well know paradoxes in modern epistemology. It's not revolutionary in any way, but it collects its ideas from good sources and gives a nice and coherent view of the topic and the field.
I would recommend this book only to people willing to read slowly and think about what they read. The journey is not easy - but Mr. Poundstone would get you to your destination every time.

Brain Workout in a Nutshell.......2002-04-09

With this collection of paradoxes and intrigues, Poundstone gracely accomplished what he set out to do -- guiding the readers on an unforgettable journey through the many Labyrinths of Reason. Chapter by chapter, Poundstone took some famous paradox as a seed, and made it grew into a whole field of thought provoking ideas.

Book Description

Diabetes Burnout is an interactive book that addresses the emotional issues that contribute to poor glycemic control and provides guidance to overcoming the barriers to good self-care. Worksheets help readers assess their current state of motivation and establish a successful plan of action.

Customer Reviews:

Life-saving psychological help with diabetes challenges.......2007-07-03

With diabetes, there is no walking away from the difficulties of the illnes; it can't be laid aside when the going gets tough. This great book helps look at and deal with the everyday difficulties that are real parts of living with diabetes. Dr. Polonsky is like a friend who understands and furthermore, has good suggestions for how to handle what you feel you can't live with any more. Great tone, helpful information, comforting message. Great book!

Diabetes Burnout.......2005-08-09

EXCELLENT book for those living with diabetes. Diabetes burnout is very common. This book is full of tips, suggestions, and even tests, to help you in dealing with diabetes.

Golden empathy at first but it only goes so deep.......2004-05-14

When I first saw the chapter for "Werewolf Syndrome" I knew I had to buy this book. It makes for an interesting read at first to learn about others' experiences. Though one thing the author fails to do is provide instruction on the process of motivation, and only provides a very shallow surface, if any, of scientific insight into why people get "burned out". I would suggest going to the book store and skimming this book to feel better about yourself but don't take it home with you.

One chapter he could've included would have been MY GENERAL PHYSICIAN HAS MISDIAGNOSED ME! I was burned out on my diabetes type II management. I couldn't get my sugars down! I would go to my GP and get the advice of take these pills and eat right. Then come back in three months we'll see if you're better. After two years I finally went to an endocronologist, *slap-slap*, and he is convinced I am type I LADA diabetes. Sure enough after a couple of insulin shots I am feeling normal! (Well, normal feels like a drug after having hyperglycemia for two years.) This is my chapter for the burnout book, sc$&@ the GP and go to an endocronologist.

This book tells it like it is.......2004-01-19

When I picked up Diabetes Burnout, I was truly amazed. Dr. Polonsky understands that there are "barriers to self-care," real life problems and situations that get in the way of doing what's best for our bodies.

He knows that people make a cost/benefit analysis when it comes to self-care. If the behavior is too hard or too unpleasant, and the rewards don't seem worth it, we're not going to consistently exercise, check sugars, or eat what we're supposed to.

This problem is not just true for people with diabetes. It applies to anyone with chronic illness, or really, to anybody at all. I knew about this from living with multiple sclerosis, and I wrote about it in my book. But I didn't think anybody else had developed these ideas. I was sure Dr. Polonsky must have some kind of chronic condition himself, because he knows what it's like. But he doesn't have an illness. He's just very insightful.

I really like the humor in this book. I know some reviewers accuse him of being "cutesy" or Disneyfying diabetes, but I think being able to laugh at your situation helps, even when it's really painful. His description of "werewolf eating" and "Diabetes police" are highly evocative -- they get the point across. I don't think he's talking down to anyone -- he has compassion for people's struggles and wants us to feel better.

It's true that Diabetes Burnout does not cite its sources very well and doesn't contain a lot of specific info on diets or other self-care practices. But that's not its purpose. He is giving tools for identifying and overcoming our barriers -- social, practical, psychological or economic. This is important -- some of those barriers may have been with us for decades, and overcoming them can change not just diabetes management, but also entire lives.

He also inspires by telling stories of real people he has worked with, who have made great strides in difficult circumstances. It's entertaining, inspiring and educational (just like my book :-). What more do you want?

David Spero RN, author of The Art of Getting Well: Maximizing Health When You Have a Chronic Illness (Hunter House 2002) and the upcoming Politics of Diabetes: Social Causes, Costs and Cures of an Epidemic (2005). www.davidsperoRN.com

Excellent book for ANYONE with a chronic illness.......2003-04-17

He makes some really stellar points and has already helped me begin changing over to a more "problem solving" approach, rather than my previous approach to type 2 diabetes, which could best be termed "denial and despair".

I think that removing the 'stinger' from long-term diabetes care requires a bit of pseudo-professional detachment. Rather than seeing my diabetes as a great dramatic production, with me as the tragic heroine, his book is helping me to see it as a series of discreet problems needing solutions (where possible) and acceptance (where no solution is possible).

You'd have to know me to know what a drastic change this is from my normal way of being: 'Drama Queen' just doesn't do me justice!

Book Description

An elderly lady once left $20,000 and "my Bible and all it contains" to her nephew. The young man knew what the Bible contained so he didn't bother to open it. He merely picked it up and put it on a high shelf in his house, and headed for Las Vegas.

It wasn't long until all his money was gone. He lived the next 60 years as a pauper, scraping for every meal and barely having the clothes on his back.

As he was moving to a convalescent home he reached up to grab that old Bible and accidentally dropped it from his trembling hands. It fell to the floor and opened, revealing a $100 bill between every page.

That man lived his life as a pauper when he could have lived in luxury, simply because of his prejudice. He thought he knew what the Bible contained.

Most people don't know that the Bible contains a wealth of incredible scientific, medical and prophetic facts. The implications are mind boggling…

Customer Reviews:

Does more harm than good.......2007-06-02

I am a Christian, and I certainly don't think you have to be an idiot to believe in the Bible and I think there are some wonderful sources in the world if you feel pressed to justify your beliefs on an intellectual level, BUT...this is not one of those sources. It is full of mistakes and misinformation. I hope it is accidental rather than deliberate, but I do have to warn you that using these arguments to justify the Christian faith will only feed the secular view that there is nothing intelligent about Christianity.
He tells outright lies about Columbus that even a grade-schooler could catch (as another reviewer mentioned)...buy something by Chuck Missler instead...he's a little more esoteric, but a far better scientist and scholar (as well as a Bible believer).

Incredibly stupid book!.......2006-11-16

This is the silliest, goofiest book I have read in a long time. There is no gentle way to say this: the author is a man of exceedingly modest intellectual capacity. He does not understand evolution. He does not understand science. He has an idiosyncratic understanding of the Bible that one can only marvel at - or else heartily laugh at!

If his intended audience was kindergarten classes, then he has been successful.

Here are some examples of the Bible's science:

Evidence of atoms: "things which are seen were not made of things which do appear." Hebrews 11:3

Radio waves: "Can you send lightnings, that they may go, and say to you, Here we are?" Job 38:35

Job 38:19 "Where is the way where light dwells?" This implies electromagnetic radiation and light travelling at 186,000 mpsecond.

By talking of heavens & "highest heavens", the Bible was explaining galaxies and clusters of galaxies.

"...neither shall you eat any flesh that is torn of beasts in the field..." Exodus 22:31 He hails this as insight into bacterial contamination!

He quotes a lot of notable people on their biblical faith - but most are centuries dead and not a few are taken out of context (e.g. Einstein who clearly stated his "God" was not the Christian God). His section on archeology is a farce - or state of the art for the 17th century if you prefer. His discussion of evolution is so warped as to make one wonder if he has EVER bothered reading even a high school biology textbook.

I don't think any reasonable, rational, semi-conscious Christian can take much "comfort" in this embarrassing book. I went to Comfort's web site to get further insight and I came away thinking this is a man with a GIANT ego and he has absolutely no basis for his self-congratulatory egotism.

This book is useless, except for chuckles.

Well written and fun to read........2006-08-10

Do I believe this book was a little bit biased? Yes, I do but, generally speaking, it was full of great information. I am educating myself on the Evolution Theory and the more I study it, the more I see that it makes much more sense to believe in a Creator than to believe in chance. If natural selection is true, then in order to select, it must have some kind of programming, if you will, to let it know which species were weak and deserved to be extinct and which ones were strong and deserved to exist. Just a few of the 100 Reasons to Believe the Bible is Supernatural in Origin were not convincing to me at all. I would say, less than 10 of the 100 reasons Ray Comfort gave were not too convincing, but overall, the book is worth reading. Good reference for those in a hurry. I highly recommend this book.

This is a Awesome Book..........2006-07-16

This book has opened my eyes. It is full of truthful facts that I never knew was in the bible. It is a must for everybody to read. And to comment on what E. Lores said; I think you need to open your eyes b/c everything in that book clearly comes right out of the bible... I think you need to make sure that you know what your saying before you open up your big mouth...

Not as good as it sounds.......2005-01-19

This book is fun to read, yes, no question about that, the problem are the facts inside.

In the first pages I found the first error. I continued, but without knowing if what I was reading was true. For example, Mr. Comfort, in page 12, states: "It was another 2000 years later (at a time when science believed that the earth was flat) that the scriptures inspired Christopher Columbus to sail around the world." Well, the problem is that, first, Columbus wasn't inspired by scriptures and, second, in those times people didn't believe that the earth was flat.

I am a Christian, and I'm very disappointed. Mr. Comfort's efforts to find evidence of modern science, modern hygiene and even dinosaurs in the Bible are simply unbelievable, and many times feels forced. He even quotes famous people on the Bible, I mean, if Napoleon said anything good about the Bible, that is a proof of is supernatural origin? He founds what his eyes want to find, he understands what he wants to understand... The worst is that he sees things that are not there and compares it to data that is wrong... The result is a fun but messy book.

In Good Conscience: Reason and Emotion in Moral Decision Making

Average customer rating:

In Good Conscience: Reason and Emotion in Moral Decision Making
Sidney Callahan
Manufacturer: HarperOne
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Ethics & Morality | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

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Look Inside Nonfiction Books | Trip | Specialty Stores | Books

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ASIN: 0060612924

How We Believe: Science, Skepticism, and the Search for God (second edition)

Average customer rating:

I once was blind..
Fascinating Look at god Belief
Personable, interesting, but sloppy and unpersuasive.
Shermer did it again
A skeptic repeats an urban legend as fact.... OOPS! - and a more serious objection

How We Believe: Science, Skepticism, and the Search for God (second edition)
Michael Shermer
Manufacturer: Owl Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Theism | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0805074791

Amazon.com

One hundred years ago social scientists predicted that belief in God would decrease by the year 2000. "In fact ... the opposite is has occurred," Shermer writes in his introduction. "Never in history have so many, and such a high percentage of the population, believed in God. Not only is God not dead as Nietzche proclaimed, but he has never been more alive."

Why do so many believe in the existence of something so inexplicable? That's exactly what Shermer answers in this comprehensive, intelligent, and highly readable discussion about the nature of faith. "People believe in God because the evidence of their senses tell them so," claims Shermer, who is the publisher of Skeptics magazine. Having been a believer and a student of the history of science, Shermer (now an agnostic) is more interested in knowing why and how people believe in God rather than trying to prove who's right or wrong. As a result, this book is not only even-handed and thorough, it is also destined to become a timeless contribution to spirituality as well as science. --Gail Hudson

Book Description

Recent polls report that 96 percent of Americans believe in God, and 73 percent believe that angels regularly visit Earth. Why is this? Why, despite the rise of science, technology, and secular education, are people turning to religion in greater numbers than ever before? Why do people believe in God at all? These provocative questions lie at the heart of How We Believe, an illuminating study of God, faith, and religion. Bestselling author Michael Shermer offers fresh and often startling insights into age-old questions, including how and why humans put their faith in a higher power, even in the face of scientific skepticism. Shermer has updated the book to explore the latest research and theories of psychiatrists, neuroscientists, epidemiologists, and philosophers, as well as the role of faith in our increasingly diverse modern world. Whether believers or nonbelievers, we are all driven by the need to understand the universe and our place in it. How We Believe is a brilliant scientific tour of this ancient and mysterious desire.

Customer Reviews:

I once was blind.........2007-06-06

This was one of the most fascinating books I have read, everyday I looked forward to it. I was most impressed with Shermer's mastery of multiple and diverse disciplines, my IQ must have gone up a few points from reading such a well written and elegant tome. Its comprehensive style reminded me of Carl Sagan's "Cosmos" because it opened my mind to things I never considered and made me think. I find it difficult to point out what I liked about the book because it has so much to offer however I was moved as Shermer touchingly explained how he has found meaning in a world without god. I too was a Christian once and have gone though the same existential and philosophical struggles. I felt an intellectual and emotion freedom as I read of his appreciation in the awe of the natural world and his coming to understand his place in it as a "homo sapiens" or "wise man". Such considerate expression gave me a new understanding of what it means to be a freethinker.

Fascinating Look at god Belief.......2006-10-16

How We Believe is a nice read--very informative, often fascinating, and very timely. Written in a straightforward style somewhere between Dawkins and Sam Harris, How We Believe should be read right along with The God Delusion and Letter to a Christian Nation. Mr. Shermer publishes some very interesting information about the general characteristics of "believers" in the U.S. and who are those most likely to have no god belief. He does a nice job of succinctly describing messiah myths and the endemic nature of "end-times" thinking in cultures throughout the world.

There are a few small problems with this book, however. The first is its lack of cohesion. Is Mr. Shermer writing a general interest nonfiction book about god belief in the U.S. or is he addressing specific pet peeves that he's come across in his research? For example; in chapter 6, we are subjected to long quotations from Pope John Paul II and Shermer's feelings about these excerpts. I really didn't care much for this, and I didn't think it was that relevant to the book's theme. The second main problem is similar--Shermer finishes the book discussing contingency theory, and this is as good a way to end the book as any. Unfortunately, this segment is overlong and too focused on responding to Daniel Dennett's response to Stephen Jay Gould.

Mr. Shermer could have even left these ideas in his book, but he should have trimmed them down considerably. Keeping all this in mind, How We Believe is a vital and needed addition to the nontheist library. I highlighted (highlit?) many passages as very pertinent to our society's blanket acceptance of patently ridiculous mythology and the reasons behind its folly. Put this one high on your list!

Personable, interesting, but sloppy and unpersuasive........2006-01-19

Having just finished two other books by skeptics (Sam Harris and Pascal Boyer) who want to explain and / or abolish religion, Shermer's easy style and cheerful approach were a welcome change of pace. Sure, he meanders a bit, but in the process covers many interesting topics, and offers some great quotes. Unlike Harris or Boyer, Shermer is not afraid to credit faith with good influence on occasion (making his argument far more credible), and he has a pretty decent grounding, overall, in Christianity, the "orthodoxy" he goes after most often. (Though he also discusses the Bible Code, NDEs, Ghost Dances, Nation of Islam, and other Messianic cults -- most of which I found fascinating.) I also liked the last chapter, on Steven Jay Gould and historical contingency -- the butterfly effect. As an historian, I think the theory helps explain both the pattern of Chinese dynastic power, and the way schools of thought mix as they form, then congeal into orthodoxies.

Elsewhere, though, I found Shermer's arguments unsuccessful, and often confused.

For one thing, sloppiness often undermines Shermer's credibility. He flubs the story of Augustine's famous conversion - the verse quoted in Confessions did not tell Augustine to sell all he had and give to the poor, but to avoid sexual immorality! No one who has read Pensees should talk as if "The Wager" were Pascal's only argument for Christianity. Shermer's ten arguments for God, and his responses, are as others remark embarrassing - not only because they are short and therefore inadequate, but they often also miss the point. Shermer introduces Michael Behe as his primary antagonist on ID, but then most of his arguments seem to argue past Behe.

Shermer also fails to critique his own arguments objectively. Shermer often tells us, "People are pattern-seeking animals." True, but we can also be pattern-avoiding, overlooking signs of cancer or an affair. The question is which faculty is most in play when it comes to religion. One cannot simply assume that faith in God means connecting too many dots, rather than disbelieving, means not connecting enough. This is the weakness of a psychological approach to religion without an adequate discussion of objective evidence. After all, math and logic and science and history also connect dots.

Shermer relies on Burton Mack on Jesus. This is a poor choice. See my Why the Jesus Seminar can't find Jesus, and Grandma Marshall Could, for a critique of Mack, Crossan, Borg, and Funk, among others. I argue that Mack is more a maker of myths than a believable historian.

Shermer's surveys of why people believe, or do not believe, were probably the most interesting part of the book for me. He summarizes the data at the end of the book in a series of useful graphs. He finds that skeptics are more likely to be well-educated, open-minded, male, and to conflict with their parents. But here too, his analysis is premature. First of all, he assumes that a person who describes himself as "inventive, curious, original," is these things - which seems a bit naïve. Secondly, the only society he surveys is America. He does not therefore control for the sociological difference between orthodox views and new sects. A different kind of person is likely to convert than stick with the views of his ancestors. To decide what difference theism itself makes, it would be necessary to take similar surveys in (say) communist China or Russia, Tibet, Iran, and Japan. If Shermer did so, having studied culture and religion all my adult life, I am sure he would get quite different results. While education may make Americans a bit less likely to believe in God, it seems to make Taiwanese or Singaporean far more likely to become Christians. And this, Rodney Stark shows, was also the case in Medieval Europe, among the first scientists.

Shermer asks, "How can one set of people find no evidence for God's existence, while another set finds quite the opposite? Both are observing the same world. The answer, as we shall see, lies in the psychology of belief." To be fair, he should also consider whether the answer might lie instead in (1) the psychology of unbelief (see Paul Vitz, Faith of the Fatherless); (2) the sociology of unbelief (see Stark, For the Glory of God); (3) the fact that people observe different parts of the world; (4) the possibility that science has become a rival god (there is evidence for that in this book); (5) sex on campus (see Tom Wolfe!); (6) different ways in which people on different levels of society falsify or deny God (see Cornelius Plantinga, A Bestiary of Sin); (7) public education may discriminate against faith. (Shermer himself says, "It is not acceptable in science" to offer supernatural explanations. And indeed, many of us have learned, even a hint of openness to the supernatural can be bad for one's academic health;) (8) the public education system may have become a propaganda machine for humanism, as envisioned by Dewey; or (9) the sociological tendencies described by Stark. Each hypothesis, I say, should be considered.

Finally, Shermer puzzles much over the relationship between faith and reason. His survey shows that the most common reason for faith is intellectual. He thinks this is a modern heresy, an inappropriate response to skepticism on the part of Christians, who should admit that they believe because they want to, end of story. He praises the pope for writing, "Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth." But when the pope describes faith and reason as both "inseparable" and "distinct," he complains: "Either faith and reason are inseparable or they are distinct." Why? It does not occurr to him that the poetry he has just praised shows that it is possible for two things to be both "inseparable" and "distinct." Both wings on a bird are inseparable in the sense of being joined through its body, and in being required for flight - yet are distinct as well. The world is full of objects both "inseparable" in that sense and "distinct:" electron and proton, head and shoulders, mother and child. Skeptics often assume "faith" means "blind faith:" it is to Shermer's credit that he digs up evidence to the contrary. But the evidence takes him by surprise, and he resorts to the improbable assumption that Pope John Paul does not properly understand the Christian tradition, and educated Christians have heretical notions of epistemology. He is, of course, mistaken. Far from a modern heresy, however, John Paul (and Pascal!) accurately understood that faith and reason complement one another in the Christian tradition. (See the anthology on Faith and Reason on my web site, christthetao.com, for quotes on faith and reason from leading Christian thinkers over the centuries.) So while I credit Shermer for being open-minded enough to learn new things about religion, it remains to be seen how open and self-critical he really is.

Shermer did it again.......2006-01-10

Michael Shermer is awesome, thats pretty much all there is too it.

The book is jam packed full of interesting facts about... well... how we believe. Shermer nicely outlines why religious and magical thinking was helpful from an evolutionary perspective. Besides at looking at things such as scientific and philosophical arguments for and against Gods existance, "intelligent design" and the "bible code", Shermer delves into all sorts of things to show how belief and experiencing God points to nothing outside of our own brains.

This is the untimate God book.

A skeptic repeats an urban legend as fact.... OOPS! - and a more serious objection.......2005-12-10

On page 220, Shermer repeats one version of the QWERTY myth when he says the normal typewriter layout was "designed for nineteenth-century typewriters whose key striking mechanisms were too slow for human finger speed." He then goes on to point out the sequence DFGHJKL on the home row and says, "It appears that the original key arrangement was just a straight alphabetical sequence, which made sense in early experiments before testing was done to determine a faster alignment. The vowels were removed to slow the typist down to prevent key jamming."

The first quote is partially wrong or confusing, and the second is incomplete, as illustrated by an entry on the typewriter at one of the two main urban legends-refutation websites, About.com's Urban Legend Reference Pages.

From About:

"For years, popular writers have accused Sholes of deliberately arranging his keyboard to slow down fast typists who would otherwise jam up his sluggish machine. In fact, his motives were just the opposite. ...

"If two typebars were near each other in the circle, they would tend to clash into each other when typed in succession. So, Sholes figured he had to take the most common letter pairs such as "TH" and make sure their typebars hung at safe distances."

So, the modern key spread was not done to slow down typists; it simply was, in a phrase Shermer should appreciate, a near-optimal evolutionary adaptation of the original keyboard layout to mechanical constraints of the time.

And, as for his implication that an alternative layout might be better? (Something believed by many others, not just him.) About answers that one, too:

"The Dvorak keyboard sounds very good. However, a keyboard need to do more than just 'sound' good, and unfortunately, Dvorak has failed to prove itself superior to QWERTY. ... A U.S. General Services Administration study of 1953 appears to have been more objective. It found that it really didn't matter what keyboard you used."

Not a huge deal, but a professional skeptic should get this one right.

====

Now, on to the more serious objection.

Shermer, in my opinion, explains HOW religious belief may have come into being, but not WHY.

Man the pattern-seeing, or even man the pattern-making out of white-noise seeing, I agree with. But, why do the seen patterns have to have a religious vision to them?

THAT's the question Shermer doesn't answer. To attempt an answer, he would have to delve into psychology of religion, as well as cognitive science, even more than he did, IMO. Paleoanthropology of early homo sapiens would also be needed.

Also, pattern-seeing falls somewhat short on the "how," in my opinion. Rather, I believe that religious belief was developed in part to FORCE patterns onto massively contingent medium-term temporal patterns.

For example, some ancient culture asks why it has a drought, which is NOT part of the normal rain patterns.

Answer... the seen pattern of some divinity, malevolent or angry.

The Death of Truth: Responding to Multiculturalism, the Rejection of Reason and the New Postmodern Diversity

Average customer rating:

A Must Read
Sums Up Our Society Perfectly
The Death of Reason
An important aid to understanding our times.
Illuminating.

The Death of Truth: Responding to Multiculturalism, the Rejection of Reason and the New Postmodern Diversity

Manufacturer: Bethany House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

ASIN: 1556617240
Release Date: 1996-01-01

Book Description

A book for ordinary readers who want to understand the maze of multiculturism, inclusivism, and the new postmodern diversity that daily impact us.

Customer Reviews:

A Must Read.......2006-01-15

Dennis McCallum has done a great job explaining why nothing in our society seems to make sense any longer. The book is, mildly stated, a masterpiece, though it does demand a better than average I.Q. and an academic background. It is not for feather brains and airheads. The first few chapters are heavy slogging, but well worth the trouble. Near the end, McCallum fits the puzzle together, and the book makes a great deal of sense. I recommend this book not only to Christians, but especially to secular thinkers,who are now beginning to ask themselves what has gone wrong in our Western world view .

Sums Up Our Society Perfectly.......2004-06-06

Of the hundreds of books I've ever read, this is one of the most important.

It deals with postmodernism--the use of moral relativism and other forms of illogic to restructure society according to the whims of subversives.

Postmodernists use feelings and intuition instead of reason to arrive at their conclusions, and examples of this abound everywhere today. Postmodernists think that Reagan, not the Soviet Union, was the warmonger in the Eighties; they think that America was responsible for 9/11/01, not the terrorists; they think that those who oppose affirmative action and hiring quotas are racists; they think that people who commit crimes, not those brutalized by crime, are victims.

If you want to have it driven home just how much liberals and postmodernists who use emotion instead of logic to form their opinions have an extraordinarily difficult time discerning, making judgments, and assigning blame in any given situation and almost seem to be programmed to come to the wrong conclusion about virtually everything, get this book. We see this constantly, but to see all of these examples in one place is a true eye-opener.

The Death of Reason.......2003-05-27

The book The Death of Truth edited by Dennis McCallum attempts to uncover the postmodernism that is slowly leaking into the practitions of politics, health care, literature, education, history, psychotherapy, law, science, and religion. Since postmodernism is arguably the new worldview of some people in these professions, understanding their perspective is important. However, the attitude of the authors towards postmodernism is very negative right from the beginning, with chapter one setting up a dualism with Christian worldview on one side and postmodernism on the other. As such, the biases of the authors are clear. The beliefs of postmodernism are often stated in the worst negative way and without citation as to where these beliefs are found.
Altogether, the editors seem to be writing more out of the personal angst they feel towards postmodernism than a rational discussion of the topic. The back cover reads, âNot since Charles Darwin confronted Christians with his doctrine of naturalistic evolution has the church faced a challenge for which it is so ill-prepared. We are witnessing THE DEATH OF TRUTH.â This is a little over the top, even for a teaser. But, once inside the book, Dennis McCallum and the other contributors manage to raise the sensational tone to an even higher level. "Now, in the late twentieth century, we are caught up in a revolution that will likely dwarf Darwinism in its impact on every aspect of thought and culture: postmodernism" (p. 12). Where circumspection would seem advised, exclamations, proclamations, and dire predictions abound. The connections between âcultural historiansâ and the devaluation of facts that lead to "reckless manipulation of history" (p. 140) is strained, relying more on rhetorical questions than the facts that the author is so proud of (p. 138). As a result, The Death of Truth often goes beyond its stated goal of bringing "postmodernism . . . within the reach of people who have never studied it" (p. 4) and crosses the line into misinformation.
An embarrassing example of this is where the New Age movement, along with films The Mission and Jurassic Park and rock bands Offspring and Green Day, are all lumped together under the ominously italicized rubric of postmodernism (p. 47). In this the author shows his extreme ignorance, The Mission celebrates the western missionaries and their sacrifices to save the natives from slavery. The author also seems to see any critique of new technology, determining whether or not it is more beneficial to humanity than a more traditional method, to be postmodern cynicism. This painting with a broad brush seems to promote less understanding among "the popular audience" and more misunderstanding and a witch-hunting mentality. Replace the word âpostmodernâ with any number of substitutes "New Age, communism, feminism, secular humanism" and the results would be similar: another shadowy "something" for Christians to chase through the sea of half-truths.
In form the book does not reach beyond its circle of beliefs. The information for further reading is nothing more than a plug for the organization the authors work for. Anyone who wishes to learn more and read original works by postmodernists, or even more scholarly articles against postmodernism, is left lost (p. 9). Technically, the index is misleading in many places.
In general, this book is entirely negative on postmodernism in all its forms, no matter what. The tone is sarcastic and immature, implying that all who do not follow the line of argument are dense or, worse, infected with postmodernism already. Many of the authors make definitive statements on various issues without backing up where that statement is given in original sources. An example of this technique is seen in the following sentence: "New Age consciousness and postmodernism share an overlapping philosophical base" (p. 50). No citation is given for this statement, nor is this statement explained or explicated further. Instead, sentences like these dropped in as ways to vilify postmodernism beyond any rational comprehension.

An important aid to understanding our times........2003-05-17

This is, perhaps, the most important book written in the last ten years for those who want to understand modernism, post-modernism, multiculturalism and the various types of relativism, including moral relativism.
Ever wonder why some politicians seem to lie and misrepresent the facts while on the campaign trail? When Clinton was in office, were you concerned by his cavalier dismissal of the prevailing code of morality that has made America great? Were you perplexed that he could appear on TV and brazenly wag his finger at the American people and claim, "I did not have sex with that woman!" and then go on to lie under oath in interrogatories and in a deposition in the Paula Jones case? Well, after reading this book, you'll understand how Clinton and so many others in his administration could do just that.
... If everybody is lying to everybody else because they no longer believe that truth exists or if it does it's whatever they want it to be at that moment, then nobody will be able to trust anybody about anything. Since so much in a free society depends upon truth and trust, it would be a disasterous development for our culture were relativism in general and moral relativism in particular to become more pervasive than it already has. That's just one of many reasons why postmodernism, which promotes the relativisms, must be opposed.

Illuminating........2002-03-14

I found this book to be quite interesting, despite its repetitive style. Written by several Christian educators, it compares theism, modernism (or secular humanism), and postmodernism. They believe that postmodernism undermines all objective truth (i.e., truth that is true whether one believes it or not) and, therefore, is the death of truth, as we know it. Their thesis is that theism believes in objective truth as revealed by God; modernism believes in objective truth discovered through experience and observation, and postmodernism believes truth is subjective and determined by individuals. They aren't fans of modernism, but they believe postmodernism is downright pernicious
The basic tenants of postmodernism are:
· Reason and rationality are cultural biases, and truth, especially God's truth, doesn't exist.
· All lifestyles, religions, and worldviews are equally valid.
· The only real sin is criticizing someone else's views or moral choices.
· Opinions matter as much as evidence.
· Reality is in the mind of the beholder.
The authors believe postmodernism is the source of:
· The political correctness movement.
· Lower academic and discipline standards in public classrooms.
· Tolerance gone extreme and the rising lack of personal responsibility.
· The black community's rising separatism.
· The increasingly widespread belief that every hurt is intentional and legally actionable.
· Radical victimology.
· History is slanted in favor of white males.
· "Male" and "female" are socially created categories intended to enslave women to men.
· Hostility towards science.
To quote from page 20, "Postmodernists believe that truth is created, not discovered. They think things like reason, rationality, and confidence in science are cultural biases. They contend that those who trust reason -- and things based on reason, like science, Western education, and governmental structures -- unknowingly act out their European cultural conditioning. This conditioning seeks to keep power in the hands of the social elite."
Well, I like my European conditioning.
The authors take us through different subjects -- health, religion, science, history, literature, education, etc. -- and compare these 'isms. Not surprisingly, I find myself in agreement with parts of all three of the 'isms, on most subjects. For example, I accept the idea of cultural relativism, or paradigms. Moreover, I've often touted the idea that "reality is perception," not in an absolutist sense, but in the sense that what a person believes is true will govern that person's actions. In that sense I agree with the postmodernist view that people are never objective or rational. "Where we stand depends on where we sit." I also believe that words (semantics and syntax) have power, and how you describe something -- the words you use -- can influence others. However, I take this only up to a point, albeit that point may be where my ethnicity and class kick in. (That's certainly the case in the authors' view.)
I do not see any inherent contradiction between theism and modernism, between the Christian (or anyone else's) concept of God and science. And while I can accept some of the underlying concepts of postmodernism, I definitely do not like where the authors say affirmative postmodernism is taking us. The authors' simplistic approach, which is necessary for someone like me to take the time to read and grasp their thesis, probably necessitates the stark divisions between these 'isms and their absolutist definitions.
Going back to my fondness for my so-called European conditioning, I can see from recent history (i.e., at least the last 1,000 years or so) that European strengths have prevailed over all others with which we have come into contact. Europeans are an inquisitive, individualistic, scientific, warlike culture that hasn't hesitated, until the latter half of the 20th century anyway, to throw its weight around. It has serious flaws -- arrogance, callousness, and greed, to name a few -- but so do all other cultures. We have progressed politically and socially, however. Ironically, it may be that very progress that will bring about our demise. Blacks, for example, for all the righteousness of their cause as they struggled out of slavery and segregation in the United States, could not have done so had there not been significant numbers of white people championing their cause. Blacks have never had the strength of numbers to rise up militarily and throw off the yoke of slavery in this country (although it was often tried - more often, I suspect, than most people realize). In fact, it was only in the past fifty years that have they had the political strength to change the laws in this country and even then it took white support. Moreover, there has been no international pressure put on this country to change. It has always taken American white sympathy -- whites' sense of justice -- to enable those things to happen.
I'm not arguing that it should have been otherwise. Rather, I'm just recognizing what I see in history. Whites (along with help from Arabs and other black Africans) put blacks into slavery in the New World, and it was whites that pulled them out of it. In the United States, it was white Americans. To the extent that blacks refuse to acknowledge this is unfortunate, as is the extent to which white Americans are abrogating, or denying, the very qualities that made us great. White Americans of European heritage have just as much of which to be proud as do any other race, and vice versa. I worry, though, that the high rate of immigration into this country will dilute European traits (steeped in northwest and north central European heritage) and thereby destroy the very thing that makes this country worth immigrating to in the first place.
Well, that was a bit of digression, but I see a connection between the authors' description of postmodernism and the potential erosion of our European values and way of life. I endorse diversity and believe that our American culture benefits from it. I just don't want it to morph into something unrecognizable.
Anyway, this is an excellent book.

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