A Devil's Chaplain: Reflections on Hope, Lies, Science, and Love

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Richard Dawkins has an opinion on everything biological, it seems, and in A Devil's Chaplain, everything is biological. Dawkins weighs in on topics as diverse as ape rights, jury trials, religion, and education, all examined through the lens of natural selection and evolution. Although many of these essays have been published elsewhere, this book is something of a greatest-hits compilation, reprinting many of Dawkins' most famous recent compositions. They are well worth re-reading. His 1998 review of Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont's Fashionable Nonsense is as bracing an indictment of academic obscurantism as the book it covered, although the review reveals some of Dawkins' personal biases as well. Several essays are devoted to skillfully debunking religion and mysticism, and these are likely to raise the hackles of even casual believers. Science, and more specifically evolutionary science, underlies each essay, giving readers a glimpse into the last several years' debates about the minutiae of natural selection. In one moving piece, Dawkins reflects on his late rival Stephen Jay Gould's magnum opus, The Structure of Evolutionary Theory, and clarifies what it was the two Darwinist heavyweights actually disagreed about. While the collection showcases Dawkins' brilliance and intellectual sparkle, it brings up as many questions as it answers. As an ever-ardent champion of science, honest discourse, and rational debate, Dawkins will obviously relish the challenge of answering them. --Therese Littleton

Book Description

The first collection of essays from renowned scientist and best-selling author Richard Dawkins is an enthusiastic declaration, a testament to the power of rigorous scientific examination to reveal the wonders of the world. In these essays Dawkins revisits the meme, the unit of cultural information that he named and wrote about in his groundbreaking work The Selfish Gene. Here also are moving tributes to friends and colleagues, including a eulogy for novelist Douglas Adams, author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy; correspondence with the evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould; and visits with the famed paleoanthropologists Richard and Maeve Leakey at their African wildlife preserve. The collection ends with a vivid note to Dawkins's ten-year-old daughter, reminding her to remain curious, to ask questions, and to live the examined life.

Customer Reviews:

Dawkins addresses some myths.......2007-08-27

Some excellent essays. A touch too close to being a bit racist here and there, but perhaps that was inaccuracy of language. For the first time I think I actually understand something about evolution. His point about the 98% figure of genetic similarity with chimps was well made. He cited the fact that if you compare two books, there will be a lot of common letters and the figure would suggest similarity. But if you were to compare them sentence by sentence, they would probably share only a tiny fraction of commonality.

What I still don't understand about theorists on evolution is how they still discuss superiority or desirability for breeding in terms of strength, speed, size etc. After many hundreds of thousands of years during which human cooperation in agriculture, shared civilisation and eventually technological change has transformed the success rate of the species, why are qualities of cooperation, constancy or intellect now not also included in the factors that influence natural selection? Perhaps they are. Maybe I should read late Darwin.

The idea that atheists just go one God further was also a point well made. Many of us would admit to being atheists when it comes to Mithras, Zeus, Thor, etc etc. Of all the Gods, most people who claim not to be atheists probably only admit a belief in one and thus reject thousands of other. It's a bit like claiming to be a vegetarian on the grounds that you don't eat duck, but do eat all the rest of the animal world.

The point about cloning and identical twins was made a few too many times, I think, but then it was a collection of essays. It is a point, however, that the non-scientist would find it hard to relate to, since for someone from that starting position the twins are "natural" and the "clone" is not, despite the fact that genetically they represent identical concepts. The position would be really interesting, however, if the twins, or triplets or quads etc arose as a result of in vitro fertilisation and then implantation, and hence were not "natural".

Nobody does it better, but . . . .......2007-05-27

Richard Dawkins is more eloquent in explaining biology and more forthright in disparaging its critics than anyone else writing in English today. However, the Greeks said even Homer nods, and I want to pursue a thread in this collection of reviews, prefaces and articles where I think Dawkins does not follow his own argument.

A recurrent proposition in these essays is that humans evolved in Africa (even Dawkins haters could be charmed by his essays on his return to Kenya) to meet African conditions. Surprisingly, he does not then inquire: How does it come about that a genetic armamentarium designed for camping on the plains of Africa produced a species capable of both inventing absurd religions and working out, through direct observation and indirect, abstract arguments, what stars are? What possible selective value could having a brain capable of either have to a caveman?

The answer, of course, is that the mental function evolved for reasons unrelated to stars or spooks but once evolved proved to have other capacities. In medicine, it is not uncommon for physicians to discover that a drug selected for one organ or syndrome has a completely unexpected, positive effect on some other organ or syndrome. (And, of course, it is even more common for it to have an unexpected, negative effect elsewhere.)

The significance of this is that it opens the door to a special status for humans. Dawkins does not want to concede this, claiming, for example, that if we were aware of the continuous genetic gradient between us and chimpanzees, we would not countenance any fundamental difference between us and, therefore, would not `sacrifice' chimps in medical experiments.

This is very strange proposition for a professional zoologist to be making. What are species for?

The genetic continuity is present, obviously, and, as Dawkins himself sometimes says, goes right back to an ur-organism. So, where does the quantitative difference become qualitative? If it is unthinkable to torture chimpanzees (or, to put it positively, as Dawkins does, if it should be thinkable to imagine interbreeding with them), why not object to eradicating mosquitoes that carry the malaria plasmodium that kills a half a million African babies each year (or maybe a million, who's counting?).

One barrier is to claim for humans a soul. This is nonsense. No one has ever seen such a thing. But another barrier is the capability of being moral actors, and everybody has observed that.

It is not obvious that moral action has selective advantages for inclusive fitness. Dawkins himself worries that having too many babies risks famine. Indiscriminate breeding, without worrying about moral consequences, is likely to leave more descendants, at least in the nearest subsequent generations, than discriminate, morally driven breeding -- or non-breeding, as the case may be.

Surely the evolution of a trait that confers voluntary selective unfitness on a species makes that species qualitatively different from all other species that cannot do it?

I expect this deviationism is a result of Dawkins's desire to see certain outcomes. Very natural it is, too, but it needs to be struggled against. Evolution up to us was non-deterministic. We should keep it that way.

Otherwise, this is a marvelous book.

Dawkins revealed.......2007-05-21

It's pity about the title: the subtitle is slightly more informative. Dawkins defines the book himself in the first sentence of his introduction: " ... a personal selection from among all the articles, tirades and reflections, book reviews and forewords, tributes and eulogies that I have published (or in some cases not published) over 25 years." This would be a better title but it's a bit long.

If you want to learn more about the things Dawkins writes about, this book is not the best book to read. If you want to learn about genetics or evolution or the God Delusion, this is just an appetiser. But it's a good book to read if you want to get to know Dawkins and his way of thinking.

It's a well-chosen anthology of 32 of Dawkins' "minor works", grouped in seven sections, each with a common theme and an explanatory introduction. Dawkins is a prolific writer, and sometimes he must write in a hurry: you get the impression that in his "tirades" he is using a dictating machine while waving his arms about. But the same passion that makes him do this can, a few pages further on, emerge as language so carefully and economically crafted that it will make you cry or laugh out loud, as probably intended. And make you think, too.

You don't have to read this book in page order. It's a good book to dip into. The memo for Tony Blair is a gem; every politician should be given briefs like this and made to read them. The eulogies are both moving and funny. The book reviews will make you want the books. The last essay is a letter Dawkins wrote to his daughter: it's personal and revealing and rather sad; I suspect the letter wouldn't have worked; he doesn't say. (I'm older than Dawkins and have had more children.) Look for the other personal bits, the anecdotes scattered through these writings: for each anecdote, you get one insight.

This is a great book for an atheist to own and lend.

A Devil's Chaplain.......2007-05-08

Of the several books by Richard Dawkins that I have recently read, this is my favorite. I read it forth in my list, and have since read six more of his books. This one is especially poetic and answered a majority of my questions in one reading. In my opinion if you are only going to read one of his books, this is the one to grab.

Having explored a variety of studies on religion, I decided to have a serious look at the opposing views. I spent many years trying to make sense of the contridictions in creation based beliefs. I had not until recently considered evolution as a serious consideration of belief. I found reading Dawkins to be a serious, yet sensitive presentation of his reasons for not believing in a personal God. I particularly like his respectful, detached approach to the subject. I personally can't imagine anyone taking personal offense to his way of sharing his point of view. . His writing style is witty, intelligent and engaging. He is practical and respectfully present in his dialogue. I will read anything he writes and I highly recommend his work to anyone who is looking for answers that makes sense of a complicated subject. I have greater respect for those who choose to practice religion now than before I read Dawkins' work on the theory of evolution. The The Meme Machine, by Susan Blackmore is my second favorite read so far~

Refreshing and Thought-Provoking.......2007-03-30

Richard Dawkins tells us not only why the Emporer has no clothes, but tell us how he knows - by discussing his logical processes for making his determinations. It's nothing short of brilliant, and offers much to contemplate.

If you enjoy a series of 'articles' on an array of different subjects, as I do, you will find that Dawkins manages to pack a lot of punch into each and every one of his selections on topics that range from Ethics to Public Education to Cloning with a seemless thread that makes it hard to put this book down.

It's my first book by Dawkins, but definitely not my last.

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A Study in Fallacious Reasoning
great book, was extremely hard to put down
Don't believe a word of it
awesome
The Lie is the Heart of the Matter

The Lie: Evolution
Ken Ham
Manufacturer: Master Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0890511586

Book Description

An eye-opening look at the harmful effects of evolutionary thought on modern culture and religion. Author Ken Ham uses his years of teaching and ministry experience to expose false teaching that is destroying children and families.

Customer Reviews:

A Study in Fallacious Reasoning.......2007-08-17

Let me make one thing clear, to begin: I am a Christian, I believe in the divinity of Christ, the reality of the Gospel, and the authority of scripture--and also that God created the universe.

For that reason, I gave Ham's book as objective a treatment as I could, coming to it with an open mind, and a willingness to find not the problems in his argument but to discover what he could teach me as a thinking believer. In other words, I intentionally read the book with an "I'm going to assume he's right unless he proves himself wrong" sort of mentality.

What I found in Ham's book was not a logical argument but rather something I'm seriously considering using in writing classes I teach at a Christian university as an example of fallacious logic--of what NOT to do when trying to make an argument from a Christian perspective.

A number of his fallacies are pointed out in other reviews, here are several that seemed significant to me:

1. He seems to willfully mis-characterize both the Bible and science. Primarily, he attributes to a present-day consensus about evolutionary theory a number of ideas that present-day scientists rejected as false long ago, and that have been roundly critiqued as destructive lies by the very liberal academic community (both in the humanities and sciences) he descries, such as social Darwinism. Present-day scientists do not accept Darwin's theories wholesale, and haven't for a very long time. By thus mischaracterizing the nature and ideas of his opposition, he creates a clear "straw man" argument, setting up not the real arguments used by present-day scientists, but rather the ideas that he can knock down most easily.

The largest fallacy of all in this vein is the assumption that science itself purports of "prove" anything at all. I have a number of friends who are scientists, some at Christian universities. Each of them would immediately correct a student who says he/she says that an experiment has "proven" a theory as "true," when, in fact, what they have done is observed a phenomenon that has acted in a manner consistent with a hypothesis: nothing more, nothing less. This isn't the same thing as religious belief.

2. Ham argues that evolutionary theory is essentially the "root of all evil" in modern society, responsible for things like homosexuality, abortion, and the rest of the usual litany of social ills. He fails to address, however, the fact that all these things existed in significant ways well before Darwin published his theories, and existed even in a medieval and renaissance western Europe that was an entirely Christian society in which the idea of young-earth creation was accepted as a matter of course. Perhaps there is a counterargument to this--but the point is that Ham doesn't make it.

3. Ham also fails to answer the potential counterargument of why science actually seems to work under many other circumstances. He argues, essentially, that all science is theory, that all theory is "tainted" by belief and bias, and that if science is theory, then it must uncertain; and if it's uncertain, it can't really explain anything. The problem is, it does explain a lot of things: if you take medication for a physical condition and it works, you're acting on the kind of science Ham descries: the medication was generated using empirical research, which noticed how certain chemicals acted on the body, and explained that interaction sufficiently well to create a medication that, say, demonstrably dries up your sinuses when you're sniffly. If science is nothing but spurious belief, why does science clearly explain many things? And if Ham's critique of science is true, why does he not also critique, say, the law of gravity as just as big a religious myth as evolution?

In a way, he's actually right: if you read up on the philosophy of science, you'll find that even scientists don't believe they can prove that the law of gravity is an eternal constant, that it will keep operating as it has forever. Why? Because science deals with observable phenomena, and the future isn't there to be observed. All science can prove is that the law of gravity has acted in a consistent manner in the past. However, if we take Ham's argument to heart, then we should be nailing down or furniture, because if science can't prove that it will continue to act as it does, then the idea that gravity will continue to act as it has is nothing but a spurious religious belief. In other words, if Ham's argument is true, then ALL science is nothing but empty religious belief, including all the scientific concepts that you take for granted on a daily basis--the concepts that theorize why airplanes fly, how light and electricity are transmitted, how the mechanism of your watch works.

4. The biggest problem, for me, was that a huge part of his argument really seemed to be missing: Ham argues, as I've mentioned, that because our knowledge of science isn't absolute, it can't explain anything with complete surety. If that's the case, Ham says, then science really doesn't teach us anything. However, he argues, we can know about the Bible because if we start with the idea that God is supreme and all-knowing, then his word, i.e. the Bible, must be true. But here's the question he doesn't answer: HOW DO WE KNOW THAT OUR KNOWLEDGE AND UNDERSTANDING OF THE BIBLE IS COMPLETE? We are, as Ham acknowledges, a fallen species, our understanding both the world and God is tainted by our own sinfulness. If that's the case, can we really afford to think that our understanding of scripture isn't equally tainted by our fallenness? I'm not saying, here, that God isn't all-knowing and the scripture doesn't contain the Truth with a capital-T; I'm saying that if we are a fallen people, we can't trust our own understanding of anything, that includes science, but it also includes God and the scriptures. The reason this is a problem is that it shows that Ham actually commits the very sin he thinks is at the root of all contemporary social evil: he assumes that his understanding of the Bible and of God are absolute, assumes that, when we read the Bible, a perfect knowledge of God is beamed into our hearts, untainted by our own fallen, human understanding. This is important because what he does, here, is to literally LEAN ON HIS OWN UNDERSTANDING. That, my friends, is a stance that Ham himself has a word for: Humanism. For that reason, I would submit that Ham is the ultimate hypocrite, because he proves himself, ultimately, to be the very kind of humanist he so abhors.

To those who are inclined not to believe me in any of this, my response is "GREAT! Don't believe me! Do some reading from the real sources and judge for yourself!" Read recent work that's coming out from actual scientists in the fields of geology or biology: what are the questions they're really asking these days? How are they going about looking for answers? What do they say their research is really telling them? What do real, pious scholars of the scriptures have to say about Genesis? What has been said and thought about Genesis in the Christian tradition?

If you'd like a really accessible overview of all this, allow me to recommend a different book, which I'm sure is available here on Amazon: Roger Olson's _The Mosaic of Christian Belief_. Olson is a respected scholar of Christian theology at Baylor University--and is very orthodox in his belief. I'm not going to review the book here, but only issue this challenge: after you've read both books, ask yourself which seems the more logical? Which writer seems to be working from accurate historical knowledge? Which writer seems to write from a position of real humility and generosity toward his fellow believers, including the ones with whom he disagrees? Which seems the more informed? Which seems to be writing more out of a sense of Christ's commandments to love God and neighbor than our of a sense of simply accusing the "other guy" of being the source of all the world's evil? Which one seems to be building up rather than tearing down? Which writer evinces more real hope and joy? Which demonstrates the fruits of the spirit and the spirit of the beatitudes more clearly? What are the potential fruits of Ham's view of the scriptures and the world as opposed to Olsen's?

Blessings to all.The Mosaic of Christian Beliefs: Twenty Centuries of Unity & Diversity

great book, was extremely hard to put down.......2007-06-15

I was very impressed with this book. This book challenged my beliefs when it comes to science and I agree with Ham's points. This book attacks the dangers of mixing the humanist and Christian worldviews and only cracks the surface on the scientific holes that are in the religion of evolution and the strategies to brainwash our children. If you are a professional who wonders about creation and the Bible and how it all relates with the Biology classes you took in high school and college on your way to a non-science degree this book is for you. If you are a scientist there are many more books available that will get more indepth into the science of creationism and the Bible and the glaring holes in evolution and why it takes just as much faith to believe the evolution theories of our origins.

Don't believe a word of it.......2007-05-27

Is anyone going to believe this nonsense who is not in the first place a religious believer in the Hebrew Scriptures (or for that matter the Koran.) In other words, is anyone going to be convinced by the logic of this "creation science" who is not a religious fool to begin with? Real science, evolution, an ancient universe, the fossil record and so on is accepted throughout the world by educated people of all faiths, religions, and nations.

Ken Ham will have you believe he is giving you the literal truth of Genesis, but he merely gives you his interpretation. Dinosaurs on the ark? Come on, they went extinct exactly because they were left off the ark, along with the unicorn.

To ask the classical question: whom did Cain and Abel and Seth marry? Ken Ham says they married their sisters. Huh, their sisters? Yes, because the rule against sibling marriage did not come into effect until Leviticus, you see. That's not what the Bible says, that's Ham's inference. Of course, the law against murder was not written until Leviticus either, so why was Cain punished?

So Cain went off to the Land of Nod, and there he impregnated his wife. Ken Ham would have you believe Cain dragged one of his sisters with him into exile. My interpretation is (1) there was an established people in the Land of Nod, and Cain (2) married one of them. Which of course opens this question, is Genesis about the beginning of the universe, the earth only, or the tribe of Hebrews.

Don't believe there is a simple, straight forward interpretation of the Bible or that Ken Ham and his museum own it.

awesome.......2007-03-19

this is awesome. i love this book. i recommend it to buy it. it's such a blessing to have people like ken ham who defend the TRUTH! the age of the earth is young. look at the evidence, do the research from true honest scientists who arent corrupt like many are.

The Lie is the Heart of the Matter.......2007-03-02

This book will strengthen the faith of the believer in Christ and the Bible. It will help those wavering between creation and evolution. It will empower Christians from the onslaught of evolution teaching and the anti-Christ dogma that accompanies society. It will help families raise godly children today. It may even help an evolutionist see the error of their ways. I highly recommend [...].

Believe it or not; there is an answer to the question; "what came first, the chicken or the egg?" The answer is found right in the first chapter of Genesis

Why We Lie: The Evolutionary Roots of Deception and the Unconscious Mind

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Scientific Approach
How to Make Friends and Influence People
I never lie....
Know Thy Lying Self
This could be a lie...

Why We Lie: The Evolutionary Roots of Deception and the Unconscious Mind
David Livingstone Smith
Manufacturer: St. Martin's Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0312310390

Book Description

Why We Lie The Evolutionary Roots of Deception and the Unconscious Mind David Livingstone Smith 'Self-deception is one of the most powerful ideas in psychology and [this book] is an excellent synthesis of this crucial topic. The biology is up-to-date and accurate, the psychological implications are clearly worked out, and the writing is inviting and accessible.' -Steven Pinker, author of The Blank Slate ince our species first evolved, lying and deceit have been an integral part of our social existence. Now, for the first time, philosopher and evolutionary psychologist David Livingstone Smith elucidates the essential role that deception and self-deception have played in human evolution and shows that the very structure of our minds has been shaped by the need to deceive. Readers of Richard Dawkins and Steven Pinker will find this a fascinating book, which declares that our extraordinary ability to deceive others, and even deceive our own selves 'lies' at the heart of our humanity. 'Written with snap, panache, and the sort of insights that stop you in your tracks.' -Howard Bloom, author of Global Brain 'David Smith has pulled off a beaut. Why We Lie is a wonderfully blended cluster of arguments to support the painful truth that we are a species whose skill at deceiving others is matched only by our ability to deceive ourselves.' -Arthur S. Reber, author of The Penguin Dictionary of Psychology DAVID LIVINGSTONE SMITH is currently professor of philosophy and co-founder and director of the Institute for Cognitive Science and Evolutionary Psychology at the University of New England. He lives in Scarborough, Maine. Science 0-312-31039-0 $24.95 $36.95 Canadian 51/2" x 81/4" / 256 pages July

Customer Reviews:

Scientific Approach.......2007-06-07

This book described exactly what its title claims. It methodically analyzes how we tend to operate on two levels with a clear and direct writing style. There is a whole unconscious level of communication that is more honest but less admitted in most of our interactions. Smith explains how this has supported our survival over time. Personally, I'm more interested in becoming more conscious of those processes, but the book only peripherally addresses increasing our awareness.

How to Make Friends and Influence People .......2007-03-23

Now here's a familiar scenario: when I was growing up, my parents, teachers and other such authority figures every now and then found it fit to scold me for lying -- and made it sound like a character flaw, a fearful sin. Of course, they were absolutely right and managed to pass on a very valuable lesson: if you want to survive in this world, you've got to cheat in a way that makes you sound/appear totally honest!

And here is a book that can teach you everything you need to know about the origins, mechanisms and usefulness of lying to ourselves and each other. Far from being a morally dubious trait in some "bad" people, it turns out that this is one of our most vital survival strategies.

Smith makes some very important contributions to the understanding of our minds from an evolutionary point of view. He convincingly portrays social life as a highly competitive system, and our cooperation with others as a form of allegiance against competitors/enemies. But because it is so difficult and draining to make reliable friends and influence the right people (as you might have noticed after any cocktail party or family gathering), our brains have evolved mechanisms to do most of the job unconsciously, while we merrily engage in (mostly elevating) self-deception and apparently boring small-talk.

In fact, recovering some of Freud's most enlightening hypotheses, Smith (along with many other evolutionists quoted in his book) argues that our conscious mind is not at all responsible for making decisions: "only results become conscious". We're like the user-friendly computer screen, as opposed to the hard disk, where all the real important information gets processed. Which means that what's going on even in our yapping heads is not really under our "control" -- at best we are informed of the final verdict (though we actually tend to be given false information by our unconscious!).
This split between conscious and unconscious, Smith argues, actually helps us blissfully cheat and manipulate each other without noticing it (thus avoiding unnecessary and possibly violent conflict) -- except when we, all too often, betray ourselves. The book is full of witty and convincing examples of situations in which the gap between our real but unconscious opinions/intentions and our fake but morally/socially acceptable actions becomes visible.

With all this social poker taking place on a daily basis, it becomes clear that society itself is mainly sustained by lies and deception, from religion through the judicial system to elections -- like a collective hallucination. (Which would really explain why politicians, celebrities, the media, schools, etc can come up with the greatest imaginable nonsense without anyone feeling particularly insulted -- it's just normal, after all.)

Thus, Smith's book may lead to two basic conclusions:
1) Either you are totally honest with yourself (if this were possible at all) and must therefore bluntly and unashamedly lie to others;
2) Or, far more likely, you mostly deceive yourself about your true opinions/intentions, in order to keep the conviction that you can be totally honest with others (just like mum and dad and all the other grown-ups taught us).

In any case, reading Why We Lie might give you some valuable hints about how to go on participating in this farce called life -- and enjoy the brief moments of enlightenment that may follow, once we understand that we are swimming in a sea of fables... starting with our own minds.

I never lie...........2006-07-01

Reading the LA paper tonight on the Star Jones /Barbara Walters lie/truth/lie things....bored.. I was reminded of this book and pulled it from my shelf and reacquainted myself with the text. On some level I thought...is this for real or is it really a lie? No, just lying, I didn't. I really thought about the state of our world, journalism....
Actually what I thought was popular culture is so terrifically difficult for kids, I'm a teacher, to contextualize around the issue of lies or lying. Other reviews here give remarkably good insight into the content of the book. I will tell you why I, a school teacher, enjoyed the book. Practcally I wanted to understand the issue better. It's one thing to find yourself telling white lies to explain that Coach purse you snuck in for yourself for your birthday or participating in something like NCLB which seems embedded in bigger societal lying, but it's another issue altogether understanding the issue in children. From time to time a child perplexes me when using falsity as a coping mechanism,or in a situation where it seems so much a fabric of their particular interface caught between school culture and home culture-creation of lying seeming a way to cope- or simply let's say within my work I need a frame for understanding the issue. It happens I ran into the book at one of those times when a student seemed to use untruth to their own detriment.This was a child with many issues, anorexia, poverty, large family, extremely ill parent and I was feeling so sad both for the child and for how her coping was making it all so much harder. I really didn't get the answers to that child here in regard to that specific incident-seeking out some psych reading/thinking/people in the field later-but I did get a remarkable insight into my simple question(why is this child lying?)as being such a complex part of human development. I found many references and forward sending pointers, it helped me be a better thinker about an issue that is with us every moment. In fact just sitting here I thought how difficult it is to move thought or feeling or experience even of my own working with this issue in school to word, how removed it is from intial experience. As an artist as well as teacher, who then creates work third removed -it begins to be truth several times away from that experience (wasn't that Aristotle?) and yet....who is to say it might not be less the lie more the truth. I once debated that this notion of truth as lie, lie as truth.I know working with the student I often debated whether her inner world wasn't the more real to her and often felt she was too fragile to deal with my dealing with the untruth. The book gives a very good account of deception.. biologic foundation to self deception. I enjoyed it .
I recommend this to all readers. Really.

Know Thy Lying Self.......2006-06-24

David Livingstone Smith presents Why We Lie as a beginning step in the direction of an evolutionary psychology of deception. "Nature is awash with deceit," he claims. He produces many fascinating examples of deceit in nature (jumping spiders, for example) as a survival strategy and points out that "although we claim to value truth above all else, we are also at least dimly aware that there is something antisocial about too much honesty."

Smith gives an evolutionary account that in a nut shell goes as follows. As our evolutionary ancestors began to gather in larger and larger groups, the increasing complexity of group dynamics led to an "arms race between deception and detection [that had] huge implications for the evolution of human intelligence." The advent of language upset the balance between deception and detection and gave a huge advantage to the liar. "Most of us are embarrassingly inept at spotting liars." The problem is that we tend to privilege speech over raw observation, and thereby miss the clues that give the liar away. "Once our ancestors learned to gossip, they could form secret alliances, deceive each other far more effectively about where they stood in relation to other community members, and stab each other in the back."

Under Smith's account "the power to deceive is our main weapon in the struggle for social survival." Self-deception was an adaptation that enabled us to better deceive others. The result for us today? Not so good. "Self-deception has been a wonderful gift, but it is now destroying us. Our taste for it resembles our craving for sugar and animal fat." Further, "the most dangerous forms of self-deception are the collective ones. Patriotism, moral crusades, and religious fervor across nations like plagues, slicing the world into good and evil, defender and aggressor, right and wrong."

Smith's book is, as he admits, thin on evidence and light on research. Even so, it is a quick, easy read with enough interesting insights to nudge the reader a little closer to that ever elusive goal of self-knowledge. After all, shouldn't you know whether, at the most fundamental level, you are a self-deciever? It's worth thinking about.

This could be a lie..........2006-04-23

This could be a lie, but I found this book to be fairly interesting, yet poorly written. The author sometimes writes his opinions as if they are blunt facts. I enjoyed the bits of information on animal behaviour, but again poorly written. There is a lot here to make a more interesting read out of. I really felt sometimes as if I was reading a high school student's extended essay. He did his research, he had some interesting things to think about, he put it together and got a B+ (for a high school student).

This book really has potential. I'd say pull it from the shelves, rewrite it, then resell it. More money for the author and publishers, more fun for more readers.

Regardless, it's a book to be taken with a grain of salt. Enjoy the stories, disregard the opinions.

The Exchange of Truth: Liberating the World from the Lie of Evolution

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A Timely Book

The Exchange of Truth: Liberating the World from the Lie of Evolution
David E Shormann
Manufacturer: iUniverse, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: 0595421776

Book Description

"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness . who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator." Romans 1:18-25

Evolution never happened. The best scientists in the history of the world didn't believe in it, so why should you? Men like Newton, Euler, Galileo, Kepler, Bacon, Kelvin and Faraday believed Scripture and science, God's word and His works, were completely compatible and should be studied together. Then Darwin came along and published On the Origin of Species for the purpose of showing that "species had not been separately created" (Descent of Man, p. 62), exchanging the truth of God for a lie and paving the way for a study of science apart from God.

Evolutionary thinking has taken a tremendous toll on the lives and minds of many, but there is hope. In The Exchange of Truth, Dr. Shormann shows that with a little thought and a basic understanding of genetics and probability, anyone can liberate themselves from evolution's false worldview. Read the book and learn how.

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A Timely Book.......2007-05-19

Dr. Shormann has provided a much needed resource for those who care about the impact of the modern debate over evolution.

The Beast In Sheep's Clothing: Exposing the Lies of Godless Human Science

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The Beast In Sheep's Clothing: Exposing the Lies of Godless Human Science
David Michael Lindsey
Manufacturer: Pelican Publishing Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books

Science & Religion | Religious Studies | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books

General | History & Philosophy | Science | Subjects | Books

General | Europe | Travel | Subjects | Books

General | Travel | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 1589802888

Book Description

This well-researched book expands on the age-old conflict between human science and revealed religion. Both the novice and the scholar will be fascinated with the material here, which links the infamous heroes of human science to the dark side of reality--that is, Satan. The three main topics covered are godless philosophy, Darwinian evolution, and atheistic psychology.

Continuous Cohomology, Discrete Subgroups, and Representations of Reductive Groups (Annals of Mathematics Studies)

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Continuous Cohomology, Discrete Subgroups, and Representations of Reductive Groups (Annals of Mathematics Studies)
Armand Borel
Manufacturer: Princeton Univ Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Mathematics | Science | Subjects | Books

Book Description

It has been nearly twenty years since the first edition of this work. In the intervening years, there has been immense progress in the use of homological algebra to construct admissible representations and in the study of arithmetic groups. This second edition is a corrected and expanded version of the original, which was an important catalyst in the expansion of the field. Besides the fundamental material on cohomology and discrete subgroups present in the first edition, this edition also contains expositions of some of the most important developments of the last two decades.

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Here's proof: Evolution is a lie!
Dennis C Miller
Manufacturer: Louis Waltrous
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

Science & Religion | Religious Studies | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books

General | Evolution | Science | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B0007335M0

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THE LIE EVOLUTION
Ken A. Ham
Manufacturer: Master Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000GJMZD0

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The Lie: Evolution
Ham
Manufacturer: Master Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000JGHRGA

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The Lie: Evolution (( SIGNED ))
Kenneth A. Ham
Manufacturer: Master Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000T6C6W0

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