The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason
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- ISBN13: 9780393327656
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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, on the right side….Harris writes what a sizable number of us reflect, but few are willing to say.” This vital and timely book delivers a startling analysis of the clash of faith and reason in today’s world. Harris offers a plain past tour of mankind’s willingness to suspend reason in favor of religious beliefs, even when persons 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 right 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. .Amazon.com Review
Sam Harris cranks out blunt, hard-arresting chapters to make his case for why faith itself is the most treacherous 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.
Fascinatingly, Harris is not just all ears on debunking religious faith, though he makes his compelling opinion with verve and intellectual clarity. The End of Faith is also a bit of a philosophical Swiss Army knife. Once he has open his opinion on why, in an age of Weapons of Mass Destruction, belief is now a hazard of fantastic proportions, he focuses on proposing alternate approaches to the mysteries of life. Harris recognizes the truth of the human condition, that we dread death, and we regularly pine for “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 (but the rich Bibliography provides more than enough background for an intrigued reader to follow up for months on any particular strand of the leader’ 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 being to another, it loses its sting and finality. Harris pointedly questions us to consider that persons who do not dread death for themselves, and who also revere very 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
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By Sam Harris
The book by Sam Harris starts with a excellent observation that atheism is an impediment to a career in politics. Most people in the USA judge in the being of God. For that matter, most people around the world judge in the being of God. The Bible says,’the fool hath said in his heart that there is no God’. The book of ROmans tells us that by observing scenery we know that there is a Creator of all things. And most people around the world, thus, convinced of the being of God. Right, John Locke, the father of evidentialism also judge that atheism is stupid. In fact the miracle reported in the Gospels is the perfect case of evidentialism for the authenticity of the Christian Gospel and its trustworthiness. But, sorry to say, David Hume used the same evidentialism to argue against Christianity. But we shall realize that the resurrection of Jesus is a past fact and that lays the strongest foundation for the being of God. Now let me deal with each of the ten myths the writer discussed.
1) Atheists judge that life is having no effect.
I agree that atheists can find some sort of meaning to their lives. But what difference does it make to your life whether you live a meaningful or having no effect life since at the end all you got is distengration of the molecules of your body into the grave. From atheistic perspective Hitler and Mother Theresa both had their molecules disappeared into the ground and had the same fate. But the life of Mother Theresa is only meaningful if God exists because evil must be punished and excellent must be rewarded and that is what most people in the world wish.
2) Atheism is reliable for the greatest crimes in human history.
You can argue that concentration camps and gulap fields are not due to atheism but due to political factors. We can use same argument to dismiss the charge against Christianity as the cause of crusades. Crusades have more to do with political factors of Europe than with the teachings of Lord Jesus who taught to like your enemies permanently.
The history of twentieth century alone proves that Godless atheists killed more people than the faithful. Besides, their killings are in accordance with the worldviews they espoused. Karl Marx, an avowed atheist, wrote in Das Kapital that violence is inevitable as we go from one achievement of communism to the additional. Most atheists with bloody hands also believed in Darwinian doctrine of survival of the fittest. There is no God to question us accountability. We are the strongest and we could eliminate the week for the progress of human race. Excellent, that is why Marx wanted to dedicate his Das Kapital to Darwin, though Darwin rejected his request.
On the additional hand violence done by Christians is radically contradictory to the teachings of Christ and encourages us to look to Christ, not at Christians.
3) Atheism is dogmatic.
As the historian Stephen Henry Roberts (1901-71) once said: “I contend that we are both atheists. I just judge in one fewer god than you do. When you know why you dismiss all the additional possible gods, you will know why I dismiss yours.” GOod, but if Jesus is the only way to heaven and if that is right, having no way is as terrible as having many fake ways. The authenticy of Bible is proved historically, archaeologically and philosophically than any additional book of very ancient times.
4) Atheists reflect everything in the universe arose by chance.
Atheists might add natural selection to chance. But does natural selection have some sort of intelligence to direct the evolution? More than 99 percent of mutations are harmful for the organism and you are betting on one percent to carry the evolution in the forwards direction? Try reaching your goal with 99 people arresting you backwards while only one person pushing you forwards. There is no scientific evidence to Darwinism. It is a myth with no scientific credibility and deserves to be removed from our public schools.
It seems that Richard Dawkins became some sort of prophet to atheism. But let us not forget that fantastic scientists of modern science how customary the pillars of modern science like Isaach Newton, Tycho Brahe, Robert Boyle, Carl Linnaeus, Francis Bacon, Mendel, George Cuvier etc were not only believers in God but staunch Christians. Who cares what lilliput scientists like Dawkins judge about God?
5) Atheism has no tie to science.
90 percent of all-purpose public judge in God while same percentage of scientists donot judge. That is the sort of impunity the atheists have towards all-purpose public. A smart scientist does not mean He has common sense to judge in God. These smart scientists who had no God were the ones who did living experiments on Jewish children during holocause on the basis of doing excellent to humanity.
6) Atheists are arrogant.
Arrogance has nothing to do with truth. You can be humble and incorrect while your national is arrogant and right.
7) Atheists are clogged to spiritual experience.
Atheist can have spiritual experience. Buddha, who did not any belief in a personal God, ongoing his faith in a spiritual tradition. But that spiritualism is subjective and convenient. No marvel, most Hollywood celebrities left Absolutist Christian GOd to judge in Buddha who leaves you to live by your own rules. What the atheist really wants is not intellectual freedom, but moral freedom. Spirituality lacking a God who gave us Ten Commandments is fine with atheists.
The naturalism offers no hope beyond the grave. Life according to naturalism is an manufacturing accident and trivial in the long tree of evolution. Only God can give us a right meaning to this life and life beyond.
9) Atheists snub the fact that religion is extremely beneficial to society.
Christianity does not teach us that we should help the poor out of our desire to get rewards from God. The Bible tells us that we are made in the image of God and when we see our suffering neighbors who are made in the image of God we are obliged to help them for ‘who’ they are, not ‘what’ we get. The best goodhearted organizations like Red Cross and Salvation Army were ongoing by Christians, not atheist. Bill Gates and Warren Buffet, the largest contributors to the philanthrophy adhere to Christianity, not to atheism.
10) Atheism provides no basis for morality.
THe leader contended that Bible condoned slavery. But, first what sort of slavery the Bible condoned. Read the Torah carefully and you will learn the rules God laid on the masters on how to treat their slaves. We should realize what sort of relationship God prescribed between masters and their slaves. We should not be confounded by simply looking at words like ’slavery’. In one sense, we are all slaves to the government, but we know what sort of relationship exists between us and our government.
When the slave practice went against the teachings of Christ and Bible, the Christians ongoing the abolition movement. Fantastic abolitionists like Abraham Lincoln, William WIlberforce, John Brown, Frederick Douglass were Christians, not atheist. Let us not forget that Martin Luther King Jr. was a Baptist minister thumping his Bible, not a biology atheist professor thumping Origin of Species.
Conclusion: Atheism is stupid, Christianity is intelligent and reasonable.
Reader’s Rating: 2 / 5
What religion caused the most deaths in the last 100 years ?
Atheism.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5