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Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Book: The End of Faith
For the past several days I have been devouring Sam Harris’ The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason. I found out about this book through a review online and subsequently discovered that he’s been making the rounds promoting the book, which came out last year. I am impressed and humbled by the level on which Harris discusses the problem of religion and its detrimental effects on society; he’s not simply another ranting atheist out to remove every Ten Commandments monument in the United States. Rather, he logically and rationally dissects the problem of religion and many of its social implications. Miraculously (I know...) he manages to achieve this by not coming across as offensive to people of faith (as far as I can tell). I’m not quite half way through the book and I can already tell this is easily one of the best contemporary refutations of religious belief that I have come across. Harris argues that reason is being sacrificed for unfounded belief structures that have shown time and time again to be more harmful to society than most people realize. This is the book I’ve been waiting for. Not so I can blindly recite Harris’ theses when arguing with a Christian (or a Muslim or a Jew) but so I can have a better understanding of what it means to embrace reason and reject religion. I highly recommend it to both atheist and faithful alike. Full review to come.
The End of Faith/Sam Harris website
Posted by Will at July 27, 2005 12:43 AM in Books