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24 books with the same feel
Include books by the same authorThe God Delusion
Richard Dawkins · 416 pages
Publication Date: January 16, 2008 A preeminent scientist—and the world's most prominent atheist—asserts the irrationality of belief in God and the grievous harm religion has inflicted on society, from the Crusades to 9/11. With rigor and wit, Dawkins examines God in all his forms, from the sex-obsessed tyrant of the Old Testament to the more benign (but still illogical) Celestial Watchmaker f
Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon
Daniel C. Dennett · 448 pages
For all the thousands of books that have been written about religion, few until this one have attempted to examine it scientifically: to ask why—and how—it has shaped so many lives so strongly. Is religion a product of blind evolutionary instinct or rational choice? Is it truly the best way to live a moral life? Ranging through biology, history, and psychology, Daniel C. Dennett charts religion's
The Evolution of God
Robert Wright · 567 pages
In this sweeping narrative that takes us from the Stone Age to the Information Age, Robert Wright unveils a hidden pattern that the great monotheistic faiths have followed as they have evolved. Through the prisms of archaeology, theology, and evolutionary psychology, Wright's findings overturn basic assumptions about Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and are sure to cause controversy. He explains
Religion Explained: The Evolutionary Origins of Religious Thought
Pascal Boyer · 430 pages
Formerly at Princeton, King's College, Cambridge and the University of Lyon, Pascal Boyer is Professor of Anthropology at Washington University in St Louis, MissouriWhile human religious practice and belief are extraordinarily varied, they are nevertheless not infinitely so. The varieties of belief have provided generations of anthropologists and religious scholars with material for research; ther
The Meaning of Human Existence
Edward O. Wilson · 207 pages
How did humanity originate and why does a species like ours exist on this planet? Do we have a special place, even a destiny in the universe? Where are we going, and perhaps, the most difficult question of all, "Why?" In The Meaning of Human Existence, his most philosophical work to date, Pulitzer Prize–winning biologist Edward O. Wilson grapples with these and other existential questions, examini
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
Yuval Noah Harari · 456 pages
From a renowned historian comes a groundbreaking narrative of humanity’s creation and evolution—a #1 international bestseller—that explores the ways in which biology and history have defined us and enhanced our understanding of what it means to be “human.” One hundred thousand years ago, at least six different species of humans inhabited Earth. Yet today there is only one—homo sapiens. What hap
The Bonobo and the Atheist: In Search of Humanism Among the Primates
Frans de Waal · 304 pages
A renowned primatologist argues that ethical behavior witnessed in animals is the evolutionary and biological origin of human fairness and explains that morality has more to do with natural instincts than with religion.
Religion and Science
Bertrand Russell · 255 pages
"In this timely work, Russell, philosopher, agnostic, mathematician, and renowned peace advocate, offers a brief yet insightful study of the conflicts between science and traditional religion during the last four centuries. Examining accounts in which scientific advances clashed with Christian doctrine or biblical interpretations of the day, from Galileo and the Copernican Revolution, to the medi
The Devil's Delusion: Atheism and Its Scientific Pretensions
David Berlinski · 230 pages
A secular Jew, Berlinski delivers a biting defense of religous thought. An acclaimed author who has spent his career writing about mathematics and the seciences, he turns the scientific community's cherished skepticism back on itself, daring to ask and answer some rather embarrassing questions. -- Dust jacket.
The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick
Philip K. Dick · 1,000 pages
"'A great and calamitous sequence of arguments with the universe: poignant, terrifying, ludicrous, and brilliant. The Exegesis is the sort of book associated with legends and madmen, but Dick wasn't a legend and he wasn't mad. He lived among us, and was a genius.'--Jonathan Lethem. Based on thousands of pages of typed and handwritten notes, journal entries, letters, and story sketches, The Exeges
Living the Secular Life: New Answers to Old Questions
Phil Zuckerman · 276 pages
Over the last twenty-five years, "no religion" has become the fastest-growing religion in the United States. Around the world, hundreds of millions of people have turned away from the traditional faiths of the past and embraced a moral yet nonreligious--or secular--life, generating societies vastly less religious than at any other time in human history. Revealing the inspiring beliefs that empower
The Belief Instinct: The Psychology of Souls, Destiny, and the Meaning of Life
Jesse Bering · 262 pages
An evolutionary psychologist examines humans' belief in God and argues that it evolved in the species as an "adaptive illusion" that originally had an evolutionary purpose, now outdated, that ensured the survival of the human race.
The Te of Piglet
Benjamin Hoff · 257 pages
The author and the characters from the Pooh books engage in dialogue elucidating the Taoist principle of Te, the Way of the Small.
Why There Is No God: Simple Responses to 20 Common Arguments for the Existence of God
Armin Navabi · 128 pages
The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Nonbeliever
Christopher Hitchens · 499 pages
Presents excerpts on the subject of religion from the writings of such notable non-believers as John Stuart Mill, Karl Marx, Charles Darwin, Mark Twain, H. L. Mencken, Albert Einstein, Richard Dawkins, and Salman Rushdie.
The Future of an Illusion
Sigmund Freud · 95 pages
In what is considered one of his greatest contributions to psychology, Austrian psychiatrist, Sigmund Freud describes his perspectives on the development and origins of religion - religion as an illusion, wishes that are the "fulfillments of the oldest, strongest, and most urgent wishes of mankind." He goes on to explain and illustrate, "what is characteristic of illusions is that they are derived
Doubt: A History: The Great Doubters and Their Legacy of Innovation from Socrates and Jesus to Thomas Jefferson and Emily Dickinson
Jennifer Michael Hecht · 551 pages
Cloud-hidden, Whereabouts Unknown
Alan W. Watts · 185 pages
How (Not) to Be Secular: Reading Charles Taylor
James K.A. Smith · 160 pages
This book is a smart, intelligent guide to navigating today's culture. How (Not) to Be Secular is what Jamie Smith calls "your hitchhiker's guide to the present." It is both a reading guide to Charles Taylor's monumental work A Secular Age and philosophical guidance on how we might learn to live in our times. Taylor's landmark book A Secular Age (2007) provides a monumental, incisive analysis of w
Reason, Faith, and Revolution: Reflections on the God Debate
Terry Eagleton · 185 pages
Being Different: An Indian Challenge to Western Universalism
Rajiv Malhotra · 488 pages
"India is more than a nation state. It is also a unique civilization with philosophies and cosmologies that are markedly distinct from the dominant culture of our times -- the West. India's spiritual traditions spring from dharma which has no exact equivalent in Western frameworks...Rajiv Malhotra addresses the challenge of a direct and honest engagement on differences, by reversing the gaze, repo