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Title: How We Believe : Science, Skepticism, and the Search for God (second edition) by Michael Shermer ISBN: 0-8050-7479-1 Publisher: Owl Books Pub. Date: 01 October, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.52 (44 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: Does This Book Really Answer The Question
Comment: To me the title of this book suggested a treatise essentially on the psychology of belief systems. Indeed we are presented with quite interesting material in this regard. Mr. Schermer uses the fields of psychology, evolutionary biology, sociology, philosophy, and anthropology, amongst others, to help explain belief systems.
While I found that almost all the book held my interest, it seemed somewhat disjointed. Some of the material is also quite controversial. While such matters only serve to entertain me, others may get offended - Christians may take umbrage at having their beliefs repeatedly referred to as "myths".
The book presents intriguing survey results on why people believe in God. What is most fascinating is that respondents felt that other people believe in God for reasons that differ considerably from their own. Shermer moves on into a discussion of evolutionary biology and a "belief module" (more controversy). Then, surprisingly, we move into a section concerned with traditional philosophical arguments (primarily those of Thomas Aquinas) for belief in God. When you get right down to it, no one embraces religious belief purely on the basis of philosophical arguments. Creationists will be offended by a section on their beliefs. A chunk of the book is given to the Indian Ghost Dance of the 1890s, and we read a discussion on a mathematical refutation of the recent best seller The Bible Code. Good stuff, but its like reading a collection of essays that are not often obviously related to each other.
The final chapter had me scratching my head the most. It's a section discussing the controversy surrounding Stephen Jay Gould's theories of evolution regarding necessity/contingency/chance. While poring through this I kept wondering what it had to do with religion. My question was never answered satisfactorily. Shermer forces this subject into a paean to the wonders of living in a contingent universe. He states that his abandonment of religion allows him to bask in the beauty of our magnificent universe. I get annoyed with concept that if you are religious you can't appreciate science and nature. Not every religious believer is constrained by fundamentalist young earth/intelligent design theories. I am an agnostic who was brought up a Catholic. My intense curiosity and admiration of nature was as strong when I was a believer as it is as a non-believer today.
Rating: 5
Summary: Why We Cannot Know God
Comment: As in his Why People Believe Weird Things, Michael Shermer makes it clear that people who believe in God are not stupid. He breaks important ground by making a home for two types who have been lately rejected by the mainstreams of Skepticism and Religion: those who believe in God even though they know that they cannot prove God's existence empirically; and those who simply refuse to answer the question.
Shermer makes an excellent case for an alternative form of Skepticism with this book, based on the premise that if there is a God, He/She/It is of such a character as to be beyond human knowing. God, Shermer reminds us, is supposed to be omniscient (all-knowing), omnipresent (present everywhere), and omni-potent (all-powerful). We human beings are none of these things: so how can any of us claim to be certain of this other beings existence or nonexistence?
It is a premise which will make those who want empircal proof for their beliefs unhappy: neither the Creationist or the Atheist will be satisfied with Shermer's formula. Yet, I think, that thinking people of spirit and nonspirit will appreciate Shermer's liberating observations. He is consciously trying to create a world-view about religion for the coming millenium and, I dare say, his is the most realistic and sensible that I have seen so far.
From this beginning, Shermer goes on to discuss the human creation of religion, an artifact which is separate from the question of whether or not God exists. Shermer contends that we humans are, by the grace of natural selection, pattern-seeking animals. Religion is an attempt by us to make sense of the chaos and the uncertainty which is always there. He concludes his discussion by establishing his view as an independent theory of religion, offering it to religious scholars and others who are seeking a common-sense position about the way we believe.
The concluding section, about the theory of Evolution and its relationship to issues of modern faith, has been cited by some as superfluous and out of keeping with the rest of the book. I contend, however, that it is a logical conclusion to Shermer's epistemology given that nowhere has the conflict between the Godless and the God-inspired been so evident as it has been in this debate. Shermer pulls evolution and Science as a whole out of the political void created by this conflict and sets it where it rightly belongs: as an objective, well-grounded explanation of the fossil evidence which does not tell us a thing about whether or not God exists. This question, Shermer believes, cannot be answered by we mere humans. We are best served by realizing our limitations, he concludes, and accepting empirical Truth as limited to what we can find out with our own senses.
It was appropriate that this book appeared in the first month of the year 2000. It is a book to guide epistemological debate in the next millenium.
Rating: 5
Summary: Kudos for Shermer
Comment: I have just been introduced to Shermer's work. I think he is a beaon for clear and critical thinking. We need more like him in this world ruled by religious bigotry and irrationalism.
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Title: The Science of Good and Evil: Why People Cheat, Gossip, Care, Share, and Follow the Golden Rule by Michael Shermer ISBN: 0805075208 Publisher: Times Books Pub. Date: 02 February, 2004 List Price(USD): $26.00 |
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Title: Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of Our Time by Michael Shermer ISBN: 0805070893 Publisher: Owl Books Pub. Date: 01 September, 2002 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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Title: The Borderlands of Science: Where Sense Meets Nonsense by Michael Shermer ISBN: 0195143264 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 March, 2001 List Price(USD): $27.50 |
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Title: Religion Explained: The Evolutionary Origins of Religious Thought by Pascal Boyer ISBN: 0465006965 Publisher: Basic Books Pub. Date: 30 April, 2002 List Price(USD): $17.50 |
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Title: The Demon-Haunted World: Science As a Candle in the Dark by Carl Sagan ISBN: 0345409469 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 01 March, 1997 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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