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Title: The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason
ISBN: 0393327655
Author:
Sam Harris
Publicate Date: 2005-10-10
Publish: 2005-10-10
List Price: $13.95
Average Customer Rating: 4.0
Format: Paperback
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $7.36
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1: Imagine no religion....
Is religion the bane of all existence or the only thing that gives life purpose? As a matter of popular opinion, the latter seems the more likely answer, but is that really correct. Certainly, in recent years--likely because of the rise of the "religious right" in the U.S.--faith has played a more significant role in politics than it has in previous decades. It would be expected that there would be a backlash to this resurgence, and Sam Harris's book The End of Faith is on the forefront of this backlash.
The general thesis of The End of Faith is that religion is bad. Whether God exists or doesn't is almost superfluous to Harris; the more important issue is that all organized faiths cause more harm than good, and in fact, and benefits from religion--such as ethics--can also be derived from other sources.
Although "religion" in general is attacked by Harris, there are two faiths that are particularly derided. Islam is the faith that Harris is most critical of, with its declarations of violence (and glorification of martyrdom) that are hard to avoid and that are used to justify all sorts of murder. Christianity doesn't fare much better, with a history that includes witch hunts and Inquisitions and even today has some dubious practices. On the other hand, Eastern religions come off more lightly, probably they have a philosophical and spiritual basis that Harris can relate to.
You'd think that so-called fundamentalists would be the villains of Harris's book, and they are, but not the biggest ones. The worst people are the "moderates" who don't embrace the worst aspects of their religion but tolerate those extremists. It's these moderates who also offer hope of a better world, but only if they get off the fence and condemn the fanatics.
Religion, to Harris, is an ancient, irrational concept that should be discarded like other superstitions like alchemy or phrenology. Harris makes good, well-argued points, but he is no doubt preaching to the choir: the very religious are unlikely to shed their beliefs after reading this book (of course, I doubt Harris would expect them to change; if the religious are irrational, they will not listen to his appeal for reason). On the other hand, there may be some more moderate people who can learn from his book that tolerance of extremism can be as damaging as the extremism itself.
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2: Valuable Incoherency
The End of Faith is one of a growing number of books that are taking effective counter-punches against religion based lunacy in the world. In this erratically researched book, Sam Harris is at his best when he is revealing underknown facts about the brutal, dehumanizing, and devastating effects that organized religion, particularly the people of Abraham (Jews, Christians, Muslims)have often had on the human pursuits of life, liberty, happiness, and knowledge. Though Dawkins, Hitchens, and others are doing their best to bring inquiring minds up to speed fast, there is no doubt whatsoever that the general public is underinformed about the detrimental aspects of organized religion, and vastly overinformed about highly doubtful benefits of same. No intelligent discourse about the future role of religion in human life can be held when there has been such a whoppingly lopsided bias towards faith as a basis of government and policy; Harris' book goes a long way towards allowing informed debate to take place.
That said, this is an oddly incoherent book. It starts out detailing the abuses of the Inquisition (impressive!), moves towards an emotionally charged, less well researched, and (I suspect) fear-based editorializing about the Great Satan of all religions (from Harris' point of view): the Muslim faith. Harris' discussion of Islam veers from descriptive to invective, and never lets up. Though he mentions a few Islamic apologists, he does so in the same way that Dr. Evil, in the Austin Powers movies, talks to his teenage son Scott: Zip it! Zip it! Zip it!.
Harris' discussion about terrorism is right at the level of luminaries like Rush Limbaugh, Donald Rumsfeld, and our esteemed George Bush, taking an analytical line that I would call sneer, fear, and smear.
Finally, Harris veers into an inconsistently informed discussion of what constitutes consciousness in humans, and attempts to resurrect a type of spirituality that lauds meditation and the loss of the concept of self. Whatever sense of peace his new spirituality gives him, it doesn't prevent Harris from routinely exploding into lizard brain rage on the topic of Islam.
My own take is that the book took a swing and a miss at what impedes human progress. Blindly held beliefs, be they religious or otherwise, result in human catastrophe. The largest human killings in history were perpetrated by secular leaders (Stalin's 10 million deaths, Mao Zedong's 80 million deaths, Pol Pots Killing Fields). Harris' disingenuous response to these facts simply overlooks the fact that DOGMA, uncritically held and revered, religious or secular, results in horrendous grief for this barely sane human race.
The overall effect of wading through The End of Faith, a book that is more a collection of essays than a coherent approach to a topic, is like eating a delicious bread pudding and repeatedly encountering jarring bits of walnut shells or olive pits. It has definite nutritional value, but take care not to choke or break a tooth on the junk in the mix.
Finally, get the paperback version, Harris has included a very valuable update to FAQ's and challenges regarding the hardcover edition.
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3: Be wary of some of those who are on your side.
As others have said, this book suffers from the "destroy the village in order to save it" mentality that mirrors the attitudes of Harris' religious adversaries. He can rationalize his reverse intolerance any way he likes, but that's what it is.
Like it or not, we secular humanists gain nothing by adopting the narrow tactics of religious extremists in responding to them. One makes common cause with one's ideological opponents as best one can---and sometimes that can't be done when the gulf is too wide. And sometimes it can. And that's how the world works.
Diatribes like Harris' are, at best, distractions from trying to find those places of common accord, and a humanist jihad is NOT what secular humanists should be aspiring to.
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4: Stick with Daniel Dennet or Richard Dawkins
This is probably one of the worst books ever written on the subject of atheisim and the end of religious faith. Harris should be taken to task on a number of issues, one, which cannot be overlooked, is his simplistic view on torture as necessary to secure vital information...Has Harris not been paying attention to the Iraq War in particular Abu Ghirab? Has he not read anything by Chalmers Johnson-someone who is more experinced than he is-on the subject of torture and information.
The other area of diagreement should be evident from Harris suggesting that people are becoming more rational and are leaving churches and religious beliefs behind them-Harris believes this is true in any religion but his own spirituality. He has consistently praised Buddhism and Hinduism while at the same time he has critised Christian teachings..I mean, I am an atheist, but this is just beyond the pale of rationality. So readers, stay with Daniel Dennett or Richard Dawkins.
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5: God is Dead (Again)
Often bracketed with "The God Delusion", this is a better book, though fuzzy, loosely argued and (I'm guessing) hastily written. At least Harris is intelligent and open-minded enough to see the rationale of Buddhist spiritual practice: one more intuitive leap and he might understand what religion, the Sacred, has meant to the majority of the human race.
Shame he wastes so much space on fashionable but silly anti-Muslim tirades. The reader should try going through and replacing the word "Muslim" with "Jew", and "Islam" with "Judaism", and see if it still looks acceptable, or even printable. Yet the Hebrew Bible contains at least as many exhortations to violence as the Qur`an; and Jews were "terrorists" too until they achieved their political objectives (anyone remember?) Harris never stops to wonder Why people adopt extreme beliefs: dismissing your opponents as stupid or brainwashed is a game anyone can play, and too easy to be much fun.
Muslim compose one quarter of the world's population. It is well-known that in North America and Europe there are hateful, violent White Supremacist, racist, Fascist and neo-Nazi groups. No-one ever thinks to judge all Westerners on this basis. Why then are we so strongly encouraged to vilify all Muslims because of similar minorities?
Harris should devote a couple of months to reading the Muslim saints and sages: R??m??, `Att??r, San??'??, Sa`d??, J??m??, Suhraward??, Shabistar??, `Ir??q??, Ibn `Arab??, Ibn al-F??rid, al-Hall??j, al-Makk??, Ibn `Ata'ill??h, etc, etc, etc. The Islamic tradition is second to none, its spiritual writings astonishing in quantity and quality, uniquely poetic and life-affirming. But Buddhism should already have taught him that beliefs based on fear and hatred are always wrong.
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