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God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything
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Average Rating:  out of 811 Reviews
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Price: $24.99
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Sale: $10.49
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Manufacturer: Twelve Books, Hachette Book Group
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EAN (European Article Number): 9780446579803
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Number of Items: 1
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Binding: Hardcover
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Author: Christopher Hitchens
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Publisher: Twelve Books, Hachette Book Group
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Dewey Decimal Number: 200
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Publication Date: 2007-05-01
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Reading Level: 307
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Description: In the tradition of Bertrand Russell's Why I Am Not a Christian and Sam Harris's recent bestseller, The End of Faith, Christopher Hitchens makes the ultimate case
against religion. With a close and erudite reading of the major religious texts, he documents the ways in which religion is a man-made wish, a cause of dangerous sexual repression, and a distortion of our origins in the cosmos. With eloquent clarity, Hitchens frames the argument for a more secular life based on science and
reason, in which hell is replaced by the Hubble Telescope's awesome view of the universe, and Moses and the burning bush give way to the beauty and symmetry
of the double helix.
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Customer Reviews
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Review Summary: reads more like 'WHY I DONT LIKE RELIGION' |
Date: 2008-12-14 |
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Details: It goes on for 300 pages.Some of the oldest philosophies are HINDU/BUDDIST.He offers 8 pages of text ovet 9 pages of the book and while he may have a publishing deal/best seller[s] HE DOESNT GET THOSE 2 RELIGIONS!
He also doesnt seem to know much of the real history of the dreaded UNITED NATIONS.
Atheism is a belief system.It might have better to offer than this.
HE ATTEMPTS TO TAKE 6000? YEARS OF HINDUISM AND REDUCE IT TO 'OSHO'...the druggie with rajnesshpurim in oregon and the 100? rolls royces. |
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Review Summary: A 101 for the beginner atheist |
Date: 2008-12-10 |
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Details: After reading Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion last year, I wanted to give a few other atheist manifestos a read - not really with the intent of learning anything particularly new, but just out of interest in the different views. Dawkins' was heavily scientific, to be expected from a scientist, so I assumed - rightly - that Hitchens' would lean more towards the historical and philosophical. Although there's nothing new or particularly inspiring here, he does have a way with words and uses his sharp wit to deliver a rain of relatively gentle blows upon the shoulders of the worst aspects of religion.
As mentioned there wasn't really anything ground-breaking for the well-informed atheist, but it's a decent read for anyone newly interested in the discourse on religion and its significance in today's world, and provides a little 101 on some of religion's more illustrious moments in history. He does make some very salient, always-worth-repeating points about the fact that true morality and good deeds come from the heart and have nothing whatsoever to do with any religion, and vice versa.
I got a little bored with the conversation on fascism and communism, but again I think that's because it's old, oft-treaded ground already. Hitchens does not mince words when it comes to calling out certain world leaders and icons, past and present, for their participation in and proliferation of some of religion's more irresponsible consequences. Even those who are traditionally left out of other atheists' rants are not spared here, including the Dalai Lama, St. Francis, Mother Theresa and Gandhi, in a list of those who have manipulated masses of people in ways that, in Hitchens' view, did almost as much harm as good. In his conclusion, he states unequivocally that in today's educated, enlightened world religion truly has no further justification for itself, and that indeed, in some of its more fanatical manifestations is actually an enemy to be fought by the intelligent, rational and genuinely ethical. He repeats a famous quote by Spanish painter Francisco de Goya to illustrate the need to think first, then believe: "The sleep of reason breeds monsters," ("El sueno de la razon produce monstrous.") - always a worthy point, if rarely taken.
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Review Summary: Disappointed with Delivery |
Date: 2008-12-08 |
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Details: As an Atheist familiar also with the works of Harris and Dawkins, I found Hitchens attempt to be quite disappointing in comparison. The primary problem was not content but in his organization and delivery. He writes they way you would expect a journalist... the longer book format doesn't work for him. I reread some of Dawkins' just to make sure my memory wasn't faulty, and it was clear that Dawkins' style is much better organized and coherent. Hitchens seems to jump all over the place. I also didn't like that the endnotes were not marked in the text. I like his magazine work... He should stick to it. |
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Review Summary: don't be put off by the title |
Date: 2008-12-08 |
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Details: I would have preferred to give a 3.5...
I don't like the title, its cumbersome and a little um, fierce. That being said, I do agree with the title, just not sure it should be the title. I liked this book; its one of the easier reads of the atheist/anti religion books that have come out in the last couple of years. The points I appreciated the most: religious indoctrination of children is abuse, there is no "eastern" solution, religion doesn't make people behave better.
I would have liked to see a greater exploration of a few things, for example the child abuse idea.
There were a few places in the book that it seemed the writer was so pissed he got a little off topic and stopped making sense for a moment. However, I am glad that he let his ire show, I have a lot of that myself and get really tired of all this tiptoeing around out or respect for people's beliefs when the beliefs are so patently false and harmful. |
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Review Summary: Clarifies one's thoughts... |
Date: 2008-12-07 |
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Details: If it's sound ideas you're after, God is Not Great has more than can be absorbed in a single read-through.
I'm persuaded by God is Not Great that any good that religion might accomplish can be better achieved without religion and, conversely, the worst evils will arise from religious belief, as they always have.
Hitchens strengthens my view of faith as a barrier to clear thinking. It was refreshing to see his clinical treatment of religion in America, something Americans can't seem to do. The Mormons are one of his examples. Few in the US have the nerve to discuss Joseph Smith as the sexual predator and con man that historical records show him to be, or to analyze the timely "revelations" that have kept the Mormons clinging to the fringes of viability through the years.
The Mormons are only one of Hitchens' examples of how fast a religion can spring from a fertile mind and spread to infect millions. He makes a good case that we in America are uniquely susceptible to such charlatans (although England's new relationship with Islam would make equally fascinating reading).
All major and many minor religions receive the same treatment to which the Mormons are subjected. Many iconic figures are made simply human again before the end of the book. I think I'll be very cautious in the future before I elevate a person to too high a pedestal.
Those who are irreligious, religious merely out of habit, or are observant due to a failure of introspection, will obviously be the ones to embrace the rationale of 'God is Not Great' most readily.
The grimly devout will probably respond to Hitchens' ideas with their usual vitriol. They may rightly sense the fatal threat that rational treatment of religious thinking poses to their personal brand of god.
I ended the book seeing that we're currently in a bit of a Dark Age, again, thanks to religion. We likely won't enjoy a new Enlightenment until the majority see blind faith and religious thinking as the human invention that it is. Then, the devout minority will be relegated to the same status as conspiracy theorists, UFO seekers and witch doctors. |
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