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Our selection of books and associated reviews. Each cover is an affiliate link to Amazon for purchase.
A Drop of Reason: Essays from the Secular Web
In 1995, the Secular Web made its debut online with the goal of promoting a naturalist view of reality, without recourse to God or gods or any supernatural realm. Now, thirty years on, the site is still going strong, and during that period it has assembled an impressive collection of scholarly essays from contributors. Now, to commemorate the site's 30th anniversary, we have assembled a number of those essays in book form: A Drop of Reason. Please enjoy this stellar collection of critical thinking.
Where did Everything Come From? A Short Philosophy Novel for Kids (Starring Billy and Bee, Who are Blue and Green)
Join young Billy and Beatrice, squabbling siblings, as they visit imaginary neighborhoods in different time periods, and even blast off into outer space! Engaging with oddball characters like Mr. Whom (a balloon), Mr. Sour Hour (a vulture) and Mr. Darwinkle (a bearded moose), they come to grips with Big Questions, like the nature of God, time, evolution, death, and the biggest question of all: where did everything come from?
Heterodox Hymns: Three Poets, One Purpose
The following works are from three writers who are members of the Internet Infidels Discussion Board (IIDB), which, in affiliation with the Secular Web, promotes a naturalistic world view, free of God or gods and the supernatural. The works in the main are in keeping with the basic idea of metaphysical or methodological naturalism, and the idea that ultimately we are responsible for our own lives, and not beholden to some eye in the sky always watching and judging us.
Killing History: Jesus in the No-Spin Zone
Description Killing Jesus, the bestselling blockbuster by Bill O’Reilly, claims to be a purely historical account of the events in the life of Jesus leading up to his crucifixion. New Testament scholar Robert M. Price (a member of the Jesus Seminar) shows how unfounded this claim is in this critical review of O’Reilly’s work. In […]
God’s Gravediggers: Why No Deity Exists
Description Raymond Bradley is probably the most important atheist you’ve never heard of. 16 years before the release of Richard Dawkin’s The Selfish Gene, Professor Bradley was completing his Ph.D. regarding the theological problem of free will, setting off a long, esteemed and distinguished career. As a veteran professor of philosophy back in 1994–long before […]
The Bad Jesus: The Ethics of New Testament Ethics
Description Did Jesus ever do anything wrong? Judging by the vast majority of books on New Testament ethics, the answer is a resounding “No.” But since the historical Jesus was a human being, must he not have had flaws, like everyone else? According to Avalos, it shows that New Testament ethics is still primarily an […]
The Bible Against Itself: Why the Bible Seems to Contradict Itself
Description All books are written for or against some point of view, and the books of the Bible are no different. Bible book authors were often motivated to write because they wanted to challenge or correct those who had written before them. As Helms explains, The Bible is a war zone, and its authors are […]
What If I’m an Atheist?: A Teen’s Guide to Exploring a Life Without Religion
Description Can you have guidance without God? This thoughtful, one-of-a-kind guide offers answers to all of your questions about atheism and nonbelief. Have you ever wondered what religion and belief mean for your life? Maybe you believe in nothing at all. Does that mean you’re an atheist? What does atheism even mean? Regardless of the […]
God or Godless? One Atheist. One Christian. Twenty Controversial Questions
Description Perhaps the most persistent question in human history is whether or not there is a God. Intelligent people on both sides of the issue have argued, sometimes with deep rancor and bitterness, for generations. The issue can’t be decided by another apologetics book, but the conversation can continue and help each side understand the […]
50 Simple Questions for Every Christian
Description Written in a respectful and conversational style, this unique book is designed to promote constructive dialogue and foster mutual understanding between Christians and non-Christians. The author, a skeptic and journalist, asks basic questions about Christian belief. What is the born-again experience? Why would God want to sacrifice his only son for the world? Do […]
Doubting Jesus’ Resurrection: What Happened in the Black Box? (2nd Edition)
In this outline of what may have given rise to the beliefs and traditions in 1 Corinthians 15:3-7 if Jesus did not rise from the dead, Kris D. Komarnitsky explains why using these verses to support the historical reliability of the Gospels is problematic.
Atheist Universe: The Thinking Person’s Answer to Christian Fundamentalism
New Expanded Edition The world’s best-selling book on atheism just got better. Building upon two years of voluminous reader feedback, David Mills has just revised and expanded Atheist Universe to include all the latest arguments and debate, including detailed rebuttals to the newest Christian books on “Intelligent Design.” The New Edition (published August 28, 2006, […]
Sword of Islam: Muslim Extremists from the Arab Conquests to the Attack on America
Undoubtedly timely and full of fascinating detail, Sword of Islam is a thorough, well-researched, and revealing account of global Islamic terrorism. A military historian, John F. Murphy Jr. traces the intricate interconnections among various terrorist cells, including Osama Bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda and its relationship with the Taliban of Afghanistan, the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt, Islamic […]
The Historical Jesus Quest: Landmarks in the Search for the Jesus of History
The possibility of finding reliable information about the life of the historical Jesus has fascinated the imagination of generations of scholars from as early as the seventeenth century. Opinion on the issue has moved in waves, coming and going along with moods of pessimism and optimism. Until now, no one has brought together a comparison of the points of view of the most influential writers about the historical Jesus.
The Historical Jesus Quest brings together substantial extracts from the seminal works in Jesus studies over the last two centuries. The extracts are accompanied by brief introductions to each writer, helpful summaries of the central arguments of the works from which the extracts are taken, and incisive assessments of their continuing relevance to current debates. In one resource, this compendium provides the foundation upon which modern research is based and allows these great scholars—Spinoza, Troeltsch, D. F. Strauss, Wrede, Schweitzer, Kahler, Bultmann, Kasemann, and others—to speak in their own words. It is essential reading for all serious students of the Gospels and of the historical Jesus.
The Historical Jesus Quest brings together substantial extracts from the seminal works in Jesus studies over the last two centuries. The extracts are accompanied by brief introductions to each writer, helpful summaries of the central arguments of the works from which the extracts are taken, and incisive assessments of their continuing relevance to current debates. In one resource, this compendium provides the foundation upon which modern research is based and allows these great scholars—Spinoza, Troeltsch, D. F. Strauss, Wrede, Schweitzer, Kahler, Bultmann, Kasemann, and others—to speak in their own words. It is essential reading for all serious students of the Gospels and of the historical Jesus.
Vision of War
Originally published: 1915 Genre: Poetry Subject: World War, 1914-1918 — Poetry
Physics and Psychics : The Search for a World Beyond the Senses
Editorial Reviews From Book News, Inc. , June 1, 1990 Stenger (physics, U. of Hawaii) critically examines theories of a transcendentreality in terms of what is currently known about matter at its most fundamentallevel. He offers a convincing rebuttal to those who attempt to link physicsto mystical truths.Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or
Superstition in All Ages
From Reviewer Will Murphy: “First of all, this work was not written by Jean Meslier, and the real title is not ‘Superstition In All Ages.’ In reality, this work is Baron d’Holbach’s masterpiece, ‘Good’ or ‘Common Sense.’ Due to the severe restrictions on the press in the 18th century, d’Holbach published virtually all of his […]
The Age of Reason
Thomas Paine, defender of freedom, independence, and rational common sense during America’s turbulent revolutionary period, offers insights into religion which ring sharply true more than two centuries later. This unabrdiged edition of The Age of Reason sets forth Paine’s provocative observations of the place of religion in society.
The Best of Humanism
Questions about human nature, immortality, the unknown, faith, reason, free will, and more are addressed by a host of renowned humanists.
The Case Against Christianity
This book is the most systematic philosophical critique of Christianity ever written. Michael Martin discusses the historicity of Jesus, the resurrection, the virgin birth, the second coming, the incarnation, Christian ethics, salvation by faith, the divine command theory, and the atonement.
The Comprehensible Cosmos: Where Do the Laws of Physics Come From?
Book Description In a series of remarkable developments in the 20th century and continuing into the 21st, elementary particle physicists, astronomers, and cosmologists have removed much of the mystery that surrounds our understanding of the physical universe. We now have mathematical models that are consistent with all observational data, including measurements of incredible precision, and […]
The Emergence of Life on Earth: A Historical and Scientific Overview
How did life emerge on Earth? Is there life on other worlds? These questions, until recently confined to the pages of speculative essays and tabloid headlines, are now the subject of legitimate scientific research. This book presents a unique perspective-a combined historical, scientific, and philosophical analysis, which does justice to the complex nature of the […]
The Faith Healers
James Randi, the celebrated magician, has written a damning indictment of the faith-healing practices of the leading televangelists and others who claim divine healing powers. Randi and his team of researchers attended scores of “miracle services” and often were pronounced “healed” of the nonexistent illnesses they claimed. They viewed first-hand the tragedies resulting from the […]
The Ghost in the Universe: God in Light of Modern Science
Is there a God, or a spiritual reality beyond nature? Physicist Taner Edis takes a fresh look at this age-old question, focusing on what we have learned about our world rather than on traditional metaphysical disputes. Emphasizing a search for explanation rather than listing flaws in theistic metaphysics, Edis uses the results of natural science […]
The Horror in the Museum and Other Revisions
H.P. Lovecraft, the creator of Cthulhu Mythos, is the acknowledged modern master of the macabre, but he also worked with many younger pulp writers. Collected here are a dozen experiments in arcane terror, unearthly horror, and inhuman evil. Adding his inimitable touch, Lovecraft revised these tales of terror into frightful shadows of his own unique […]
The Jesus Puzzle
A new presentation of the argument that no historical Jesus existed. A full and comprehensive survey of the question through an examination of the early Christian record, canonical and non-canonical, from Q to the Gospels, from the earliest Pauline epistles to the second century apologists, along with Jewish, Gnostic, and Greco-Roman documents of the time. […]
The Loved Dead : And Other Revisions
H.P. Lovecraft, aside from devising his own works in his Cthulhu Mythos cycle, also collaborated in his day with many younger writers of the uncanny and eerie. Available for the first time in paperback, this collection features stories to which the master of horror added his own ingenious touch.
The Moral Animal: Why We Are the Way We Are
Subtitled: The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology An accessible introduction to the science of evolutionary psychology and how it explains many aspects of human nature. Unlike many books on the topic,which focus on abstractions like kin selection, this book focuses on Darwinian explanations of why we are the way we are–emotionally and morally. Wright deals […]
The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings
This new edition of Bart Ehrman’s highly successful introduction approaches the New Testament from a comparative historical perspective, emphasizing the rich diversity of the earliest Christian literature. Ehrman shows why scholars continue to argue over such significant issues as how the books of the New Testament came into being, who produced them, what they mean, […]
The Plague
The Plague is a riveting story of an Algerian town forced to quarantine itself from the outside world after an outbreak of bubonic plague. The actions and behavior of the characters in the novel follow patterns of authentic and inauthentic behavior in the face of certain death. In this sense, the town is a metaphor […]
