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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
Keith Augustine | David Misialowski | Richard Carrier | Edouard Tahmizian | John MacDonald | B. Steven Matthies | Edward Babinski | Raymond D. Bradley | Brian Vroman | Andrew Melnyk
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March 13, 2025
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Kiosk Book, Publications
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
The Case Against the Case for Christ: A New Testament Scholar Refutes the Reverend Lee Strobel
Description Lee Strobel arguably is now the leading apologist in America for evangelical, fundamentalist, benighted forms of Christianity. Although not an authority himself in any of the fields in which he defends his faith, he has produced a series of best-selling The Case For… books in which he consults alleged experts to obtain “evidence” and […]
The Constitutional Rights, Privileges, and Immunities of the American People
Description The Constitutional Rights, Privileges, and Immunities of the American People: The Selective Incorporation of the Bill of Rights, the Refined Incorporation, the Second Amendment Right, and Much More … The Constitutional Rights, Privileges, and Immunities of the American People explores the idea that the Supreme Court should radically revise its general theory of constitutional […]
The End of Biblical Studies
Book Description In this radical critique of his own academic specialty, biblical scholar Hector Avalos calls for an end to biblical studies as we know them. He outlines two main arguments for this surprising conclusion. First, academic biblical scholarship has clearly succeeded in showing that the ancient civilization that produced the Bible held beliefs about […]
The Fallacy of Fine-Tuning: Why the Universe Is Not Designed for Us
Description Drawing on the findings of modern physics and cosmology, numerous authors have argued that it would have taken only slight changes to some of the universe’s physical parameters to make life, as we know it, extremely unlikely or even impossible. But does the seemingly “fine-tuned” nature of the universe also suggest that there must […]
The God Delusion
Description: Discover magazine recently called Richard Dawkins “Darwin’s Rottweiler” for his fierce and effective defense of evolution. Prospect magazine voted him among the top three public intellectuals in the world (along with Umberto Eco and Noam Chomsky). Now Dawkins turns his considerable intellect on religion, denouncing its faulty logic and the suffering it causes. He […]
The Human Question
The Human Question is a frank examination of all sides of the human origins debate. From Evolution to “creation science” and reincarnation to life on other planets, the book peels away the emotion from controversial topics to reveal the most common beliefs about human origins. Personal Interviews highlight each chapter and reveal why we often […]
The Jesus the Jews Never Knew
The ancient Jews never heard of Jesus of Nazareth. Indeed, they never heard of Nazareth either. That is the startling conclusion of a comprehensive investigation of Jewish records surviving from antiquity. Every literary source ever advanced by serious scholars as being a reference to the historical Jesus is examined and found to be nothing of […]
The Magic of Reality: How We Know What’s Really True
Description Magic takes many forms. Supernatural magic is what our ancestors used in order to explain the world before they developed the scientific method. The ancient Egyptians explained the night by suggesting the goddess Nut swallowed the sun. The Vikings believed a rainbow was the gods’ bridge to earth. The Japanese used to explain earthquakes […]
The Most Dangerous Man in America
One of the most powerful and potentially dangerous religious/political movements in American history has been built by right-wing televangelist Pat Robertson. The Christian Coalition (broadcasting fundamentalism and extreme politics to an audience of millions via the “700 Club”) wields a mighty sword within the Republican party in at least 25 states. And GOP national leaders […]
The Non-Existence of God: An Introduction
Is it possible to prove or disprove God’s existence? Arguments for the existence of God have taken many different forms over the centuries: in The Non-Existence of God, Nicholas Everitt considers the best of the contemporary arguments, and examines the role that reason and knowledge play in the debate over God’s existence. Everitt’s conclusion is […]
The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Nonbeliever
Book Description From the #1 New York Times best-selling author of God Is Not Great, a provocative and entertaining guided tour of atheist and agnostic thought through the ages–with never-before-published pieces by Salman Rushdie, Ian McEwan, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Christopher Hitchens continues to make the case for a splendidly godless universe in this first-ever […]
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe
This sequel to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy finds Arthur Dent, reluctant space adventurer, joining Zaphod Beeblebrox –two-headed former president of the galaxy –Zaphod’s dead great-grandfather, sexy cadet Trillian, and paranoid Marvin in the search for the ruler of the Universe
The Skeptic: A Life of H. L. Mencken
When H. L. Mencken talked, everyone listened — like it or not. In the Roaring Twenties, he was the one critic who mattered, the champion of a generation of plain-speaking writers who redefined the American novel, and the ax-swinging scourge of the know-nothing, go-getting middle-class philistines whom he dubbed the “booboisie.” Some loved him, others […]
The Truth About Everything: An Irreverent History of Philosophy
While attempting to bring order and structure to the history of philosophy, professionals in modern universities have apparently lost sight of what philosophy really is. So says Matthew Stewart, who has discovered that in the professors’ well-intended pursuit of the truth and knowledge, this area of thought has been dissected, organized into a series of […]
