The Atheist Blogger » books

Carnival of the Godless #124

Adrian Hayter — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:37:27 +0000

The latest Carnival of the Godless is up at Radical Atheist, so go check it out! It’s a great carnival, and has two great reviews of the new book “The evolution of God” which were very informative.

Remember to submit something to the next carnival, or put your own blog forward for the prestigious job of hosting the carnival!

As a side note, I’ve been meaning to update this blog a lot more often, but every time I’ve sat down to write a post, something else has barged in the way, whether it be important emails I have to answer, work that has to be done, or (most recently) a breach of my PayPal account which almost cost me $300 I don’t have. Nevertheless, I’m finally emerging from the flow of “more-important-than-blogging” things, and there will be a few articles up this week on my adventures in Egypt, and my delving into Astrology!

Given that Twitter is a far better (and quicker) way of getting my thoughts out, if you miss me you can always follow my thoughts there. My account is @ah8r.

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Just Pre-Ordered Ariane Sherine’s “The Atheist’s Guide to Christmas”

Adrian Hayter — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:55:57 +0000

Thanks to a reminder by the Friendly Atheist, I have now pre-ordered my copy of Ariane Sherine’s latest book “The Atheist’s Guide To Christmas”:

Unfortunately, there's probably no Christmas either...

The book comes out in the UK on October 1st, and Brits can pre-order a copy through Amazon (sorry Yanks). Whilst you are there, don’t forget to pre-order a copy of Richard Dawkins new book, “The Greatest Show on Earth” if you haven’t already (what on earth were you waiting for?!?).

Dawkins’ book is of course about Evolution, whilst Ariane’s is a compilation of tips offered by scientists, comedians, authors, etc in order to help you survive the Xmas holiday. All that we have left to wonder about is how many other things we can use that font (and indeed the colour scheme) on before it gets old. Perhaps we could make some un-festive “There’s probably no god” wrapping paper?

Now what are you waiting for? The post is over! Go order the books! Ariane Sherine reported earlier on Twitter that the book was now at the #34 spot on Amazon’s future releases chart. 34??? Methinks that score needs vast improvements! Let’s have it at #1 position by the end of the week; if we did it for the Atheist Bus Campaign, we can do it for a book.

Update: Aparently Ariane reads my blog, and has kindly given me a hi-res image of the book cover. Now you have literally no excuse not to pre-order it!

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The Atheist’s Way by Eric Maisel

Adrian Hayter — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 19:43:35 +0000

I got sent some information about a new book coming out on 1st March in the UK (it’s already out in the US). It seems like a completely new approach to the standard “let’s refute religious claims” mantra that most atheist books seem to have. Should be a worthwhile read!

In The Atheist’s Way by Eric Maisel demonstrates that atheism is not a denial of the world or of gods, but instead leads away from self to a more active participation in society but without a directive from some higher force. Maisel explodes the myth that life has any inherent meaning to seek, demonstrating that meaning is a decision and that until we decide what is meaningful, nothing is. He makes the case that the paradigm shift from seeking meaning to making meaning is this century’s most pressing intellectual goal. The Atheist’s Way is the first book to describe the beauty, power, and righteousness of personal meaning and to provide both nonbelievers and believers with an atheist blueprint for living.

According to Maisel, the atheist’s way is not humanism, not existentialism, not spirituality, and not psychology but a path that embraces aspects of all those approaches to life. Unlike recent bestsellers about atheism, this book doesn’t rail against religion and believers. Instead, it announces that an indifferent universe need not deter humans from creating lives of value and integrity that are at once sustainable, rich, and real.

Drawing on the freethinking traditions, contemporary psychology and the life sciences, Maisel presents a logical and practical program for the person looking for a compelling answer to the question, “How should I construe the purpose of my life?”

At a time when people are burdened by the feeling that they and their efforts don’t matter, Maisel offers a picture of the universe and of a purposeful life that floundering unbelievers and wavering believers can wholeheartedly embrace.

It also seems to have generated a lot of praise, from both authors and the blogging community:

“Eric Maisel has given us a lovely, thoughtful book about belief outside of the narrow confines of organized religion. The Atheist’s Way offers an uplifting positive answer for anyone interested in how to live life without gods, superstitions or fairytales. For atheists it is a must read; believers should read it as well, so that we can get beyond the divisiveness of belief versus non-belief.” — Nica Lalli, author of Nothing: Something to Believe In

“I find Eric Maisel’s writings more witty than Hitchens, more polished and articulate than Harris, and more informative and entertaining than Dawkins. A 5-star read from cover to cover! My only complaint is that Maisel is going to leave the rest of us atheist authors in the dust.” — David Mills, author of Atheist Universe

“Eric Maisel elevates the tag ‘atheist’ from a mere denial of the supernatural to a calling: a calling to a high-hearted life of diligence, creativity, and ruthless honesty in maintaining one’s integrity in the face of uncaring nature.” — David Cortes, Secular Wholeness

“With this book, Eric Maisel does what none of the New Atheists have succeeded at doing: elaborating what atheists do believe. Maisel invites religious believers to live life as an atheist would, opening their eyes to worlds a religious outlook cannot see. For people who can’t even imagine a Godless outlook, I would gladly hand them this book and say, ‘Read this and you’ll know what goes through my mind every day.’ This is a guidebook for brand-new atheists and for anyone wanting to learn how an atheist
thinks.” — Hemant Mehta, I Sold My Soul on eBay

“In The Atheist’s Way, Eric Maisel takes a giant leap beyond where the New Atheist authors have gone before. Instead of simply criticizing religion or demolishing arguments for the existence of God, Maisel covers new territory and provides a foundation for making meaning and living purposefully without supernatural intervention. A book to be relished by atheists, skeptics, humanists, freethinkers, and unbelievers everywhere.” — Donna Druchunas, Skepchick.org

“Unlike many other books on atheism which deal with the question of God’s existence, The Atheist’s Way attempts to answer a different question: So you don’t believe, now what? How do you bravely face the world as it is and create meaning for yourself without the crutch of a divine benefactor? Eric Maisel’s wise suggestions, musings, and insights are a wonderful resource for your quest.” — John Allen Paulos, author of Irreligion: A Mathematician Explains Why The Arguments for God Just Don’t Add Up

I’m attempting to organise an interview with Dr Maisel, so if you have any questions you want to ask him about his work, or about the book, please leave them in the comments or send them to me via my contact form.

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Imaginary Friend – An Atheist Thriller

Adrian Hayter — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 21:04:45 +0000

Law professor Douglas Whaley has written a book which he describes as an “atheist thriller”. He was kind enough to send me the following synopsis and information.

Franklin Whitestone, a lawyer in Columbus, Ohio, is trapped in the rubble of the Ohio State football stadium when a Muslim terrorist sets off a bomb. During the rescue Franklin becomes a hero by holding onto a girder while allowing over 50 people to escape. This is captured on television, and is the one bright spot in the what becomes known as “9/11 Two.” Franklin is flown to New York City for an appearance on the Jimmy Ball Show (the equivalent to the Larry King program). Accompanying him to NYC is his significant other, Kelly Keyfold, and since the two of them are the guests of the tv show, they dine at a fancy restaurant where Kelly insists on a bottle of wine, telling Franklin it would be good for his nerves to have one glass himself. He does this, but at some point during the meal a waiter refills his goblet, and so he drinks two glasses of wine. At the studio, Franklin is shown into the green room, where the first guest on the Jimmy Ball Show, a rummy comedian, offers him a drink from a flask. Franklin at first refuses, but, unused to national tv and shaken to his very core, he finally takes another sip. Of course, this proves unwise.

When Franklin goes on the air, the video clip of his heroics is shown and applauded, and then he and the host answer call-in questions from the live audience. One of the callers is a woman from Salt Lake City, and she asks him whether he was praying to God to give him strength during his heroics, and—his judgment clouded by alcohol—Franklin blithely says no. “God,” he tells her, “was not the solution, but the problem—belief in him is what caused the bombs to go off.” This sparks outraged calls from other viewers, and Franklin
makes some other ill-considered statements along this same unfortunate line. When asked by the host if he is an atheist, Franklin replies:

“Let me put it like this, Jimmy. When I was a child I had an imaginary friend who was with me everywhere I went, helping me out, very real to me. I loved him with all my heart. But as I got older I didn’t need that crutch anymore, and one day he just wasn’t there, nor did I miss him. As an adult I’d be embarrassed if I still needed an imaginary friend to help me run my life.”

Of course, saying this is a mistake of major magnitude, as is made clear to Franklin when his life blows up on many fronts, starting minutes after he’s off the air.

The book has much to say about theism versus atheism, and the role of each in today’s society (I am a lifelong professional teacher and this is a subject about which I am passionate). But the novel is much more than that. There is quite a bit of humor in it, as well as a number of action sequences (and some violent encounters). I would hope that anyone picking up the book would find it an entertaining read.

The book can be ordered from Amazon.com ($15.00).

Finally, let me add that I know this is a delicate and controversial subject, and I have tried to handle it in a way that is fair to all viewpoints. The reader can judge for him/herself whether I have succeeded or whether to join the crowd gathering tar and feathers. I would love to hear any and all comments readers have about the book, and my email address for making them is in the “Author’s Note” at the end of the novel.

Douglas Whaley

The book is currently only out in America, so we can’t add it to the book club list, but if anyone reads it please write a review. Many thanks to Douglas for passing this information on, and best of luck with the book!

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50 Reasons People Give For Believing In A God By Guy P. Harrison

Adrian Hayter — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 16:58:29 +0000

The book for October’s book club is “50 reasons people give for believing in a god” by Guy P. Harrison. It is available from Amazon and hopefully I will be able to contact the author and invite him into a live discussion like we did with Hemant Mehta.

For this month, the book is “Biblical Nonsense” and we are abandoning the live discussion due to lack of interest. At the end of the month, a forum discussion will be put up where people can post their views. I hope one day to bring back the live discussion, but I think we need more dedicated members for that.

For now, the live discussion will be reserved for books in which I can contact the author.

UPDATE: Guy P. Harrison says he would love to do a live discussion of his book. We will confirm a date nearer the time.

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Book Club Vote – October 2008

Adrian Hayter — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 13:13:42 +0000

This month’s book is “Biblical Nonsense” by Dr. Jason Long, and I’m thinking about scrapping the live discussion. It is fun when you get to invite the author along (as with Hemant Mehta) but otherwise it usually ends up with 2 people discussing the book for about 5 minutes, and then turning onto something else.

So the discussion for this book will simply take place over in the forums.

We need to start choosing a book for October.

Do not vote unless you wish to read the book or take part in the discussion!

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

I’d also like to know who out of my readership is interested in the book club, so please make a comment if you think you’ll be able to subscribe to it regularly. I’d also love some feedback on it.

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Postponing Carl Sagan

Adrian Hayter — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 11:38:20 +0000

Sorry for the late announcement, but I’ll have to postpone the online discussion of Carl Sagan’s book “The Demon Haunted World” until Tuesday 2nd September. That gives everyone an extra 3 days with the book in case they need to finish the final chapter!

I need to get up early tomorrow as I am attending my dad’s wedding, and so I won’t be online to oversee the book club meeting tonight. I’ll be back in action on the 2nd, and if I get access to a computer before then I will update everyone with information. Hopefully I’ll be able to set up a vote for October’s book on the 1st.

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Busy Busy Busy

Adrian Hayter — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 22:30:03 +0000

Woah! A whole two days of nothingness on the blog. It feels empty to me so I guess it probably feels empty for my readers! I have an excuse though:

Refurbishing an entire house is hell.

Not literally hell of course, for obviously no such place exists. However if I were to believe in a hell, it would probably have me cleaning and tidying a student house for all eternity. All my housemates have arrived now, and in addition to all the house-keeping, we’ve been setting up phonelines, internet connections, and routers. We now have cable running through the entire house which on two occasions has nearly caused me to break my neck (it gets caught around my feet easily).

A couple of days ago I got a visit from a representative of the UK Brights who came to talk to me about our plans to hold a “Brights Awareness Week” at the university (part of my student group Atheist & Agnostic Alliance). Our hope is to hold an event that beats the crap out of the Christian Unions “Jesus Awareness Week”, which is why we have started planning so many months in advance.

Finally, I totally missed the book club result for September, which is:

Biblical Nonsense by Dr. Jason Long

Luckily it is a book I suggested in the forums, and therefore I already have it in my bookcase. Its available on Amazon though. Preliminary date for discussion is Saturday 28th September.

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Book Club Vote – September 2008

Adrian Hayter — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 20:28:13 +0000

So this months book is “The Demon Haunted World” by Carl Sagan, and the discussion will be held on Saturday 30th, at 23:00 UTC. Again, if you need to work out your time follow these steps:

Visit the website http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/
Scroll down past the first table of countries and you will see another box that has the words “Current UTC (or GMT/Zulu)-time used: “
With the time/date shown in that box, you can work how how far ahead or behind you are of UTC.

Everything will be confirmed nearer the time.

Now for the vote for Septembers book.

Do not vote unless you wish to read the book or take part in the discussion!

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

Voting lasts 7 days.

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Freedom Evolves But I Messed The Discussion Up

Adrian Hayter — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 14:38:15 +0000

The forum discussion for Daniel Dennett’s book “Freedom Evolves” is up. Apologies to anyone who went to the live discussion, which I had put an hour later so that Aussie readers could get out of bed. It seems people still thought it was the same time, so I showed up an hour “late” and nobody was there.

Just so everyone knows for future reference, the book club live discussion is now taking place at midnight (UTC+1). So if you go to this world clock website and scroll down, you will see the time written in UTC. When that time is 23:00, it’s time for the discussion!

Voting for Septembers book will take place tomorrow.