Sunday, January 01, 2006

Getting a Rational Grip on Religion (Scientific American)

Is religion a fit subject for scientific scrutiny? Daniel Dennet, in his book Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon answers "yes". George Johnson reviews Dennett's book in this article. According to Johnson,

Dennett hopes that this book will be read not just by atheists and agnostics but by the religiously faithful--and that they will come to see the wisdom of analyzing their deepest beliefs scientifically, weeding out the harmful from the good. The spell he hopes to break, he suggests, is not religious belief itself but the conviction that its details are off-limits to scientific inquiry, taboo.

Read the whole review here and note the important word 'speculates' in paragraph 7!

No comments:

Post a Comment