Believers : faith in human nature / Melvin Konner.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Konner, Melvin, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Faith.

Religiousness.

Belief and doubt.

Physical Description:

xxv, 244 pages ; 22 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York : W. W. Norton & Company [2019]

Summary:

"An anthropologist examines the nature of religiosity, and how it shapes and benefits humankind. Believers is a scientist's answer to attacks on faith by some well-meaning scientists and philosophers-- a firm rebuke of the "Four Horsemen": Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens, known for writing about religion as something irrational and ultimately harmful. Konner, who was raised as an Orthodox Jew but has lived his adult life without such faith, explores the psychology, development, brain science, evolution, and even genetics of the varied religious impulses we as a species experience. Conceding that faith is not for everyone, he views religious people with a sympathetic eye; his own upbringing, his apprenticeship in the trancedance religion of the African Bushmen, and his friends in Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, and other faiths have all shaped his perspective. He concludes that religion does much good as well as undoubted harm, and that for at least a large minority of humanity, the belief in things unseen neither can nor should go away"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Encounters

Varieties

Elementary forms

The God map

Harvesting faith

Convergences

Good to think?

The voice of the child

Awe evolving

Goodness!

If not religion, what?

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 191-231) and index.

ISBN:

9780393651867

039365186X

OCLC:

1112690330