Book Recommendations

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

What would qualify as an atheist book, for you? A book specifically arguing for atheism or just any book by an atheist? Or something else?
(...)

I think the vagueness of what I mean by "atheist book" is intentional - I want to leave it pretty open to see what comes up.

Mostly, I think I mean any book that contains atheist or anti-theist ideas and arguments. You could argue that any scientific book falls under this category, I suppose - and books like Sapiens and Homo Deus have certainly strengthened my atheist outlook. While I think I'm looking for books that focus more on religious or anti-religous concepts, I love reading and learning so many different things that I don't want to close the door on any book that might present a new and interesting perspective.

Do with that as you will! 😊

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The Bible. And I think it’s weird that you sign your posts. You should stop immediately.

Boru

As someone who's already wasted far too much time in her life reading that monstrosity of contradictions and crimes against humanity, I think it's safe and appropriate for me to say "fuck that shit!"

As for post-signing - 🙂

Fair enough. 

It’s a bit of heavy going, but might try Hume’s A Treatise On Human Nature (assuming you haven’t done so already).  It isn’t so much pro-atheism as it is a secular exploration as to why we behave the way we do. For example, he was one of the first enlightenment scholars to reject the idea of a distinct soul as an animating, driving force for such things as moral behaviour and a sense of ‘self’, arguing instead that individuals are the sum total of their experiences.

Boru

[Gnomey]

It’s a bit of heavy going, but might try Hume’s A Treatise On Human Nature (assuming you haven’t done so already).  It isn’t so much pro-atheism as it is a secular exploration as to why we behave the way we do. For example, he was one of the first enlightenment scholars to reject the idea of a distinct soul as an animating, driving force for such things as moral behaviour and a sense of ‘self’, arguing instead that individuals are the sum total of their experiences.

Boru

Sounds right up my alley! I'll look into it.

[Porcupine]

and a sense of ‘self’, arguing instead that individuals are the sum total of their experiences.

That's Hume's 'bundle theory', right?

Do you know if he believed that our selves, as experiences, persisted across time or was he 'more buddhist about it', as it were?

I know that Derek Parfit, for one, original accepted the psychological continuity thesis: the idea that we are our memories. But later in life he decided, like Hume, that we are our experiences ... however he also did indeed not consider his past or future self to be his self. For Parfit, providential concern gets replaced with moral concern---in other words, when we help our 'future self' it's very much like helping somebody else.

I think it's more profound than it first appears. One example of that is it explains how people who greatly lack empathy and compassion, such as sociopaths, tend to be very reckless and tend to not care much about their future self---because it's as if their lack of compassion for other humans also makes them lack compassion for their future.

It would also explain why people like Trump tend to not give a shit about the consequences of their actions.

[downbeatplumb]

Hey folks - hit me with all your favourite atheist books! Here's some I've read or are on my list already:

Mom, Dad, I'm am Atheist by David G McAfee
Godless by Dan Barker
God is not Great by Christopher Hitchens
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
The Happy Atheist by PZ Myers

Not exactly an atheist book, but God dies or is the bad guy or something (and my parents didn't want me reading it as a kid) so I wanna read The Golden Compass. And subsequent books.

What else you all got?

- Gnomey

"small gods" by Terry Pratchett.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Gods

[Little lunch]

Adams vs God. - Philip Adams.
This is the book that first got me to start thinking.
I found it in a bus shelter. :-)

[Fake Messiah]

"Faith Versus Fact: Why Science and Religion Are Incompatible" by Jerry Coyne is pretty good, I think that is my favorite "atheist" book.

But there is only certain amount of atheist books you can read since they kind of become repetitive when all of them cover and debunk theist claims.

Also my favorite book is "I Asimov" which is not directly an atheist book, per say, but rather a funny autobiography of a rational man and his brush with irrational people.

[Simon Moon]

Hey folks - hit me with all your favourite atheist books! Here's some I've read or are on my list already:

Mom, Dad, I'm am Atheist by David G McAfee
Godless by Dan Barker
God is not Great by Christopher Hitchens
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
The Happy Atheist by PZ Myers

Not exactly an atheist book, but God dies or is the bad guy or something (and my parents didn't want me reading it as a kid) so I wanna read The Golden Compass. And subsequent books.

What else you all got?

- Gnomey

I've read quite a few of the usual 'atheist' books, and they all have good refutations of theist arguments. While they might all point out the same flaws and fallacies that theist arguments contain*, doing so with different explanations, metaphors and examples, may help someone understand, where another version of the same refutation may not have.

It is my opinion, that atheism is just the logical, rational outcome of skepticism, when applied to the god claim**.

So, some of the best 'atheist' books are not specifically atheist books. For example, Carl Sagan's book, "The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark". While this book is not specifically an atheist book, what it does is provide one with a sort of "BS detection tool kit", so when confronted with existential claims (gods, alien abductions, bigfoot, ghosts, ESP etc), one has the tools to determine if said claim has sufficient: demonstrable evidence, reasoned argument, and valid and sound logic to support it.

Michael Shermer's "Why People Believe Weird Things" is also quite good.

*ALL theist arguments are flawed and fallacious. Arguments from design (teleological), Kalam cosmological argument, Ontological arguments, etc.

**I can't count how many theists I've encountered, that disbelieve: alien abductions, the existence of bigfoot, ESP, etc, for all the right reasons (lack of evidence and reasoned argument), but fail to apply the same level of skepticism to their god beliefs.

[Pat Mustard]

Hey folks - hit me with all your favourite atheist books! Here's some I've read or are on my list already:

Mom, Dad, I'm am Atheist by David G McAfee
Godless by Dan Barker
God is not Great by Christopher Hitchens
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
The Happy Atheist by PZ Myers

Not exactly an atheist book, but God dies or is the bad guy or something (and my parents didn't want me reading it as a kid) so I wanna read The Golden Compass. And subsequent books.

What else you all got?

- Gnomey

Small Gods by Terry Pratchett.

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"small gods" by Terry Pratchett.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Gods

Oops didn't see this. Ah well, two recommends is better than one.

But to show what I mean about Pratchett, I'll quote from one of his later books:

“I was walking along the bank of a stream when I saw a mother otter with her cubs, a very endearing sight, I'm sure you'll agree. And even as I watched, the mother otter dived into the water and came up with a plump salmon, which she subdued and dragged onto a half submerged log. As she ate it, while of course it was still alive, the body split and I remember to this day the sweet pinkness of its roes as they spilled out, much to the delight of the baby otters, who scrambled over themselves to feed on the delicacy. One of nature's wonders, gentlemen. Mother and children dining upon mother and children. And that is when I first learned about evil. It is built into the very nature of the universe. Every world spins in pain. If there is any kind of supreme being, I told myself, it is up to all of us to become his moral superior.”

Havelock Vetinari, Unseen Academicals; Terry Pratchett, 2009.

[Gnomey]

These all sound awesome, guys! Looks like I'm about to drop some serious dough at the bookstore... 😁

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

These all sound awesome, guys! Looks like I'm about to drop some serious dough at the bookstore... 😁

If it helps, you probably find Hume’s work online for free.

Boru