Author: Andy Norman

Humankind: A Hopeful History, by Rutger Bregman. (New York: Little Brown, 2020, ISBN: 978-0-316-41853-9). 461 pp. Hardcover, $30.00. Rutger Bregman’s Humankind: A Hopeful History was just released in June, and already it’s being compared to Yuval Harari’s Sapiens.[1] Like Sapiens, it will enrich your understanding of the human animal. Like Sapiens, it’s a work of …

The Four Horsemen: The Conversation That Sparked an Atheist Revolution, by Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens, with foreword by Stephen Fry (Random House, 2019, ISBN 978-0525511953). 160 pp. Hardcover, $13.69. The Four Horsemen is a transcript of a 2007 conversation between four prominent public intellectuals, each the author of a bestselling …

“A science of right and wrong is on our doorstep. In fact, the concept of mattering brings it within reach.”

“How, one might ask, can humanism compete with worldviews that exploit the power of myth?”

It emerged from the swamp”ooze / And crawled onto land;

“Why should Muslims part with their cherished convictions if Christians won’t part with theirs?”

A review of Creating Change Through Humanism, by Roy Speckhardt.

Religious thinking systematically defies every rule of rational accountability essential to a robust and healthy political discourse. We need to do better!

In a spirited polemic against “spirit”-talk (“Excrement Eventuates,” FI, February/March 2012), Tom Flynn invites us to join him on what he calls the “welcoming shores” of a “wholly dis-‘spirited’ naturalism”—a place where the natives reject all “spiritual security blankets” and sternly contemplate the fact that everything in life is all just “shit happening.” Sorry, Tom. …

In early December 2011, the Center for Inquiry–Transnational held a fascinating conference on the scientific study of religion in Amherst, New York. I was fortunate enough to attend, and I would like to share what I learned with readers of Free Inquiry,. The conference was, among other things, a tribute to philosopher Daniel Dennett’s Breaking …

How we compromise reason’s capacity to transform the human condition – Part 2: Recovering Reason Part 1 of this two-part essay identified a common assumption about reason and then traced its origin and uptake. Plato suggested that reason consists in a judgment’s being supported with sufficient evidence, and this idea went on to decisively shape …

How We Compromised Reason’s Capacity to Transform the Human Condition, Part I: How Rationalism Lost Its WayAndy Norman   One hundred generation s ago, a curious character from Athens, Greece, staked his life on a radical proposition: by cultivating reason, he argued, we can gain wisdom, promote moral development, and fashion more just and harmonious …