The God Delusion

Tartalom

Contents
Preface to the paperback edition 13
Preface 23
Chapter 1 A deeply religious non-believer 31
Deserved respect 31
Undeserved respect 41
Chapter 2 The God Hypothesis 51
Polytheism 52
Monotheism 58
Secularism, the Founding Fathers
and the religion of America 60
The poverty of agnosticism 69
NOMA 77
The Great Prayer Experiment 85
The Neville Chamberlain school
of evolutionists 90
Little green men 94
Chapter 3 Arguments for God's existence 100
Thomas Aquinas' 'proofs' 100
The ontological argument and other
a priori arguments 103
The argument from beauty 110
The argument from personal
'experience' 112
The argument from scripture
The argument from admired
religious scientists
PascaTs Wager
Bayesian arguments
Chapter 4 Why there almost certainly is
no God
The Ultimate Boeing 747
Natural selection as a
consciousness-raiser
Irreducible complexity
The worship of gaps
The anthropic principle:
planetary version
The anthropic principle:
cosmological version
An interlude at Cambridge
Chapter 5 The roots of religion
The Darwinian imperative
Direct advantages of religion
Group selection
Religion as a by-product of
something else
Psychologically prímed for religion
Tread softly, because you tread
on my memes
Cargo cults
117
123
130
132
137
137
139
144
151
162
169
180
190
190
194
198
200
208
222
234
Chapter 6 The roots of morality: why are
we good? 241
Does our morál sense have a
Darwinian origin? 245
A case study in the roots of
morality 254
If there is no God, why be good? 259
Chapter 7 The 'Good' Book and the changing
morál Zeitgeist 268
The Old Testament 269
Is the New Testament any better? 283
Love thy neighbour 288
The morál Zeitgeist 298
What about Hitler and Stalin?
Weren't they atheists?
Chapter 8 What's wrong with religion?
Why be so hostile?
Fundamentalism and the
subversion of science
The dark side of absolutism
Faith and homosexuality
Faith and the sanctity of humán
life
The Great Beethoven Fallacy
How 'moderation' in faith fosters
fanaticism
Chapter 9 Childhood, abuse and the escape
from religion 349
Physical and mentái abuse 354
In defence of children 366
An educational scandal 372
Consciousness-raising again 379
Religious education as a part of
literary culture 383
Chapter 10 A much needed gap? 388
Binker 389
Consolation 394
Inspiration 404
The mother of all burkas 405
Appendix: a partial list of friendly addresses, for
individuals needing support in escaping
from religion 421
Books cited or recommended 427
Notes 436
Index 449

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