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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 13.6 MB
    Pages | 320
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  Atheism is one of the most important movements in modern Western culture. For the last two hundred years, it seemed to be on the verge of eliminating religion as an outmoded and dangerous superstition. Recent years, however, have witnessed the decline of disbelief and a rise in religious/spiritual devotion throughout the world. In this highly readable book, the distinguished historian and theologian, Alister McGrath examines what went wrong with the atheist dream and explains why religion and faith are destined to play a central role in the twenty-first century.

    A former atheist who is now one of Christianity's foremost scholars, McGrath traces the history of atheism from its emergence in eighteenth-century Europe as a revolutionary worldview that offered liberation from the rigidity of traditional Christianity and the oppression of tyrannical monarchs, to its golden age in the first half of the twentieth century. Blending thoughtful, authoritative historical analysis with incisive portraits of such leading and influential atheists as Sigmund Freud, Marx and Richard Dawkins, McGrath exposes the flaws at the heart of atheism and argues that the renewal of faith is a natural, inevitable and necessary response to its failures.
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 1.0 MB
    Pages | 169
    Language | English
    Category | God
    Description:  The question of whether or not God exists is profoundly fascinating and important. Now two articulate spokesmen--one a Christian, the other an atheist--duel over God's existence in an illuminating battle of ideas.

    In God? A Debate between a Christian and an Atheist, William Lane Craig and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong bring to the printed page two debates they held before live audiences, preserving all the wit, clarity, and immediacy of their public exchanges. Avoiding overly esoteric arguments, they directly address issues such as religious experience, the Bible, evil, eternity, the origin of the universe, design, and the supposed connection between morality and the existence of God.

    Employing sharp and humorous arguments, each philosopher strikes quickly to the heart of his opponent's case. For example, Craig claims that we must believe in God in order to explain objective moral values, such as why rape is wrong. Sinnott-Armstrong responds that what makes rape wrong is the harm to victims of rape, so rape is immoral even if there is no God. 
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 1.0 MB
    Pages | 115
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  The God Delusion: "If this book works as I intend, religious readers who open it will be atheists when they put it down." The volume has received wide coverage, fueled much passionate debate and caused not a little confusion. Alister McGrath, along with his wife, Joanna, are ideal to evaluate Dawkins's ideas.

    Once an atheist himself, he gained a doctorate in molecular biophysics before going on to become a leading Christian theologian. He wonders how two people, who have reflected at length on substantially the same world, could possibly have come to such different conclusions about God. McGrath subjects Dawkins's critique of faith to rigorous scrutiny. His exhilarating, meticulously argued response deals with questions such as:

    Is faith intellectual nonsense?
    Are science and religion locked in a battle to the death?
    Can the roots of Christianity be explained away scientifically?
    Is Christianity simply a force for evil?
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 22.6 MB
    Pages | 330
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  Darwin’s Black Box helped to launch the Intelligent Design movement: the argument that nature exhibits evidence of design, beyond Darwinian randomness. Today, with the movement stronger than ever, Michael J. Behe updates the book with an important new Afterword on the state of the debate.

    Naming Darwin’s Black Box to the National Review’s list of the 100 most important nonfiction works of the twentieth century, George Gilder wrote that it “overthrows Darwin at the end of the twentieth century in the same way that quantum theory overthrew Newton at the beginning.”

    Discussing the book in The New Yorker in May 2005, H. Allen Orr said of Behe, “he is the most prominent of the small circle of scientists working on intelligent design, and his arguments are by far the best known.”

    From one end of the spectrum to the other, Darwin’s Black Box has established itself as the key text in the Intelligent Design movement—the one argument that must be addressed in order to determine whether Darwinian evolution is sufficient to explain life as we know it, or not.
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 4.93 MB
    Pages | 314
    Language | English
    Category | Christianity
    Description:  Questions whether Darwin's theory of natural selection really shook our fundamental beliefs, or whether they served to transform and illuminate our views on the origins and meaning of life
    Identifies the forms of natural theology that emerged in 19th-century England and how they were affected by Darwinism.

    The most detailed study yet of the intellectual background to William Paley's famous and influential approach to natural theology, set out in 1802.
    Brings together material from a variety of disciplines, including the history of ideas, historical and systematic theology, evolutionary biology, anthropology, sociology, and the cognitive science of religion.

    Considers how Christian belief has adapted to Darwinism, and asks whether there is a place for design both in the world of science and the world of theology.
    A thought-provoking exploration of 21st-century views on evolutionary thought and natural theology, written by the world-renowned theologian and bestselling author.
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 1.18 MB
    Pages | 114
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  A leading Christian intellectual explores the newest strain of atheism, its foremost thinkers, the cultural conditions that have bred it, and how Christians should respond.
    Something has changed in American culture. What for years was a little-regarded belief system-atheism-has now gained a large, and increasing, national hearing through the writings of "new atheists" such as Dawkins, Dennett, Harris, and Hitchens.

    Wanting to both inform and equip serious-minded Christians regarding this cultural shift, R. Albert Mohler Jr. explores the environment that has bred the "new atheism" while also introducing readers to the movement's four leading thinkers and the contours of their arguments.

    Mohler-deemed "the reigning intellectual of the evangelical movement in the US" by Time magazine-then uses this foundation to pinpoint eight major distinctives that make the new atheism new, and to discuss the future of Christianity in relationship to it.
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 1.76 MB
    Pages | 451
    Language | English
    Category | Philosophy
    Description:  The philosophy of religion as a distinct discipline is an innovation of the last two hundred years, but its central topics--the existence and nature of the divine, humankind's relation to it, the nature of religion and its place in human life--have been with us since the inception of philosophy. Philosophers have long critically examined the truth of (and rational justification for) religious claims, and have explored such philosophically interesting phenomena as faith, religious experience and the distinctive features of religious discourse. The second half of the twentieth-century has been an especially fruitful period, with philosophers using new developments in logic and epistemology to mount both sophisticated defenses of, and attacks on, religious claims.

    The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Religion contains newly commissioned chapters by 21 prominent experts who cover the field in a comprehensive but accessible manner. Each chapter is expository, critical, and representative of a distinctive viewpoint. The Handbook is divided into two sections. The first, "Problems," covers the most frequently discussed topics, among them arguments for God's existence, the problem of evil, and religious epistemology. The second is called "Approaches" and contains four essays assessing the advantages and disadvantages of different methods of practicing philosophy of religion.
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 1.96 MB
    Pages | 386
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  This study of Professor William Rowe’s defense of atheism on the basis of evil assesses the literature that has developed in response to Rowe’s work, closely examining two strategies: mystery – the idea that God may have reasons beyond our comprehension for permitting evil; and theodicy - explanations as to why God allows evil to flourish. The book unearths difficulties in both, concluding that the God of theism must be "beyond belief.
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 11.1 MB
    Pages | 672
    Language | English
    Category | Orthodox
    Description:  Vol. 1 Holy Gospels may be purchased separately. See also, Vol. 2, under Acts, Epistles, and Revelation of The Orthodox New Testament with patristic commentary. 6 x 9 -inches, lavishly illustrated.
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 1.0 MB
    Pages | 53
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  And that inverted Bowl we call the sky, Where under crawling coop'd we live and die, Lift not your heads to it for help -- for it As impotently moves as you or.
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 1.91 MB
    Pages | 287
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  Throughout history, arguments for and against the existence of God have been largely confined to philosophy and theology, while science has sat on the sidelines. Despite the fact that science has revolutionized every aspect of human life and greatly clarified our understanding of the world, somehow the notion has arisen that it has nothing to say about the possibility of a supreme being, which much of humanity worships as the source of all reality. This physicist and author contends that, if God exists, some evidence for this existence should be detectable by scientific means, especially considering the central role that God is alleged to play in the operation of the universe and the lives of humans.

    Treating the traditional God concept, as conventionally presented in the Judeo-Christian and Islamic traditions, like any other scientific hypothesis, Stenger examines all of the claims made for God's existence. He considers the latest Intelligent Design arguments as evidence of God's influence in biology. He looks at human behavior for evidence of immaterial souls and the possible effects of prayer. He discusses the findings of physics and astronomy in weighing the suggestions that the universe is the work of a creator and that humans are God's special creation. After evaluating all the scientific evidence, Stenger concludes that beyond a reasonable doubt the universe and life appear exactly as we might expect if there were no God. 
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 6.81 MB
    Pages | 331
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  Atheism Explained explores the claims made both for and against the existence of God. On the pro side: that the wonders of the world can only be explained by an intelligent creator; that the universe had to start somewhere; telepathy, out-of-body experiences, and other paranormal phenomena demonstrate the existence of a spirit world; and that those who experience God directly provide evidence as real as any physical finding. After disputing these arguments through calm, careful criticism, author David Ramsay Steele presents the reasons why God cannot exist: monstrous, appalling evils; the impossibility of omniscience; and the senseless concept that God is a thinking mind without a brain. He also explores controversial topics such as Intelligent Design, the power of prayer, religion without God, and whether a belief in God makes people happier and healthier. Steele’s rational, easy-to-understand prose helps readers form their own conclusions about this eternally thorny topic.
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 1.92 MB
    Pages | 198
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  In a world where natural selection has shaped adaptations of astonishing ingenuity, what is the scope and unique power of rational thinking?
    In this short but wide-ranging book, philosopher Ronald de Sousa looks at the twin set of issues surrounding the power of natural selection to mimic rational design, and rational thinking as itself a product of natural selection.
    While we commonly deem ourselves superior to other species, the logic of natural selection should not lead us to expect that nature does everything for the best. Similarly, rational action does not always promote the best possible outcomes. So what is the difference? Is the pursuit of rationality actually an effective strategy?

    Part of the answer lies in language, including mathematics and science. Language is the most striking device by which we have made ourselves smarter than our nearest primate cousins. Sometimes the purely instinctual responses we share with other animals put explicit reasoning to shame: the movements of a trained athlete are faster and more accurate than anything she could explicitly calculate. Language, however, with its power to abstract from concrete experience and to range over all aspects of nature, enables breathtakingly precise calculations, which have taken us to the moon and beyond. Most importantly, however, language enables us to formulate an endless multiplicity of values, in potential conflict with one another as well as with instinctual imperatives. 
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 1.0 MB
    Pages | 187
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  Does a god exist? This question has undoubtedly been asked, in one form or another, since man has had the ability to communicate. . . Thousands of volumes have been written on the subject of a god, and the vast majority have answered the questions with a resounding 'Yes!' 

    With this intriguing introduction, George H. Smith sets out to demolish what he considers the most widespread and destructive of all the myths devised by man - the concept of a supreme being. With painstaking scholarship and rigorous arguments, Mr. Smith examines, dissects, and refutes the myriad "proofs" offered by theists - the defenses of sophisticated, professional theologians, as well as the average religious layman. He explores the historical and psychological havoc wrought by religion in general - and concludes that religious belief cannot have any place in the life of modern, rational man.

    It is not my purpose to convert people to atheism . . . (but to) demonstrate that the belief in God is irrational to the point of absurdity. If a person wishes to continue believing in a god, that is his prerogative, but he can no longer excuse his belief in the name of reason and moral necessity.
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  • About The File:
    File Format | PDF
    File Size | 1.39 MB
    Pages | 161
    Language | English
    Category | Atheism
    Description:  Why do religious people believe what they shouldn't--not what others think they shouldn't believe, but things that don't accord with their own avowed religious beliefs? This engaging book explores this puzzling feature of human behavior.
    D. Jason Slone terms this phenomenon "theological incorrectness." He demonstrates that it exists because the mind is built it such a way that it's natural for us to think divergent thoughts simultaneously. Human minds are great at coming up with innovative ideas that help them make sense of the world, he says, but those ideas do not always jibe with official religious beliefs. From this fact we derive the important lesson that what we learn from our environment--religious ideas, for example--does not necessarily cause us to behave in ways consistent with that knowledge.

    Slone presents the latest discoveries from the cognitive science of religion and shows how they help us to understand exactly why it is that religious people do and think things that they shouldn't. He then applies these insights to three case studies. First he looks at why Theravada Buddhists profess that Buddha was just a man but actually worship him as a god. Then he explores why the early Puritan Calvinists, who believed in predestination, acted instead as if humans had free will by, for example, conducting witch-hunts and seeking converts. Finally, he explains why both Christians and Buddhists believe in luck even though the doctrines of Divine Providence and karma suggest there's no such thing.
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