I have read almost all books written by Richard Dawkins and especially I love the ones about biology, more specifically evolution. Dawkins's other books about evolution always had a more theoretical structure than the experimental side of evolution. This book is here to close this gap.
We see a lot of data and experimental work throughout the book. Dawkins collected a lot of scientific work to support his theoretical ideas. However it is not as heavy as other books such as Selfish Gene or Blind Watchmaker in theoretical side of evolution. We see the basic natural selection via mutational change in species.
I recommend the book everyone who wants to learn about evolution and to see how we can know it is true. Also you can recommend this book to people who denies evolution around you to avoid arguing about it for a long long time.
It sounds strange however contrary to popular belief, rate of all kind of violence, death toles in wars, homicide rates, beating of children and woman, cruelity to animals and goes so on, declines throughout history. In this book, Steven Pinker uses a lot of numerical data and scientific research, papers to demonstrate that fact.
The book consists of 10 sections. The first six sections are about history and history of violence. We see a lot of data about that violence is really declined course of history. Also, Pinker explains political theories and ideas that influenced the revolutions that declined violence.
Sections 7 to 9 are about the psychology of violence and passivism. We see the affective neuroscience theory of the brain created by 
Jaak Panksepp ( 
Afektif Nörobilim ). This is the part that is related to our nature. We see brain systems related to violence and how to affect or suppress them. Also, as an evolutionary psychologist, Pinker explains some nature-nurture facts about the psychology of violence.
It's a really big book (For me, it took 2 big months of tons of reading) about the subject. Although books' length, Pinker is very successful in writing clear and incredibly fluent texts.
Unfortunately, I can not mention the content of the book here. I have dozens of pages of notes for this book. If someone curious about it can send me a private message to get them :).
Jaak Panksepp ( Afektif Nörobilim ). This is the part that is related to our nature. We see brain systems related to violence and how to affect or suppress them. Also, as an evolutionary psychologist, Pinker explains some nature-nurture facts about the psychology of violence.
It's a really big book (For me, it took 2 big months of tons of reading) about the subject. Although books' length, Pinker is very successful in writing clear and incredibly fluent texts.
Unfortunately, I can not mention the content of the book here. I have dozens of pages of notes for this book. If someone curious about it can send me a private message to get them :).
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A valuable work that evaluates the origins of the holy books of the Abrahamic religions and how they were created, and then their relationship with science. First of all, the Torah, called the Old Testament, was discussed in the work and how it was formed, its contradictions and the parts related to science in the Torah were evaluated. The author has demonstrated that scientific development contradicts the issues stated in the Torah regarding science. Then, the Bible was discussed and especially the formation process of the Bible texts was included in detail. Contradictions between texts, critical examination of texts and the genealogies of Jesus are discussed. After the first two holy books, the Quran was discussed and first of all, it was revealed that the text of the Quran is different from the first two in terms of authenticity that is authentic. Then, the verses regarding scientific issues discussed in the Quran were compared with scientific reality. It has been revealed that some of the science-related topics in the Quran are supported by contemporary scientific data, while some topics cannot be falsified. Following this, the stories in the holy books were discussed and evaluated. Finally, hadiths are briefly mentioned.
It has been revealed that holy books and scientific data are compared and the book that best suits scientific data is the Quran.
SPOILER içerir...
First, I wanna provide a brief summary of the book then I will share my comments on it:
Humans defeated famine, plague and war (starvation, epidemics and violence)
Humanities new targets are immortality, happiness and divinity by using artificial intelligence, big data, biotechnology, genetic engineering, regenerative medicine and nanotechnology and thus upgrading Homo Sapiens to Homo Deus.
Imminent dangers are climate change, global warming, pollution
Humans domesticated more than 90% of all large animals and thus conquered the world.
But humans are no different than animals since we have no soul, consciousness, mind or free will. Our sensations, emotions, desires and thoughts are biochemical data processing algorithms
What makes humans more special than animals are not our soul, mind or consciousness but our ability to cooperate flexibly in large numbers by creating ‘fictional myths’ such as money, corporation, state, gods. Fictions enable us to cooperate better and without fiction no complex human society can function.
Scientists study how the world functions, but there is no scientific method for determining how humans ought to behave. So, countries cannot function on the basis of scientific theories alone. They require some religion or ideology to maintain order.
Humanism (the worship of humankind which sanctifies life, happiness and power of Homo Sapiens) became the dominant world religion for the last 300 years.
Humanism split into three main branches, all of which believe that human experience is the supreme source of authority and meaning, yet they interpret human experience in different ways: Orthodox Humanism (Liberal humanism or simply as liberalism), Socialist Humanism (Communism, leftists), Evolutionary Humanism (Racism, Fascism
