Sam Harris's first book, The End of Faith, ignited a worldwide debate about the
validity of religion. In the aftermath, Harris discovered that most people - fro
m religious fundamentalists to nonbelieving scientists - agree on one point: sci
ence has nothing to say on the subject of human values. Indeed, our failure to a
ddress questions of meaning and morality through science has now become the prim
ary justification for religious faith.
In this highly controversial book, Sam
Harris seeks to link morality to the rest of human knowledge. Defining morality
in terms of human and animal well-being, Harris argues that science can do more
than tell how we are; it can, in principle, tell us how we ought to be. In his
view, moral relativism is simply false - and comes at an increasing cost to huma
nity.
And the intrusions of religion into the sphere of human values can be f
inally repelled: for just as there is no such thing as Christian physics or Musl
im algebra, there can be no Christian or Muslim morality. Using his expertise in
philosophy and neuroscience, along with his experience on the front lines of ou
r 'culture wars', Harris delivers a game-changing book about the future of scien
ce and about the real basis of human cooperation.
