Argues that it is possible to live the good life and be morally responsible, without belief in religion. This book contains chapters on privacy and human rights, and presents ethical recommendations as alternatives to various orthodoxies.
Attempts to understand the role of Catholic dogma in a world undergoing wide-ranging changes in science, social science, historical analysis, and cultural study. This book includes the text of Loisy's work and the complete text of the papal encyclical condemning the Modernist movement.
Proceeding from the assumption that human beings desire pleasure (and avoid pain), this title uses the utilitarianism perspective to construct a calculus for determining which action to perform when confronted with situations requiring moral decision-making the goal of which is to arrive at the 'greatest happiness of the greatest number'.
An examination of the evidence for many long-accepted notions about the 'biography' of the man called Jesus. Building on the biblical studies of Christian theologians, it demonstrates that we have no reliable eyewitnesses to the events depicted in the New Testament. It quotes from the Epistles and the Gospels of the New Testament.
Presents a study of the Gospels based upon a demonstrable literary theory. This book presents the work of the four evangelists as the 'supreme fictions' of our culture, self-conscious works of art deliberately composed as the culmination of a long literary and oral tradition. It analyses the best-known and the most powerful of these fictions.
Explores topics such as the nature and extent of human freedom, the Bill of Rights, judicial review as it pertains to constitutional interpretation and the balance of powers among the three branches of government, censorship, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and social justice.
Fundamentalism - the belief that the Bible is the inspired, inerrant, and literally true word of God - thrives on ignorance, not just of a general sort, but an ignorance of the Bible itself. This work serves as a response to fundamentalism.
How does parapsychology differ from hard science? Since the origins of psychical research, parapsychology has been hard-pressed to convince sceptics that it is a legitimate science. This collection of essays seeks to clarify and explore the philosophical problems implied by such alleged phenomena as ESP, psychokinesis, and out-of-body experiences.
Seeks to understand the thrust of socialist theory and to appraise the impact of its potential implementation. This book features chapters originally made public in the pages of the "Fortnightly Review" in 1879.
