Purchase
How to Have Convictions Without Becoming a Fanatic
HarperOne
August 2009
On Sale: August 4, 2009
192 pages
ISBN: 0061778168
EAN: 9780061778162
Hardcover
Add to Wish List
Non-Fiction
Modernity was supposed to usher in a rational secular world
where religion was marginalized. Some even predicted it
would disappear. But religion has not only survived—it is
growing and thriving in the modern world. Defying
predictions, we live today in a world of plurality where
diverse groups live under conditions of civic peace and in
social interaction. However, this arrangement is not without
tensions. How do we handle moral issues, such as abortion or
homosexuality, when different groups have strongly held but
opposing viewpoints? And how does culture maintain its
harmony when confronted with the challenge of an aggressive
fundamentalism? The answer, according to world-renowned sociologists Peter
Berger and Anton Zijderveld, is doubt. Not the stupefying
doubt of relativism where we become incapable of any
decision because we are overwhelmed by options, but a
virtuous use of doubt that allows us to move forward boldly
with strong moral convictions without caving in to the
fanatic's temptation of seeing everyone who disagrees with
you as the enemy. How we as individuals and as a society can
find this ideal balance is the subject of this deceptively
simple but revolutionary work. In Praise of Doubt takes the reader on an exciting whirlwind
tour of the history of modernity, religion, the rise of
psychology, Marxism, and the intellectual challenge of
relativism, the failure of totalitarianism, fundamentalism
as a modern invention, and the startling conclusion
explaining why truth, even religious truth, needs doubt to
survive and thrive.
Comments
No comments posted.
Registered users may leave comments.
Log in or register now!
| 
© 2003-2024 off-the-edge.net
all rights reserved Privacy Policy