Average customer rating:
- Why did I buy this?
- Understanding Death
- another load of Chopra
- Excellent Science and Philosophy
- Burden of Proof not met here
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Life After Death: The Burden of Proof
Deepak Chopra
Manufacturer: Harmony
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
General | Death & Grief | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
General | Self-Help | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
Chopra, Deepak | Authors, A-Z | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
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Metaphysics | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
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The Book of Secrets: Unlocking the Hidden Dimensions of Your Life (Chopra, Deepak)
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Buddha: A Story of Enlightenment
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The Spontaneous Fulfillment of Desire: Harnessing the Infinite Power of Coincidence (Chopra, Deepak)
ASIN: 0307345785
Release Date: 2006-10-17 |
Book Description
Deepak Chopra has touched millions of readers by demystifying our deepest spiritual concerns while retaining their poetry and wonder. Now he turns to the most profound mystery: What happens after we die? Is this one question we were not meant to answer, a riddle whose solution the universe keeps to itself? Chopra tells us there is abundant evidence that “the world beyond” is not separated from this world by an impassable wall; in fact, a single reality embraces all worlds, all times and places. At the end of our lives we “cross over” into a new phase of the same soul journey we are on right this minute.
In Life After Death, Chopra draws on cutting-edge scientific discoveries and the great wisdom traditions to provide a map of the afterlife. It’s a fascinating journey into many levels of consciousness. But far more important is his urgent message: Who you meet in the afterlife and what you experience there reflect your present beliefs, expectations, and level of awareness. In the here and now you can shape what happens after you die.
By bringing the afterlife into the present moment, Life After Death opens up an immense new area of creativity. Ultimately there is no division between life and death—there is only one continuous creative project. Chopra invites us to become cocreators in this subtle realm, and as we come to understand the one reality, we shed our irrational fears and step into a numinous sense of wonder and personal power.
Customer Reviews:
Why did I buy this?.......2007-09-16
I bought this after one of my friends died. Not sure why, mental lapse. What a waste - just theories that contradict themselves, you wont learn anything or really feel better after reading this either. Same stuff can be read by searching google for Life after Death and spending half an hour that way. I eventually just threw it out.
Understanding Death.......2007-08-26
Science has not been able to tell us much except we seem to cease to exist once we die. Why is it that man and woman alike crave something more after the flesh gives out? I find Deepak Chopra books intriguing and I want to believe there is something more. Our traditional Jew, Christian beliefs here in the USA makes it so hard to feel that way if we don't quite believe in the bible. We're taught we must believe in God as he is shown us in the bible or we lose life everlasting, but to thinking people this just seems bogus that have to accept just one way of viewing God or the Divine.
I loved the book, and I love the ideas and presentations of the Author. I will continue my quest for understanding the divine in a new way. Thanks to Mr. Chopra for continuing to challenge our western way of viewing the world.
Ruth Baker
another load of Chopra.......2007-08-13
I find reincarnation very interesting and hoped that this book included much on this subject. There was very little about it. The book was very disappointing overall. It was more about one's conscious mind than anything else. Nothing new, nothing good.
Excellent Science and Philosophy.......2007-07-28
I recommend skipping right to chapter 12 for some of the excellent far reaching science and philosophy today. I appreciate his presentation of ancient eastern philosophy and mix it with the ancient Greek philosophers. I not only read these chapters often, but I also make audio notes to review while driving in the car. He reaches into areas that are possibilities and he will tell you that, not like religion who says "it is the word of God!"
The first few chapters use parable-type techniques like scripture, designed to teach us, but I would rather he jump right to the hard core philosophy and science. I will summarize these chapters for myself eliminating the "story telling" and just list the solid core information these chapters intend to teach us.
Burden of Proof not met here.......2007-07-25
Yet another story about how dying is the next phase of life and is nothing to fear. This material is presented much better in "Home With God In A Life That Never Ends" and makes a much easier read. At the end of this book I was still waiting to see what was going to be "proved" and how that would happen.
Average customer rating:
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Jamás moriremos (Life After Death: The Burden of Proof)
Deepak Chopra
Manufacturer: Alamah
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General | Self-Help | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
Chopra, Deepak | Authors, A-Z | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
General | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
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( C ) | Autores, A-Z | Religión y espiritualidad | Libros en español | Formats | Books | Canfield, Jack | Castaneda, Carlos | Chesterton, G. K. | Cleary, Thomas | Coelho, Paulo
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Life After Death: The Burden of Proof
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El Secreto (The Secret)
ASIN: 9707707690
Release Date: 2006-12-12 |
Product Description
Deepak Chopra has touched millions of readers by demystifying our deepest spiritual concerns while retaining their poetry and wonder. Now he turns to the most profound mystery: What happens after we die? His most important and urgent message is, ultimately there is no division between life and death there is only one continuous creative project. He affirms with abundant evidence that the world beyond is not separated from this world by an impenetrable wall, and that single reality embraces all worlds, all times and places. In Life After Death, Chopra draws on cutting-edge scientific discoveries and the great wisdom traditions to provide a map of the afterlife. It s a fascinating journey into many levels of consciousness. In this book, Chopra invites us to become co-creators in this subtle realm. In the here and now you can shape what happens after you die.
Average customer rating:
- The Whole Deal
- Turow falls far below his best efforts
- It's The Journey That Matters, Not The Destination
- My Kind of Novel
- Excellent
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The Burden of Proof
Scott Turow
Manufacturer: Grand Central Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
Legal | Thrillers | Mystery & Thrillers | Subjects | Books
General | Turow, Scott | ( T ) | Authors, A-Z | Mystery & Thrillers | Subjects | Books
Paperback | Turow, Scott | ( T ) | Authors, A-Z | Mystery & Thrillers | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0446677124 |
Book Description
In Burden of Proof, Sandy Stern, the brilliant defense attorney from Presumed Innocent, faces an event so emotionally shattering that no part of his life is left untouched. It reveals a family caught in a maelstrom of hidden crimes, shocking secrets and warring passions.
Download Description
The author of Presumed Innocent, one of the signature novels of the eighties, has written a dazzling, taut, utterly engrossing new book about a family and its deepest, most closely guarded secrets. Late one Spring afternoon, Alejandro "Sandy" Stern, the leading defense attorney in the midsized Midwestern city where he lives, comes home from a business trip to find that Clara, his wife of thirty years, has committed suicide. Readers of Presumed Innocent will remember Stern as the brilliant, elegant, and elusive lawyer who masterminded the defense of Rusty Sabich. Scott Turow's new novel probes the character of this fascinating and complex man and his troubled private world. Like many successful individuals, Stern has often seemed preoccupied and remote even to those closest to him. He is overwhelmed by Clara's death, and as he tries to come to terms with it, he is forced to confront all he truly does not know about his life, including his children. Even in his mourning, Stern is drawn back to the law as the defender of Dixon Hartnell, who is the target of an increasingly complex investigation by a federal grand jury. Stern's connections to Dixon, the immensely rich owner of a commodities futures brokerage and a wily financial gamesman, are long and involved. Dixon, who both fascinates and repels Stern, is the husbad of Stern's beloved sister, Sylvia, and he has employed Stern to keep him one step ahead of the law for decades. As Sandy seeks to unravel both the painful mystery of Clara's death and the tangled web of Dixon's financial wheeling and dealing, his whole world--marriage, family, career--is brought ynder the intense scrutiny that only a lawyer as persistent, perceptive, and honest as Stern can muster. The result is a novel of enormous emotional resonance, riveting suspense, and profound and devastating revelations. It confirms Scott Turow's place as one of our most compelling and convincing storytellers.
Customer Reviews:
The Whole Deal.......2007-03-16
This was a great fun ride. I began reading with some trepidation that the ending would somehow mess up the journey -- but Turow did a great job tying together a fairly involved plot into satisfying finale.
Turow falls far below his best efforts.......2006-09-19
In most of his novels, Scott Turow enjoys mixing several plotlines, the past and the present, and the internal worlds of several characters, and almost always makes it enjoyable or at least intriguing for his readers. Unfortunately, in this book he ends up tripping over his own complications, to the extent that the story becomes boring and hard to follow. In an overzealous attempt to create more plot twists as the story develops, Turow throws out new discoveries about his characters that after a while become too contradictory to be plausible.
Possibly the book's greatest failure is its insufficient development of its central character, Alejandro "Sandy" Stern. His cultural background (born and raised in Argentina, with parents who fled Eastern Europe ahead of the Holocaust) and experience as an immigrant who enters the local elite through the law is barely glossed over (a frequent failing of American authors: insufficient research of or insight into the non-American experience), while his sexual adventures and romantic self-exploration after his wife's death can be interesting but receive more than their fair share of pages. In addition, the widower who realizes after his wife's death that he barely really knew her is a cliché; Stern's relationship with his wife is also insufficiently explored.
Turow has developed several high-quality novels with some of the characters who are also present in this book, but here his effort to create a further story about his characters comes across as more of a forced effort than an engaging story and eventually falls under the weight of its world-weary cynicism. He definitely can provide better reading material and has done so many times.
It's The Journey That Matters, Not The Destination.......2006-05-08
Scott Turow writes literature. Like John La Carre, the joy of reading his works lies in the journey through the book. Characters come alive; scenes are rich with description. Though not stream of consciousness novels, we are able to witness the thoughts of the actors, and discern their emotions as well as their understanding of life. In reading the "Burden of Proof " I often forgot that I was reading a mystery. To many readers that may be seen as a novelistic flaw, but to me it was a source of pleasure.
Sandy Stern has to cope with losing his wife who has committed suicide. How does a middle aged man make his way through this tragedy? How does a reserved, formal lawyer re-enter the world as a single man? How does he manage to legally represent his adventuresome, risk taking brother-in-law? These are a few of the challenges he faces.
Yes it is a mystery; a double one in fact. One sub-plot involves the federal investigation of his brother-in-law for some questionable futures trading. Some readers may find this less interesting than the typical legal thriller where the protagonist is faced with defending a suspected murderer (as in Turow's "Presumed Innocent"). The other sub-plot concerns a medical mystery surrounding the death of Stern's wife.
This is not a book for lovers of heart pounding, action thrillers. It is a story where you savor the quality of the writing; where you enjoy the development of the characters, and where you take pleasure in the scenes and setting of the story.
One complaint I've come across in reviews of various books is the comment that the author could have told the same story in less than half the actual pages. Turow could have written this novel in half the actual 570 pages, but then we would have missed the beauty of the story as he wanted to tell it. One reviewer of this book indicated that Turow was trying to show his knowledge of the dictionary. That puzzles me; I didn't have to look up a single word, and I'm sure you won't have to either.
If you like both fine writing, and a good story Turow can't be beat.
My Kind of Novel.......2005-07-10
Turow knows how to through it out there. I really enjoy legal thrillers. This one had me. I usually can figure things out, but this one caught me off guard. Well done.
Excellent.......2004-11-11
Scott Turow is an outstanding writer; no doubt about it. His character development is on a level way higher than Grisham. I like both writers but if you want something that goes deeper; go with Turow. Grisham has good plots but his characters are often weak. Turow has good plots and interesting characters. The only reason I didn't give this book 5 stars was becuase I feel Turow goes a bit overboard with the verbiage and the reader gets the feeling he wants to show that he is the master of the dictionary.
Book Description
After a suspicious explosion on board the galactic space cruiser USS Michaelson costs an officer his life, the ship's legal counsel, Lieutenant Sinclair, risks everything to expose a cover-up--and prosecute the son of a powerful vice-admiral.
Customer Reviews:
Excellent naval courtroom drama in space.......2006-08-24
The second book in a series, this space naval courtroom drama nonetheless contains sufficient explanation of what happened in the prior book that it can be read without leaving the reader lost.
Lt. JG Paul Sinclair, legal officer on the starship USS Michaelson by dint of a 2-week elective Academy course, is experiencing some ups and downs. A close friend is being promoted off of his ship, and the too-slick officer who replaces him (who happens to be a high-ranking Admiral's son) is not pulling his own weight. His relationship with his girlfriend's father gets off to a rocky start. And then there's a fatal accident onboard the ship with some questions remaining as to its cause, and Sinclair cannot in good conscience stay silent when he finds some evidence that the investigation into it missed.
There are plenty of space-naval dramas out there, David Weber's
Honor Harrington being the best-known example. There are also many realistic courtroom dramas. What's rare is to find a book combining the two genres. In Burden of Proof, Hemry does an excellent job. Of course, there is nothing really requiring this book to be set in space; it could just as easily have been transposed to modern-day Earth in almost every respect, right down to replacing the "Greenspacers" who interfere in a military weapons test with modern-day Greenpeace protesters doing the same thing. But the SF elements are handled ably and well, and do not feel like window-dressing the way they could have in such a book.
The courtroom drama, though it only occurs relatively late in the book, is also handled well. By presenting it from the point of view of the inexperienced Sinclair, the reader gets to learn about elements of legal strategy as Sinclair learns, rather than simply being presented with them as in the average Matlock or Perry Mason episode. Although Sinclair insists that he does not want to become a lawyer, there are signs that his fascination with matters of law may lead him down that path despite himself.
Of all the books I read on the bus on the way to and from GenCon a couple of weeks ago, I think this is the only one for which I will actively seek out other books in the series (which currently contains four books in all). I'm glad that I bothered to pick it up in the dollar store after all.
Good read, a few stylistic quibbles........2005-01-27
This is a good legal procedural novel. It isn't a whodunnit, more a howcatchhim book. Hemry does a fine job with the naval atmosphere and setting.
The two things keeping this from a 5 star review are:
the exposition is a bit clunky in places -- the exposition doesn't flow smoothly from the characters, it is there to make sure the reader is keeping up. This can be a persistent problem both in the SF genre and in legal stories.
the antagonist seems to lack any redeeming features. It is fairly clear who the antagonist will be within pages of his appearance in the story. It would have been nice to see some redeeming features to flesh him out as a 3D person. As it is, even the people who liked him are doubting their judgment by the end.
Another tour de force of legalistic s-f from Hemry.......2004-11-07
With Burden of Proof, the follow-up novel to A Just Determination, John G. Hemry cements his position as the best writer of legalistic military science fiction working today. Drawing on his own Naval career, Hemry brings the world of the United States Space Navy of 2100 to vivid life, populating it with some of the most human, realistic, vibrant characters I've ever been introduced to. Paul Sinclair, recently promoted from Ensign to Lieutenant Junior Grade, is a remarkable hero. Committed and hard-working, he cares only about doing his job to the best of his ability and he constantly chides himself for his own small mistakes. While he struggles to live up to the expectations of some of his senior officers, he is on the best of terms with most of his fellow junior officers and the ranks of enlisted men and women, actively seeking the advice of those around him and always acting in the most thoughtful, ethical of ways.
Things are going pretty well for Paul. His relationship with Jen Shen remains strong, even though she now serves on a different ship, and he has finally witnessed a return to normalcy after his critical involvement in the court-martial trial of his previous captain. Unfortunately for Paul, that two-week legal training course he took early in his career is about to come back and bite him once again.
I love the opening of this novel, as it features the disruption of a test firing mission by protestors. In a remarkable scene, Greenspacers fly in and launch themselves in to the target zone in individual pods, forcing Sinclair's ship, the Michaelson, to pick them up one by one and take them back to port. Soon thereafter, most unexpectedly, an explosion rocks the ship and takes out most of Forward Engineering. With the chief engineer missing in action and the fire suppression system not working, Sinclair takes it upon himself to lead the dangerous fire-fighting mission in to the affected area. It soon becomes clear that Chief Asher died in the explosion, and an investigation concludes that Asher caused the disaster by working on a critical piece of equipment alone - a clear violation of Navy policy. The man in charge of that investigation just so happens to be the father of Jen Shen, a man who has already made it clear that he finds Sinclair unworthy of his daughter's affection. The official report actually blames Paul - indirectly - for the tragedy, but the most galling thing of all is the awarding of a medal to Lieutenant Silver, the new replacement for Paul's best buddy on the ship. Anyone with eyes can see that Silver gets by on his personal charm alone while foisting all of his work on his subordinates (including Sinclair), and Silver was particularly useless at the time of the explosion.
Soon, information reaches Paul's ears that casts the official report's conclusions in doubt, and Sinclair is anxious to clear the name of Chief Asher and see that justice is done. The focus of attention quickly becomes Lieutenant Silver, putting Sinclair in a tough position. If he recommends court-martial proceedings against Silver based on his growing evidence, some will question whether he is trying to make Silver the scapegoat in order to deflect the doubts cast upon his own performance. There's another tiny little matter to consider, as well - Lieutenant Silver just happens to be the son of a powerful vice admiral. Once again, Sinclair is forced to make a tough choice that could threaten his reputation and Naval career - not to mention his relationship with Jen Shen, as her father will of course be called to testify for the defense.
The case against Silver is far from a slam-dunk because virtually all of the evidence is circumstantial. Clearly, though, that evidence points to Silver's wrongdoing. As in A Just Determination, the climax of the novel plays out in a military courtroom. It is here that Hemry's incredible skills at characterization really come to the fore, as this is by no means a boring courtroom drama.
Hemry has done the impossible and actually produced a novel more exciting, more engrossing, and more impressive than A Just Determination. I'm quickly coming to the conclusion that Hemry is the best science fiction writer working today. No other author manages to hook me mind, body, and soul from the very first page, and no other author creates characters who become such an integral part of my life. The first hundred pages are quite telling, as Hemry spends all of that initial time describing Sinclair's performance on the job and his interaction with friends and fellow officers. Only when the reader is firmly grounded in Sinclair's character and the nature of life aboard a Space Navy vessel does the central action of the novel, namely the explosion, take place. It's a picture perfect approach to making this legalistic science fiction thriller such an engrossing, addictive reading experience.
Shaping up to be a great series.......2004-09-06
I devoured this book and its predecessor (_A Just Determination_) in one weekend. They're both excellent.
As I said in my review of the earlier book, John G. Hemry may not have personally invented the genre 'military-SF legal drama', but there can't be too many examples of it out there. And reading these two superbly crafted novels will show you why: if you pay attention to the details, you'll see a lot of expertise lurking unobtrusively in the background. There can't be all that many authors who can write with confidence about the US Navy, the physics of space travel and spaceships, _and_ military law -- let alone keep all that stuff in the background while competently _telling an interesting story_ that doesn't bog down into technical exposition.
I'm not going to tell you a great deal about that story itself, and as with the earlier book, I strongly advise you _not_ to read the cover blurb and other book information if you haven't done so already. In each case, Ace has seen fit to promote the book by giving away things that happen well over a hundred pages in, and I would have enjoyed each of them more if I hadn't known in advance what was going to happen.
I can safely tell you that as this one opens, Paul Sinclair has just made Lieutenant Junior Grade and is still serving aboard the USS _Michaelson_. Again, the first hundred or so pages follow him through his shipboard experiences as we watch him grow and mature as a naval officer.
I can also tell you that early on, there's an extremely well thought out (and, incidentally, extremely funny) sequence involving a protest by an organization called 'Greenspace', who apparently do much the same sorts of things in space as their present-day predecessors do at sea. Hemry's portrayal of the Space Navy's personal and professional responses to these 'hippies' is both hilarious (this is where the meat of the humor is) and accurate (as a measure of Sinclair's assimilation to Navy life); his portrayal of the Greenspacers themselves is a _little_ bit of a caricature, but no one will have any trouble recognizing their real-life counterparts. One of my complaints about Heinlein's mostly-excellent _Starship Troopers_ is that Heinlein sets up and shoots down way too many straw men; Hemry doesn't make that mistake.
(Any actual hippies who read this book should read the narrative and dialogue very carefully. Hemry isn't taking sides at the authorial level; if he's making a sociopolitical point here, it's the one Commander Sykes makes: by all means question assumptions and challenge beliefs -- every society needs people who will do that -- but don't, don't, don't do foolish things that put lives in danger. And if anybody out there is still under the illusion that people in military service are 'fascists', Hemry's books should help to disabuse them of such silliness.)
Otherwise I won't give anything away. This is some of the best recent SF I've read, and I'm looking forward to reading the next Paul Sinclair book (due out in March 2005, I think).
superb space ship military legal thriller.......2004-02-29
An explosion occurs on the galactic cruiser USS Michaelson, killing Chief Petty Officer Asher and destroying much of the Forward Engineering section. While repairs are made, an inquiry into the accident occurs. The investigation team concludes that Asher violated regulations by working solo.
However, legal officer Lieutenant Junior Grade Paul Sinclair hears rumors from distraught sailors that they not only mourn the loss of a peer, but they have lost confidence in the leadership as it seems to the crew that a big cover-up happened. Everyone insists that Asher followed orders given by rising superstar Lieutenant Scott Silver the son of a very powerful Rear Admiral. Paul knows that the BURDEN OF PROOF is on him. However, all the JUST DETERMINATION in the galaxy could lead to the destruction of his own career and the end of his relationship with the woman he loves, the daughter of the head of the investigation team because if Paul succeeds it will embarrass the officer he wants as a father-in-law.
John G. Henry has pioneered a new sub-genre with his superb space ship military legal thrillers. As with the first tale (JUST DETERMINATION), BURDEN OF PROOF is more a tour of duty than an action packed tale as the plot focuses on relationships on an outer space vessel. The story line cleverly enables the audience to ride along with the crew and taste the pressure of the vastness of space inside relatively tight quarters, the seemingly endless stretches of time, and the protocol of rank. The legal aspects are brilliantly intertwined within a fantastic relationship military science fiction drama that should promote Mr. Hemry to a best selling admiral.
Harriet Klausner
Book Description
The book explores how courts decide, or ought to decide, in situations of uncertainty. A Court must always decide the case before it, even if the relevant facts remain unclear. The question then arises which party benefits and which party is burdened by that uncertainty. This is the field of application of the rules on the burden of proof or, more precisely, the burden of persuasion. Their importance for the individual claimant is obvious. The comparison of two domestic systems (one based on common law and the other a traditional code-based legal order) with regard to the issue of burden of proof helps to clarify the terminology and lays the ground for dealing with the burden of proof in international human rights law. Without knowing what can be understood by the term `burden of proof' under domestic law, international lawyers with different domestic law backgrounds are in danger of misunderstanding each other. This may lead to obscuring the problems connected with court decisions involving uncertainty. The study also deals with uncertainties with regard to legislative (general) in contrast to adjudicative (individual) facts and with uncertainties in the framework of predictions in contrast to uncertainties relating to historic facts. It attempts to prepare the ground for dealing more consciously and more consistently with problems of uncertainty in international human rights law. International courts, due to their geographical and cultural distance from the case, usually have less access to the underlying facts. Nevertheless, in order to protect human rights effectively, international courts and tribunals cannot always restrict themselves to reviewing the law, but may also have to decide on the facts. Thus issues relating to decision-making on the basis of uncertain facts, including the burden of persuasion, are even more important in international than in domestic human rights law.
Customer Reviews:
Disappointed.......2006-07-18
This book purported to be an analysis of Plantinga and Swinburne's philosophies in a non-technical format. In reality it is a biased presentation of the atheistic criticism of both men's work. Parson flippantly dismisses their works as 'failures' in many respects.
I find it quite interesting that it was Swinburne's work that heavily influenced Antony Flew (whose work is the ammunition for much of the atheistic criticism in this book) to a belief in God's existence. So although Parson ends with "point, set, game and match to the athiests", I would have to score a big one for Swinburne here (well, God with the aid of Swinburne).
Lucid; very good introduction to some of Plantinga's/Swinburne's arguments.......2006-04-06
Extremely clear writing style. Parsons assumes only an intro level of philosophical knowledge. He is rarely condescending and this is particularly refreshing in the era of in-your-face atheism. Still, every now and then Parsons can't help but sneer. For example, in his conclusion Parsons writes,
"What rightly offends secular humanists is the...persecuting zeal that all too often accompany theistic belief...[like] the crusade against abortion..." (p145).
He then states that this sometimes leads atheists to shout: "Crush the infamous thing!" (the "thing" is institutional theism). However, I think Parsons assumes too much here. The biggest assumption is that one needs to be religious (or use religious arguments) to oppose abortion. I want to note that there are atheists strongly opposed to abortion. Patrick Lee has penned a brilliant, secular defense of the pro-life position called "Abortion and Unborn Human Life." Lee is not an atheist, but he makes a secular, pro-life argument. Thus, it is a mistake to automatically link pro-life arguments to religious arguments.
This contention on my part, however, is minor; save for this one example, Parsons handles the theist/atheist debate very gracefully. Overall, the book is excellent. If you're interested in the God debate, you need to read this. Very much recommended.
An excellent introduction to the subject matter.......1998-09-01
The topics covered in Parsons's book are: (1) Alvin Plantinga's attempt to show that theistic belief can be rational even without positive arguments in its favour, (2) Richard Swinburne's cosmological argument, and (3) the problem of evil.
The aim of the book is, presumably, to introduce uninitiated readers to some of the issues currently at the forefront of philosophical theology. It meets this aim brilliantly. The clarity and simplicity of Parsons's writing allow the reader to fully understand the arguments being considered. At the same time, he is careful not to oversimplify, with the result that his critiques are no less incisive for their nontechnicality. I am not aware of any book that offers a better introduction to the issues Parsons considers. Indeed, it is difficult to think of any way the book could be significantly improved -- save, perhaps, a halving of its somewhat ridiculous cost price.
One word of warning: all of the material Parsons presents can be found elsewhere -- for example, in Michael Martin's _Atheism: A Philosophical Justification_. Thus, if you have already read (and understood) Martin's book, there would be little point buying _God: and the Burden of Proof_. On the other hand, if you are as yet unfamiliar with the arguments of Plantinga and Swinburne (two of today's leading theologians), there is no better place to start than Parsons's book. Highly recommended.
God and the Burden of Proof.......1997-06-18
In debating the existence of God, a fundamental question is who -- if anyone -- should bear the burden of proof. In _God and the Burden of Proof_, Keith Parsons explains why theists (but not atheists) bear the burden of proof. Along the way, he manages to provided a nontechnical response to two of the most influential theistic philosophers of our time, Alvin Plantinga and Richard Swinburne. Highly recommended, despite the book's excessive cost. -- Jeffery Jay Lowde
Average customer rating:
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Arguments from Ignorance
Douglas N. Walton
Manufacturer: Pennsylvania State University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
History & Surveys | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
Logic & Language | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 027101475X |
Average customer rating:
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The Burden Of Proof
Manufacturer: Bloomsbury
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000HNNWGY |
Books:
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- Live from Death Row
- LL Cool J's Platinum Workout: Sculpt Your Best Body Ever with Hollywood's Fittest Star
- Long Time Coming
- Malicious Intent : A Writer's Guide to How Murderers, Robbers, Rapists and Other Criminals Think (The Howdunit)
- MTI and Pulsed Doppler Radar (Radar Library)
- Mugglenet.Com's What Will Happen in Harry Potter 7: Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Falls in Love and How Will the Adventure Finally End
- One Nation Under the Gun
- Orgasms for Two: The Joy of Partnersex
- Partner in Crime
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