From the moors of science and nature, to the boggling insights into culture, morality and religion, these book suggestions ought to be on the list of every informed reader who seeks to understand and piece together the fringes of universe. Drawing from some of the classical texts and contemporary researches in areas which should concern a thinking human society. These are suggestions by me, and are nowhere near exhaustive or perfect.
It explains some of underlying processes going on in evolution, which as the title suggests is "a blind watchmaker", with no eyes to foresee the future. Contrary to popular ideas about evolution and natural selection, Dawkins describes how evolution creates and designs, which is not necessarily the "best" design.
1) The Blind Watchmaker
It explains some of underlying processes going on in evolution, which as the title suggests is "a blind watchmaker", with no eyes to foresee the future. Contrary to popular ideas about evolution and natural selection, Dawkins describes how evolution creates and designs, which is not necessarily the "best" design.
2) The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning and the Universe itself
You just cannot ignore physics, no matter how wild and fancy your imagination gets in the philosophical realms such as nature of reality, life and the universe. Sean Carroll explains what our current understandings about the natural world are and what plausible inferences we can draw from it. To the fine-tuners, the bio-centrists and the woo woo hoods, bad news for you all.
3) Good Natured: The Origins of Right and Wrong in Humans and other Animals
Why are we moral? Why do we have remarkable capacities of altruism, cooperation and mutuality?
This interdisciplinary voyage seeks to answer questions which have long been at the discretion of philosophy and religion.
4) Thinking Fast and Slow
It is the holy grail for any one trying to grasp the complexities of human behavior, cognition and psychology. Comprehensive and understandable for an ordinary creature. (No, you won't be able to control people after reading this, but you surely will be able to see, how vulnerable our thought and perception is)
5) The Age of Reason
This is one of the classic Enlightenment texts which throw light at the philosophical loopholes in theology and religious doctrines. If a God was all-powerful, it would not need the aid of revelation or prophets, or any agency and would be accessible to every man alike without any barrier of tradition, culture and language.
6) Sex At Dawn: The Prehistoric Origins of Modern Sexuality
It traces the evolution of human sexuality, while challenging some of the assumptions about sexual nature of humans and the cultural pretexts in the social sciences and the evolutionary psychology. The "hyper-driven male and the reluctant female" picture, which have been at the heart of most sociological and anthropological literature is a vestige of Victorian era, which have crept into our present-day ideals of marriage, monogamy and sex.
7) Why People Believe Weird Things?
From psychic mediums, to alternative medicines, ancient astronauts, and to the elusive conspiracy theories, weird things are everywhere, which continue to attract so many people and the drive million dollar industry of pseudo-science and quackery. Why do smart people believe weird things?
8) Breaking The Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon
How do religions do it? which keep billions of people on their feet, and some are even ready to go at far fetched lengths for it. It seeks to vacuum some of the fog which surrounds the origins of religion, its practice and its evolution.
9) Sapiens: A brief history of Humankind
How did humans become the dominant species of the planet? From small herd of foragers to vast civilizations of glamour and technology. It is a story about us, and our success which will leave you thinking for long.
10) The Mind of the terrorist: The psychology of terrorism from IRA to Al-Qaeda
No, the terrorists are not the "psychopathic" mind wretched creatures you once have thought. They are perfectly normal people who know what they are doing, Before we step into the political dimension of countering terrorism, it is important to understand them first, from a closer and detached point of view.
11) The Second Sex
Its one of the central pieces of feminist literature. Oh, the horror of the F word. From biology, to history and to culture, it sheds light on some of the ideological nicks, which an ordinary eye presumably fails to catch.
12) The Origins of Species
Even though we know about evolution a lot more than Darwin did, it is still a beautiful and mind sparking read.
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