A scientist, author, podcaster and proponent of Atheism. Has written several exceptional books including Letter to a Christian Nation and The Moral Landscape.
We have barely emerged from centuries of barbarism. It’s not a surprise that there are shocking inequities in this world. It is hard work to climb down out of the trees, walk upright and build a viable global civilization when you start with technology that’s made of rocks and sticks and fur. This is, this is… a project and progress is difficult.
- Sam Harris YouTube
A few minutes spent wandering the graveyard of bad ideas suggests that such conceptual revolutions are possible. Consider the case of alchemy: it fascinated human beings for over a thousand years, and yet anyone who seriously claims to be a practicing alchemist today will have disqualified himself for most positions of responsibility in our society. Faith-based religion must suffer the same slide into obsolescence. What is the alternative to religion as we know it? As it turns out, this is the wrong question to ask. Chemistry was not an “alternative” to alchemy; it was a wholesale exchange of ignorance at its most rococo for genuine knowledge.
- Sam Harris