Category Archives: Book Notes

Jerry A. Coyne: FAITH VS. FACT, post 5 and last

Posted on Monday 15 September 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled “Why Science and Religion are Incompatible” (Viking, May 2015, xxii + 311pp, including 46pp of acknowledgements, notes, references,and index) (Earlier: post 1; post 2; post 3; post 4) Comments first this time: The final chapter of this book asks, … Continue reading →

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Jerry A. Coyne: FAITH VS. FACT, post 4

Posted on Saturday 13 September 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled “Why Science and Religion are Incompatible” (Viking, May 2015, xxii + 311pp, including 46pp of acknowledgements, notes, references,and index) (Earlier: post 1; post 2; post 3) Summary: Chapter 4: Faith Strikes Back Faith sometimes claims that it can deduce … Continue reading →

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Jerry A. Coyne: FAITH VS. FACT, post 3

Posted on Thursday 11 September 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled “Why Science and Religion are Incompatible” (Viking, May 2015, xxii + 311pp, including 46pp of acknowledgements, notes, references,and index) (Earlier: post 1; post 2) Summary: Chapter 3: Why Accommodationism Fails This chapter explains why you can’t have your religion … Continue reading →

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Jerry A. Coyne: FAITH VS. FACT, post 2

Posted on Wednesday 10 September 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled “Why Science and Religion are Incompatible” (Viking, May 2015, xxii + 311pp, including 46pp of acknowledgements, notes, references,and index) (Earlier: post 1) Summary: Chapter 2: What’s Incompatible? This chapter considers science, religion, their incompatibility, and their conflicts of method, … Continue reading →

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Jerry A. Coyne: FAITH VS. FACT, post 1

Posted on Tuesday 9 September 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled “Why Science and Religion are Incompatible” (Viking, May 2015, xxii + 311pp, including 46pp of acknowledgements, notes, references,and index) For this next book, I’m going to split summary and notes up into multiple posts. And include some general comments … Continue reading →

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Jesse Bering, THE BELIEF INSTINCT

Posted on Saturday 6 September 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled: “The Psychology of Souls, Destiny, and the Meaning of Life” (Norton, hardcover, 2011, 252pp, including 47pp notes, additional reading, and index.) (UK title The God Instinct: The Psychology of Souls, Destiny and the Meaning of Life, also 2011) I … Continue reading →

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Margaret Atwood: THE HANDMAID’S TALE

Posted on Thursday 4 September 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

(Houghton Mifflin, Feb. 1986, hardcover, 311pp) This is the US first edition hardcover, which I bought when it came out (it’s the first printing too), though the book was published in Canada the year before, in 1985. It’s 40 years … Continue reading →

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Eugene Burdick & Harvey Wheeler: FAIL-SAFE

Posted on Wednesday 20 August 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

(First published 1962. Edition show here: HarperCollins/Ecco, trade paperback, 1999, 286pp.) Here’s another book that begs categorization; is it really science fiction? I’ve grouped this book with two previously discussed, Pat Frank’s ALAS, BABYLON and Nevil Shute’s ON THE BEACH, … Continue reading →

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Nevil Shute: ON THE BEACH

Posted on Monday 11 August 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

(First published 1957. Edition here: Vintage International, trade paperback, February 2010, 312pp) And here’s the next in a group of apocalyptic novels I read in June, following Butler’s PARABLE OF THE SOWER and Frank’s ALAS, BABYLON (review review here.) This is … Continue reading →

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We’re Living in a World of Mad Hatters

Posted on Monday 4 August 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

David Brin on the red state/blue state divide; The authors of a report about the 2016 election set the record straight, to correct Tulsi Gabbard, and all the Fox News coverage of her; Tom Nichols on the latest Trump distraction … Continue reading →

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