10 Books that Screwed Up the World: And Five Others That Didn't Help by Benjamin Wiker
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(Hardcover)
- Pub. Date: May 2008
- 260pp
- Sales Rank: 134,284
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Product Details
- Pub. Date: May 2008
- Publisher: Regnery Publishing, Inc., An Eagle Publishing Company
- Format: Hardcover, 260pp
- Sales Rank: 134,284
- ISBN-13: 9781596980556
- ISBN: 1596980559
Synopsis
You've heard of the "Great Books"?
These are their evil opposites. From Machiavelli's The Prince to Karl Marx'sThe Communist Manifesto to Alfred Kinsey's Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, these "influential" books have led to war, genocide, totalitarian oppression, family breakdown, and disastrous social experiments. And yet these authors' bad ideas are still popular and pervasive-in fact, they might influence your own thinking without your realizing it. Here with the antidote is Professor Benjamin Wiker. In his scintillating new book, 10 Books That Screwed Up the World (And 5 Others That Didn'tHelp), he seizes each of these evil books by its malignant heart and exposes it to the light of day. In this witty, learned, and provocative exposé, you'll learn:
* Why Machiavelli's The Prince was the inspiration for a long list of tyrannies (Stalin had it on his nightstand)
* How Descartes' Discourse on Method "proved" God's existence only by making Him a creation of our own ego
* How Hobbes' Leviathan led to the belief that we have a "right" to whatever we want
* Why Marx and Engels's Communist Manifesto could win the award for the most malicious book ever written
* How Darwin's The Descent of Man proves he intended "survival of the fittest" to be applied to human society
* How Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil issued the call for a world ruled solely by the "will to power"
* How Hitler's Mein Kampf was a kind of "spiritualized Darwinism" that accounts for his genocidal anti-Semitism
* How the pansexual paradise described in Margaret Mead's Coming of Age in Samoa turned out tobe a creation of her own sexual confusions and aspirations
* Why Alfred Kinsey's Sexual Behavior in the Human Male was simply autobiography masquerading as science
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Biography
Benjamin Wiker received his Ph.D. from Vanderbilt University, and has taught at Marquette University, St. Mary's University, Thomas Aquinas College, and Franciscan University. He now writes full time as a senior fellow at the St. Paul Center for Biblical
Theology and is also a senior fellow with Discovery Institute. He has written several other books, most recently A Meaningful World: How the Arts and Sciences Reveal the Genius of Nature (co-authored with Jonathan Witt) and Answering the New Atheism: Dismantling Richard Dawkins' Case against God (co-authored with Scott Hahn). He lives in rural Ohio with his beloved wife, seven children, and sundry goats, chickens, rabbits, dogs, cats, and whatever else happens to wander along.
Customer Reviews
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- Ratings: 10Reviews: 4
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An Opposing View On What Are Considered To Be Great Booksby CabbieMA
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July 11, 2009: Wiker does a good job making the reader rethink settled philosophy. He writes from a conservative Christian perspective, but he effectively pokes some big holes in the philosophies of influential authors and points out why these philosophies are not so great for world peace or personal peace. Wiker states that Machiavelli's "The Prince" is the dictator's handbook, but worse, Machiavelli made the unthinkable thinkable for the average person. The ends do not justify the means, but this is exactly how Machiavelli's thoughts permeate through modern society to average people. In his critique of DesCartes, the accepted father of modern philosophy, Wiker shows how circular DesCartes' philosophy is. Wiker says DesCarte's most famous quote "I think, therefore I am" proves nothing about the existence of anything. Wiker says we exist, and therefore we can think, as well as feel joy, hunger, and pain. The world would exist whether we think or not. The world is not all about us. But DesCartes philosophy allows us to be selfish. And that selfishness, Wiker points out, is what makes DesCartes's books dangerous. Wiker does not propose burning these books, only viewing them with a more discerning eye so that can see the destructive effects their words and thoughts continue to have on society and the average person.
Entertaining and simple philosophy bookby stormshadow
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May 06, 2009: This book is simple, humorous, addictive philosophy book that it is easy to get absorbed into. The book avoids using only logic and dry statements that are common in many philosophy materials. The author employs the use of sarcasm and ridiculous scenarios to undercut the reasoning of the authors in the books he mentions. This style makes the book entertaining and easy to read as well as enlightening. The author takes an uncommon and unpopular approach of tackling 15 popular books and connecting them to the tragedies of societies (thus the title). The author encourages the reader to read these books themselves but only to see the folly in their reasoning. The author draws connections between events and ideologies in the books that many sociologist, philosophers, etc may disagree with, so be prepared. It is a interesting book for people who have read some of these "15 books" and want a view if their effects on society at large. You don't have to be a philosophy major to understand the simple reasoning in the book.
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