Faith vs. Fact – Book Review

A review of Jerry Coyne’s Faith vs. Fact. This is an educated layperson’s view of the book.

INTRODUCTION

One of the things I was fortunate enough to receive this Christmas was a copy of Jerry Coyne’s latest offering, Faith Versus Fact. One recent review came to the author’s attention and was featured in this post on the blog Why Evolution is True, which takes its title from a previous book by the same author. I hope that my review is received more favourably in that quarter!

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A LONG EXPECTED GIFT

This book was one of two that I had indicated a desire to receive, the other being Robert Harris’ Imperator (watch this space…) but the fact that I had been at least part expecting to get it did not lessen the delight when that expectation was realised.

As someone who read and enjoyed Why Evolution is True (I refuse to even attempt to compare the merits of this book and Richard Dawkins’ The Greatest Show on Earth – suffice to say that I heartily recommend both books to give you a thorough grounding in the evidence for evolution) I had some initial expectations – copious evidence well laid out prominent among them.

Suffice to say that Faith Vs. Fact is a quite superb read. I particularly recommend to your attention chapter five “Why Does it Matter?”, which deals with a variety of important situations in which placing faith above reason has disastrous consequences (this chapter is not for the squeamish – ti contains some strong meat).

I will conclude this piece by suggesting that reading Faith vs. Fact should have a prominent place on your “to do” list.

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Author: Thomas

I am a founder member and currently secretary of the West Norfolk Autism Group and am autistic myself. I am a very keen photographer and almost every blog post I produce will feature some of my own photographs. I am an avidly keen cricket fan and often post about that sport.

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