Book picks similar to
The Ethics of Abortion: Women's Rights, Human Life, and the Question of Justice by Christopher Kaczor
philosophy
abortion
ethics
non-fiction
Giving the Devil His Due: Reflections of a Scientific Humanist
Michael Shermer - 2020
And what he is due is the right to speak his mind. He must have this for your own safety's sake because his freedom is inextricably tied to your own. If he can be censored, why shouldn't you be censored? If we put barriers up to silence 'unpleasant' ideas, what's to stop the silencing of any discussion? This book is a full-throated defense of free speech and open inquiry in politics, science, and culture by the New York Times bestselling author and skeptic Michael Shermer. The new collection of essays and articles takes the Devil by the horns by tackling five key themes: free thought and free speech, politics and society, scientific humanism, religion, and the ideas of controversial intellectuals. For our own sake, we must give the Devil his due.
Living Dolls: The Return of Sexism
Natasha Walter - 2008
Once the watchwords of feminism, these terms have now been co-opted by a society that sells women an airbrushed, highly sexualised and increasingly narrow vision of femininity. While the opportunities available to women may have expanded, the ambitions of many young girls are in reality limited by a culture that sees women's sexual allure as their only passport to success. At the same time we are encouraged to believe that the inequality we observe all around us is born of innate biological differences rather than social factors. Drawing on a wealth of research and personal interviews, Natasha Walter, author of the groundbreaking THE NEW FEMINISM and one of Britain's most incisive cultural commentators, gives us a straight-talking, passionate and important book that makes us look afresh at women and girls, at sexism and femininity, today.
Lee Kuan Yew: The Man and His Ideas
Han Fook Kwang - 1998
This book, which was first published in 1998, tells the story of his life from when the Japanese occupied Singapore in 1941 until 1998 when he was Senior Minister. Based on 13 exclusive interviews held over 30 hours, this book chronicles the events, people and political fortunes that were to shape Lee’s view of the world, as well as the path he set for the transformation of Singapore. It delves into the choices he made, the political turnings he took, the insights gained and lessons learnt, some of which were expounded to the authors for the first time, with wit, wisdom, candor and vivid recollection. Written by three leading journalists from The Straits Times.
Animal: The Autobiography of a Female Body
Sara Pascoe - 2016
Animal combines autobiography and evolutionary history to create a funny, fascinating insight into the forces that mould and affect modern women.Animal is entertaining and informative, personal and universal – silly about lots of things and serious about some. It's a laugh-out-loud investigation to help us understand and forgive our animal urges and insecurities.
The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Bible
Robert J. Hutchinson - 2007
Many people though--from authors to pundits--mock it for their own purposes and political agendas. However, the Bible remains the bestselling book of all time, believed by nearly two billion people (Christians and Jews) to be divinely inspired. In his hard-hitting new book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to The Bible, author Robert J. Hutchinson details the facts behind the numerous truths the anti-religious secularists don't want you to know about, including:*Recent archaeological discoveries confirm the historical accuracy of many Bible stories*The Bible made modern science possible (which is why it started in the Middle Ages)*Biblical laws paved the way for democracy and limited government*The Bible promotes human freedom*The enemies of the Bible are enemies of true reason and tolerance In this new installment in the bestselling P.I.G. series, Hutchinson silences the secularists and atheists with historical evidence, undeniable facts, and insightful revelations--proving why the Bible is still the bestselling book of all time--and so much more.
The Disordered Cosmos: A Journey into Dark Matter, Spacetime, and Dreams Deferred
Chanda Prescod-Weinstein - 2021
Chanda Prescod-Weinstein shares her love for physics, from the Standard Model of Particle Physics and what lies beyond it, to the physics of melanin in skin, to the latest theories of dark matter — all with a new spin informed by history, politics, and the wisdom of Star Trek.One of the leading physicists of her generation, Dr. Chanda Prescod-Weinstein is also one of fewer than one hundred Black American women to earn a PhD from a department of physics. Her vision of the cosmos is vibrant, buoyantly non-traditional, and grounded in Black feminist traditions.Prescod-Weinstein urges us to recognize how science, like most fields, is rife with racism, sexism, and other dehumanizing systems. She lays out a bold new approach to science and society that begins with the belief that we all have a fundamental right to know and love the night sky. The Disordered Cosmos dreams into existence a world that allows everyone to tap into humanity’s wealth of knowledge about the wonders of the universe.
Unnatural Selection: Choosing Boys over Girls and the Consequences of a World Full of Men
Mara Hvistendahl - 2011
These numbers don't seem terribly grim, but in ten years, the skewed sex ratio will pose a colossal challenge. By the time those children reach adulthood, their generation will have twenty-four million more men than women.The prognosis for China's neighbors is no less bleak: Asia now has 163 million females "missing" from its population. Gender imbalance reaches far beyond Asia, affecting Georgia, Eastern Europe, and cities in the U.S. where there are significant immigrant populations. The world, therefore, is becoming increasingly male, and this mismatch is likely to create profound social upheaval.Historically, eras in which there have been an excess of men have produced periods of violent conflict and instability. Mara Hvistendahl has written a stunning, impeccably-researched book that does not flinch from examining not only the consequences of the misbegotten policies of sex selection but Western complicity with them.
Fermat's Enigma
Simon Singh - 1997
xn + yn = zn, where n represents 3, 4, 5, ...no solution"I have discovered a truly marvelous demonstration of this proposition which this margin is too narrow to contain."With these words, the seventeenth-century French mathematician Pierre de Fermat threw down the gauntlet to future generations. What came to be known as Fermat's Last Theorem looked simple; proving it, however, became the Holy Grail of mathematics, baffling its finest minds for more than 350 years. In Fermat's Enigma--based on the author's award-winning documentary film, which aired on PBS's "Nova"--Simon Singh tells the astonishingly entertaining story of the pursuit of that grail, and the lives that were devoted to, sacrificed for, and saved by it. Here is a mesmerizing tale of heartbreak and mastery that will forever change your feelings about mathematics.
Period. It's About Bloody Time
Emma Barnett - 2019
Period. is an agenda-setting manifesto to remove the stigma and myths continuing to surround the female body. Bold and unapologetic, Emma Barnett is on a crusade to ignite conversation among women--and men--everywhere.
If God, Why Evil?: A New Way to Think about the Question
Norman L. Geisler - 2011
A trusted apologist provides a fresh, balanced approach to understanding how a loving God can preside over a world filled with evil and suffering
The Story of Philosophy
James Garvey - 2012
Accessible writing, brilliant scholarship and over 150 colour illustrations combine to form a richly informative and highly entertaining work of narrative history. Starting with the most important figures in the Greek era, including Thales of Miletus - often referred to as the first philosopher - Pythagoras and Plato, the story continues with the great religious thinkers of medieval Europe such as Augustine, Aquinas and Maimonides, key players of the Enlightenment such as Descartes, Hobbes and Voltaire, their successors in the Romantic era such as Marx and Nietzsche, and concluding with a survey of 20th and 21st century philosophy.
10 Books That Screwed Up the World: And 5 Others That Didn't Help
Benjamin Wiker - 2008
From Machiavelli's The Prince to Alfred Kinsey’s Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, from Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto to Margaret Mead’s Coming of Age in Samoa, these "influential" books have led to war, genocide, totalitarian oppression, the breakdown of the family, and disastrous social experiments. And yet the toxic ideas peddled in these books are more popular and pervasive than ever. In fact, they might influence your own thinking without your realizing it. Fortunately, Professor Benjamin Wiker is ready with an antidote, exposing the beguiling errors in each of these evil books. Witty, learned, and provocative, 10 Books That Screwed Up the World provides a quick education in the worst ideas in human history and explains how we can avoid them in the future.
For One More Day
Mitch Albom - 2006
Now he returns with a beautiful, haunting novel about the family we love and the chances we miss.For One More Day is the story of a mother and a son, and a relationship that covers a lifetime and beyond. It explores the question: What would you do if you could spend one more day with a lost loved one? As a child, Charley "Chick" Benetto was told by his father, "You can be a mama's boy or a daddy's boy, but you can't be both." So he chooses his father, only to see the man disappear when Charley is on the verge of adolescence. Decades later, Charley is a broken man. His life has been crumbled by alcohol and regret. He loses his job. He leaves his family. He hits bottom after discovering his only daughter has shut him out of her wedding. And he decides to take his own life.He makes a midnight ride to his small hometown, with plans to do himself in. But upon failing even to do that, he staggers back to his old house, only to make an astonishing discovery. His mother, who died eight years earlier, is still living there, and welcomes him home as if nothing ever happened..What follows is the one "ordinary" day so many of us yearn for, a chance to make good with a lost parent, to explain the family secrets, and to seek forgiveness. Somewhere between this life and the next, Charley learns the astonishing things he never knew about his mother and her sacrifices. And he tries, with her tender guidance, to put the crumbled pieces of his life back together.Through Albom's inspiring characters and masterful storytelling, readers will newly appreciate those whom they love and may have thought they'd lost in their own lives. For One More Day is a book for anyone in a family, and will be cherished by Albom's millions of fans worldwide.
The Great Dissenter: The Story of John Marshall Harlan, America's Judicial Hero
Peter S. Canellos - 2021
But not in the case of the most famous dissenter on the Supreme Court. Almost a century after his death, John Marshall Harlan’s words helped end segregation and gave us our civil rights and our modern economic freedom. But his legacy would not have been possible without the courage of Robert Harlan, a slave who John’s father raised like a son in the same household. After the Civil War, Robert emerges as a political leader. With Black people holding power in the Republican Party, it is Robert who helps John land his appointment to the Supreme Court. At first, John is awed by his fellow justices, but the country is changing. Northern whites are prepared to take away black rights to appease the South. Giant trusts are monopolizing entire industries. Against this onslaught, the Supreme Court seemed all too willing to strip away civil rights and invalidate labor protections. So as case after case comes before the court, challenging his core values, John makes a fateful decision: He breaks with his colleagues in fundamental ways, becoming the nation’s prime defender of the rights of Black people, immigrant laborers, and people in distant lands occupied by the US. Harlan’s dissents, particularly in Plessy v. Ferguson, were widely read and a source of hope for decades. Thurgood Marshall called Harlan’s Plessy dissent his “Bible”—and his legal roadmap to overturning segregation. In the end, Harlan’s words built the foundations for the legal revolutions of the New Deal and Civil Rights eras. Spanning from the Civil War to the Civil Rights movement and beyond, The Great Dissenter is a “magnificent” (Douglas Brinkley) and “thoroughly researched” (The New York Times) rendering of the American legal system’s most significant failures and most inspiring successes.
The Second Sex
Simone de Beauvoir - 1949
This long-awaited new edition reinstates significant portions of the original French text that were cut in the first English translation. Vital and groundbreaking, Beauvoir’s pioneering and impressive text remains as pertinent today as it was back then, and will continue to provoke and inspire generations of men and women to come.