Sam Harris: Can Science Determine Human Values?

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Partner:: Berkeley Arts and Letters
Location:: First Congregational Church of Berkeley (2345 Channing Way at Dana, Berkeley)
Berkeley, CA
Event Date:: 11.10.10
Speaker:: Sam Harris
Tags:: atheism; morality; islam; christianity; jainism

Summary: In this highly anticipated, explosive new book, the author of The End of Faith and Letter to a Christian Nation calls for an end to religion's monopoly on morality and human values. In The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values, Sam Harris tears down the wall between scientific facts and human values to dismantle the most common justification for religious faith -- that a moral system cannot be based on science.

The End of Faith ignited a worldwide debate about the validity of religion. In its aftermath, Harris discovered that most people, from secular scientists to religious fundamentalists, agree on one point: Science has nothing to say on the subject of human values. Even among religious fundamentalists, the defense one most often hears for belief in God is not that there is compelling evidence that God exists, but that faith in Him provides the only guidance for living a good life. Controversies about human values are controversies about which science has officially had no opinion. Until now.

Morality, Harris argues, is actually an undeveloped branch of neuroscience, and answers to questions of human value can be visualized on a "moral landscape" -- a space of real and potential outcomes whose peaks and valleys correspond to human states of greater or lesser wellbeing. Different ways of thinking and behaving -- different cultural practices, ethical codes, modes of government, etc. -- translate into movements across this landscape. Such changes can be analyzed objectively on many levels, ranging from biochemistry to economics, but they have their crucial realization as experiences in the human brain.

Bringing a fresh, secular perspective to age-old questions of right and wrong, and good and evil, Harris shows that we know enough about the human brain and its relationship to events in the world to say that there are right and wrong answers to the most pressing questions of human life. Because such answers exist, cultural relativism is simply false -- and comes at increasing cost to humanity. And just as there is no such thing as Christian physics or Muslim algebra, there can be no Christian or Muslim morality. Using his expertise in philosophy and neuroscience, along with his experience on the front lines of our "culture wars," Sam Harris delivers a game-changing argument about the future of science and about the real basis of human cooperation.

Sam Harris: Islam Is Not the Religion of Peace

04 min 39 sec

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Sam Harris: The Moral Failings of Religion

03 min 48 sec

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Author Sam Harris on the Pitfalls of Moral Illusion

03 min 17 sec

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01 hr 40 min 01 sec

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73 Comments

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Oguzan

Posts: 1

Posted: 12.20.10, 04:40 AM

@sianess85:

Have you even watched the video? If so, you clearly dont understand it. What is racist about saying, that the koran the the core teaching of islam are violent? What is racist about attacking bad ideas?

And no, muslims are not as peaceful as ANY other religion. Sam also makes that point, when he talks about Jainism. If you are a fundamentalist or extremist Jaine, you are not a danger to society because you are peaceful to the extrem. If Bin Laden was an extreme Jaine, he wouldnt do what he does. It`s totally incompatible with the teachings of Jainism.

And you really dont know the difference between jihad and the crusades? Jihad is a part of muslim teachings - the crusades are not.

But thanks for admitting that Islam is bad for women. You basically said: Well, Islam is a sexist religion, but so is christianiy. To that only valid part in your post, I applaud you.

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sianness85

Posts: 1

Posted: 12.20.10, 02:59 AM

To say that violence is a fundamental and logical conclusion of Islamic teaching is pure racism and nothing else. Islamists skew the teaching of Mohammed to appeal to the feelings that are natural from our morally bankrupt society. Muslims are as peaceful as any other religion. The difference between the crusades and the jihad is? The Bible is just as sexist as the Koran.

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peterprimavera

Posts: 2

Posted: 12.19.10, 09:11 PM

Once again Sam has proven to be the most amazing logician in the debate. He is the clear heir to Hitchen's role in the cause against superstition. I do not intend to deny the monumental importance of Hitchens, or concede victory to the malignant "alien" inhabiting his body. We need Hitch more than ever. A world with both of these powerful minds expressing themselves is a better world.

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