Review: Opened my mind to a new way of thinking
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 05 29, 2014
Stanislaw Kapuscinski's "DELUSIONS - Pragmatic Realism" is a book about reconciling the scientific and religious desires of humanity. The book is, in essence, a response to Richard Dawkins' "God Delusion," which Kapuscinski asserts unjustly deals with spirituality, myths, and religion. Kapuscinski feels that Dawkins, in "God Delusion," spent too much time focusing on those who had used religious teachings to distort, rather than spending time analyzing religious teachers who had used religion and myths for the beneift of others. "DELUSIONS" approaches the alleged contrast between science and religion by going back to the basics -- such as defining religion, which means to reconnect. Already, Kapuscinski has discovered a fundamental problem with Dawkin's attack on religion -- it is done without knowing what spiritual and religious people are "reconnecting" to.  Kapuscinski then offers his reconciliation of religion and science -- pragmatic realism. Pragmatic realism uses only assumptions that are practical in our interpretation of reality and ideas that are testable. Kapuscinski then analyzes ideas from ancient philosophers and myths that could be classified as pragmatic realism. You can tell Kapuscinski spent much time researching the topics for this this book, and there are many references to original texts. This book definitely opened my mind to a different way of thinking. If you're interested in a solution to the contrast between religion and science, this book is worth checking out!