Research Catalog

The suicide of reason : radical Islam's threat to the enlightenment

Title
The suicide of reason : radical Islam's threat to the enlightenment / Lee Harris.
Author
Harris, Lee, 1948-
Publication
New York : Basic Books, ©2007.

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TextUse in library BF575.F16 H27 2007Off-site

Details

Description
xxi, 290 pages; 25 cm
Summary
Whether by choice or not, the West finds itself in a low-grade yet bitter war with Islamic fanaticism--a war the West is ill equipped to fight. The foe is resistant to any of the normal methods of conflict resolution such as negotiation, economic sanctions, or conventional armed confrontation. This book shows how modern liberal societies, whose political theories are born of the Enlightenment, are unfamiliar with the nature of mass fanaticism. The West can only think of it as a social pathology, a failure to modernize, rather than as what it is: a variety of social order that is not only fully viable in the modern world but also willing to use weapons to which the West is uniquely vulnerable. A governing philosophy based on reason, tolerance, and consensus cannot defend itself against a strategy of ruthless violence without being radically transformed--or destroyed.--From publisher description.
Subject
  • Fanaticism > Psychological aspects
  • Religious fanaticism > Psychological aspects
  • 89.62 political movements
  • Islam
  • Fanatismus
  • Vernunft
  • Fanatisme
  • Politieke bewegingen
  • Islam
  • Verlichting (cultuurgeschiedenis)
  • Fanaticism
  • Religious fanaticism > Islam
  • East and West
  • Westerse wereld
Note
  • Includes index.
Contents
Fanaticism and the myth of modernity -- The denial of fanaticism -- Fanaticism and resentment -- The end of history? -- Clash or crash? -- The fanaticism of reason -- De-mystifying reason -- Thomas Hobbes and the politics of reason -- Condorcet's tenth stage -- Reason and autonomy -- Liberal exceptionalism -- The logic of fanaticism -- The legacy and future of jihad -- Can carpe diem societies survive? -- Our new world disorder.
ISBN
  • 9780465002030
  • 046500203X
LCCN
2007009754
OCLC
  • ocm86117374
  • 86117374
  • SCSB-9589105
Owning Institutions
Princeton University Library