MUST-READ BOOKS
Philosophy, Politics, and Culture
Douglas Murray provides a piercing analysis of some of the most controversial issues of our day including sexuality, gender, race, and technology. Murray not only exposes the dangers of a world consumed by identity politics but also charts a possible way forward.
Sohrab Ahmari wrestles with twelve society-shaping questions and argues that we must remember the millennia of religious and moral traditions that have come before us if civilization is to survive the current cultural moment.
R.C. Sproul examines the ideas of many great thinkers including Plato, Aquinas, Kant, Freud, and others. An excellent book for anyone seeking to understand basic philosophy and the way these ideas still shape us today.
If I could recommend only one book on economics, this would be it. Henry Hazlitt provides an outstanding survey of economic theories and policies and explains how economies function in a way that anyone can understand.
Strange New World is Carl Trueman’s abridged version of The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self. If you are looking for a condensed summary of Trueman’s immensely important work, this book is both short and readable, making Trueman’s arguments accessible to a much wider audience.
How can everyday citizens resist the ever-growing power of government and reclaim our God-given rights and liberties? In this short and accessible book, Matthew Trewhella outlines “a proper resistance to tyranny and a repudiation of unlimited obedience to civil government.”
In a world where many individuals and institutions are embracing the philosophies and teaching of Karl Marx, this important book evaluates original sources (including Marx’s own writings) to show how Marx’s life and work were literally influenced by the evil one. For an interview with the author, see this link.
Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay examine the destructive theories that control much of our public discourse and urge a return to evidence-based arguments. Moreover, Lindsay and Pluckrose show that true justice can only be achieved in a world that allows free speech and reasoned debate.
Abigail Shrier examines the reasons why many children (especially middle school girls) are embracing transgenderism and non-binary sexual identities. What she discovered is reflected in the book’s title: this trend is causing irreversible damage to an untold number of kids.
Thomas Sowell shows how charter schools make an enormous difference in the lives of students who attend them and explains why many politicians and teachers unions oppose these schools despite their benefit to countless children—especially children in minority and underprivileged communities.
In this appropriately named book, Larry Elder examines a host of issues and exposes the double standards that are often applied by many people in our everyday public discourse.
The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self is arguably the most important book in a generation for understanding the worldviews that are currently shaping Western civilization. Bruce Ashford has said it is “perhaps the most significant analysis and evaluation of Western culture written by a Protestant during the past fifty years.”
Neil Postman shows the truly corrosive effects of modern entertainment on our ability to think, resulting in a public discourse that is stunted and rife with anger and misunderstanding. Originally written in 1985 and republished in 2005, Postman’s book is prophetic, explaining how technology and entertainment have resulted in the toxic cultural and political environment we find ourselves in today. More than that, Postman highlights ways we can regain control over our technology and entertainment in order to restore civility and reason to public life.
Noelle Mering carefully and charitably defines what it means to be “woke” and explains how this worldview has captured the hearts and minds of many in our society. Specifically, Mering traces how this worldview has slowly and subtly permeated every part of society over the past three generations. Mering also explains how this worldview undermines the family, subverting God’s design for a flourishing civilization. Perhaps most importantly, Mering proposes several ways that society can restore what has been lost and repair what has been ruptured by a woke worldview.
Most people today care about justice; they want their neighbors to be treated fairly and for good to be upheld. But true justice cannot be achieved apart from knowing the truth and living in light of reality. In this book, Thaddeus Williams provides an excellent analysis of two types of social justice—Social Justice A and Social Justice B—and he explains how truly executing justice requires evaluating evidence, putting aside bias, and treating people as individuals made in God’s image, not as dehumanized members of generalized groups.
In a world where nearly every disparity is assumed to result from discrimination, this book by Thomas Sowell offers a much-needed response. As in all his books, Sowell conducts a thorough investigation and presents what the evidence actually shows: while some disparities may be the result of discrimination, the differences among ethnicities, sexes, et al. cannot be explained simply by discrimination, whether direct or indirect. In fact, the evidence reveals a world that is much more complex and shows that many other factors better account for disparities than discrimination.
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