Richard Dawkins - The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution

I bought The Greatest Show on Earth the other day on the advice of a guy working in the bookstore, and I quite enjoyed it. I have very little to say about it, however, largely because while it was interesting I didn't find anything terribly controversial that I would want to highlight or disagree with.

Dawkins does an excellent job of outlining the way in which evolution works and why it is the logical answer for how life developed. He also effectively debunks the idea of creationism (not that it really needed any more debunking). One of the most interesting things about the book was how Dawkins pointed out that the creationist argument about "missing links" in the fossil record was faulty not just because there aren't nearly as many missing links as creationists would like to believe but also because the evidence for evolution would be overwhelming even if no fossils had ever been recovered. He also points out that this is a side to the argument that creationists avoid, hammering away instead at the fact that there is not a complete fossil record.

The Greatest Show on Earth was an incredibly interesting read, and I would recommend it not just to those who question the validity of evolution but also those who know that evolution is a fact but need more resources to effectively argue their case.

Bertrand Russell - Why I Am Not a Christian and Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects

I bought Why I Am Not a Christian earlier this week, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I was particularly struck by the fact that despite the essays being written 70-90 years ago they were not just still relevant today but were also surprisingly progressive in terms of sexual ethics and other controversial topics.

One of the major points that Russell argues against is the idea that Christianity is the best source for morality in society. Firstly, he points out that the morals taught in the bible are not really the best morals for society, but rather than focusing on the old testament laws like so many critics do he looks at the new testament. He argues that even if Jesus actually said everything he is claimed to have said (which Russell says is very unlikely), he was neither very wise (he incorrectly predicted that he would return during the lifetimes of those alive when he was) or very kind (as he fully endorses the idea of eternal damnation). Second, Russell argues that despite what it claims, the church endorses an ethic of abandoning one's family as evidenced by Jesus' requirement that his disciples do so and Jesus' own disrespectful treatment of his mother. Third, Russell makes the claim that religion has in fact been a major source of cruelty and harm in the world, pointing out that the more religious a society is the more likely it is that that society is cruel. For evidence of this he points to events ranging from the Inquisition to witch hunts to the persecution of Christians by other Christians during the Reformation. Eighty years later, this argument is echoed by Harris' commentary on the Islamic countries of the Middle East. Finally, Russell counters the arguments of those who say that non-Christian dogmas like Nazism and Soviet communism do more harm than religion by arguing that it is unlikely that those dogmas would have received as wide a following as they did if their adherents had not been trained as children in unquestioning obedience to religious dogma. He says that Hitler and Stalin merely replaced one totalitarian dogma for another, and often used the same strategies.

Russell also takes aim at the legitimacy of religion itself, and argues that religious belief stems not from evidence but from fear (like children looking for the reassurance of an adult when things go wrong), a desire to be important (in the cosmic scale of things we are unimportant, but flatter ourselves that an all-powerful being takes an interest in the minutiae of our lives), and hatred (the desire to judge others in order to feel superior). He also points out that increasingly (in his time, although this still occurs frequently today) the religious argue for the existence of god based on their belief that it makes their lives and the world a better place, rather than on actual evidence that it is true. This is what Dawkins refers to as the belief in belief.

Why I Am Not a Christian was a brilliant book, and I could clearly see the arguments that likely inspired later writers like Dawkins, Hitchens, and Harris. I would definitely recommend it, especially to people who are beginning to question their faith.

Sam Harris - Letter to a Christian Nation

I picked up Letter to a Christian Nation today because I wanted to read more of what Harris had to say after reading The End of Faith. Specifically, because so much of The End of Faith was about Islam, I wanted to read more of his opinion about Christianity. Although much of what Harris says in Letter to a Christian Nation was very similar to what he said in The End of Faith, I enjoyed the book very much.

One of the biggest arguments in Letter to a Christian Nation is about morality. Harris approaches this argument from several directions. First, he argues that contrary to what Christian fundamentalists claim they do not truly get their morals from the bible (which is the same argument that Dawkins made in The God Delusion). For example, he looks at the issue of slavery. Not only is slavery acceptable and widespread in the bible, both the Old and New Testaments give guidance for how slaves should be treated and how they should act. Those slave owners in the 1800s who argued in favour of slavery using the bible as justification were correctly citing their text, but it is now agreed by the vast majority of people (including the fundamentalists) that slavery is morally wrong. In other words, society has labelled something as morally repugnant even though the bible says that it is not. He goes further in order to address protests by moderate Christians by saying that while it is possible to cherry-pick arguments from the bible that go against things like slavery, a thorough reading of the entire text does not justify their moderate beliefs. His second argument about morality is directed at those who wish to control the morals of others even when it means causing harm. He outlines the standard arguments, including that missionaries and NGOs discouraging condom use in Africa contributes to the spread of HIV/AIDS, and that the attempt to force the teaching of abstinence in schools as the only option has caused America to have extremely high teenage pregnancy and STD rates when compared to other developed countries. Overall, Harris argues that following the morals of the fundamentalist Christian community does far more harm to society than good. Finally, Harris argues that contrary to popular Christian fundamentalist belief, being a "Christian" society does not lead to greater happiness or morality. On the contrary, societies with less religion (both countries such as Sweden or Norway and areas of the US like the northeastern states) tend to be happier, wealthier, and have less crime than those that are highly religious.

Discussions of morality took up the majority of Letter to a Christian Nation, but Harris also takes the opportunity to examine the validity of Christian belief itself. First, he points out that the bible was fairly obviously written by people with very limited understanding of how the world worked rather than by people inspired by an omniscient god who had created the earth and should presumably know how it worked. There are lots of discussions about slaves and menstruation in the Old Testament, but not a lot of knowledge of germs or cancer (or stars, or the sun, or really anything else that science has discovered). In addition, the "prophecies" that are sprinkled throughout the bible are oddly unspecific for an omniscient god who could have presumably predicted things with extreme accuracy but chose instead to speak in vague generalities that are not overly difficult to fulfill (rather like a carnival psychic). Harris also points out the various illogical natural things in the world, such as fetuses growing a coat temporary of hair or snakes that have pelvises to point out that so-called intelligent design does not really appear all that intelligent.

I really enjoyed Letter to a Christian Nation. It was a fairly quick read, and makes strong arguments against the beliefs of fundamentalist Christians (it is explicitly not directed at moderate or liberal Christians, who Harris does not have terribly much respect for). I would highly recommend it.

Sam Harris - The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason

I bought The End of Faith a few weeks ago when I went out and bought a number of other atheist books. Unlike The God Delusion or God is Not Great I'm not entirely sure how I feel about Harris' work. He makes quite a few strong points about the harm that is done by religion, specifically Islam, and although I agree with much of his logic I don't particularly like agreeing with him.

This dislike of agreeing with Harris likely stems from my own general worldview that people and their belief systems should be treated more or less equally mixed with a conscious desire to avoid the appearance of racism. Harris, on the other hand, confidently asserts that of all the world religions, Islam is the worst in terms of the harm that it does both to its adherents and those outside of the faith. He argues that Islam is the only major religion that has a holy book where one is hard-pressed to find justifications to not be violent, and that while religions like Christianity and Judaism have certainly done terrible things, they at least have traditions that can be used to justify peace. He also states that while this idea that Islam is a particularly bad religion might make people uncomfortable when said out loud (it certainly did for me) it is not racism to impartially look at the facts and reach a conclusion. I think that my discomfort stems from the fact that Harris' conclusions sound very close to those espoused by so many right-wing fundamentalist Christians. The difference of course is that while those people argue that Islam is inherently violent and that Christianity is the only alternative as a peaceful, "true" religion, Harris (and I, I suppose) would argue that Islam is inherently violent and that other religions are not much better, and that no religions should have an influential political say in the world.

Harris also makes a compelling argument against religious moderates. For one, he believes that those who claim to be religiously moderate are doing so in response to cultural norms as opposed to justification from their holy books. This lines up nicely with what Dawkins says in The God Delusion, which is that most modern people do not truly get their morals from their scriptures, they pick and choose from them to find those that they agree with. Harris also makes the claim as Hitchens and Dawkins have that moderates in religion are partially responsible for the atrocities committed in the name of their religion because of their general unwillingness to stop the extremists. Once again, Harris looks specifically at Muslims, this time those who claim that it is only Muslims in non-Western countries that are fundamentalist extremists. Harris points out that not only is that claim false (there are sharia law courts in Britain as well as plenty of so-called homegrown terrorists) but that it is meaningless, since minorities tend to be "tolerant" of the majority since the majority are the ones with the power.

Although much of Harris' focus is on Islam, he does not spare other religions. Specifically, Harris looks at the Christian influence in the United States under Bush and says that the United States government comes dangerously close to being a theocracy. In addition to repeated references to god by all sorts of government leaders, Harris points out the dangerous amount of influence that Christian fundamentalists have in shaping public policy. He criticizes the prohibition of drugs and laws against same-sex marriage and sexual "immorality" as having very little practical purpose and stemming from a desire to regulate the morals of the people based on an interpretation of a holy book that not everyone subscribes to. Harris also strongly criticizes the interference of religion with science, starting with the insistence in many places in the US that creationism and evolution be given equal weight in the science classroom. Harris' strongest criticism comes when looking at the interference of Christian lobbies with scientific advances that could significantly help humanity such as stem cell research. Out of concern for harming five-day-old embryos consisting of a hundred or so cells, fundamentalists are inhibiting research that has the potential to end or reduce the suffering of countless sentient human beings.

In general, I agreed with Harris' main points. In the case of Christian fundamentalism in the United States I agreed readily, while in the case of his criticisms of Islam I agreed after being dragged along kicking and screaming. In retrospect this makes very little sense, since it is patently obvious that the harm being done by Islamist states to their own citizens as well as others is considerably more than the harm being done by other states, and is likely the effect of my conditioning that to criticize the belief systems of others (even when what they are doing is fundamentally wrong) is tantamount to racism and intolerance. This is not to say that Islam is guilty while other religions are not, since Christian, Jewish, Hindu, and other fundamentalism does a great deal of harm as well (and has done an enormous amount of harm historically). I would highly recommend The End of Faith, since it made me do a great deal of thinking about how I view the world.

Christopher Hitchens - God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything

I bought God is Not Great a couple of weeks ago unsure of whether or not I would enjoy it. Although I generally agree with what Hitchens had to say, I'm not always a fan of his style, so I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked the book. In particular, I liked how the book was divided into a series of short essays on different topics all pointing towards the central thesis that religion poisons everything.

I found it quite interesting that towards the beginning of the book Hitchens states that even if he had the power to do so he would not want to ban all religions from the world. All he wanted was to be left alone by religion, and for others to have the same right. A major problem with religion, according to him, is that it has an overwhelming desire to force its version of what is "right" on others and is not content to leave others to believe what they want. While this is certainly not true of all religions, it is for a vast number of them, especially those that enjoy power today (the Islamic governments in the Middle East, for instance, or the Evangelical churches in America).

One of my favourite essays in God is Not Great was on the relationship between religion and health, as I found that it made one of Hitchens' strongest points in favour of the idea that religion poisons everything. In it, he looks at a number of ways in which modern religions interfere with healthcare and thereby increase suffering. For one, he looks at the Catholic opposition to birth control as a contributing factor towards the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa, along with the opposition of some Muslim authorities to vaccines (such as the one for polio). He goes further by examining practices such as female genital mutilation and faith healing in lieu of actual medical care as religious practices that cause serious health problems for those unlucky enough to be victims of them. Finally, he points out that many of the things that modern religions take as sacred stories from their religions' history would, if they occurred today, be taken as signs of serious mental illness. I have heard that exact same statement from the other side of the argument decrying the state of modern society and bemoaning that if Jesus were to return today society would so cynical that it would not believe him but would have him committed as mentally ill. I tend to agree that if someone came around declaring themselves to be the son of god and encouraging people to abandon their families to wander with him they would be placed under psychiatric care, and rightly so.

Hitchens also responds to the argument that many religious people make that their religions should not be judged on the actions in their past. Firstly, if we are to believe that what is stated in the bible is the literal truth then absolutely god and those who follow the teachings of the bible should be judged on the past. Even if god existed, I do not think that I would willingly wish to obey someone who ordered on multiple occasions that all of the inhabitants of a city, regardless of age be put to death (or, for a bit of variation, that all the males and non-virgin women be put to death, with the virgin girls distributed amongst the slaughterers for their own entertainment). In addition, Hitchens points out that just because modern Christianity for the most part now tries to sell itself as a religion of personal salvation and relief, one should never forget how it acted when it actually held power (hint: it was a lot like how Islam acts when it is in power now).

A good portion of God is Not Great is dedicated to confronting the argument that atheists have done just as much harm in the last century as religious people, if not more. Interestingly, he does not make the same argument as Dawkins, which is that while much of the violence done by the religious is done in the name of religion and with religious justifications, very little violence by atheists is done on behalf of atheism; it is generally for reasons like greed or power. Instead, Hitchens makes two points. First, Hitler, who is often named as one of the major "atheist" killers of the twentieth century was not in fact atheist and he (along with most of his fascist colleagues) had quite a bit of religious support. Second, he points out that the two major atheist slaughterers of the last century (Stalin and Mao) weren't really interested in destroying religion, just in replacing it with new dogmas. They created their own religions centered on themselves via cults of personality which in many cases (and especially with Mao) still exist today and have been emulated in Cuba, North Korea, and elsewhere. Therefore what they were killing in the name of was not atheism, it was their own egos and personality cults.

Hitchens also briefly makes a number of very good points that I want to mention. First, he does a good job of examining a variety of Eastern traditions to show that contrary to much modern thought (as casually following various Hindu or Buddhist practices is increasingly trendy) they are not really much better morally or historically than Western religions. They too have histories of violence and oppression. Second, he also makes a good point about religious indoctrination as child abuse. Specifically, he states that by terrifying children with the idea of outlandish punishments (vivid descriptions of hell, for example, or the idea that a wide variety of natural impulses are in fact grievous sins) children suffer psychological harm that is not justifiable.

There was only one point in God is Not Great where I disagreed with Hitchens. In one section he discusses the case of Joseph Kony and the Lord's Resistance Army as well as a religious charity that worked with those who had been harmed by the LRA. Hitchens states that while a secular charity could do the same work as the religious charity and do it just as well, to do what Kony is doing requires faith. I do not really agree with this. I believe that it is more accurate to human nature to say that to do something as abhorrent as the actions of the LRA one needs a cause, but that cause does not necessarily have to be religious faith. It simply needs to be blind, unquestioning obedience to an authority figure.

I very much enjoyed God is Not Great. Hitchens lays out an excellent series of arguments and does a great job of proving his argument that religion poisons everything. I would highly recommend it.

Jenna Miscavige Hill - Beyond Belief: My Secret Life Inside Scientology and My Harrowing Escape

I bought Beyond Belief last week because I've been curious about Scientology for a while now, but hadn't gotten around to reading much about it. I was not disappointed, as Miscavige Hill does an excellent job of outlining what life is like for a child who grows up within the "religion."

I was struck by the sheer amount of brainwashing and other cult behaviour that Miscavige Hill described, including the seeming ease with which her parents essentially abandoned her at a young age in the belief that they were serving the "greater good." The brainwashing brought to mind a number of parallels, including the disturbing similarities to the Hitler Youth in forcing children to spy and report on one another. In addition, the complete lack of access to information critical of Scientology (and Miscavige Hill's comment that she grew up thinking that everyone admired L. Ron Hubbard) made me think of the strict controls on outside information in North Korea and the cult of personality developed about its leaders.

What disturbed me the most was the amount of control that Scientology has over the lives of its Sea Org members, especially the children. If the conditions of life at the Ranch described by Miscavige Hill are accurate (including huge amounts of manual labour) then that definitely crosses the line into child abuse. As well, the ability of the church to force members to do manual labour for punishment and restrain them if they try to leave their sessions seems incredibly dubious legally. Finally, it seemed to me that much of the "training" that the young members of the Sea Org were doing was nothing more than servant work for the higher ups, who are the ones collecting large amounts of money and who have the freedom of movement denied to those who are lower down.

Beyond Belief was an incredibly interesting book, and I would highly recommend it. It definitely pushed me further into thinking that Scientology is a dangerous cult (as it is classified in much of Europe) rather than just a ridiculous pseudo-religion.

Bart D. Ehrman - Forged: Writing in the Name of God--Why the Bible's Authors Are Not Who We Think They Are

Forged, by Bart D. Ehrman, is an attempt to prove to a wider audience what many biblical scholars have known for a long time, that many of the books in the bible were not written by who we think they were. While I liked portions of the book, and it was certainly informative, in many places I found it to drag and become somewhat boring.

One point that Ehrman made repeatedly that I appreciated was that contrary to what some people claim, forgery did exist in antiquity and was soundly condemned when it was discovered. He goes on to point out that those who claim that forgery didn't really exist, or that the writers didn't mean to deceive anyone, or that it was common practice to sign one's work with the name of one's teacher as a sign of honour and humility, are basing those claims on absolutely no evidence. I remember very clearly being told in a first year new testament class at my bible college that even though many of the books were not written by the people whose names are on them, it wasn't really forgery because that type of attribution was common during those times. I remember thinking that that was a weird practice, but accepting it as the truth. It's nice to see that it in fact was not the truth.

Ehrman has a wealth of evidence that many of the books in the new testament were not written by those who claim to have written them, ranging from differences in writing styles, the coverage of topics that were not relevant until decades after the deaths of the supposed authors, and perhaps most interestingly the fact that those books were written in a highly educated style of Greek (employing Greek rhetorical argument styles) that it is very unlikely that people like Peter or Paul possessed. I also found it very interesting that many of the books, including the gospels, do not claim an author, and what were originally anonymous works had authors imposed on them centuries later when church authorities realized that in order for those books to be authoritative they needed famous authors like the apostles.

Ehrman does however spend a large amount of time examining forgeries that never made into the canon and that everyone acknowledges are forgeries. While that was interesting to a point, it began to drag on considerably. That is merely personal preference, however, as I would have liked Ehrman to have examined more possible forgeries in the bible itself (perhaps in the old testament, which he hardly touches on). I also had a few problems with Ehrman's acceptance of much of the bible as historical fact. He discusses the "genuine" Pauline letters, but does not provide the evidence he uses that they are in fact genuine. In addition, while he does look at historical inaccuracies (like the idea of an empire-wide census at the time of Jesus' birth) he does not look at the inclusion of the supernatural in the gospels and discuss the improbabilities of them (and the reasons why they were included, obvious as they might be).

Overall, Forged was a generally interesting book, although there were definitely some parts that were considerably more interesting than others.

Christopher Hitchens - The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice

I bought The Missionary Position today after seeing a report on the news about a Canadian study that reached the same conclusion about Mother Teresa as Hitchens did; namely that she did very little to actually alleviate suffering but instead ran a massive propaganda machine that benefited from the plight of the poor and saw their suffering as noble. I expected the book to be virulently anti-Catholic, but it wasn't. Hitchens uses for evidence almost entirely Mother Teresa's own words and actions, with some reliance on former members of her order.

One of the strongest pieces of evidence that Hitchens has to support his thesis is the sheer amount of money that Missionaries of Charity took in compared to how much was spent on things like doctors and medical equipment. The results are staggering, and show a woman who was far more concerned with her own dogma than with actually relieving the suffering of the poor. Her hypocrisy is also stunning, as Hitchens points out that while supposedly advocating for the poor she hobnobbed with a variety of dictators whose regimes were supported on the backs of the poor and oppressed. It also bears mentioning that while she refused to provide adequate medical equipment or care for the suffering under her care, when she was faced with health problems she had nothing but the best medical attention.

My biggest problem with Mother Teresa is one that I had before reading The Missionary Position, although the book helped to solidify it. Namely, it is that Mother Teresa was more concerned with the so-called holiness of suffering experienced by the poor than with alleviating their pain (as evidenced by her telling a man who was wracked with pain that he was being kissed by Jesus rather than spending money on painkillers or doctors to help him). Her care for their souls far outstripped her care for their suffering, as one former member of her order has claimed that she authorized secret baptisms of non-Catholics without their permission. In addition, her own words condemn her as someone who was ultimately unconcerned with the poor. She explicitly said that caring for the poor was not an end in and of itself (she actually referred to this way of thinking as a danger!), but that caring for them was a way to reach heaven. This is important: she was not caring for them because they were suffering, or even because she wanted to help them get into heaven. She worked with them so that she herself could get into heaven.

Hitchens does a masterful job of exposing Mother Teresa's hypocrisy by doing what he set out to do: judging her reputation by her actions rather than her actions by her reputation.

Richard Dawkins - The God Delusion

I bought The God Delusion a few days ago after realizing that I had read very little by any of the great atheist scholars of our time, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Dawkins does an excellent job of disproving the existence of a god as well as showing how religion is in general a negative or at least not a positive force in the world.

Dawkins looks at quite a few controversial issues, but one that I especially appreciated was his examination of why religion is somehow granted an automatic respect where other personal beliefs (such as politics) are not. People feel free to argue against other peoples' political viewpoints, but see religion as a taboo, which translates into a tolerance for the extreme elements present in many religions (he uses the example of authorities turning a blind eye to female circumcision in Britain so as to not upset the fundamentalist Islamic community there). He also makes a strong argument against the indoctrination of children in religious beliefs, arguing that children should be taught how to think, not what to think.

Dawkins also examines a number of misconceptions about atheism and scientific belief. First, he makes the obvious point that natural selection is not random chance. He points out that the common religious argument that chance is an impossible method for life to have emerged on earth is correct, but that unlike what they assert, chance is not the only alternative to intelligent design; natural selection is. He also raises the common religious argument that those who do not believe in a higher power see no point in life by stating that because atheists believe that we have no more chances at life that we see life as even more worth living to the fullest. Finally, he also looks at the commonly asserted belief that atheists who argue their points are just as much fundamentalists as religious extremists. Dawkins refutes this by pointing out that passion does not equal fundamentalism, and that while a religious fundamentalist will not change their mind regardless of the evidence presented to them, a passionate scientist will change their mind when provided with new evidence.

In arguing against the existence of the supernatural, Dawkins makes a number of very solid points, including the obvious one of pointing out the great many contradictions in the bible. He also examines Thomas Aquinas' argument of infinite regress halted by god (everything has a cause, leading back in a long line of causes until they reach god) and makes the same point that I did when reviewing Lewis' God in the Dock: if god is the cause of all these things, what caused god? He also takes aim at the idea that human morality has a divine source, and that atheist morality is flawed because there is no god to provide an ultimate definition of good and evil. First, he argues that clearly modern human morals do not come from the bible, since no one in the modern world follows every precept in the bible. Therefore, just as atheists choose which morals and values they adhere to, so too do Christians. Second, he points out what he calls the "debate stopper:" if there is no morality without god, then people are naturally immoral and would, without the restraint of god's presence, be rampant murderers, rapists, and looters. If it is not the case that people would rampantly commit crimes without god's presence, then god is clearly not required for morality. This brought to mind the argument that those who blame women for being sexually assaulted (because they were dressed "indecently") are not just blaming the victim, but also insulting men in general, since it assumes that men are naturally rapists who are only able to restrain themselves if women dress "modestly" (incidentally, that is essentially what fundamentalist Muslim doctrine is saying when it forces it women to cover themselves from head to toe).

Overall, I greatly enjoyed The God Delusion. Dawkins makes a number of excellent points both disproving the existence of a god and arguing against religion in general. I would highly recommend this book.

Marcus Brotherton - We Who Are Alive and Remain: Untold Stories From The Band of Brothers

I bought We Who Are Alive and Remain a few months back after reading Dick Winters' Beyond Band of Brothers because I thought it would be interesting to learn the stories of the men of Easy Company who hadn't been featured in Winters' memoirs, Ambrose's Band of Brothers book, or the mini-series.

The stories themselves were very interesting, but the format of the book left something to be desired. Brotherton organizes the book according to themes (such as motivations for joining the army, or the journey across the Atlantic), and includes snippets from each man he interviewed providing their perspective. The problem is that this fragments the individual mens' stories, making the narratives that they provide sometimes hard to follow. Brotherton also acts on the assumption that his readers have either read Ambrose's book or have seen the mini-series, because he provides virtually no information to buttress the accounts of the veterans he interviewed, including when they reference the names or activities of men seen in Band of Brothers but not featured in Brotherton's book.

There were a number of things that I really liked about We Who Are Alive and Remain, however. One is the perspective of the replacement troops who came into Easy Company after Normandy. Band of Brothers doesn't really focus on them at all, so it was nice to see their stories, how they came to be in Easy Company, and what their experience as replacement troops was like. Perhaps the best part of the book for me was the last section, in which the children of three members of Easy Company who survived the war but have since died shared the stories of their fathers.

One of those soldiers was Herbert Sobel, who was featured in Ambrose's book, the mini-series, and Winters' memoirs as an incompetent jerk. Sobel's son shares his recollections about his father, which were entirely positive. More interestingly, to me, was that almost all of the veterans interviewed by Brotherton had good only good things to say about Sobel. By contrast, the vast majority of the men interviewed by Ambrose disliked him, including Winters, who admitted to a hatred of Sobel. Obviously there were serious problems with Sobel's command or he wouldn't have sparked the sergeants' near-mutiny featured in the mini-series, but there is clearly more to the story than Ambrose and HBO showed. It makes me wonder a little bit about how Ambrose chose which veterans to interview, that they would all share the same view.

Overall, We Who Are Alive and Remain was quite a good book, but it should only be read after having read or watched Band of Brothers, otherwise the reader will be left with a lot of questions.