REALITYis enough: We don't need belief to know what's true and what's not

'REALITY is enough' consists of more than fifty essays – chapters – bundled into three themed sections: 1. Thinking about Thinking, 2. Wondering about Religion and 3. Defending Science. The author dissects the mind, exploring what it is to be an atheist in a religious world, and shows how science – particularly biology – is under attack from extreme religion. He explores aspects of brain behaviour that have interested him as he sorted out his own life and explored the extraordinarily baffling phenomenon of religion, paying special attention to its interaction with science. With reference to science as it really is and a dash of good humour, he demonstrates how religiously driven pseudo-scientists are, more often than not, just plain wrong when they prattle on about science they don’t or won’t understand. His arguments are based on the inadequacy of beliefs to explain anything, whilst he wisely avoids the valid but hazardous topic – wherein lies irreconcilable dispute – of which out of religion and science is true or false. Instead, he shows how the anti-science case relies on nonsensical reality-contradicting beliefs and incorrect, skewed, bogus, made-up versions of scientific ideas and facts – not what scientists ever actually thought, said or published. James Merryweather explores belief versus reality and what different people mean when they refer to ‘truth’. He maintains that when belief agrees with reality it makes no difference and when it doesn’t, it still makes no difference – to reality. FIRST REVIEW by Chris Gutteridge: "James Merryweather’s book of essays, Reality is enough, is an engaging and well-researched one. His writing is authoritative and amusing, and he has thought deeply. He mercilessly exposes the inner workings of his own mind, and tells us candidly of the experiences that have moulded it, and of his journey towards repairing the damage that life has done it. His description of how he sees numbers and dates (a sort of magical mystery tour) gave me an astonishing insight into how someone else sees the world. "I have personally experienced on many occasions the power of his delight in and extensive knowledge of the workings of nature, and equally the strength of his feelings concerning mankind’s many follies, and both come over clearly here. The conclusions he draws in his essays on various subjects are inarguable but, unfortunately, even if he manages to get beyond preaching to the converted, I’m fairly certain that he will not change the closed minds of those he so wishes to enlighten." JAMES MERRYWEATHER has been fascinated by natural history since the age of five and has always studied and taught biology. When he retired (relatively young) and moved to the Scottish Highlands he encountered, for the first time, apparently sane people who earnestly told him that the experimental and field biology he knew so intimately was untrue. Far from persuade him to recant his precious understanding of reality, he was inspired to learn his subject in greater depth so that he could defend science against the legions of tomfoolery. This he does!