WarOfTheWorldviews

I recently read War of the Worldviews: Where Science and Spirituality Meet -- and Do Not by Deepak Chopra and Leonard Mlodinow (2012). 

Chopra is a well known author (though trained as a physician) and Mlodinow is an American physicist. 

In this book DC and LM alternatively take turns addressing some very deep and interesting questions. 

Those questions were:  
How did the universe emerge?  Is the universe conscious?  Is the universe evolving?  What is the nature of time?  Is the universe alive?  What is life?  Is there design in the universe?  What makes us human?  How do genes work?  Did Darwin go wrong?  What is the connection between mind and brain?  Does the brain dictate behavior?  Is the brain like a computer?  Is the universe thinking through us?  Is God an illusion?  What is the future of belief? 

As the title indicates, DC and LM hold very differing perspectives on these deep questions, Chopra arguing for the spiritual underpinnings, Mlodinow for the purely scientific explanations. 

I tend naturally to lean toward the spiritual side of that continuum, yet have come to believe that the fundamentalists who cling to the extreme ends necessarily must dismiss some pretty compelling evidence in support of the other perspective.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book.  If you choose to read (or listen) to it, expect your assumptions to be challenged, regardless of what you think you believe.