List of Books Every Freethinker Should Read

Here is a list of books (or works) which I feel every freethinker, skeptic, and person of reason should aspire to read. In no particular order, the books I would most recommend to my fellow skeptics and critical thinkers are:


1. Demon Haunted World (Carl Sagan)

2. Works of Thomas Paine (Thomas Paine)

3. Arrows/Flowers of Freethought (G.W. Foote)

4. Lectures of R.G. Ingersoll (Robert G. Ingersoll)

5. Thoughts (Meditations) of Marcus Aurelius (Marcus Aurelius)

6. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Thomas Jefferson)

7. An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (David Hume)

8. Works of William James (William James)

9. The Critique of Practical Reason (Immanuel Kant)

10. Ideas That Matter (A.C. Grayling)

11. Darwin's Dangerous Idea (Daniel C. Dennett)

12. Self Comes to Mind (Antonio Damasio)

13. Religion Explained (Pascal Boyer)

14. The Power of Myth (Joseph Campbell)

15. The Great Code (Northrop Frye)

16. The Ancestor's Tale (Richard Dawkins)

17. A Brief History of Time (Stephen Hawking)

18. The Fabric of the Cosmos (Brian Greene)

19. Deconstructing Jesus (Robert M. Price)

20. On the Decay of the Art of Lying (Mark Twain)

21. Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysic of Morals (Immanuel Kant)

22. Dirty Minds (Kayt Sukel)

23. Nicomachean Ethics (Aristotle)

24.The Portable Atheist (Christopher Hitchens)

25.The Analects (Confucius)


[P.S. Inevitably someone always asks whether or not I have read all the books I recommend or not. The answer is, yes. I have read all of them. I wouldn't recommend books which I had not read and did not fully know the content of. That said, I did not read these all overnight. The newer ones like Dirty Minds by Kayt Sukel or Self Comes to Mind by Damasio I only read to completion in the past few months. They are both heavy on neuroscience and psychology. Meanwhile, if you follow this blog, you will know I recently, within the last several months, finished the works of G.W. Foote, R.G. Ingersoll, and Marcus Aurelius. The only two authors I haven't read every single work of is William James and Jefferson, but I have read, I'd estimate, eight to ninety percent of what they have written. 


At any rate, I hope this list is of some benefit to those who are having a crisis of faith and want to know where to find ideas they can really latch onto, or those who just want to strengthen their critical thinking skills or understanding of philosophy and science. Happy reading!]

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