Maybe Right, Maybe Wrong: A Guide for Young Thinkers

by Dan Barker

Book Overview

This captivating book affirms a child's ability to think, to seek information, and to question "why?"Children should be given information, not dogma, and tools for critical thought, not holy books, asserts Dan Barker. Maybe Right, Maybe Wrong teaches children important humanistic ideas. Andrea, the book's main character, distinguishes between rules and principles, finds that there is not always a "right" thing to do, and realizes that sometimes the...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0879757310
• ISBN13: 9780879757311
• Release Date: July 1992
• Publisher: Prometheus Books
• Length: 76 Pages
• Weight: 0.20 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.2" x 5.5" x 8.4"
• Age Range: 8 to 12 years
• Grade Range: Grades 3 to 7

Customer Reviews

Honest Morality

Maybe right and maybe wrong is a great book for honestly explaining morality (both to adults and kids) without any appeals to arguments from authority. It gives valid reasons for why one should behave in certain ways, without appealing to any Bibles/Korans/Talmuds. And in a much more universal language, it advocates morality, listening to one's conscience, and living with principles. It leaves open the possibility that one principle might be more important than another principle, whereas religiously based morality makes inflexible (though sometimes contradictary) moral assertions, without any general principles and explanations about why something is moral (other than appealing to the authority of the bible, et. al). The religious way can and never could be reconciled with the paradoxes of real human society. For example, if killing is always against God's commandments, then why do Muslims exhort killing in Jihad's, or why do Christians and Jews believe in the eye for an eye (without any explicit permission). For real morality, you have to be consistent. Principle based morality relys on us humans to figure out what is truly moral. What a fresh and honest outlook on life this book gives. I wish my parents had read this book to me when I was little.

Love this book!

Very simple comic style book that covers some pretty serious issues. Both my children enjoyed this book and had a lot of thinking to do as a result of reading it. I highly recommend this to anyone who would like their children to think a little more about what they hear and do.

Brilliant

We live in a country where Fundamentalists are pushing religion into every corner of our lives. My 11 year old daughter and her best friend were both told by another "friend" that they would burn in Hell because of their beliefs....my daughter is a Humanist and her best friend is Jewish. (Mind you, we live in a mostly progressive and open-minded city!) We need this book and more authors who are willing to say that all of us can be good and moral without a belief in God.

Teaches Moral Principles rather than laws

Teaches young people how to be Good, not through obeying laws and rules without thought, but by remembering certain principles ("do not hurt others", "value life) and fitting them, through thought, to situations. A wonderful answer to the idea that people can't be moral without god and government.

Excellent book for freethought households

Amongst all the WWJD, religion equals morality, preaching stands Dan Barker, willing to say, "Yes, there is such a thing as morality and, no, there's no need to buy into superstition to understand it." Barker never talks down to kids nor does he try to pass off the old shell game of pretending that morality is simply a matter of following someone else's rules.I highly recommend this book for children of freethinkers and anyone else who prefers rationality to dogma.