The Holy Bluff

“What is the meaning of human life?” and more to the point,“Who gets to make the call?” The not always obvious answer, as suggested in Charles Nolan’s sometimes serious, sometimes humorous book is... “We all do”.
The problem for the author and, he suspects, for many of us trying to go it alone in this challenging and frequently terrifying century, is that this task has been delegated to the official religions through most of human history. Religion has suffered serious credibility problems in recent years but the question “What am I doing here and what am I supposed to do about it?” is still very much on the table. Whether or not religion is “real”, the human need for meaning is, as real as our need for air, water and each other.

The author’s assertion that human meaning and all human progress comes from our ability to bluff, and that we need to get better at it, starts to make a surprising amount of sense once you accept his “close enough for human life” approach to the Big Questions. The book moves in rapid and readable succession through such supposedly “unanswerable” topics as:

• The origins of the universe, especially us
• The lie at the base of all human knowledge
• The real meaning of “why?”
• The existence (or not) of God
• Human morality in a world that doesn’t care
• Love and why we bother
• Myth vs. Reality and which one always wins
• The hidden message of Christianity
• The truth propping up religion and why we need it more than ever
• Death and what we can do about it
This book will provide a welcome and not at all heavy handed toolkit for anyone who has struggled with the “why” of human existence and is looking for a little help.