The Lucifer principle.

This turned out to be a good recommendation from Jim. Though it looks like a daunting book, this one is written rather well, and keeps the reader engaged using short data-filled chapters. Basically, Bloom introduces us to the concept of the social superorganism that encompasses religion, politics, and family life. Rather than a single human going through life looking to simply have a child to continue on his/her genetic line, most of our species pursue an entirely different goal - learning (subscribing to new memes) as well as propagating (getting others to get on board). This extremely interesting concept is basically exclusive to humans, with a few exceptions mainly in primate behavior.

The book goes on to talk quite a bit about the history of memes, including specific religious history, economic history, military history, and political history. Much of this is very engrossing. He applies pecking order to the superorganisms, claiming that they are all striving to reach the top, usually by asserting their power over an inferior superorganism. He then argues that this implies the current leader in the pecking order must keep arms against those wishing to top it. He argues that Ancient China failed because of disarmament, and Britain's economy in the 19th century was overtaken by the Germans because of arrogance and incompetence of the pecking order leader.

He has some very strong negative opinions of Islam, many of which he justifies or attempts to justify in the book. There is a good discussion on the difference between Shiite and Sunni Muslims as well. Yet, it's hard to put him on one side or the other of the American political spectrum, as he makes many arguments against the Republicans' actions in the text.

Overall, this was a very good read, and I'm interested in reading his other work.