I recently read a review of Robert Morey’s 21-year-old book The New Atheism at Bill Muehlenberg’s CultureWatch blog, which describes Nicholas Capaldi’s The Art of Deception as “a famous atheist debating guide, in which every trick in the book is offered to fellow atheists as they attack theists.” There are just a few problems with … Christian deception about The Art of Deception

Brink Lindsey has an interesting post at his blog about the increasing numbers of nonreligious people globally over the last five decades, and speculation about why the U.S. remains so religious. He suggests that it’s not the separation of church and state (with Australia and New Zealand as counter-examples to the U.S.), but ethnic heterogeneity … Global trends towards secularization

I received the unfortunate news this morning that Clark Adams has died, and that he took his own life. Clark was a long-time board member of the Internet Infidels (and for many years its public relations director) and a frequent speaker and attendee at atheist, freethought, humanist, and skeptical events. He was a jovial, funny … Clark Adams, RIP

Complementing Jim Still’s post about “The Family,” Ed Brayton writes at Dispatches from the Culture Wars about how Pat Robertson’s Regent University Law School, a 4th-tier law school barely half of whose graduates pass the bar exam, has managed to be the source of at least 150 appointees to the Bush administration. Perhaps the fact … Pat Robertson’s continuing influence on the Bush administration

That’s the headline of an opinion piece in today’s Los Angeles Times by Stephen Prothero. Prothero, chairman of the religion department at Boston University, is author of a new book, Religious Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know–And Doesn’t. Part of his book is based on a “religious literacy quiz” he has given to his … We live in the land of biblical idiots

Or rather, are being worshipped again in Greece: To the astonishment of onlookers, [Doreta] Peppa also began babbling Orphic hymns, before thrusting her arms upwards into the Attic skies and proceeding, somewhat deliriously, to warble her love for the gods of Mount Olympus. But, then, for the motley group of modern pagans coalesced around the … The Greek gods are back

I’ve occasionally remarked that I don’t care so much what people believe as I do how they act. The people I enjoy spending time with are not always those who share my beliefs, but are those who demonstrate integrity, respect, honesty, and other virtues. These virtues are associated with not just holding beliefs in the … Belief, behavior, and bumper sticker religion

At the Overcoming Bias blog, Robin Hanson raises the question of how to interpret the fact that more of the U.S. public believes in God than university professors do, more of whom in turn believe in God than their counterparts at elite universities. He offers the following as possibly relevant considerations: Hanson suggests that factors … Godless Professors

As if covering up molestation by its priests were not bad enough, Trent Stamp of Charity Navigator points out that, according to researchers at Villanova University, 85% of Roman Catholic dioceses have discovered embezzlement in the last five years, and 11% report that more than $500,000 was taken. As Stamp suggests, if this were reported … Embezzlement in the Catholic Church

Gene Expression has a nice ten-question interview with Heather MacDonald, John M. Olin Fellow at the Manhattan Institute, about her article in The American Conservative in August of last year, in which she revealed her atheism. She wasn’t in the closet about her conservatism. Hat tip to Catallarchy.