Contents

• Chapter 1: Lucretius
  Lucretius
  Titus Lucretius Carus was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is an epic philosophical poem laying out the beliefs of Epicureanism, De rerum natura, translated into English as On the Nature of Things or "On the Nature of the Universe".Virtually no details have come down concerning...
  
  : De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things) - Books I, III, V, translation by W. Hannaford Brown
• Chapter 2: Omar Khayyám
  Omar Khayyám
  Omar Khayyám was aPersian polymath: philosopher, mathematician, astronomer and poet. He also wrote treatises on mechanics, geography, mineralogy, music, climatology and theology....
  
  : Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám
  Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
  The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám is the title that Edward FitzGerald gave to his translation of a selection of poems, originally written in Persian and of which there are about a thousand, attributed to Omar Khayyám , a Persian poet, mathematician and astronomer...
  
  : A Paraphrase from Several Literal Translations by Richard Le Gallienne
• Chapter 3: Thomas Hobbes
  Thomas Hobbes
  Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury , in some older texts Thomas Hobbs of Malmsbury, was an English philosopher, best known today for his work on political philosophy...
  
  : Of Religion, from Leviathan
  Leviathan (book)
  Leviathan or The Matter, Forme and Power of a Common Wealth Ecclesiasticall and Civil — commonly called simply Leviathan — is a book written by Thomas Hobbes and published in 1651. Its name derives from the biblical Leviathan...
  
  
• Chapter 4: Benedict De Spinoza
  Baruch Spinoza
  Baruch de Spinoza and later Benedict de Spinoza was a Dutch Jewish philosopher. Revealing considerable scientific aptitude, the breadth and importance of Spinoza's work was not fully realized until years after his death...
  
  : Theologico-Political Treatise
  Theologico-Political Treatise
  Written by the philosopher Baruch Spinoza, the Theologico-Political Treatise or Tractatus Theologico-Politicus was published anonymously in 1670.It is an early criticism of religious intolerance and a defense of secular government...
  
  
• Chapter 5: David Hume
  David Hume
  David Hume was a Scottish philosopher, historian, economist, and essayist, known especially for his philosophical empiricism and skepticism. He was one of the most important figures in the history of Western philosophy and the Scottish Enlightenment...
  
  : The Natural History of Religion, Of Miracles
  Of Miracles
  "Of Miracles" is the title of Section X of David Hume's An Enquiry concerning Human Understanding .-The text:In the 19th-century edition of Hume's Enquiry , sections X and XI were omitted, appearing in an Appendix with the misleading explanation that they were normally left out of popular editions...
  
  
• Chapter 6: James Boswell
  James Boswell
  James Boswell, 9th Laird of Auchinleck was a lawyer, diarist, and author born in Edinburgh, Scotland; he is best known for the biography he wrote of one of his contemporaries, the English literary figure Samuel Johnson....
  
  : An Account of My Last Interview with David Hume, Esq.
• Chapter 7: Percy Bysshe Shelley
  Percy Bysshe Shelley
  Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets and is critically regarded as among the finest lyric poets in the English language. Shelley was famous for his association with John Keats and Lord Byron...
  
  : A Refutation of Deism
• Chapter 8: John Stuart Mill
  John Stuart Mill
  John Stuart Mill was a British philosopher, economist and civil servant. An influential contributor to social theory, political theory, and political economy, his conception of liberty justified the freedom of the individual in opposition to unlimited state control. He was a proponent of...
  
  : Moral Influences in My Early Youth, From Autobiography
• Chapter 9: Karl Marx
  Karl Marx
  Karl Heinrich Marx was a German philosopher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. His ideas played a significant role in the development of social science and the socialist political movement...
  
  : Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right
  Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right
  [Contribution to the] Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right is a manuscript written by German political philosopher Karl Marx in 1843....
  
  
• Chapter 10: George Eliot
  George Eliot
  Mary Anne Evans , better known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, journalist and translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era...
  
  : Evangelical Teaching
• Chapter 11: Charles Darwin
  Charles Darwin
  Charles Robert Darwin FRS was an English naturalist. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed the scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection.He published his theory...
  
  : Autobiography
• Chapter 12: Leslie Stephen
  Leslie Stephen
  Sir Leslie Stephen, KCB was an English author, critic and mountaineer, and the father of Virginia Woolf and Vanessa Bell.-Life:...
  
  : An Agnostic's Apology
• Chapter 13: Anatole France
  Anatole France
  Anatole France , born François-Anatole Thibault, , was a French poet, journalist, and novelist. He was born in Paris, and died in Saint-Cyr-sur-Loire. He was a successful novelist, with several best-sellers. Ironic and skeptical, he was considered in his day the ideal French man of letters...
  
  : Miracle
• Chapter 14: Mark Twain
  Mark Twain
  Samuel Langhorne Clemens , better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist...
  
  : Thoughts of God, From Fables of Man; Bible Teaching and Religious Practice, From Europe and Elsewhere and A Pen Warmed Up in Hell
• Chapter 15: Joseph Conrad
  Joseph Conrad
  Joseph Conrad was a Polish-born English novelist.Conrad is regarded as one of the great novelists in English, although he did not speak the language fluently until he was in his twenties...
  
  : Author's Note to The Shadow Line
  The Shadow Line
  The Shadow-Line is a short novel based at sea by Joseph Conrad; it is one of his later works, being written from February to December 1915. It was first published in 1916 as a serial in New York's Metropolitan Magazine in the English Review and published in book form in 1917 in the UK and America...
  
  
• Chapter 16: Thomas Hardy
  Thomas Hardy
  Thomas Hardy, OM was an English novelist and poet. While his works typically belong to the Naturalism movement, several poems display elements of the previous Romantic and Enlightenment periods of literature, such as his fascination with the supernatural.While he regarded himself primarily as a...
  
  : God's Funeral
• Chapter 17: Emma Goldman
  Emma Goldman
  Emma Goldman was an anarchist known for her political activism, writing and speeches. She played a pivotal role in the development of anarchist political philosophy in North America and Europe in the first half of the twentieth century....
  
  : The Philosophy of Atheism
• Chapter 18: H. P. Lovecraft
  H. P. Lovecraft
  Howard Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
  
  : A Letter on Religion
• Chapter 19: Carl Van Doren: Why I am An Unbeliever
• Chapter 20: H. L. Mencken
  H. L. Mencken
  Henry Louis "H. L." Mencken was an American journalist, essayist, magazine editor, satirist, acerbic critic of American life and culture, and a scholar of American English. Known as the "Sage of Baltimore", he is regarded as one of the most influential American writers and prose stylists of the...
  
  : Memorial Service
• Chapter 21: Sigmund Freud
  Sigmund Freud
  Sigmund Freud , born Sigismund Schlomo Freud , was an Austrian neurologist who founded the discipline of psychoanalysis...
  
  : From The Future of an Illusion, translated and edited by James Strachey
• Chapter 22: Albert Einstein
  Albert Einstein
  Albert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics and one of the most prolific intellects in human history...
  
  : Selected Writings on Religion
• Chapter 23: George Orwell
  George Orwell
  Eric Arthur Blair , better known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English author and journalist...
  
  : From A Clergyman's Daughter
  A Clergyman's Daughter
  A Clergyman's Daughter is a 1935 novel by English author George Orwell. It tells the story of Dorothy Hare, the clergyman's daughter of the title, whose life is turned upside-down when she suffers an attack of amnesia...
  
  
• Chapter 24: John Betjeman
  John Betjeman
  Sir John Betjeman, CBE was an English poet, writer and broadcaster who described himself in Who's Who as a "poet and hack".He was a founding member of the Victorian Society and a passionate defender of Victorian architecture...
  
  : In Westminster Abbey
• Chapter 25: Chapman Cohen
  Chapman Cohen
  Chapman Cohen was a leading English atheist and secularist writer and lecturer.-Life:...
  
  : Monism and Religion An Old Story
• Chapter 26: Bertrand Russell
  Bertrand Russell
  Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, OM, FRS was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, and social critic. At various points in his life he considered himself a liberal, a socialist, and a pacifist, but he also admitted that he had never been any of these things...
  
  : An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish
• Chapter 27: Philip Larkin
  Philip Larkin
  Philip Arthur Larkin, CH, CBE, FRSL is widely regarded as one of the great English poets of the latter half of the twentieth century...
  
  : Aubade Church Going
• Chapter 28: Martin Gardner
  Martin Gardner
  Martin Gardner was an American mathematics and science writer specializing in recreational mathematics, but with interests encompassing micromagic, stage magic, literature , philosophy, scientific skepticism, and religion...
  
  : The Wandering Jew and the Second Coming
• Chapter 29: Carl Sagan
  Carl Sagan
  Carl Edward Sagan was an American astronomer, astrophysicist, cosmologist, author, science popularizer and science communicator in astronomy and natural sciences. He published more than 600 scientific papers and articles and was author, co-author or editor of more than 20 books...
  
  : The Demon-Haunted World
  The Demon-Haunted World
  The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark is a book by astrophysicist Carl Sagan, which was first published in 1995.The book is intended to explain the scientific method to laypeople, and to encourage people to learn critical or skeptical thinking...
  
   The God Hypothesis
• Chapter 30: John Updike
  John Updike
  John Hoyer Updike was an American novelist, poet, short story writer, art critic, and literary critic....
  
  : From Roger's Version
  Roger's Version
  Roger's Version is a 1986 novel by John Updike about Roger Lambert, a theology professor in his fifties, whose rather complacent faith is challenged by Dale, an evangelical graduate student who believes he can prove that God exists with computer science...
  
  
• Chapter 31: J. L. Mackie
  J. L. Mackie
  John Leslie Mackie was an Australian philosopher, originally from Sydney. He made significant contributions to the philosophy of religion, metaphysics, and the philosophy of language, and is perhaps best known for his views on meta-ethics, especially his defence of moral skepticism.He authored six...
  
  : Conclusions and Implications, From The Miracle of Theism: Arguments for and against the Existence of God
• Chapter 32: Michael Shermer
  Michael Shermer
  Michael Brant Shermer is an American science writer, historian of science, founder of The Skeptics Society, and Editor in Chief of its magazine Skeptic, which is largely devoted to investigating pseudoscientific and supernatural claims. The Skeptics Society currently has over 55,000 members...
  
  : Genesis Revisited: A Scientific Creation Story
• Chapter 33: A. J. Ayer: That Undiscovered Country
• Chapter 34: Daniel C. Dennett: Thank Goodness!
• Chapter 35: Charles Templeton
  Charles Templeton
  Charles Bradley Templeton was a Canadian cartoonist, evangelist, agnostic, politician, newspaper editor, inventor, broadcaster and author. He was born and died in the same city, Toronto, Canada...
  
  : From A Farewell to God, A Personal Word, and Questions to Ask Yourself
• Chapter 36: Richard Dawkins
  Richard Dawkins
  Clinton Richard Dawkins, FRS, FRSL , known as Richard Dawkins, is a British ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author...
  
  : Why There Almost Certainly is No God, Gerin oil
  Gerin oil
  Gerin oil or geriniol is a fictional drug used as a device to criticize religion in articles written by Richard Dawkins. The word is an anagram of "religion"....
  
  , and Atheists for Jesus
• Chapter 37: Victor Stenger: From God: The Failed Hypothesis
  God: The Failed Hypothesis
  God: The Failed Hypothesis is a 2007 New York Times bestseller by scientist Victor J. Stenger who argues that there is no evidence for the existence of a deity and that God's existence, while not impossible, is improbable....
  
  , Cosmic Evidence
• Chapter 38: Daniel C. Dennett: A Working Definition of Religion from "Breaking Which Spell?"
• Chapter 39: Elizabeth Anderson: If God is Dead, Is Everything Permitted?
• Chapter 40: Penn Jillette
  Penn Jillette
  Penn Fraser Jillette is an American magician, comedian, illusionist, juggler, bassist and a best-selling author known for his work with fellow illusionist Teller in the team Penn & Teller, and advocacy of atheism, libertarian philosophy, free-market economics, and scientific skepticism.-Early...
  
  : There is No God
• Chapter 41: Ian McEwan
  Ian McEwan
  Ian Russell McEwan CBE, FRSA, FRSL is a British novelist and screenwriter, and one of Britain's most highly regarded writers. In 2008, The Times named him among their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945"....
  
  : End of the World Blues
• Chapter 42: Steven Weinberg
  Steven Weinberg
  Steven Weinberg is an American theoretical physicist and Nobel laureate in Physics for his contributions with Abdus Salam and Sheldon Glashow to the unification of the weak force and electromagnetic interaction between elementary particles....
  
  : What About God? From Dreams of a Final Theory
• Chapter 43: Salman Rushdie: "Imagine There's no Heaven": A Letter to the Six Billionth World Citizen
• Chapter 44: Ibn Warraq
  Ibn Warraq
  Ibn Warraq is the pen name of a polemical author of Pakistani origin who is critical of Islam, and who founded the Institute for the Secularisation of Islamic Society . He is a senior research fellow at the Center for Inquiry focusing on Qur'anic criticism...
  
  : The Koran, The Totalitarian Nature of Islam
• Chapter 45: Sam Harris
  Sam Harris (author)
  Sam Harris is an American author, and neuroscientist, as well as the co-founder and current CEO of Project Reason. He received a Bachelor of Arts in philosophy from Stanford University, before receiving a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA...
  
  : In the Shadow of God, From The End of Faith
  The End of Faith
  The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason is a book written by Sam Harris, concerning organized religion, the clash between religious faith and rational thought, and the problems of tolerance towards religious fundamentalism....
  
  
• Chapter 46: A. C. Grayling
  A. C. Grayling
  Anthony Clifford Grayling is a British philosopher. In 2011 he founded and became the first Master of New College of the Humanities, a private undergraduate college in London. Until June 2011, he was Professor of Philosophy at Birkbeck, University of London, where he taught from 1991...
  
  : Can an Atheist Be a Fundamentalist? From Against All Gods
• Chapter 47: Ayaan Hirsi Ali
  Ayaan Hirsi Ali
  Ayaan Hirsi Magan Ali is a Somali-Dutch feminist and atheist activist, writer, politician who strongly opposes circumcision and female genital cutting. She is the daughter of the Somali politician and opposition leader Hirsi Magan Isse and is a founder of the women's rights organisation the AHA...
  
  : How (and Why) I Became an Infidel
  Infidel (book)
  Infidel , a New York Times bestseller, is the autobiography of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, originally written in English together with an English-language ghost-writer. Because of publisher agreements the book first appeared in a Dutch translation as Mijn Vrijheid , released on September 29, 2006...