Modern Library

Ambrose Bierce chaffed at this world as long as he could, but after losing his wife to divorce and two sons to death, the asthmatic, superstitious, bilious atheist felt compelled to write his friends of his premonition of approaching death. Soon he would vanish with few clues. His thoughts, his humor, his wit, and his social criticism remain.

She spent her short life fending for her gender, and children and animals. She was a freethinker who championed the supremacy of reason over any tradition or dogma that was unjust.

The history of the world is the battle between intelligence and superstition. Take a look at the Scopes "Monkey Trial."

James Madison (1751-1836), the Father of our Constitution and our fourth president went to Princeton at 18 with the idea of becoming an Anglican minister, and came back to Virginia a freethinker. At age 22, he wrote, "Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise, every expanded project." He then fought for religious liberty for all, believer and disbeliever, which was no easy task-then or now.

What makes a fellow who has title, wealth, and social standing want to ignore the mores of his time--to go around tossing dead cats through stained glass windows, saying "everyone is crazy, and here's why"? It is called the pursuit of happiness.

All that we know comes to us from our five senses. All that we know and all that we have found, from quarks to quasars, are part of the natural world. Freethinkers can only share their ignorance of the alleged supernatural for we have no knowledge of it.

Secular Web Feature Article Archive Looking for more recent Feature articles? See the Secular Web Kiosk Looking for scholarly papers? Visit the Secular Web Library. 2001 2000 1999

(1999) Eyewitness Evidence | Documentary Evidence | Corroborating Evidence | Scientific Evidence | Rebuttal Evidence | Identity Evidence | Psychological Evidence | Profile Evidence | Fingerprint Evidence | Medical Evidence | Evidence of the Missing Body | Evidence of the Appearances | Circumstantial Evidence | Concluding Thoughts | Addendum | Related Resources This review was […]

So where did we come from if not from Eden? Darwin said, "Man is descended from a hairy, tailed quadruped, probably arboreal in its habits ... For my part I would as soon be descended from a baboon ... as from a savage who delights to torture his enemies ... treats his wives like slaves ... and is haunted by the grossest superstitions."

The Bible in the Book of Mormon (1999) Curt van den Heuvel Introduction To the ardent follower of Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon is the surest proof of his prophetic office. It is the one undeniable sign of his divinely given gifts of translation. To the skeptic, the Book of Mormon is an interesting […]

Mark Twain (1835-1910) was a freethinker who brooked many hard blows in his roisterous life.

Henry Louis Mencken (1880-1956) was a compound of brilliance, wit, grit, gumption, and humor who became one of the great writers and social critics of this fading century.

In his chapter on "The Uniqueness of the Christian Experience" (a chapter that McDowell or his editorial staff chose to delete from the latest edition of Evidence That Demands a Verdict), he made a variety of sweeping claims about the "Christian Experience," and also argued for the uniqueness of the Christian experience in history, but McDowell did not investigate history very deeply, nor the lives and writings of the Christians whom he cited, some of whom came to hold different views on a wide variety of theological subjects. Lastly, McDowell seems to have only examined superficially his own youthful conversion experience (any reasonable analysis of which would seem to confirm how young and emotionally unstable he was when he converted).

Should we laugh or cry when we are confronted with the invincible ignorance of bigotry? We can't honor freedom of religion by dishonoring freedom from it. How little we have changed--while the ancient Cypress along the Guadalupe grew from plants to towers--freethought still seeks a home in Comfort.

Percy Bysshe Shelley was a sad genius who tried to live a happy life. He mastered Latin and Greek, pondered the great philosophers, and, suddenly he was reborn--he became an amalgam of Lucretius, Pliny, Hume, Locke, d'Holbach, Bacon, Voltaire, Spinoza, Franklin, Paine, and a host of other giants whose thoughts were melded into his flashing mind.

(1998*) Theodore Schick Jr. Abstract: Some believe that evidence for the big bang is evidence for the existence of god. Who else, they ask, could have caused such a thing? In this paper, I evaluate the big bang argument, compare it with the traditional first-cause argument, and consider the relative plausibility of various natural explanations […]

(1998) Victor Reppert I. Hume’s Argument Bertrand Russell was reportedly once asked what he would say to God if he were to find himself confronted by the Almighty about why he had not believed in God’s existence. He said that he would tell God “Not enough evidence, God, not enough evidence!”[1] But perhaps, if God […]

(1998) Victor Reppert When we hear of some new attempt to explain reasoning or language or choice naturalistically, we ought to react as if we were told that someone had squared the circle or proved the square root of 2 to be rational: only the mildest curiosity is in order-how well has the fallacy been […]

This is the second of a three-part series of essays composed during a three-year spirited discussion between Glenn Miller of Christian Thinktank and James Still. Together, the three essays reveal more than anything that there still exists an enormous gulf between the conservative and liberal views of the New Testament.

This is the third of a three-part series of essays composed during a three-year spirited discussion between Glenn Miller of Christian Thinktank and James Still. Together, the three essays reveal more than anything that there still exists an enormous gulf between the conservative and liberal views of the New Testament.

This is the first of a three-part series of essays composed during a three-year spirited discussion between Glenn Miller of Christian Thinktank and James Still. Together, the three essays reveal more than anything that there still exists an enormous gulf between the conservative and liberal views of the New Testament.

Keith Parsons refutes seven popular misconceptions about atheism.

In this article, Keith Augustine responds to Theodore Schick, Jr.'s arguments against the subjectivity of moral values in his Free Inquiry article "Is Morality a Matter of Taste?"

In this paper (originally presented as a talk) Theodore M. Drange seeks to improve upon J. L. Schellenberg's watershed argument that a perfectly loving God would reveal his existence clearly to people in order to get them to believe in him. Schellenberg's argument maintains that the existence of a large number of nontheists provides good reason to deny the existence of such a perfectly loving God. But Drange argues that a stronger version of the argument would add to God's attributes a strong desire for humanity's love. Since one cannot love God if one does not believe in him, God would more clearly desire widespread belief in his existence under Drange's revised formulation. Drange then responds to objections to this line of reasoning, particularly those couched in terms of a free-will or unknown-purpose defense, including Daniel Howard-Snyder's inappropriate-response defense. To this day Drange is unaware of any response by either Schellenberg or Howard-Snyder to his objections to their arguments.

(1998) In Reasonable Faith, William Lane Craig makes a sharp distinction between knowing that God exists and being able to show this. He maintains that one knows that Christianity is true “by the self-authenticating witness of God’s Holy Spirit.”[1] One can show that God exists, that Jesus is his Son, and that other alleged Christian […]

A common objection to atheism—one stated by many scholars and laymen, theists and nontheists—is that it is impossible to prove the nonexistence of God. Yet there are actually two ways to prove the nonexistence of something. One way is to prove that it cannot exist because its very concept is self-contradictory (e.g., square circles, married bachelors, etc.). The other way is by carefully looking and seeing. Both of these methods can and have been used to disprove various conceptions of God.

Niclas Berggren argues against the existence of objective moral values. Along the way, he states an interesting "moral knowledge argument for atheism."

Montgomery asserts that Christianity's claims survive examination using the legal tests for evidence. He does this only by misstating and twisting the rules of evidence and the facts.

A Review of Arguing for Atheism: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion by Robin Le Poidevin

This is an open letter to tell Dr. James Dobson of Focus on the Family, and his claque at the Family Research Council, that their right to spread hatred, veiled or blatant, will not be impaired if Colorado makes gays and lesbians eligible to be victims of hate crimes.