23rd Oct 2007 : Video of this month's Freedom From Religion Foundation conference is now finally available online.

23rd Oct 2007 : As usual, the argument over God becomes one over Torquemada and Mao, Stalin and Richard the Lionheart

23rd Oct 2007 : Eddie Tabash's talk at AAI 07 titled "The Present Threat of the Religious Right to Our Modern Freedoms."

23rd Oct 2007 : Religious observance must be consistent and accept the inevitable consequences of clashing with society's inclusivity.

23rd Oct 2007 : TEGUCIGALPA (Reuters) - The rapid spread in Latin America of the virus that causes AIDS is made worse by the Roman Catholic Church's stand against using condoms, a U.N. official said on Monday.

22nd Oct 2007 : There is no reason for the head of the British army to air his religious ideas - they have no relevance to his job or our troops.

22nd Oct 2007 : Two curious political relationships of Senator Barack Obama came to light last month in The Chicago Sun-Times: he is an 11th cousin to President Bush, and a 9th cousin once removed to Vice President Dick Cheney.

21st Oct 2007 : Can we be good without God? That's a very old question believers like to ask because, I suspect, the answer is very pleasing to them.

21st Oct 2007 : Twice circumcised, Wafaa Helmy swore her own daughters would never suffer the same fate. But one night her own mother secretly took her first-born to go under the knife in their Upper Egypt village.

21st Oct 2007 : As a vicious cancer ravages Tasmanian devil populations, zoos have launched a worldwide project to save the species. Kathy Marks reports.

21st Oct 2007 : Socratic Club Debate featuring Michael Shermer and Dinesh D'Souza. Monday, October 15, 7 PM, Austin Auditorium - LaSells Stewart Center, Oregon State University

21st Oct 2007 : Ayaan Hirsi Ali on Islam, immigration, civil liberties, and the fate of the West.

21st Oct 2007 : God is back in the discussion about life, the universe and everything, Jill Rowbotham writes. After decades of peaceful coexistence, Christians and non-believers are at each other's ideas ... and throats

21st Oct 2007 : To petition the Prime Minister to make Richard Dawkins a Knight, visit the Web site mentioned in this article ("You must be a British citizen or resident to sign the petition").

20th Oct 2007 : Conventional wisdom says that the primary reason why so many people do not accept Darwin's theory of evolution is that they find it threatening to their religious beliefs. There is no question that religion is a big part of the reason behind the large number of people who reject evolution. But I am convinced that just as often, the cause and effect is reversed: people hold onto their fundamentalist religious beliefs because evolution by natural selection -- the strongest argument against an Old Testament-type creator -- is so counter-intuitive to so many.

19th Oct 2007 : The US may be one of the most religious countries in the West but is it undergoing a period of doubt, asks Tim Egan.

19th Oct 2007 : Neanderthals, an archaic human species that dominated Europe until the arrival of modern humans some 45,000 years ago, possessed a critical gene known to underlie speech, according to DNA evidence retrieved from two individuals excavated from El Sidron, a cave in northern Spain.

19th Oct 2007 : Christopher Hitchens talks about his recent tour and takes questions at the AAI 07 conference in Washington, D.C.

18th Oct 2007 : When hundreds of practitioners of Humanistic Judaism convene in Michigan this weekend, the absence of their movement’s founder, Rabbi Sherwin Wine, is sure to be deeply felt.

18th Oct 2007 : The Swedish government is making it illegal for schools to teach religious doctrine as if it were true. Britain should follow suit.

17th Oct 2007 : Atheism is nothing new, we all know about it. But in the past 12 months there have been disturbing developments in this country. There is a new breed of atheists on the scene. They are skilled men and women mounting an aggressive crusade to 'evangelize' America.

16th Oct 2007 : Poison or Cure? Religious Belief in the Modern World
Video of a debate, dialogue, and discussion with Christopher Hitchens and Alister McGrath

15th Oct 2007 : A conversation with Cindy Lee Van Dover.

15th Oct 2007 : Dan Dennett receives the "Richard Dawkins Award" at the AAI 07 conference in Washington, D.C. Julia Sweeney introduces Richard Dawkins, who introduces Dan Dennett.

15th Oct 2007 : What is the purpose of the universe, anyway? I hadn't started reading the Sunday papers with this question in mind, but after slogging through mass rapes in Congo, bombings in Baghdad and K-Fed's worthiness as a father, I could no longer dodge it. Then, in the middle of the New York Times Week in Review section--some of the priciest real estate in the print industry--I came across a two-full-page ad under the headline "Does the Universe Have a Purpose?"

15th Oct 2007 : The Indian government has withdrawn a controversial report submitted in court earlier this week which questioned the existence of the Hindu god Ram.

14th Oct 2007 : Video of Richard Dawkins accepting the prize.

13th Oct 2007 : Call it a small step for E.T., a leap for radio astronomy.

13th Oct 2007 : LONDON: Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, the Anglican spiritual leader, criticized popular atheist writers such as Richard Dawkins on Saturday, saying they misunderstand religious beliefs and unfairly portray faith in God as "an eccentric survival strategy."

13th Oct 2007 : This is the speech given by Ayaan Hirsi Ali at the AAI 07 conference in Washington DC. She is the author of the bestselling book "Infidel", and helped create the film "Submission" with Theo Van Gogh.

13th Oct 2007 : When it comes to establishing democracy, a me-first attitude isn't such a bad thing. In fact, it might be a necessity, according to Northern Illinois University anthropologist Giovanni Bennardo.

12th Oct 2007 : Apes are patient, but only people are fair. That may help explain why people came out on top

12th Oct 2007 : Lauren Green and others at Fox News attacks "Godless" Air America in claiming the radio station is starting a "war on religion." This is, I guess, based on allowing Free Thought Radio to exist. I guess Fox is upset that some atheists like to hear like-minded people? The free thought radio show is put together by the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

12th Oct 2007 : Scientists have discovered how a microscopic organism has benefited from nearly 80 million years without sex.

12th Oct 2007 : The event had been sold out for weeks. Tickets were being offered on the black market for three times their face value. With 30 minutes to show time, the crowds were forming outside, some wolfing down sandwiches in the parking lot. For this much excitement, people around here generally expect some serious football.

11th Oct 2007 : Prominent Muslim scholars are warning that the "survival of the world" is at stake if Muslims and Christians do not make peace with each other.

11th Oct 2007 : The Western liberal media had a laugh in August when China's State Administration of Religious Affairs announced Order No. 5, a law covering "the management measures for the reincarnation of living Buddhas in Tibetan Buddhism."

11th Oct 2007 : THERE has been fierce debate over the past several decades about the role of religion in American politics. From the late 1970s and on, religious conservatives played an increasingly vociferous public role and were important in pushing the country to the right--much to the chagrin of both secular and religious liberals. Now there seems to be a shift in mood. A number of prominent authors and scientists have published books in the past year that advocate a "New Atheism." The books, which include Daniel Dennett's Breaking the Spell, Richard Dawkins's The God Delusion, and Christopher Hitchen's God is Not Great, have sparked considerable public controversy across the political spectrum. Dissent co-editor Mitchell Cohen weighs in on the phenomenon in a recent interview with the left-wing Berlin weekly Jungleworld. Cohen is professor of political science at Baruch College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. His article on the current state of French politics ("France: Red Rose, Blue Grip") appears in the Dissent's Fall 2007 issue.

10th Oct 2007 : Brian Aldiss is one of the world's leading science-fiction writers. Here he assesses how he and his fellow novelists got it right — and wrong — about space travel

10th Oct 2007 : A court in Argentina has convicted a former Roman Catholic police chaplain of collaborating in murders during the country's military rule.

9th Oct 2007 : 'Message Of Submission'

The group that 12 years ago fought vehemently for the rights of students who wore a hijab in Quebec's public schools is now trying to ban their teachers from wearing the Islamic headscarf and other "ostentatious" religious symbols while at work.

9th Oct 2007 : Human innate immunity differs between Africans and others, perhaps due to different infectious environments

9th Oct 2007 : In the place where I grew up – a particular square in one of the nicer Northern housing estates – there was a young Muslim doctor who lived with his wife and children.

9th Oct 2007 : The outspoken former Dutch legislator deserves the protection her country promised before she ran for parliament.

9th Oct 2007 : Royal is a cantankerous old male baboon whose troop of some 80 members lives in the Moremi Game Reserve in Botswana. A perplexing event is about to disturb his day.

9th Oct 2007 : In mid-August, Texas Gov. Rick Perry signed something called the "Religious Viewpoints Antidiscrimination Act" into law. Although the new law has an innocuous-sounding title, it's really a ticking time-bomb, opponents say.

8th Oct 2007 : PZ Myers responds to Sam Harris.

8th Oct 2007 : IF THE DUTCH GOVERNMENT ABANDONS AYAAN HIRSI ALI, AMERICA SHOULD WELCOME HER.

8th Oct 2007 : In his memoir Foreskin's Lament, author Shalom Auslander writes about his attempt to break free from the strict, socially isolated Orthodox Jewish environment of his childhood.

8th Oct 2007 : As several prominent atheists have now criticized the speech I gave at the Atheist Alliance conference in DC—without, apparently, understanding it—I thought I would take a moment to clarify the point I was making about the use of the term "atheist."