The less you think, the more you believe.

But, however many ways there may be of being alive, it is certain that there are vastly more ways of being dead, or rather not alive.

Maybe scientists are fundamentalist when it comes to defining in some abstract way what is meant by 'truth'. But so is everybody else. I am no more fundamentalist when I say evolution is true than when I say it is true that New Zealand is in the southern hemisphere. We believe in evolution because the evidence supports it, and we would abandon it overnight if new evidence arose to disprove it.

Creationists are possibly gaining more political power. In the U.S., you are constantly hearing stories of school boards harassing teachers and trying to get textbooks banned.

I do think imagination is enormously valuable, and that children should be encouraged in their imagination. That's very true.

The atheist view is correspondingly life-affirming and life-enhancing, while at the same time never being tainted with self-delusion, wishful thinking, or the whingeing self-pity of those who feel that life owes them something.

I have never quite understood - and this is no doubt my failing - I never quite understood why you would read fiction to understand the human condition.