The atheist, by merely being in touch with reality, appears shamefully out of touch with the fantasy life of his neighbors.

The point is that most of what we currently hold sacred is not sacred for any reason other than that it was thought sacred yesterday.

Nonbelievers like myself stand beside you, dumbstruck by the Muslim hordes who chant death to whole nations of the living. But we stand dumbstruck by you as well--by your denial of tangible reality, by the suffering you create in service to your religious myths, and by your attachment to an imaginary God.

Religious faith is the one species of human ignorance that will not admit of even the possibility of correction.

We read the Golden Rule and judge it to be a brilliant distillation of many of our ethical impulses. And then we come across another of God’s teachings on morality: if a man discovers on his wedding night that his bride is not a virgin, he must stone her to death on her father’s doorstep (Deuteronomy 22:13-21).

If someone doesn’t value evidence, what evidence are you going to provide that proves they should value evidence. If someone doesn’t value logic, what logical argument would you invoke to prove they should value logic?

As a man believes, so he will act.