Those who use the Bible as a reference for moral behavior are simply cherry-picking those teachings, such as the Golden Rule, that they have independently decided are moral for other reasons, while ignoring those teachings with which they disagree.

In a poll taken in 1998, only 7 percent of the members of the US National Academy of Sciences, the elite of American scientists, said they believed in a personal god.

Selling eternal life is an unbeatable business, with no customers ever asking for their money back after the goods are not delivered.

Saying the universe is eternal simply is saying that it has no beginning or end, not that it had a beginning an infinite time ago

A scenario is suggested by which the universe and its laws could have arisen naturally from nothing. Current cosmology suggests that no laws of physics were violated in bringing the universe into existence. The laws of physics themselves are shown to correspond to what one would expect if the universe appeared from nothing. There is something rather than nothing because something is more stable.

The argument from design stands or falls on whether it can be demonstrated that some aspect of the universe such as its origin or biological life could not have come about naturally. The burden of proof is ... on the supernaturalist to demonstrate that something from outside nature must be introduced to explain the data.

The belief in supernatural forces remains to this day a yoke on the neck of humanity, but at least Thales made it possible, for those of us who wish it, to be free of that yoke.