Atheists: The Origin of the Species

I'm so glad to be done with this book! It is full of interesting information but disappointing to read because of its meandering (lack of) organization and its glibness about assessing the strength of various movements or arguments in the history of atheism. I am coming away from the book with a sense that atheism has often been thought to be a stance on the source of moral or political authority. However, the 20th century, with its authoritarian regimes seeking (and failing) to stamp out religion in favor of a scientific world view has changed the conversation somewhat. The last chapter in the book was intriguing in its critique of what it called the New Atheism–Christopher Hitchens and others painting all religious belief as adherence to a set of historical/factual propositions (as in Christian fundamentalism) and thus worthy of ridicule–but Spencer doesn't do enough to fill out his arguments. My main source of enjoyment in reading this book was in the amusing anecdotes about characters in the history of atheism. Unfortunately, they were not enough to make this a satisfying read.