29. John Brockman (b. 1941) Brockman is a literary agent, book editor, and self-proclaimed cultural impresario.

He serves as publicist for many leading atheist authors. However, Brockman is perhaps best known as the founder of Edge.org, a web site promoting speculative thought about the nexus of science, technology, and culture. He has said: I mean I dont believe: Im sure theres no God. Im sure theres no afterlife. But dont call me an atheist. Its like a losers club. When I hear the word atheist, I think of some crummy motel where theyre having a function and these people have nowhere else to go. Books: The Next Fifty Years, What We Believe but Cannot Prove, This Will Change Everything, Culture, and The Mind

28. Susan Jacoby (b. 1946) Jacoby, a former newspaper reporter, is a bestselling author and blogger. She contributes to The Spirited Atheist blog at The Washington Post, as well as to one of her own. Jacoby is Program Director for the Center for InquiryNew York City, and sits on the advisory board of the Secular Coalition for America. Though she is a strong atheist activist, her voice is one of relative moderation. She has written that: Atheism, in a mature form, is not angry anarchy that lashes out at religion, but simply looking for a collective and personal moral code independent of an external god. Books: Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism and The Age of American Unreason Click here for free information about Online Bachelors Degree in Communication!

27. Victor Stenger (b. 1935) Stenger is Emeritus Professor of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Hawaii and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at the University of Colorado. He has done research on the properties of neutrinos and other elementary particles. He is best known, however, as a prolific author of

popular-science books and as a crusader against paranormal claims and against religion. Stenger has a special interest in challenging claims that the so-called fine-tuning coincidences constitute evidence for the existence of God. He is a long-time Fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, and is famous for saying: Science flies you to the moon. Religion flies you into buildings. Books: Not by Design, God: The Failed Hypothesis, The New Atheism, and The Fallacy of Fine-Tuning Click here for free information about Online Bachelors Degree in Mathematics!

26. Jennifer Michael Hecht (b. 1965) Hecht is a true polymath: she pursued advanced studies in France and received her Ph.D. in the history of science from Columbia University; she has published two well-received volumes of poetry and three meticulously researched but popular books (one of them a bestseller) in the esoteric field of the history of ideas; and she currently teaches writing at Columbia University and New School University in New York. She also maintains a busy schedule of interviews, lectures, and poetry readings. Hechts approach to atheism is informed more by the arts than by the sciencesa perspective she promotes through her blog, Poetic Atheism. Books: The End of the Soul, Doubt: A History, and The Happiness Myth Click here for free information about Online Bachelors Degree in English!

25. Fang Zhouzi (born 1967) Fang, who holds a Ph.D. in biochemistry, is a poet, popular-science author, and blogger who made his name by publicizing corruption in Chinese academia and by debunking Chinese traditional medicine. Born Fang Shimin, he was attacked with a hammer by hired thugs in 2010,

but escaped with only minor injuries. A prominent surgeon whose work Fang had criticized was jailed for ordering the attack. He writes that Religion wants you to believe blindly, while science wants you to doubt, to rely on evidence and logic. They have fundamental conflicts. I have always opposed efforts at reconciliation. None of Fangs books has yet been translated into English.

24. Jerry Coyne (b. 1949) Coyne is Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at the University of Chicago. Educated at Harvard University, where he studied under Richard Lewontin, he is a specialist in the problem of speciation. He runs a web site called Why Evolution Is True, and has published a bestselling book by the same name. He is a frequent contributor to The New Republic, The Times Literary Supplement, and other prominent publications. He confesses to impatience with the New Atheists, remarking: [H]ow much is there to say about a movement whose members are united, after all, by only one thing: disbelief in divine beings and a respect for reason and evidence. What more is there to say? Books: Why Evolution Is True

23. Robert Wright (b. 1957) Wright is a journalist, bestselling author, and founder of Bloggingheads.tv. Currently Senior Future Tense Fellow at the New America Foundation, he is a revisionist Darwinian evolutionary psychologist, who believes emergent and nonlinear dynamical effects influence the evolutionary process. Wright is also a critic of the dogmatism of the New Atheist authors, qualifying his own atheism as follows: I would say theres reason to believe there is some sort of purpose unfolding through the natural workings of the world. This doesnt by itself establish the existence of a god, much less a good one, but it seems to cut against the grain of pure atheism. Books: Three Scientists and Their Gods, The Moral Animal, Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny, and The Evolution of God

22. Richard Carrier (b. 1969) Carrier is a historian, author, and blogger. He received a Ph.D. in ancient history from Columbia University in 2008. As a crusading atheist, Carriers specialty is attacking the historicity of the New Testament. He has said that he thinks it very probable Jesus never actually existed as a historical person (original emphasis). He has also been an active promoter of atheism on the Internet, formerly serving as Editor-in-Chief of the Internet Infidels/Secular Web site. He now runs the Naturalism as a Worldview web site, as well as a blog. He also participates in numerous public debates with Christians. Books: Sense and Goodness without God, Not the Impossible Faith, and Why I Am Not a Christian Click here for free information about Online Bachelors Degree in History!

21. Michel Onfray (b. 1959) Onfray is a philosopher and prolific author who teaches in the philosophy seminar at the Universit Populaire de Caen (UPC). He has written more than 50 volumes of philosophy, journals, travel, and political and cultural commentary. The principal focus of his philosophical writing, both historical and systematic, has been philosophical hedonism. His 2006 Trait dathologie (translated as Atheist Manifesto) became a sensation and elevated him onto the national stage in France. The Trait dathologie has been closely associated with the books of the Four Horsemen of the New Atheism in France, Italy, Australia, and elsewhere. He traces his philosophical lineage to the Cynic, Diogenes of Sinope. Books: Atheist Manifesto and La Puissance dexister: Manifeste hdoniste

20. Steven Pinker (b. 1954) Pinker is a psychologist, linguist, and bestselling author. Born in Montreal and a naturalized U.S. citizen, he is Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. He is best known for advancing the language instinct hypothesis, and for promoting a version of Darwinian evolutionary psychology. It has been announced that Pinker will join the faculty of the New College of the Humanities in London, the all-star university founded by A.C. Grayling. He has said that I never outgrew my conversion to atheism at 13, but at various times was a serious cultural Jew, and that Atheists are the most reviled minority in the United States, so its no small matter to come out and say it.