The Mother of All Atheist Bestsellers
Britannica Blog, published by the Encyclopedia Britannica, speculates on the mother of all atheist bestsellers... The Da Vince Code! It's a provocative thesis, but we're not sure it holds up. The average Da Vinci fan didn't think of the book as an attack on religion, but as a thriller. Those who considered its "philosophy" at all would find it more in line with new age spirituality than atheism. But maybe there is a connection there -- how many Sam Harris/Richard Dawkins/Christopher Hitchens fans are really atheists, as opposed to "spiritual but not religious"? How many read their books not out of antagonism toward all religion, but toward particular manifestations -- militant Islam (Harris and Hitchens) or fundamentalist Christianity (Harris and Dawkins)?
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Britannica Blog, published by the Encyclopedia Britannica, speculates on the mother of all atheist bestsellers… The Da Vince Code! It’s a provocative thesis, but we’re not sure it holds up. The average Da Vinci fan didn’t think of the book as an attack on religion, but as a thriller. Those who considered its “philosophy” at all would find it more in line with new age spirituality than atheism. But maybe there is a connection there — how many Sam Harris/Richard Dawkins/Christopher Hitchens fans are really atheists, as opposed to “spiritual but not religious”? How many read their books not out of antagonism toward all religion, but toward particular manifestations — militant Islam (Harris and Hitchens) or fundamentalist Christianity (Harris and Dawkins)?