Based primarily on in-person, telephone-based, and e-mail interviews with more than five hundred American atheists, this book, situated within the discipline of sociology, uncovers the vast diversity of attitudes that exists among atheists today. In doing so, it shows that everyday atheists typically have more nuanced views on religion than do best-selling New Atheist authors; they rely on their feelings as well as their critical thinking when making sense of their nonbelief; and, rather than being members of various atheism-related groups and communities, they generally ground their identitie ... More

Based primarily on in-person, telephone-based, and e-mail interviews with more than five hundred American atheists, this book, situated within the discipline of sociology, uncovers the vast diversity of attitudes that exists among atheists today. In doing so, it shows that everyday atheists typically have more nuanced views on religion than do best-selling New Atheist authors; they rely on their feelings as well as their critical thinking when making sense of their nonbelief; and, rather than being members of various atheism-related groups and communities, they generally ground their identities as atheists by participating within an “imagined community” of putatively like-minded others. Moreover, even though atheists are typically understood by the wider public in negative terms, as people who do not believe in God, this book attempts to understand them in more positive terms. Looked at more closely, rather than simply rejecting God and religion, they are actually embracing lives marked by what they deem as integrity, open-mindedness, and progress.