McCain's Numerical Demagogy

Election: Religion and Simulation

Paulos wins AAAS award - photo

Review: Gimme that Old-time Irreligion

IRRELIGION, 2008. Consider buying it.

More Reviews, Excerpts from IRRELIGION

Math, Voting, and Obama

Order, but No God

12 Irreligious Questions for the Presidential Candidates

Faith Flunks Logic "He is as sure-footed as a tiger as he prowls through the theocratic landscape pouncing on sloppy thinking."

Paulos speaking (a bit hurriedly) at Beyond Belief 2.0

PW: "Few of the recent books on atheism have been worth reading just for wit and style, but this is one of them: Paulos is truly funny"

Kirkus: "Reasoned, cool and concise - a good-natured primer for infidels."

Sam Harris: "John Allen Paulos has done us all a great service. Irreligion is an elegant and timely response to the manifold ignorance that still goes by the name of 'faith' in the 21st century."

Most recent ABCNews column and archive of past ABC columns

Help Free Burma

Creationist Probability?

Diebold Thoughts

Dick Cheney's 1% Solution

Monty Hall Revisited

Jesus' & Seneca's Descendants?

Reflections on 9/11

Exit Polls Remain a Statistical Mystery!

Of Wiretaps, Google Searches, and Handguns

Complexity and Intelligent Design ---Addendum---

Troop Strength

Dangerous Idea

Alternative Pledge

Abortion Through the Looking Glass

iPod Shuffle Extended

My Lowest Ebb(ers)

Red, Blue, Why?

The Internet, Power, and Wealth

Jesus, Socrates, and Secularism

New S.E.C. Inquiry: 62.381527% of all statistics made up on the spot.

Total(itarian) Information Awareness

Psychology and the War in Iraq

Google and e

Each of the six expressions - 8y, 6x, 8z, 7w, 7x, 6w - will disappear when focused upon. Stare at one and check below to see if the occult ocular software has guessed your choice.

All of Paulos' books are available at bookstores and through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or Booksense.

Finally, rather indiscriminately obsessed with statistics, the anomalous professor is interested in the
number of visits
( )
to this cybervertex since February 24th, 2000.

Missing Expression!

Celebrity bios are available here as are stories about (wink) astrological enlightenment, amazing miracles, world sports, new books, peerless persiflage, quarky commentary, travel, and the presidential betting odds of William Safire.

Market analysis may be found as well as some old news on the after(math) of 9/11 - number nonsense and the prisoner's dilemma.

"Measuring (Presidential) Bacteria" and "How Florida's Chief Judge Misquoted Me", from 2000 election.

Shark reports - two views, one Paulos', the other not.

KIRKUS Review, 11/01/2007, John Allen Paulos' IRRELIGION: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don't Add Up

// Add this impious brief to the growing stack of earnest texts by atheists set on debunking the venerable notion of an omnipotent, omniscient Almighty. The old-time religion wasn't good enough for Epicurus or, more recently, for infidels Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and others. And it isn't good enough for Paulos (Mathematics/Temple Univ.; A Mathematician Plays the Stock Market, 2003, etc.). Heedless of the First Commandment, but not necessarily unmindful of other parts of the Ethical Decalogue, he explains in his brief manifesto why he belongs to the apparently burgeoning congregation of the seriously dubious. First, he assaults some classic arguments: anthropic, teleological and first cause. Next, he demolishes such subjective justifications for the Deity as coincidence, prophecy, emotion, unexplained phenomena and just plain faith. Finally, he deploys the nonbelievers' philosophical-mathematical methods, dispensing theoretical and metaphysical algorithms with as light a touch as such weighty material can handle. Though Paulos promises no heavy math, many passages will be most meaningful to mathematically minded readers. Throughout, he demonstrates the foolishness of blind faith using seriously defective syllogisms constructed with flawed religious premises. Straw men are demolished with ease. Though even Mother Teresa may have had doubts, such proof is not likely to convert pious readers to the heretics' cause. Paulos is preaching, naturally, to the choir. He has, thank Someone, considerable wit. He wonders why folk who abhor the notion of evolution are not bothered by the biblical claim that we come from dirt, and he ponders the source of Jesus's DNA. In the beginning, he asks if there is any logical reason for belief in God. But in the mind of the faithful, logic, no matter how persuasive, has little to do with it. Paulos is speaking a different language. Reasoned, cool and concise - a good-natured primer for infidels. (Agent: Rafe Sagalyn/The Sagalyn Agency)

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY, 11/14/2007 John Allen Paulos IRRELIGION: A Mathematician Explains Why the Arguments for God Just Don't Add Up Hill & Wang, $20 (150p) ISBN 978-0-8090-5919-5 //Few of the recent books on atheism have been worth reading just for wit and style, but this is one of them: Paulos is truly funny. Despite the title, the Temple University math professor doesn't actually discuss mathematics much, which will be a relief to any numerically challenged readers who felt intimidated by his previous book Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and Its Consequences. In this short primer ("just the gist with an occasional jest") Paulos tackles 12 of the most common arguments for God, including the argument from design, the idea that a "moral universality" points to a creator God, the notion of first causes and the argument from coincidence, among others. Along the way, he intersperses irreverent and entertaining little chapterlets that contain his musings on various subjects, including a hilarious imagined IM exchange with God that slyly parodies Neale Donald Walsch's Conversations with God. "Why does solemnity tend to infect almost all discussions of religion?" Paulos asks, clearly bemoaning the dearth of humor. This little book goes a long way toward correcting the problem, and provides both atheists and religious apologists some digestible food for thought along the way. (Jan. 3)

Books by John Allen Paulos