regress, 77

religion: as a by-product of something else, 172-9; cargo cults, 202-7; the Darwinian imperative, 163-6; direct advantages of, 166-9; group selection, 169-72; meme theory, 191–201; psychologically primed for, 179-90; survival value of, 172

Religion Explained (Boyer), 36, 177

Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, 297n

Renfrew, Colin, 170

replicators, 191, 192

reputation, 218-19

Revelation, book of, 257-8, 302

Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science (RDFRS), 7, 363

Richerson, Peter, 196

Ridley, Mark, 140

Ridley, Matt, 125, 218

Ridley, Nicholas, 314

RNA, 137

Roberts, Keenan, 319-20

Roberts, Oral, 32-3

Robertson, Pat, 239, 290

Robeson, Paul, 271

Robinson, Jackie, 271

Rocks of Ages (Gould), 55, 57

Roman Catholic Church: bortion policy, 60, 291; abuse of children, 316-18, 321; as memeplex, 200; doctrine of purgatory, 358-60; Hitler's religion, 273-4; marriage policy, 261; miracle policy, 59–60; Mortara kidnap case, 311-15; polytheism of, 34-5; role of guilt, 167

Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare), 221, 222

Ronson, Jon, 368-9

Roosevelt, Franklin, 67

Root of All Evil? (Channel Four), 1, 6, 318

Rothschild, Eric, 133

Rothschild, Lionel, 313

Royal Institution Christmas Lectures, 363

Royal Society, 101-2, 281, 335

Rumsfeld, Donald, 268

Ruse, Michael, 67-9

Rushdie, Salman, 22, 25, 260

Ruskin, John, 118

Russell, Bertrand: briefly convinced by ontological argument, 81-2; courageous views, 104; on death from belief, 306; on outward belief in religion, 97; teapot parable, 51-2, 53, 54, 69; view of death, 354-5

Russian Orthodox Church, 273

Sacranie, Iqbal, 25-6, 287-8

Sacred Depths of Nature, The (Goodenough), 13

sacrifice, human, 327-8

Saddam Hussein, 107, 247, 273

Sagan, Carl: Contact, 72; Demon-haunted World, 366; on life elsewhere in universe, 47, 69–70; on love of science, 366; on religion and the Universe, 12; on views of God, 19; Pale Blue Dot, 12, 361

St Matthew Passion (Bach), 86

Salmon of Doubt, The (Adams), 116

Sanhedrin, 254

Sarah, 241-2

Satan, 5, 91, 108, 304

Saudi Arabia: status of women, 302; Wahhabism, 249, 288

Scarborough, Rick, 23

Schrodinger, Erwin, 365-6

Schubert, Franz, 86, 87

Science and Christian Belief (Polkinghorne), 150

Science of Good and Evil, The (Shermer), 214, 226

Scientology, 201

Scopes, John, 284

Scott, Eugenie, 66

Seaton, Nick, 340

Secular Bible, The (Berlinerblau), 95

secularism, 38-46

self-deception, 187

Selfish Gene, The (Dawkins), 196, 215n

Selfish Meme, The (Distin), 196

Seneca the Younger, 276

SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence), 70, 71, 72, 73, 138

Seven Clues to the Origin of Life (Cairns-Smith), 129

sexual behaviour, 166, 169, 221-2

Shaheen, Naseeb, 344

Shaikh, Younis, 287

Shakespeare, William, 86, 87, 221-2, 243, 344

Shaw, George Bernard, 167

Sheen, Fulton J., 19

Sherman, Stephen, 196

Sherman, Robert, 43

Shermer, Michael, 102, 168, 184, 214, 226-7, 345, 361

Shorter Oxford Dictionary, 353

Shulevitz, Judith, 68n

Silver, L. M., 386, 392 sin, 251-2

Singer, Peter, 225-6, 271, 392

Sins of Scripture, The (Spong), 237

Sistine Chapel, 86

Six Impossible Things Before Breakfast (Wolpert), 186-7

Skilling, Jeff; 215n

'skyhooks', 73, 155, 157, 158

slavery, 169, 265, 271

slippery slope arguments, 293-4

Smith, Joseph, 201

Smith, Ken, 258

Smolin, Lee, 146, 156

Smythies, John, 185

Snowflakes, 294

Social Evolution (Trivers), 187

Sodom and Gomorrah, 239-40

Sookhdeo, Patrick, 307

Soul of Science, The (Shermer), 361

Spectator, 307

spectrum of probabilities, 50-1

Spinoza, Benedict, 18

Spong, John Shelby, 237

Stalin, Joseph, 67, 107, 153, 272-3,278

Stamp Dawkins, M., 396

stances, 181-4

Stannard, Russell, 61-2, 99, 147,281

stars, 48, 71-2, 142, 146

stem-cell research, 294

Stenger, Victor, 118

Sterelny, Kim, 165-6

Stevas, Norman St John, 298

Stirrat, Michael, 101, 102

strong force, 142

Stubblebine, General, 368-9

suffering, 297

suicide: assisted, 356-7; bombers, 1, 304-5, 308

Sulloway, Frank, 102

Supreme Court, US, 22, 291, 329-31

Susskind, Leonard, 118, 145

Sutcliffe, Peter, 88

Sweeney, Julia, 4, 250, 323-5

Swinburne, Richard, 58, 63-5, 147-50

symbiosis, 216-17

Table Talk (Hitler), 276

Taliban: art appreciation, 1, 248-9; punishment for homosexuality, 289; religious views, 246, 263, 287, 288; treatment of women, 290, 302

Tamarin, George, 255-7

Tamil Tigers, 306

Tanna, 203-6

Tanner Lectures, 6

TAP (Temporary Agnosticism in Practice), 47, 48, 51

Tasmanian wolf, 268

teapot, celestial, 51-2, 53, 54, 55

Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre, 154

teleological argument, 79, 181

Teller, Penn and, 128-9

Templeton Foundation, 19, 62-3, 65, 151-3, 344

Templeton Prize, 19, 98n, 99, 152-3, 285

Ten Commandments, 42, 237, 244, 246, 248; New, 263-4

Tennyson, Alfred, Lord, 175

Teresa of Avila, 186

Teresa of Calcutta, 292

Terror in the Mind of God (Juergensmeyer), 294

terrorists, 304-5

Terry, Randall, 292-3, 294

theism, 18, 38, 50, 54, 109, 143

theocracy, American Christian, 286,319

theodicy, 108

Thomas, gospel of, 96

Thomas Jefferson: Author of America (Hitchens), 42

Thomson, J. Anderson, 143

Tiger, Lionel, 187

Tin Men, The (Frayn), 183

Tipler, Frank, 135

Tit-for-Tat, 218

Toland, John, 274

Tonge, Jenny, 331

Trinity, 33-4, 152, 200

Trivers, Robert, 187, 216

Turing, Alan, 289

Twain, Mark, 354, 357

2000 Years of Disbelief (Haught), 98

Type Three Secretory System (TTSS), 131-2

Unauthorized Version, The (Lane Fox), 93, 95

unicorn, 52

United States of America, 38-46

Unweaving the Rainbow (Dawkins), 214, 361

Unwin, Stephen, 105-8

utilitarianism, 232, 293

vampire bats, 217

Vanuatu, 203-6

Vardy, Peter, 331-2, 334, 336

Veblen, Thorstein, 218-19

Venter, Craig, 99n

Venus, 35

Venus' Flower Basket (Euplectella), 119

Vermes, Geza, 206, 251, 253

Vice Versa (Anstey), 180

Vidal, Gore, 37

Virgin Mary, 34, 35, 91, 93, 186

Virus of the Mind (Brodie), 196

viruses, mental, 186, 188

visions, 90, 91-2

Voltaire, 18, 38, 306

von Neumann, John, 289

Wace, Henry, 48-9

Wagner, Richard, 344

Wahhabism, 249, 288

Wallace, Alfed Russel, 118, 119

Ward, Keith, 149-50

Ward, Lalla, 1, 98n

Warraq, Ibn, 32, 96n, 307

Washington, George, 40, 45

Washington Post, 290

Watchtower, 119-21

water, 136-7

Watson, James, 99-100

Watts, Isaac, 258-9

Waugh, Auberon, 156n

Waugh, Evelyn, 31, 350

Weinberg, Steven, 12–13, 249

Wells, G. A., 97

Wells, H. G., 269-70

Whitcomb, John C, 334

White, Gilbert, 13

Why Gods Persist (Hinde), 177, 341

Why Good is Good (Hinde), 214

Why I Am Not a Muslim (Warraq), 32, 307

Why We Love (Fisher), 184

Wickramasinghe, Chandra, 113

Wilde, Oscar, 191

William of Wykeham, 358-9

Williamson, Hugh Ross, 46

Wilson, A. N., 93, 96n