check out these interesting charts showing how often people leave the religion of their upbringing and which religion they're likely to go to when they do in both the US and the UK.

new antibiotic resistant superbug has been found.

Gary Gutting is a philosopher who took issue with Richard Dawkins' atheism in an article in the New York Times. Ophelia Benson shows how Gutting gets it all wrong.

shallow, smug, and arrogant; pot, kettle, black- Russell Blackford on Suzanne Fields' article in The Washington Times.

listverse has this list of the top 10 most bizarre Mormon beliefs including citations from Mormon scripture.

the onion: if i hadn't found Jesus i'd feel pretty shitty about my crimes!

two bishops resign over their roles in covering up sexual abuse in their diocese. what does the pope do? refuses to accept their resignations and gives them new jobs elsewhere!

found: primordial magma from the hot dawn of the earth.

brainless slime mold makes decisions like humans.

John Loftus on the double standards Christians must maintain in order to believe.

there's no question that scholars agree that Jesus existed. they find this to be true upon applying their historical methodology to the question. however, there are those who question whether or not this methodology is valid and can lead to firm conclusions (see Stanley E. Porter's Criteria For Authenticity in Historical-Jesus Research and Richard Carrier's forthcoming On The Historicity of Jesus Christ). on that subject, Neil Godfrey put up this post about how historical Jesus historians use a historical methodology that isn't used by historians in any other context.

why should we use "know" in a different sense when we say we know god doesn't exist than we would when we say we know anything else?

Stephen Hawking said this week that if we can just survive a couple more centuries then humans will be able to leave Earth for other planets.

Australopithecus afarensis used stone tools to butcher meat... maybe. John Hawks, Jerry Coyne 1 and 2, Ed Yong.

climate change is complex.

the slow whiny death of British Christianity.

Karl Giberson: math works, ergo Jesus.

California high school to teach "bible as literature"

Christopher Hitchens: the dispute over the ground-zero mosque is an object lesson in how not to resist intolerance.

physicists struggling to reconcile gravity with quantum mechanics are rethinking Einstein. (thanks Gaytor!)

American Christianity is not well, and there's evidence to indicate that its situation is more critical than most realize - or at least want to admit.

certain persons in Britain voiced interest in having the pope arrested for crimes against humanity when he arrives for his scheduled visit prompting the British government to change their laws to prevent this. however there may be recourse to the law in Scotland.

Paul Tobin responds to a critique of his chapter in The Christian Delusion.

Christopher Hitchens on Charlie Rose this past Friday night.