Talk:The Portable Atheist

Spinoza
This is not a criticism of the article, but why include Spinoza in a compilation of athiest writings? Spinoza was a pantheist rather than an atheist. Did his work have any anti-religious tone? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.74.8.191 (talk) 06:19, 14 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Perhaps because he laid the groundwork for atheists and was on a continuum towards atheism. I don't see how discussion of this can improve the article though. See WP:TALK for talk page guidelines. Richard001 (talk) 09:39, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Table of contents
I don't think the previous presentation was great but at least it provided some idea of what to expect from the book. Most of the article's content has been removed by deleting it. I seem to be more in favour of showing the structure of a book than most people here though. Richard001 (talk) 09:39, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
 * I strongly agree that the information was very useful (I'd even bookmarked a link to the old revision), but the format was horrible (with each chapter of the book it's own section and thus duplicated in the article's contents table). I've restored the material but formatted more sanely so that the information now occupies less than 30% of the vertical page space it used to.  -- ToET

Cover variations
Is there any difference between the (at least) two publications, other the covers? They are different colours and one has had a squiggle added above the circle, which dramatically transforms the design into a big question mark. I'm sure Hitchens has commented somewhere on this symbolism (might it even have been on the collision film), anyone have information? Cesiumfrog (talk) 03:51, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

contents missing from the audiobook (which is abridged)
Is there a good way to indicate in the table of contents listed on this page which ones are not included in the audiobook? The audiobook by Phoenix Audio (9 CDs, 2007) is abridged and several chapters are missing. I tried an asterisk, but I couldn't find a good way to explain that. This seems important because the article mentions that the title is available via audiobook.

The missing chapters are (based on the wikipedia article here):

* Chapter 19: Carl Van Doren: Why I am An Unbeliever * Chapter 23: George Orwell: From A Clergyman's Daughter * Chapter 24: John Betjeman: In Westminster Abbey * Chapter 25: Chapman Cohen: Monism and Religion An Old Story * Chapter 27: Philip Larkin: Aubade Church Going * Chapter 28: Martin Gardner: The Wandering Jew and the Second Coming * Chapter 29: Carl Sagan: The Demon-Haunted World The God Hypothesis * Chapter 30: John Updike: From Roger's Version * Chapter 31: J. L. Mackie: Conclusions and Implications, From The Miracle of Theism: Arguments for and against the Existence of God * Chapter 32: Michael Shermer: Genesis Revisited: A Scientific Creation Story * Chapter 33: A. J. Ayer: That Undiscovered Country * Chapter 34: Daniel C. Dennett: Thank Goodness! * Chapter 35: Charles Templeton: From A Farewell to God, A Personal Word, and Questions to Ask Yourself * Chapter 36: Richard Dawkins: Why There Almost Certainly is No God, Gerin oil, and Atheists for Jesus * Chapter 37: Victor Stenger: From God: The Failed Hypothesis, Cosmic Evidence * Chapter 38: Daniel C. Dennett: A Working Definition of Religion from "Breaking Which Spell?" * Chapter 39: Elizabeth Anderson: If God is Dead, Is Everything Permitted? * Chapter 40: Penn Jillette: There is No God * Chapter 41: Ian McEwan: End of the World Blues * Chapter 42: Steven Weinberg: What About God? From Dreams of a Final Theory * Chapter 44: Ibn Warraq: The Koran, The Totalitarian Nature of Islam * Chapter 45: Sam Harris: In the Shadow of God, From The End of Faith * Chapter 46: A. C. Grayling: Can an Atheist Be a Fundamentalist? From Against All Gods * Chapter 47: Ayaan Hirsi Ali: How (and Why) I Became an Infidel

As far as I can tell, there is no unabridged audiobook available; even though my copy has an "abridged" sticker covering the originally printed "unabridged". The ISBN under the sticker is the same as the abridged version.

Dfrakes (talk) 09:33, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Editorial Reviews
i quoted ipsis litteris the editorial reviews given by Publishers Weekly and The Guardian. I don't mind if someones finds negative criticism to quote, of course.Tat Sat (talk) 02:09, 4 September 2012 (UTC)


 * What does ipsis litteris mean? Anyway, suggest taking a look at Template:Quote to clarify the formatting. Also, does warrant some consideration of wp:quotation (particularly the overusing section) and of wp:not (although that issue applies generally to this article), do you think? I'm starting to wonder (reflecting on WP:BK) whether this is symptomatic that the article perhaps ought be merged into christopher hitchens. Cesiumfrog (talk) 04:33, 4 September 2012 (UTC)


 * First of all, thank you for the indication of Template:Quote. Now, ipsis litteris means word by word. I am answering the other issues later. Now I have to go. Tat Sat (talk) 13:38, 4 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Is it different in any way from verbatim? Are both latin? Thanks for the quote templating (originally it wasn't even clear to me that those were intended as quotes). The broader issue is how appropriate it is for the article to consist solely of a few run-of-the-mill reviews (quoted with absolutely no context) and a table of contents copied out in full (again presented without further explanation), considering the goal is for an encyclopedia rather than reproducing marketing for book sales. FWIW I do personally consider this book exceptionally worthwhile but, if underrated nonetheless, there's no verifiable evidence yet of it having any notable influence (not even on other atheist literature). Cesiumfrog (talk) 00:55, 5 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Hi Cesiumfrog, sorry for taking so long to come back but I have been working day and night. Yes, verbatim is Medival English from Latin verbum, word (that I know of). And ipsis litteris is Latim: word for word (I´m sure of). I will try to expand the article. I am reading the book and could try to write an overview. Since English is not my first language, I would be grateful if you could correct any mistake that I make. As for the author, since he is a #1 best-selling New York Times author, and this book received important reviews, should it not be consider notable? Thank you and I will be back as soon as I am able. Tat Sat (talk) 00:12, 8 September 2012 (UTC)

I have rewritten the reviews with praise and criticisim, to make them neutral. I think this has addressed the doubts expressed by Cesiumfrog, for whom it was not clear my nonformatted quotes were indeed quotes. I have started working in the overview section of the book and will insert the required references. Thank you. Tat Sat (talk) 16:48, 16 October 2012 (UTC)

TatSat, what are you doing? There are now a bunch of blockquoted paragraphs in the article. I can't tell whether they are supposed to be quotes or not. If they are not quotes, why are they indented in a different font? If they are quotes, why haven't you attributed them properly (and used the proper template) to avoid appearance of plagiarism? And what do you mean by rewriting the reviews? You can't rewrite somebody else's words for them: If you think a quote is inappropriate for an article then you should either add a counterbalancing quote or reduce/remove the original quote, but you can't just freely change some of the words of the quote [...especially not without using marks to unambiguously attribute whose words are whose] nor join sentences from two different sources into a single psuedoquote. Would you mind clarifying? Cesiumfrog (talk) 22:36, 17 October 2012 (UTC)

Cesiumfrog, I was trying to do my best to make you proud of me as an editor! Sorry. I saw an article indented in a different font and thought it looked nicely formatted. I will try to repair the damage. Certainly I have misunderstood the advice (about another article) I received which I quote: "The quotes from the reviews are interesting, but it would be better to summarise and compare reviews rather than quote at length from them". Please take a look now. Since I am only editing about books I have read, any attempt to improve my contributions is most welcome. Thank you for your time. By the way you should take a look at the Autobiography of a Yogi article. Wikipedia is being used to advertise a commercial version of the book which is in public domain. Anyway, with your help I am sure I will learn to edit correctly. Thank you very much. Tat Sat (talk) 11:23, 18 October 2012 (UTC) PS Waiting for your feedback I´m awed by the article you are writing in your page. Tat Sat (talk) 11:42, 18 October 2012 (UTC)

why?
I see no reason for this sentence:

"Just like the Bible can also be appreciated by non-believers, due to its impact on world history, it is not required to be an atheist to appreciate this anti-religious anthology" — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.86.243.150 (talk) 11:11, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

Inciting?
What is meant by the sentence "In an inciting anthology of atheist and agnostic thought..."? Who is inciting whom to do what? rowley (talk) 02:58, 28 March 2018 (UTC)

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 * Christopher Hitchens 2008-04-24 001.jpg