Why I Am Not a Christian review

"Why I Am Not a Christian" is a series of essays and speeches by Bertrand Russell, a famous philosopher. Russell's views were controversial in his time (he was famously denied a teaching position at the City College of New York after being railroaded by religious types), and are still controversial. I didn't read all of the pieces in the book, as my attention span just hasn't been in the right spot lately, but I was impressed by some of them, and disappointed in others.
Some of his arguments are outdated, as most of the pieces were written in the first half of the 20th century. But largely, they make sense still today. Religion, in general, has appealed to people for as long as it has because it mainly relies on fear as a motivator, he argues. Fear of death, fear of reprisal for sinning, etc. He makes an interesting case, and it would have been fascinating to hear him debate. The thing that most impressed me though was that he had no belief in any sort of afterlife (logically, he saw no evidence that there was any such thing, based on his knowledge of physiology, and it's hard to disagree), and that he was not scared of it either. That is something that stuck in my head and that I'll be thinking about long after I return the book to the library.
Next up is a lighter non-fiction book that I got for my birthday (from my incredibly thoughtful and wonderful brother whose gift was only a little late): Just a Geek by Wil Wheaton.