| Summary: | Part of a special section on religion. Daniel Dennett, a professor at Tufts University, Medford, massachusetts, is currently in Great Britain promoting his new book, Breaking the Spell: religion as a natural phenomenon. The book develops Dennett's idea that religion has evolved as a cultural replicator that may or may not have a benign effect on those who transmit it. This notion has attracted criticism, but Dennett has allies too, and in recent times, he and other nonbelievers—what could be termed a movement of the New Godless—have been preparing to challenge the forces of increasingly intolerant and aggressive religions.
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