Christopher Hitchens on Waterboarding, Mother Teresa, and More Controversial Moments (VIDEO) - The Daily Beast
Christopher Hitchens, noted journalist, prolific columnist, atheist activist, and author of God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything died Thursday of complications related to esophageal cancer. He was 62.
I've admired his work for a few years now, albeit mostly through his interviews and debate videos on Youtube. Along with Richard Dawkins, his work helped me to finally let go of my remaining lightly held deistic religious beliefs and come out fully as an atheist.
I did not always agree with him, in particular I am not as convinced as he was that religion is an irredemably harmful influence in society, nor could I fully agree with his anti-islamicism. But agree or disagree I could never fault him for the quality or force of his arguments.
Besides admiring his work, and mourning the loss of a great fighter for the cause of atheism, his death has struck a particular chord with me because of his forthrightness and self honesty in admitting the role of his decades of hard drinking and heavy smoking in leading to his cancer. See this interview for what I mean, around 2 minutes in:
I am currently battling gastritis, colonitis, and colon polyps (non-cancerous thankfully), and have not been being nearly as honest with myself about how my own decades of poor diet, drinking and smoking have caused my own problems as Hitch had been in facing up to his own contributions to his immanent death.
Once again, I find myself inspired by him; by his courage, his dignity, and his seadfastness in insisting on making his choices based on honesty, logic, and reason, right up to the end.
The world may be dimmer for his loss, but the light he shone on unreason is still brilliantly bright.
Leaford
Christopher Hitchens, noted journalist, prolific columnist, atheist activist, and author of God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything died Thursday of complications related to esophageal cancer. He was 62.
I've admired his work for a few years now, albeit mostly through his interviews and debate videos on Youtube. Along with Richard Dawkins, his work helped me to finally let go of my remaining lightly held deistic religious beliefs and come out fully as an atheist.
I did not always agree with him, in particular I am not as convinced as he was that religion is an irredemably harmful influence in society, nor could I fully agree with his anti-islamicism. But agree or disagree I could never fault him for the quality or force of his arguments.
Besides admiring his work, and mourning the loss of a great fighter for the cause of atheism, his death has struck a particular chord with me because of his forthrightness and self honesty in admitting the role of his decades of hard drinking and heavy smoking in leading to his cancer. See this interview for what I mean, around 2 minutes in:
I am currently battling gastritis, colonitis, and colon polyps (non-cancerous thankfully), and have not been being nearly as honest with myself about how my own decades of poor diet, drinking and smoking have caused my own problems as Hitch had been in facing up to his own contributions to his immanent death.
Once again, I find myself inspired by him; by his courage, his dignity, and his seadfastness in insisting on making his choices based on honesty, logic, and reason, right up to the end.
The world may be dimmer for his loss, but the light he shone on unreason is still brilliantly bright.
Leaford
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