Dan Barker

press release: A Room of One's Own is honored to welcome Dan Barker, co-President of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, for a book launch in celebration of his new book, Free Will Explained!

About Free Will Explained: How Science and Philosophy Converge to Create a Beautiful Illusion: A compelling essay on free will from an internationally recognized authority on atheism.

Do we have free will? And if we don't, why do we feel as if we do? In a godless universe governed by impersonal laws of cause and effect, are you responsible for your actions? Former evangelical minister Dan Barker (God: The Most Unpleasant Character in All Fiction) unveils a novel solution to the question that has baffled scientists and philosophers for millennia. He outlines the concept of what he calls "harmonic free will," a two-dimensional perspective that pivots the paradox on its axis to show that there is no single answer--both sides are right. Free will is a useful illusion: not a scientific, but a social truth.

Dan Barker, a former Christian minister, is now an atheist and co-president (with his wife Annie Laurie Gaylor) of the Freedom From Religion Foundation. He tells his preacher-to-atheist story in the books Losing Faith in Faith and Godless: How An Evangelical Preacher Became One of America’s Leading Atheists(Foreword by Richard Dawkins). Dan is co-founder (with philosopher Daniel C. Dennett and scientist Richard Dawkins) and board member of The Clergy Project, which helps ministers, priests, rabbis and other clergy to leave the pulpit after they have abandoned the supernatural. He is a professional jazz pianist in the Madison area, and a songwriter with more than 200 published songs. Dan has participated in more than 120 public debates with theologians, scholars, and apologists around the world, and regularly speaks and performs concerts on college campuses.