Heroes

Remembering Paul Kurtz and Recognizing His Influence

Remembering Paul Kurtz and Recognizing His Influence

I was fortunate enough to have had a last conversation with him concerning the future work of the Institute the day before he died. One of his last directions was he wished to be a signatory on Leo Igwe’s A Manifest for A Skeptical Africa. We were also formulating plans to continue his much beloved summer school here at the University of Buffalo.

How will I remember Paul? As a lion of a man and a true friend. I will remember him with love. And I promise to continue his work carrying out his mission.

In Memory of Christopher Hitchens, 1949-2011

In Memory of Christopher Hitchens, 1949-2011

Christopher Hitchens: iconoclast, critic, essayist, columnist, editor, author, and outspoken and unapologetic atheist, died from pneumonia as a complication of esophageal cancer at the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas on December 15. He was 62.

I had the good fortune to meet Hitchens a few times. When I was an editor with Free Inquiry magazine Hitchens was a columnist. He had come to Amherst, New York, where Free Inquiry is published, to speak at the Center for Inquiry. We had taken him to dinner where he had, not unexpectedly, imbibed quite a bit of alcohol. He seemed to have not been affected much by it because he shortly thereafter delivered an excellent speech, focusing largely on threats of Islam throughout the world.