Probably No God

Atheists Send a Message, on 800 British Buses


By: Sarah Lyall

Published: January 6, 2009

LONDON — The advertisement on the bus was fairly mild, just a passage from the Bible and the address of a Christian Web site. But when Ariane Sherine, a comedy writer, looked on the Web site in June, she was startled to learn that she and her nonbelieving friends were headed straight to hell, to “spend all eternity in torment.”



Akira Suemori/Associated Press

This message — except the “probably” — has been approved by Richard Dawkins, scientist and author of “The God Delusion.”

That’s a bit extreme, she thought, as well as hard to prove. “If I wanted to run a bus ad saying ‘Beware — there is a giant lion from London Zoo on the loose!’ or ‘The “bits” in orange juice aren’t orange but plastic — don’t drink them or you’ll die!’ I think I might be asked to show my working and back up my claims,” Ms. Sherine wrote in a comentary on the Web site of The Guardian.

And then she thought, how about putting some atheist messages on the bus, as a corrective to the religious ones?

And so were planted the seeds of the Atheist Bus Campaing, an effort to disseminate a godless message to the greater public. When the organizers announced the effort in October, they said they hoped to raise a modest $8,000 or so.

But something seized people’s imagination. Supported by the scientist and author Richard Dawkins, the philosopher A. C. Grayling and the British Humanist Association, among others, the campaign raised nearly $150,000 in four days. Now it has more than $200,000, and on Tuesday it unveiled its advertisements on 800 buses across Britain.

“There’s probably no God,” the advertisements say. “Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”

Liz Charles Commentary:

Probably no God. Probably is a large gamble to take. On the flip side I can tell you without a shadow of doubt that there is a God. Why? Because I have felt his power and light, joy and happiness. So, you can put your money in the bag that says “probably” there is no God, or place your faith with the believers who have prayed and been answered and can tell you I know there is a God. Perhaps, too, if you try the experiment, you too may learn to know instead of guess. You will still be able to enjoy your life, but may not life so selfishly and harmfully. But you will be happy, immensely happy as you go about doing good and living with a knowledge of a God who loves you, cares for you and wants the best for you and all of humanity.