The fool hath said in his heart,
There is no God.
Psalm 14:1
"At the same time, the number of Americans who say they are atheists rose, from 1 percent to 5 percent.The poll was conducted by WIN-Gallup International and is based on interviews with 50,000 people from 57 countries and five continents. Participants were asked, “Irrespective of whether you attend a place of worship or not, would you say you are a religious person, not a religious person, or a convinced atheist?”
The seven years between the polls is notable because 2005 saw the publication of “The End of Faith” by Sam Harris, the first in a wave of best-selling books on atheism by Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett and other so-called “New Atheists.”
Still, Cragun does not believe the poll shows more people are becoming atheists, but rather that more people are willing to identify as atheists.
“For a very long time, religiosity has been a central characteristic of the American identity,” he said. “But what this suggests is that is changing and people are feeling less inclined to identify as religious to comply with what it means to be a good person in the U.S.”
Another possible factor may be the number of atheists within organized efforts by American atheist groups to encourage those who do not believe in God to say so publicly. The Out Campaign, a project of the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science, was launched in 2007 and has since been endorsed by several national atheist groups.
The current poll confirms a declining religiosity — both at home and abroad — that’s been detected in other polls. The 2008 American Religious Identification Survey found that 15 percent of Americans said they have no religion — different from being a “confirmed atheist,” but nonetheless up from 8 percent in 1990." TheWashingtonPost
