So while Richard Dawkins has done an excellent and admirable job of deflecting the oft-cited argument that Albert Einstein was a religious man, it seems we’re now fortunate enough to hear from the man himself more clearly than ever. In news straight from The Guardian UK, it seems a letter penned by Einstein in 1954 states quite definitively that he believed faith in God to be a “childish superstition”.

As Dawkins would also remind us, this is not a revelation since Einstein made any number of public statements which should have made it abundantly clear that he did not believe in any sort of “God”. Still, perhaps all the hubbub over this letter is worthwhile since it seems to leave absolutely no doubt as to his convictions on the subject.

Now if only we could convince Francis Collins to read a little bit more Einstein, perhaps he’d be swayed by a fellow man of science.