Gordon Stein

From Philosopedia

Stein, Gordon (1941–27 August 1996)

Stein was an extensive researcher on the topic of unbelief. For humanist and rationalist publications, he wrote in excess of six hundred book reviews. He was associated with such journals as The American Rationalist, Free Inquiry, and The Truth Seeker. Also, he was an officer of the Freedom from Religion Foundation, a Secular Humanist Mentor of the Council for Secular Humanism, and that group’s director of the Center for Inquiry libraries.

He held degree in library science and management from the University of Rochester, Adelphi College, and the University of California at Los Angeles. He had a doctorate in physiology from Ohio State University.

Dr. Stein wrote a number of basic, exhaustive, and definitive references on freethought topics. In 1981, he wrote Freethought in the United Kingdom. In 1980, he edited An Anthology of Atheism and Rationalism. In 1987, he edited A Second Anthology of Atheism and Rationalism. In 1990, he wrote the scholarly God Pro and Con: A Bibliography of Atheism. In 1993 he wrote not only the Encyclopedia of Hoaxes but also The Sorcerer of Kings: The Case of Daniel Dunglas Home and William Crookes, which describes the rise in spiritualism, or survival of the spirit after death, that began in the 1840s in upstate New York - he details how the “phenomena” of spiritualism was produced.

In 1994 at the Toronto conference of the Coalition for Secular Humanism, Atheism, and Freethought (CSHAFT), Stein spoke on “What Is the Good Life? A Humanist Perspective.” His consummate achievement was the editing of The Encyclopedia of Unbelief (1985).

Just before his death from cancer, Stein’s editing of The Encyclopedia of the Paranormal (1996), a comprehensive and major collection, was published. The work examined “a wide range of claims, claimants, phenomena, and beliefs, from the certifiably false to the intriguingly possible, and all stops between,” according to Jerome Clark. Wendy M. Grossman, founder of the United Kingdom’s The Skeptic, praised the work highly as “an ambitious and difficult project.” Contributors included Geoffrey Dean, Arthur Mather, Ivan W. Kelly, Joe Nickell, Ray Human, Terence Hines, Paul Kurtz, and others. Carl Sagan wrote the foreword.

Nicolas Walter, in The Independent (6 September 1996), described Stein as “a leading activist in the English-speaking free-thought movement,” one who “will be missed as a key figure in a growing movement.” Walter also wrote, “Stein was an unusual personality among Americans and humanists, being rather introverted and taciturn, but he was a loyal colleague and a stimulating if abrasive conversationalist. He was a severe critic of work by other people, yet sensitive to criticism by others. “ Stein, he noted, had “helped to found the best paper in the American free-thought movement, Free Inquiry,” and became “a considerable scholar in a movement which contains many considerable scholars.” Walter, however, often cited "errors" in Stein's works.

Some 8,000 of Stein’s books were contributed to the Center for Inquiry Libraries. They represent works on atheism, Bible criticism, the historicity of Jesus, freethought history, spiritualism, the occult, and parapsychology.

Stein died of cancer in Buffalo General Hospital. He was survived by his first wife, Barbara, and a daughter, Karen, both of Atlanta, Georgia. Also, he was survived by a second wife, Eve Triffo of Los Angeles, California, and a sister, Irna S. Jay of Baltimore.

Works

The American Rationalist (Magazine Editor)

Robert Ingersoll: A Checklist (1969)

Freethought in the United States: A Descriptive Bibliography (1978)

Anthology of Atheism and Rationalism (Editor, with Marshall Brown, 1980)

Freethought in the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth: A Descriptive Bibliography (1981)

Encyclopedia of Unbelief (Editor, 1985)

A Second Anthology of Atheism and Rationalism (Editor, 1987)

God Pro and Con: A Bibliography of Atheism (Editor, 1990)

The Sorcerer of Kings: The Case of Daniel Dunglas Home and William Crookes (1993)

Encyclopedia of Hoaxes (Editor, 1993)

Encyclopedia of the Paranormal (Editor, 1996)

{EU, Anne N. Gaylor and Eldon Scholt; FUK; FUS; SHD}