“What defenders of religion cannot say is that anyone has ever gone berserk, or that a society ever failed, because people became too reasonable, intellectually honest, or unwilling to be duped by the dogmatism of their neighbors. This skeptical attitude, born of equal parts care and curiosity, is all that ‘atheists’ recommend – and it is typical of nearly every intellectual pursuit apart from theology.”
http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/september-11-2011/