There is an eeriness in learning computer science, the eeriness of discovering the empty soul of a machine beneath the monitor's meaningful display. Behind the colorful banners, cartoonlike icons, and smart, responsive buttons on our screens are cryptic lines of codes and commands. Strange as they are, these hidden strings of characters are only the programmer's, not the computer's, language. The computer's only language is an endless run-on sentence of ones and zeroes. Its silicon cerebrum is a vast array of tiny electrical switches, each charged or chargeless. The changing order of charges translates, miraculously but mindlessly, into all the streaming wonders of words and colors we perceive.

So too is the atheist's universe. Pry behind the rich graphics flashing across the screen of being, and you arrive at the imbecilic machinery of it all, electrons flowing through the circuit boards of the stars, motors whirring on the hard drives of our bodies. Beneath the intelligible there is only the unintelligent, a blank stare behind beautiful eyes, muteness behind the music.