I had the pleasure of meeting Michael at Cal Tech years ago and also Stephen Hawking, I was on my way to the world of Skepticism.. I know from his bio that was he was a graduate of Pepperdine Univ and my grandson is in his 3rd yr there now. So I'm establishing some dialogue with Ryan on Shermer and Pepperdine. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Shermer Once a fundamentalist Christian, Shermer ceased to believe in the existence of God during graduate school. He accepts the labels agnostic,[6]nontheist,[7][8]atheist[9][10] but prefers to be called a skeptic.[10] He also describes himself as an advocate for humanist philosophy[11] as well as the science of morality.[12] Along my way I met some wise people who believed as Shermer does and were also very much humanists. They too were excellent teachers that I needed and wanted.
Good luck with what and why....I've posted this in other forums and there are others in our world similar to Michael Shermer like Bart Ehrman from the Kansas area. Good to keep open minds, don't ya think.