Philosophy and polemics

Readers of The Last Superstition will find that it is as polemical as it is philosophical. But shouldn't philosophy be non-polemical? No, not always, as I argued in a post at the now defunct Conservative Philosopher group blog which Bill Vallicella kindly archived at his own (highly recommended) site some time back. In light of the publication of TLS it seemed to me a good time to call attention to that post once again, since if anyone has been crying out for a simultaneously polemical and philosophically rigorous response, it is the "New Atheists."