Most leading naturalist/atheist thinkers deny libertarian free will: Dawkins, Harris, Dennett, Hawking, Rosenberg, Coyne, Carroll, Barker. Stratton uses their own admissions as premises in his argument.

Stephen Hawking: "It's hard to imagine how free will can operate if our behavior is determined by physical law... we are no more than biological machines and free will is just an illusion." Sam Harris (Free Will): "Free will is an illusion. Our wills are simply not of our own making. Thoughts and intentions emerge from background causes of which we are unaware and over which we exert no conscious control." Stratton notes he doesn't even need to defend premise 2 (naturalism entails determinism) because atheists write entire books defending it for him. Harris's book was the main catalyst for Stratton's doctoral dissertation.