Richard Dawkins - Anti -Christ or Great Thinker?

I keep thinking this thread is about Brian Dawkins and getting all infuriated that anyone would suggest he's the antichrist.

It would be hilarious if Dawkins was the anit-christ.
Imagine how pissed off he'd be!

On the subject of evolution and biology, Richard Dawkins is an intelligent, original and interesting writer - his books make potentially dull subjects fascinating, and his passion for his subject is obvious.

On religion, although I agree with most things he says, Dawkins is entirely unoriginal and uninteresting. However, I tend to agree with Mei upthread - I do think it is good that someone is promoting atheism, in a world where religion does seem to be one of the exacerbating forces behind a lot of problems. On the other hand, I feel that Dawkins may be 'preaching to the converted' - I'm not sure how many religious folks he will appeal to with his confrontational approach.

Interesting article on religious experience and the brain:

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleId=434D7C62-E7F2-99DF-37CC9814533B90D7&chanId=sa013&modsrc=most_popular

that research has been around for awhile, very interesting stuff.

altho this:
"Because of the positive effect of such experiences on those who have them, some researchers speculate that the ability to induce them artificially could transform people’s lives by making them happier, healthier and better able to concentrate."

....sounds like a disaster of collosal proportions in the making.

b-b-but i thought that was what ILX was for :(

"Are you sometimes doubtful of God's existence? Wishing you had more revelations? Sick of Ayuhuasca? Try Believeitol!"

http://books.guardian.co.uk/news/articles/0,,2180660,00.html

In an interview with the Guardian, he said: "When you think about how fantastically successful the Jewish lobby has been, though, in fact, they are less numerous I am told - religious Jews anyway - than atheists and [yet they] more or less monopolise American foreign policy as far as many people can see. So if atheists could achieve a small fraction of that influence, the world would be a better place."

Uh oh.

not working hard enough? employer sends terrifying vision of God to inspire you.

x-post

i've been waiting for someone to notice that (xpost)

lol @ atheist homeland

Thing is, Neuroscience is such a primitive branch of biology, that trying to use what we actually KNOW about the brain to explore religious experience is truly a fool's errand, at this point. Sort of like, um, electroshock therapy.

Yup Id agree the point is we simply dont know. He may well be right but I dont think one needs to be some anti ascience sketpic to see he goes beyond what science can tell us.

Like many natural scientists I dont think hes so sharp on examining his own methodology. I think his certainty here is one of his weaknesses, he has so few self doubts about his own method.

Shakey touched on his understanding of language but any number of philosophical routes could or at least should derail his followers certainty - epistemological debates dont make for great paperbacks.
His lack of intellectual modesty turns me off as much as it clealry turns others on.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/3255972/Harry-Potter-fails-to-cast-spell-over-Professor-Richard-Dawkins.html

He really is a useless cunt.

^^^ Scientific fact.

Wow. Just WOW

The prominent atheist is stepping down from his post at Oxford University to write a book aimed at youngsters in which he will warn them against believing in "anti-scientific" fairytales.
Prof Hawkins said: "The book I write next year will be a children's book on how to think about the world, science thinking contrasted with mythical thinking.

---

Speaking recently at a conference of the Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain, a group of Britons who have renounced Islam, Prof Dawkins said: "Do not ever call a child a Muslim child or a Christian child – that is a form of child abuse because a young child is too young to know what its views are about the cosmos or morality.
"It is evil to describe a child as a Muslim child or a Christian child. I think labelling children is child abuse and I think there is a very heavy issue, for example, about teaching about hell and torturing their minds with hell.
"It's a form of child abuse, even worse than physical child abuse. I wouldn't want to teach a young child, a terrifyingly young child, about hell when he dies, as it's as bad as many forms of physical abuse."

This is also choice:

"I think looking back to my own childhood, the fact that so many of the stories I read allowed the possibility of frogs turning into princes, whether that has a sort of insidious affect on rationality, I'm not sure. Perhaps it's something for research."

I hear he's writing a hard-hitting exposé of Father Christmas at the moment.

"When you think about how fantastically successful the Jewish lobby has been, though, in fact, they are less numerous I am told - religious Jews anyway - than atheists and [yet they] more or less monopolise American foreign policy as far as many people can see."

^^^classic material

I can't wait for his channel 4 documentary on Thomas the Tank Engine.

For someone who supposedly loves science so much he doesn't talk about it half as bloody often as religion/homeopathy/superstition.

Well at least he has some common ground with the fundies now.

Up to this point Dawkins has been reasonable and correct generally speaking, if kinda dull. This, however, is like tilting at fiction because it's not true. Go nuts, buddy, but can't you really discern any targets of higher priority?

I mean, a better tact if you want to take down the Potter would be to skewer all the adult Potter-lovers who won't read anything above a 6th-grade comprehension level.

yes, if you want to "take down" a children's fantasy series the first thing you should do is attack a strawman

http://ruletheweb.co.uk/b3ta/bus/

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y148/Juror8/bus.jpg

hahahahahahahahaha

o shi

A+

who is this richard dawking

http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b379/Vietgrove/bus2.jpg

http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b379/Vietgrove/bus.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3501/3253331001_941a0b0269.jpg

lol!

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v165/noodle_vague/bus.jpg

http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b379/Vietgrove/bus4.jpg

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y148/Juror8/botb.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v165/noodle_vague/bus2.jpg

http://ruletheweb.co.uk/b3ta/bus/TVVNDKBP/KILLING%20JOKE/MORE%20LIKE/GAY%20HOMOS/bus.jpg

I can die happy now.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3109/3254205218_41b78a4c02_o.jpg

good essay by james wood about dawkins and eagleton in last weeks nyer

http://www.sportclassicbooks.com/images/covers/chocolate-thunder.jpg

Snippet of the article max mentioned here: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2009/08/31/090831crbo_books_wood

That Telegraph interview above is absolutely PRICELESS.

lol wood v dawkins v eagleton is the real mt douchemore.

wood is a god-botherer iirc. eagleton is a str8 choad. dawkins just learned santa doesn't exist.

Wood is not a god-botherer. God-worrier maybe. Raised evangelical and then lapsed in his teens, but has never quite got over it. "Ruined choirboy" as one of my old editors once described him.

ah, that explains this: "What is needed is neither the overweening rationalism of a Dawkins nor the rarefied religious belief of an Eagleton but a theologically engaged atheism that resembles disappointed belief." ie, what is needed is me, james woods.

or wood, even.