Clinton Richard Dawkins 26.3.1941 Nairobi, Kenia; Zoologe, Evolutionsbiologe, Professor of Public Understanding of Science, University of Oxford – RichardDawkins.net - The Official Richard Dawkins Webauftritt David Cowan: Introduction to the Menlo Park, CA event (Video)

"If we are too friendly to nice, decent bishops, we run the risk of buying into the fiction that there's something virtuous about believing things because of faith rather than because of evidence. We run the risk of betraying scientific enlightenment." "Scientists divided over alliance with religion", 29.5. 2007 The Guardian

"I have found it an amusing strategy, when asked whether I am an atheist, to point out that the questioner is also an atheist when considering Zeus, Apollo, Amon Ra, Mithras, Baal, Thor, Wotan, the Golden Calf and the Flying Spaghetti Monster. I just go one further" The God Delusion, S. 53 "I believe not because of reading a holy book but because I have studied the evidence" The God Delusion, S. 282 "If children were taught to question and think through their beliefs, instead of being taught the superior virtue of faith without question, it is a good bet there would be no suicide bombers" The God Delusion, S. 308

"No doubt soaring cathedrals, stirring music, moving stories and parables, help a bit. But by far the most important variable determining your religion is the accident of birth." The God Delusion

"Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence." The God Delusion

Doug: "... One of the misconceptions about evolution, that I know was a big point of Stephen Jay Gould's, was the concept of progress, and whether there is any such thing as progress. You make a good point in here that to an extent of course there is progress, it just isn't necessarily directed. We used to have just one-celled things, and then there were invertebrates, and now vertebrates. Dawkins: "... The sense of progress that Gould objected to, I would of course agree; the idea that evolution was directed towards humans." Doug Brown, Powells.com: "Richard Dawkins: The Biologist's Tale", 18.10. 2004

"I can see how the title The Selfish Gene could be misunderstood, especially by those philosophers, not here present, who prefer to read a book by title only, omitting the rather extensive footnote which is the book itself." Richard Dawkins at Edge

"One of Richard's achievements has been to extend an enjoyment of science to layman like myself. Permission has been granted, no apologies necessary." ... "None of us, I think, in the mid-'70s, when The Selfish Gene was published, would have thought we'd be devoting so much mental space now to confront religion. We thought that matter had long been closed." Ian McEwan: "Science writing: Towards a literary tradition?" über Richard Dawkins

"We are extremely close cousins of other species. And yet we have grown light years away from them." The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Human Evolution, S. xi; Rezension.

"And God said: »Let there be Dawkins,«" and there was Dawkins. And Dawkins was clever, angry, charming, petulant, eloquent, arrogant and cold of eye. And God looked at Dawkins, and saw that he was good; well, pretty good. And damned irritating as well." Ron Ferguson: "What a lazy way to argue against God", The Herald, 19.1.2006

"I think that religion is a dangerous thing, because it teaches people that faith as opposed to evidence is a justifiable reason for believing something. And if you believe that it's a right to thing to say that something is true just because you believe it rather than because you've seen some evidence than that is a recipe for conflict and perhaps even murder. Because we've seen all over the world that people are prepared to kill for the sake of deeply held beliefs which are not substantiated by evidence." Richard Dawkins 12.1.2006, Broadcast on Five Live: The eminent evolutionist talks to Simon Mayo about religion, faith and the damage he believes they cause in the world. Talk online

"The most they will claim is that there is no evidence against, which is pathetically weak. There is no evidence against all sorts of things, but we don't waste our time believing in them." In: Cornelia Dean: "Scientists Confront Taboo of Mixing Science and God", The New York Times, Beilage der SZ, 29.8.2005, S. 4

© by Herbert Huber, Am Fröschlanger 15, 83512 Wasserburg, Germany, 8.6.2007