I have to say, I can't stand Dawkins. What I dislike about him is that he is as bigotted in his belief that religion is totally without merit as many religious people are in their condemnation of atheism. He never acknowledges that there are good sides to religion. He acknowledges the beauty of the Passion (music - not terrible film!) but won't give any credit to the beliefs that inspired that beauty. Furthermore, he seems to see himself as some kind of atheist messiah sent to free mankind. Instead of offering rational arguments, he often resorts to abuse - simply dismissing religious beliefs as 'rubbish'. He talks about the guilt that comes from religious belief (which is far from universal) but never mentions the hope and joy. I get angry when Islamic extremists dismiss people with beliefs different from their own as rubbish and heretical, and I find the same tactics just as distasteful when they are employed by an atheist.

Up-vote for potential discussion.

Well, as he himself said, this is a clip of his reaction to a talk- he isn't giving a lecture, he isn't prepared.

Don't think that all he has to offer is a negativist view. He has actually written two books about the hope and joy and beauty offered by a naturalist view of reality.

His point is not intolerance of people. His objective is the ending of tolerance of the proposterous things that many people believe or claim to believe.

The people are fine, but it's time we stopped regarding the ridiculous things that people are willing to believe as somehow elevating their status. Somehow because a person goes to church this makes them "more good"? It's a slippery slope- what if they go twice a week and pray every day? What if they believe in 10% of the bible? What if they believe half of the miracles? What if they think the earth is 6000 years old? What if they think god talks to them personally?

Are any of these traits admirable?

One of the best points in the God Delusion is that it makes far more sense to determine a secular code of morality. To be good just because you believe that some supernatural deity is watching you, judging you, reading your mind... isn't a very compelling reason to be good at all. What's worse, because God isn't real, anybody can say anything they want about His intentions. He wants me to kill infidels- look it says so in this book!

I do believe in God - but have no problem with those who don't, and I don't think any less of them. My problem with Dawkins is that I think he thinks less of those people who do believe in God. I agree, that simply because a person goes to church/mosque/synagogue/temple that doesn't make them any better morally. In fact, many people who do are very immoral people! Many Muslims in my country seem to think that religion is a checklist - Beard? Yes! Islamic clothing? Yes! Hijab? Yes! Well you must be a Muslim - without ever concentrating on the spiritual or moral teachings of the religion. I suppose it all leads back to that age old philosophy of religion paradox:

Is something good because God proscribes it, or does God proscribe it because it is good?

I don't have any problem with people who are religious. I understand that it is the current zeitgeist. My point, and Dawkins' is that religion does a tremendous amount of evil in the world, on personal and geopolitical levels.

If a person told you that they were in contact with an alien race of beings that wanted humans to burn our toenail clippings, what would you think? So why is it any different when somebody tells you that god doesn't want them to turn on a lightswitch on a saturday, or that they need to turn towards mecca 5 times a day, or that wine somehow turns into blood?

As I said, I'm intelligent enough to understand why there is a difference, but my point is that you can also see how in some ways there isn't any difference. The only difference is cultural, and the culture of religion is deeply deeply flawed, because religion itself is deeply deeply flawed.

If you are saying that religion can be exploited to justify anything - well that's perhaps true, but the same could be said of any belief system. The two World Wars, the Stalinist purges, the crimes of Mao - none of these were committed in the name of religion. In fact most of the great crimes of recent centuries have been committed in the name of secular ideologies or nationalism. I disagree with you when you say that "religion does a tremendous amount of evil in the world" - I would say that a lot of evil is committed in the name of religion, just as it has been committed in the name of communism or secularism. The key point is that whatever our beliefs are, we tolerate others and remain flexible.

sorry, this video is *dead

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that was quick!

no other existing clips out there!! *discard

Self-discarding this video (discard called by original submitter LadyBug)