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Richard Dawkins to Appear on Doctor Who

Posted by Zonk on Tue Apr 08, 2008 12:20 AM
from the do-the-evolution-baby dept.
Sci-Fi Science
Ravalox writes "In an interview with The Independent, current curator of the Doctor Who legacy Russell T. Davis announced that distinguished evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins would be making an appearance in the new season of Doctor Who. To quote Davies: 'People were falling at his feet ... We've had Kylie Minogue on that set, but it was Dawkins people were worshipping.' Dawkins is the author of many best-selling non-fiction books, from The Selfish Gene and The Blind Watchmaker to The God Delusion, and a renowned advocate of both Darwin's evolutionary theory and the merits of atheism."
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  • Not the first member in his family... (Score:5, Informative)

    by nebaz (453974) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @12:22AM (#22996930)
    I just thought I'd mention that Richard Dawkins is married to Lalla Ward, who played the Time Lady Romana (second version) in the original series. She was also married to Tom Baker for a short time.

    • Re:Not the first member in his family... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Jeramy (123761) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:04AM (#22997132) Homepage
      And Douglas Adams wrote for the old show. Douglas Adams and Dawkins were good friends.

        • Re:Not the first member in his family... (Score:5, Funny)

          by hey! (33014) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @07:34AM (#22998918) Homepage Journal
          Actually, it doesn't.

          It's a much more plausible that Dawkins is an extraterrestrial named Oolon Colluphid who stole her from Tom Baker at a cast party by saying, "Hey, doll, is this guy boring you? Why don't you talk to me? I'm from another planet."

          I mean, it could have happened, and Douglas Adams could have been there to see it. They say that writers, after all, should write what they know, although I have to admit the exact opposite seems to work for Dan Brown. Still, by a kind of figure/ground reversal trick you can see the outlines of what Dan Brown knows in the text of The DaVinci Code, provided you have a magnifying glass handy.

  • And (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 08 2008, @12:26AM (#22996952)
    He is going to be holding a toilet plunger and be shouting "Exterminate!! Exterminate the believer!!"
  • Dr Who: Richard, what are you doing with that fish, duct tape and four lizard legs?
    Dawkins: What, you think evolution *just happened*?

  • Put Simply (Score:5, Funny)

    by mcsporran (832624) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @12:41AM (#22997030)
    There is no god, and Dawkins is his prophet.

  • Dawkins' Popularity (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ecavalli (1216014) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @12:45AM (#22997046) Homepage
    Mod me down if you think this is too far off topic, but does anyone else wonder how much Dawkins' popularity (as related by Davies) applies specifically to the Who audience and others like it?

    I can't imagine the average person would get excited over the guy if he appeared on an episode of Friends or Deal or No Deal.

    Luckily Mr. Dawkins seems to know his audience, and the Who fans' natural tendency towards the geekier, more analytical side of the human personality spectrum makes his appearance on the show a stroke of publicity genius.

          • Re:I don't like Richard Dawkins (Score:5, Interesting)

            by mike2R (721965) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @08:10AM (#22999214)

            A scientific theory is a theory which conforms to very strict rules. A theory in general does not.

            It's been a while since I read any philosophy of science stuff - and I'm not claiming ever to have been an expert - but I think in general that viewpoint is rejected. Basically the thinking goes that it is actually impossible to nail down what you mean by a "scientific" theory, so rejecting ID for example by saying it is "not scientific" doesn't work to well since you can't actually point to anything that disqualifies it. Much better to assess it as a scientific theory and to conclude that it is a very very bad one.

            My objection to Dawkins principles is that he suggests that all theories of god should be rejected without any critical assessment. So if a theory of god appears tomorrow which conforms to scientific principles (I'm not saying it will - I am merely hypothesizing) then we must reject it because it refers to supernatural beings. I'm sorry but that lacks the plain objectivity of the scientific mind.

            Hmm, my reading of the God Delusion was quite the reverse - I understood Dawkins as claiming that all religions, by their very nature, are scientific theories. They make claims about the structure of the physical world and in some cases are predictive. Therefore they must be assessed as science. Que several hundred pages about why they are very very poor science indeed ;)

            Possibly he rejected "supernatural" entities as part of his claim that any God must be assessed as a natural entity - should not get a free pass on the question of "what cause God then?" for example? But that is hardly the same thing.

            Dawkins repeated stresses that the difference between an atheist and a theist is that an atheist is always willing to change his mind should convincing evidence of God actually come to light; hence atheism is the only logical scientific position to take in the absense of such evidence - I think there's a semantic debate about the precise meaning of atheism and agnosticism in here somewhere which can effect how some people would view that statement, but if you follow Dawkins' definitions this is the case.

  • Realignment of priorities is in order (Score:5, Funny)

    by GodfatherofSoul (174979) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @12:49AM (#22997064)

    We've had Kylie Minogue on that set, but it was Dawkins people were worshipping.

    Kylie Minogue [google.com] was on the set and people were chasing Richard Dawkins??? Wow, that show really IS for geeks.

  • How profoundly sad (Score:5, Insightful)

    by glwtta (532858) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @12:56AM (#22997096) Homepage
    That someone can be famous in the 21st century for being an "advocate of Darwin's evolutionary theory".

  • Atheists, Come Out! (Score:5, Informative)

    by gQuigs (913879) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:01AM (#22997120) Homepage
    View his call to arms: http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/113 [ted.com]

    Have we ever done a poll on religious beliefs on Slashdot?

    • Re:Atheists, Come Out! (Score:4, Funny)

      by Alsee (515537) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:40AM (#22997326) Homepage
      Have we ever done a poll on religious beliefs on Slashdot?

      Cowboy Neil won.

      -
    • I can picture that poll =]

      Celing Cat
      Basement Cat
      Flying Spaghetti Monster
      Discordian
      Subgenius
      Cowboy Neal

    • Re:Atheists, Come Out! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ringmaster_j (760218) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @02:30AM (#22997564)
      Atheists come out? Hardly! Reading all the replies to this article, I think the ratio was about 100:1 atheist to theist. On Slash, atheists rule the roost. So, actually, I'm going to come out as a theist.

      Hi! I'm not scary, I swear! I don't think you're going to hell, as long as you're nice (i.e. I believe in the idea of the anonymous christian). I believe very strongly in evolution, and I think gays are perfect just the way God made them. However, I am very much a Christian. I have a calling in life, God has given me a task, and I need to follow it. Jesus died for my sins, and- I believe- yours too. He loves us, and when we sin it pisses him off. I don't feel smug, and I think of atheists as my brothers and sisters; we're all in this together. So please, please, please, you guys, don't talk about my religion like it's evil. Sure, when religion gets mixed up with politics it's a terrible mess (viz. Bush/Khameni) and it's caused a lot of problems in the past. Sure, there are a tonne of idiots in my church, and in others, who believe that you're all evil, and so are all the gays, and the Jews, and the Muslim. Sorry some of my people have tried to convert you. Sorry they don't look at science and realize the immense beauty of the way in which God has chosen to bring us into being. Sorry they've killed some of you for your beliefs.

      What more can I apologize for? What can I possibly say to make you accept that I know we've done wrong? All I can say is this: when you deride religion, when you say it's "the opiate of the masses" or "the cyanide" as someone else put it, when you mock me for my beliefs, and when you brand me as some fundamentalist nutjob, it really, really hurts. It's not fair to me. It stereotypes, and it shows the same kind of logic that fundamentalists use. If you said "all blacks are criminals, they should go back to Africa", or "homosexuals are girly, they should all just be straight like me" you'd have everyone on your back, berating you for your insensitivity. It's the same thing with theists. Respect us, please, we have the right to practice our faith in peace. And if the fundy brigade comes with their wacko wagon and starts telling you that you're going to hell, and trying to shove a bible down your throat, I'll be right next to you, fighting those assholes off.

      • I don't think you're going to hell, as long as you're nice

        Then you are not a Christian. See Matthew 25:41.

        I think gays are perfect just the way God made them

        Then you are not a Christian. See 1 Corinthians 6:9

        You may think you are a Christian, but you are clearly a heretic who preaches that some of your Bible's most clearly laid out laws can be ignored.

          • People talk about Christianity like it's the Nazi party, like it's this horrible machine that people are indoctrinated into.

            I don't mean this to me inflammatory -- I really don't -- but a LOT of Christianity really is like the Nazi party. Not to say they're putting atheists into ovens, but the hatred of atheists in mainstream Christianity is unbelievable. I would guess you live in one of the more enlightened parts of the country.

            I was reading this story [go.com] recently, and it was absolutely shocking. These are mainstream citizens, not some wacko cult. And it really isn't all that unusual. Google for "atheist persecution" sometime.

            Your response will probably be that these aren't "real" Christians, but I maintain you can't separate the two. Polls show that your tolerance is by far in the minority of Christians. Mainstream Christianity has a burning hatred of atheists. I really believe that if a Hitler arose in the United States and called for the rounding up and extermination of atheists, there would be way more support for the policy than you're willing to admit.

            Most atheists are perfectly willing to "live and let live", but the majority of Christians aren't. It's not just annoying proselytizing, it's out and out persecution. I could give you long lists of links of examples, but I have a feeling you're not ready to accept how out of control fundamentalism has gotten in the United States.

            On a personal note, I don't admit to being an atheist in Real Life anymore. It's just not worth the hassle. It's easier just to say I believe in God without any details, and just define God as, "that natural process that created the universe." I'm pretty sure my in-laws would probably be horrified, though I doubt they would out-and-out disown the family.

  • Drs. Who, Watt and Hu [0uttake] (Score:4, Funny)

    by atrocious cowpat (850512) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:39AM (#22997312)
    Dr. Who: Where's Dr Watt? And I also need Dr. Hu right here real soon!
    Dr. Watt: I'm here, and I can see Dr. Hu coming over there.
    Dr. Hu: Whew, I really had to run fast! Hi, Dr. Watt, glad to see you. What's up, Dr. Who?
    Dr. Who: I'll tell you in a minute, but first let me say how glad I am that this did not disintintegrate into some sophomoric cavalcade of misuderstood names.
    Dr. Hu and Dr Watt: Say no more, we've all been there...

  • What's the plot? (Score:4, Funny)

    by seanellis (302682) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:39AM (#22997318) Homepage Journal
    Doctor: I will defeat you Credulons!
    Credulon leader: I have faith we will prevail!
    Doctor: (smugly) Meet my secret weapon - the Professor.
    Dawkins: Hello.
    Credulons: No! The skepticism! I'm melting!
    Dawkins: That was simple. Now, how does this TARDIS thing work, exactly?
    Doctor: No! The skepticism! I'm melting!
    Dawkins: Oops. Time for a new title.

    Close Credits, including "Next Week on Professor Who..."

  • H2G2 (Score:5, Funny)

    by FrostedWheat (172733) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:42AM (#22997342)

    Dawkins is the author of many best-selling non-fiction books, from The Selfish Gene and The Blind Watchmaker to The God Delusion,...

    ... and Who is this God Person Anyway?

    • But he's only famous/infamous for his atheism, and he knows it. He certainly wouldn't be invited to be on "Dr. Who" if he wasn't an Atheist.
      There are plenty of atheists who aren't famous. I'm one of them. Dawkins isn't famous for his atheism, he's famous for being a vocal advocate of his atheism and doing it rather well. It's a subtle distinction, but an important one.

      Ironically, atheism may have work out financially for him, but he sends the wrong evolutionary message by promoting it for society. Theists do better in society, so that's what he should remind people of, "survival of the fittest". Dawkins should promote theism, as those who embrace God are the fittest to survive in our society, due to social stigmatism on atheists..
      And this, of course, is silly. Don't confuse Social Darwinism with Biological Darwinism. The rest isn't even worth a response.
        • All the same, it's not accurate to say that Social Darwinism is an abuse of the theory.

          It absolutely definitely is.

          It is well known that many species of evolved to form communities of co-operatively behaving individuals. That made their whole communities, or entire species more likely to survive while they competed with other communities and species (remember, in evolution it doesn't matter which individuals, or all of them, survive and produce offspring -- what matters is which genes do they mostly pass to the next generation), and both humans and insects are examples of this very mechanism.

          With insects' colonies it's obvious because colonies are composed mostly of clones -- worker bee can never produce an offspring by herself, but a queen (who has the same genes as workers) can if worker bees are successful in supporting the hive, so successful worker bee promotes passing her genes by supporting the survival of queen and offspring, competing with other hives or other species of insects.

          With humans the collective nature of all activities involved in survival (hunting, agriculture, building of shelters, development of technology, medicine), and combination of long lifetime and a tradition of having stable families, places a hostile, aggressive individual that is ready to rip throats from everyone he meets including other humans, at a huge disadvantage compared to the rest of society, so humans ended up much less naturally aggressive than most of animals -- even less than animals that perform some activities collectively (hunting, migration) but remain highly competitive against each other within the same species.

          Therefore a society that emphasizes co-operation between humans is actually a result of evolution, and "Social Darwinism" goes against the mechanism that humans developed over their evolution -- it promotes development of society that is hurting its own survival by wasting resources and shutting out individuals depriving others from use of their abilities in collective activities.
    • Agree with the message above, priest/xaman/rabi is the only job where your boss doesn't exist.

    • But he's only famous/infamous for his atheism
      He has published a set of highly readable books on evolution [google.co.uk] over many years.

      He certainly wouldn't be invited to be on "Dr. Who" if he wasn't an Atheist.
      Where is your evidence for this statement ? I find it sad that those of religious pursuasion are prepared to make definitive statements without the facts to back them up.

      Theists do better in society,
      Again: evidence ?

    • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Zombie Ryushu (803103) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:10AM (#22997176)
      Part of the idea is such that, most of the mono-theists think God is really all about them. God is so they can justify what they want. It justifies the suppression of the rights of minorities, It justifies the abuse of women, and children.

      Its a little bit selfish to think that you matter so much to the creator of the universe, if there is such a thing, that he cares about small pointless things, that Humanity and its Earth somehow hold some special place in the cosmos. If there is a "First one." does it not stand to reason that we really wouldn't matter?

      For example. Christians argue against abortion. but that has nothing to do with God really. It has everything to do with Muslims not outnumbering Christians because of population control.

      Its even more self centered to think that a creator of the Universe would want to entertain or torment us until the end of time. Thats completely and utterly pointless.

      You see where I'm going with this? its a Huge huge universe. Human beings are small, insignificant. The creator of the universe if he exists wouldn't blink twice at what Humans care about.

      Theists are not more socially adapted to survival. Quite the opposite. The rational survive in an emergency. The religious panic and pray, and as a result die. As a result of religion, we have county school boards embroiled over "intelligent design." We have propoganda that claims that Evolution is completely random. We have politicians telling students that condoms don't work (They can break/tear but thats different.)and as a result STDs are rampant. Religion is a mad house that delights in psychotic behavior of all kinds. Its a cauldron and opiate.

    • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:5, Insightful)

      by xPsi (851544) * on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:19AM (#22997222)

      Theists do better in society, so that's what he should remind people of, "survival of the fittest". Dawkins should promote theism, as those who embrace God are the fittest to survive in our society, due to social stigmatism on atheists.
      You are using the classic "religion is useful" argument. But just because it may be useful, doesn't mean it is true. What Dawkins is interested (as he has stated repeatedly) in is truth, not potentially locally convenient psychology. Also, categorizing atheists as you are is nonsense. We are all atheists with respect to specific theologies and gods we don't believe in. You know that feeling you get when people start talking to you in all earnestness about how great Poseidon is? That's how Dawkins feels about your god. Finally, using evolution and "survival of the fittest" in the way you are is an antiquated tautology. "Fittest" in an evolutionary sense is defined as those who survive and reproduce. Atheists seem to be doing fine in that regard and always have (much of China, for example, is atheistic by some Abrahamic standard and is, in fact, also mostly nontheistic too). Finally, I'm sure the fact that he's married to one of the most famous and popular Dr. Who characters of all time might have something to do with why he's appearing on the show (see the first post).

      But he's only famous/infamous for his atheism, and he knows it.
      I"m guessing his multiple bestsellers (many of which have nothing to do with religion) and being the inventor of the term "meme" AND his position as Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford might have something more to do with his fame. By the way, he also happens to be a non-astrologer too.
    • "But he's only famous/infamous for his atheism"

      Yeah right, and Hawkings is only famous for his wheelchair.

      "Theists do better in society"

      Which society? - India for instance has at least twice as many polytheists as the entire population of the US.
      • Even Dawkins admits that, strictly speaking, he's an agnostic. He doesn't know that God doesn't exist. But there's any number of things that could just as easily apply to. No one says they're an agnostic with respect to unicorns. They just say "Unicorns aren't real." Only when it comes to this "God" concept, does everyone become such a pedant. If we applied the same standards to God that we did to unicorns, no one would take Dawkins to task for saying he's an atheist. He explains this all in "God Delusion." I suggest you read it.

        • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:4, Interesting)

          by Brian Gordon (987471) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:04AM (#22997136)
          That's because it's only an important distinction when talking about God. Because some people really do believe that it's impossible for a god to exist and they operate under that assumption. Some people (like Dawkins) don't accept that and call themselves agnostic, but it's just intellectual and they're really atheists.. their world would be shattered completely if they learned that they were wrong. Agnosticism isn't just some technicality, it's a completely different way of thinking.

          By the way I'm not promoting agnosticism; I think that you have to make a leap of faith [wikipedia.org] somewhere, and on this issue the options seem to me theism and strong atheism.

          • Nonsense. (Score:5, Informative)

            by warrax_666 (144623) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:22AM (#22997244)

            their world would be shattered completely if they learned that they were wrong.

            "Learned" implies evidence, and if there were any evidence they would simply change their stance to the appropriate form of theism. That's the rational way to go about things. To date there has not been any single piece of credible evidence for the existence of God(s).

            Like the other poster said: Please just read The God Delusion, it explains all of this.

              • Re: Nonsense. (Score:5, Insightful)

                by Black Parrot (19622) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @02:55AM (#22997692)

                Like the other poster said: Please just read The God Delusion, it explains all of this.
                Read it. IMHO, Dawkins being belligerent and quoting other people doesn't make a very convincing set of arguments.
                Funny, but people seem to find it plenty convincing when theists do that.

              • Re:Nonsense. (Score:5, Insightful)

                by CmdrGravy (645153) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @04:20AM (#22998012) Homepage
                Which is ironic since the only argument anyone can put forward for a specific sort of god consists entirely of quoting other people and no, it's not very convicing at all.

          • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Plutonite (999141) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @02:02AM (#22997432)
            There is no distinction at all between any fictional beings, except perhaps that deities happen to be less likely to exist than unicorns. With the unicorn, the FSM, or the yet unseen sub-atomic particle you only need to admit (as a skeptic) that you cannot prove or say much about it, since no evidence for the positivity of it's existence has been shown.*

            With gods and such, particularly the monotheist version,you just have to sit back and ponder on the entire scheme of the religion at hand to see how bizarre the underlying philosophy is. People think it's the tenets of faith/the law that makes religion un-likable, but that's not really it. I would be willing to accept any of that, but it is the "god" bit itself that is disgusting. Thousands of religions, each thinking they are "right", the others are wrong, their god is the Truth, all of them required of "believe" that. All of them expected to live and die by those respective "beliefs", those "leaps of faith" that become a microcosm of existence for each, sending them to the limits of insane behavior. And all of them not recognizing that it is their respective god that is responsible for this sick scenario, assuming we forget everything we know about physics and the dynamics of the world. Islam, the most philosophically advanced theology of the monotheist faiths(abstract god, non-deification of humans including prophets..etc), had its second Caliph arrest and kill anyone who talked about destiny/determinism debate. He had good reason to do so. The only gods that are not six-year-old in mentality happen to be the ones that do not "want" you to do things.... they sidestep the philosophical debate entirely. And by doing so, they warrant no attention from us as well - i.e the only sensible gods do not matter. It's a catch .22 that religion cannot win.

            Religion is a simplistic, silly idea that has no place in the free world of today. We have strong instincts for it, sadly, but I hope one day we no longer need them to emotionally survive. The world is beautiful without deities. Let's grow up and forget about them.

            * This is in contrast to mathematical logic, where you can indeed make statements about provability, both negative (there does not exist...) and positive(there exists...).
          • Hey if God was proven to be real one day, I think every major religion would be shattered, not just Atheists.

            All those religions. Not all of them can be right.
            By proving that God exists you destroy hundreds of faiths overnight.

          • It's not an important distinction because the set of all possible Gods is infinite, but Theists rarely believe that any kind of a God exists, they believe in their specific flavour. Jehovah, Allah, Zeus, Osiris, Freya, Thor, Ahulane ... there's no specific evidence to support the existence of any of them.

            Likewise when you look in detail at the behaviour of the universe and physics, there's no need for a God of any kind to keep it all running. Whether there was a need for a God to start it all 13.7 billion years ago is irrelevant today.

            For all his putative omnipresence, God is as elusive as the Unicorn. There's no more reason to believe in any God than there is to believe in Unicorns.

          • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Black Parrot (19622) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @02:17AM (#22997502)

            By the way I'm not promoting agnosticism; I think that you have to make a leap of faith somewhere, and on this issue the options seem to me theism and strong atheism.
            How about ordinary atheism, as in "I merely reject one more unevidenced god than you do"?

            IMO, that's the *only* viable option. On one extreme, no one can prove that no gods exist. On the other, if you lower your standards of evidence to accept one religious claim, you have to accept them all (or else be hypocritical about it). So the only options are ordinary atheism (as in "I don't believe anyones religious myths") and self-delusion.

            FWIW, 'agnostic' seems to have come into use due to a shift in the popular meaning of 'atheist'. Acording to Wictionary, the term didn't even exist before 1870. If people would try to quit reading more into a-theism than the word actually suggests, we wouldn't need a term for the neutral category.

            But in excessively religious societies like ours, people tend to interpret atheism as yet another competing claim, rather than merely a rejection of other people's claims. For me, atheism isn't a religious belief; it's a *lack* of religious beliefs. I suppose you could call it "a belief", but only in the same sense that my lack of any particular reason to believe in Bigfoot is "a belief" about Bigfoot.

      • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:5, Insightful)

        by mcsporran (832624) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:06AM (#22997146)
        In the God Delusion, Dawkins is quite clear, I believe he titles the chapter "Why there is almost certainly no God".
        Most atheists are aware that you can't prove the absence of God, anymore than you can prove his presence.
        So most atheists could be called agnostics, but we are as agnostic about the Christian Yahweh, as we are about Thor or Shiva.

        So yes we are technically agnostics, but that may confuse us with those who actually give some credibility to these superstitions.
        Almost all atheists, are saying "There is no (credible reason to believe there is a) God"

        Remember, Atheism is "Free of Theism", not "God does not exist"

      • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:4, Insightful)

        by glwtta (532858) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:07AM (#22997154) Homepage
        They mock theists for their faith, but there's certainly no way to prove that there's not a god, so aren't they also believing in something independent of scientific proof?

        What a novel and exciting argument, no one's thought of that before!

        Theism and agnosticism are orthogonal (as the kids say) concepts. Most atheists are agnostic, most theists are gnostic (not to be confused with Gnostic). There are some gnostic atheists out there, but not many - like you say, it's a hard position to end up in.

      • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:5, Insightful)

        by orzetto (545509) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:10AM (#22997172)

        [...] there's certainly no way to prove that there's not a god, so aren't they also believing in something independent of scientific proof?

        There is also no way to disprove that the universe was created by a tea pot orbiting Venus. There is no readily available tool to scientifically disprove that.

        We atheists simply think that it is plain silly to believe in the tea pot because some ancient scrolls written by some guru says so. Now, if someone were to find the tea pot, or any trace of it, it would be interesting.

      • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:4, Informative)

        by Black Parrot (19622) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:20AM (#22997232)

        I never really understood atheism anyway. They mock theists for their faith
        Yeah, and here's what happens [chicagotribune.com] when a calm and reasonable theist tries to engage a drool-spewing atheist in a reasonable discussion.

        there's certainly no way to prove that there's not a god, so aren't they also believing in something independent of scientific proof?
        Actually, they are *not* believing in something that lacks any supporting evidence.

        By your reasoning, we should believe every religious claim that has ever been made.

        IMO agnosticism is the only tenable position for the non-theist.
        Everyone is an agnostic, including you.

        As for "non-theist", that's exactly what a-theism means. (The Greek alpha privative [wikipedia.org] is in fact cognate with our "non".)

      • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:5, Informative)

        by demi (17616) * on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:54AM (#22997398) Homepage Journal

        I never really understood atheism anyway.

        Usually "agnosticism" means someone who actively believes you cannot know whether God exists or not. Atheism comes in two flavors: strong and weak.

        "Strong" and "weak" refer to the comprehensiveness of the propositions encompassed, not to the degree of conviction or its vigor. A weak atheist position is that of a person who is without a belief in God. They don't "actively disbelieve" in God any more than you "actively disbelieve" in the brown chicken in my attic. There is no reason to think such a chicken (or God) exists--you simply lack belief in it, without "denying" the chicken. Or God.

        A strong atheist position is the position that no God exists, supported by proof, evidence or belief. Whether this is the sort of thing that can be proved is perhaps open to debate--reasonable people disagree on whether it is a religious belief or not.

        In my view, it's pretty slam dunk to see that any time a religious belief has resulted in something testable that could be offered as proof or disproof of God's existence, we have found that that sort of God doesn't exist. I don't know how many times you need to be told by someone that there is a chicken behind this door, no really, only to find when you open it that there is no chicken, before you suspect that there probably aren't any chickens here at all.

      • No proof does not mean 50:50 probability. (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Epeeist (2682) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @02:01AM (#22997418) Homepage
        I think you would find that most atheists would accept that you can't prove that personal gods do not exist.

        But that doesn't mean the odds are the same as a coin toss. If we take Christianity for example, each time we find an inconsistency in the Bible (no walls around Jericho, no reports of anyone outside the middle east reporting a global flood, no town of Nazareth at the time Jesus was supposed to be alive, no reports of graves opening and the dead walking in anything but the gospels) then it lowers the probability of a biblical god.

        And people of faith take a much more extreme attitude than most atheists. They insist that the probability of their god existing is 100% exactly, while the probability of anyone else's god existing is 0% exactly.

        They need to realise that if you can't disprove that Yahweh exists then you can't disprove that Zeus, Odin or Atum (at least he had fun creating the world) exist either.

      • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Alsee (515537) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @02:03AM (#22997434) Homepage
        I never really understood atheism anyway. They mock theists for their faith, but there's certainly no way to prove that there's not a god

        July, 1998
        A juror in Judge Esmond Faulks' court in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, eagerly asked the judge for the defendant's date of birth so he could draw up a star chart to help him decide the case. He was removed.

        There ya go. Presuming that you agree it was *appropriate* to forcibly eject that juror, presuming you consider that juror mockable and perhaps even a dangerous loony-toon, now you completely understand atheism.

        To elaborate, probably half the other people on the jury read their horoscopes during lunch. Silly, irrational, but Mostly Harmless entertainment value so long as they don't take it seriously and start fucking over other people based upon their faith in magical messages from the sky.

        -

      • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:5, Insightful)

        by mgblst (80109) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @05:03AM (#22998216) Homepage
        We are all atheists, unless you hapeen to believe in all the 1000s of gods out there. You may just be a theist in one god, and atheist about the rest.

        If this seems like a reasonable way to be, then you are delusional.

      • Re:Dawkins may may a renowned evolutionary biologi (Score:5, Insightful)

        by warrax_666 (144623) on Tuesday April 08 2008, @01:38AM (#22997306)

        Do you know about man who was not made an EU commissioner because he was a Catholic?

        That's disingenuous: He was rejected because he stated that he would be compelled to force his religiously based views on others -- it had nothing to do with him being Catholic.

        I do think Dawkins does do one thing that is harmful: he attacks theism without understanding it.

        This is a fallacy. You positively do not have to be understand very much about Norse mythology to realize that's it's a silly belief system. The same applies to other gods.

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