For the real cowards, the best of Dawkins.

[napoleon_in_rags]

52. Dawkins has made some smart points and I think debate of religion is really important.

I've actually come around a bit to seeing it his way in recent years.

But at the same time, I think he suffers from a a bit of a crystal palace complex: He hangs out at Oxford (right?) with all these smart people, where he comes to the conclusion that its this wrong idea, religion, that lies behind dumb stuff happening in the world. I hang out in a much less elite setting, with all kinds of people spanning the spectrum from mentally disabled to gifted. I know that people with simple minds, have simplistic cosmologies. Simplistic ideas of God (sky man in clouds) or if they are secular, similar ideas will form about leaders, historical figures, etc. People with powerful minds will have sophisticated theologies that don't conflict much with science, or complex world views if secular. But what I unfortunately sometimes hear from the atheist movement is contrasts between 80 IQ theologies with 120 IQ secular world views. However, changing that religious world view doesn't get rid of the 80 IQ.

That said, more and more I think its important to really zoom in to what's really happening in this world, as revealed by science and science alone to find solutions to our problems. To a scientist, no idea must be sacred, everything must be up for question. So the fact that Richard Dawkins is causing people to question sacred ideas, to me means he's actually empowering people for better scientific thought. For that I am grateful.