Freewheeling Andy
3rd September 2007, 16:07
So much has been written about this book, I'm not sure that a new review is really needed. But then a lot of the stuff that's been written about The God Delusion is utterly misplaced.
A brief precis is that Dawkins, renowned UK Darwinist and atheist has written an atheist's handbook. Many people have read it as if he's trying to convert the religious.
But I think that's wrong. The book, as I read it, is more an effort to show that the proofs of god that are usually presented are deeply flawed; that the argument-from-design is, if anything, strong evidence that there isn't a god; that the arguments for religion (even if there is actually no god) are also deeply flawed.
The case is made strongly, and not in the usual slightly bolshy tone that Dawkins has when you hear him in debate on the radio. It's measured and sensible, and gives non-believers the tools they should need to survive the common attacks of the various religions who can't believe there are people who don't believe.
Only in Chapter 9, on the effects of bringing children up in a particular religion, does Dawkins beging to attack the behaviour of the religious. And he's on pretty strong ground, too.
I have a number of criticisms of his arguments - there's way too much of an obsession with Darwinism, I think; both in his suggestions of ways that science can offer the consolations removed by removing religion; and in his arguments for an evolutionary basis for religion - something that is not really necessary.
And occasionally the writing is a little self-aggrandising: there's a lot of talk of various eminent friends.
But this is a great book, and will hopefully begin to open up avenues for those who don't believe to admit that they don't believe. It is astonishing that in the UK we've never had an atheist prime-minister. It's even more astonishing that there is only one member of the 600-odd strong US senate who claims not to believe. The God Delusion is one step of many to making lack-of-belief as acceptable as belief in the eyes of the public.
A word of caution - it's probably not going to be happy reading for the religious, particularly those strongly Christian, where Dawkins has a fun attack on various bits of Old Testament nonsense. But the book isn't really aimed at you. The details of the old Testament stuff are also irrelevent to the broad argument being made - that people pick and choose bits of morality they want from Bible or Koran, and therefore morality even from religious texts is still relative and not absolute.
A brief precis is that Dawkins, renowned UK Darwinist and atheist has written an atheist's handbook. Many people have read it as if he's trying to convert the religious.
But I think that's wrong. The book, as I read it, is more an effort to show that the proofs of god that are usually presented are deeply flawed; that the argument-from-design is, if anything, strong evidence that there isn't a god; that the arguments for religion (even if there is actually no god) are also deeply flawed.
The case is made strongly, and not in the usual slightly bolshy tone that Dawkins has when you hear him in debate on the radio. It's measured and sensible, and gives non-believers the tools they should need to survive the common attacks of the various religions who can't believe there are people who don't believe.
Only in Chapter 9, on the effects of bringing children up in a particular religion, does Dawkins beging to attack the behaviour of the religious. And he's on pretty strong ground, too.
I have a number of criticisms of his arguments - there's way too much of an obsession with Darwinism, I think; both in his suggestions of ways that science can offer the consolations removed by removing religion; and in his arguments for an evolutionary basis for religion - something that is not really necessary.
And occasionally the writing is a little self-aggrandising: there's a lot of talk of various eminent friends.
But this is a great book, and will hopefully begin to open up avenues for those who don't believe to admit that they don't believe. It is astonishing that in the UK we've never had an atheist prime-minister. It's even more astonishing that there is only one member of the 600-odd strong US senate who claims not to believe. The God Delusion is one step of many to making lack-of-belief as acceptable as belief in the eyes of the public.
A word of caution - it's probably not going to be happy reading for the religious, particularly those strongly Christian, where Dawkins has a fun attack on various bits of Old Testament nonsense. But the book isn't really aimed at you. The details of the old Testament stuff are also irrelevent to the broad argument being made - that people pick and choose bits of morality they want from Bible or Koran, and therefore morality even from religious texts is still relative and not absolute.