Darwin's Rottweiler
Nov. 26th, 2023 02:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
qatsiBook Review: The God Delusion, by Richard Dawkins
The latest round of insanity in the Middle East prompted me to take this off the shelf; Dawkins himself refers uncomfortably to his Channel Four documentary Root of All Evil (apparently he didn't like the title, specifically the word "all") to which this book is approximately contemporaneous. In my day-to-day life, religion is an irrelevance, and it sometimes puzzles me why people get so worked up about it. I don't need convincing on this subject, so I was curious to see whether there was any moderation in the tone of the book.
Dawkins begins by muddying the waters, at least for a lay reader, by referring to Einsteinian "religion". This seems an odd approach, although it's perhaps explained by his later distinguishing of deism (the notion of some impersonal and disinterested Creator, essentially firing off a clockwork universe) from theism (a rather more active and interventionist Creator). He barely touches the speculative idea that our universe might be someone else's simulation, whilst at the same time insisting that religion is not and cannot be beyond scientific investigation.
There is some interesting material in the book, covering how religion might come about in evolutionary terms, why we can be "good" without religion, and how much of religious texts might actually be considered "good". But there is also the evangelical aspect. Dawkins insists that religion should not be placed in some special category, beyond criticism, which is fair enough; but he compares his writing to that of a bad theatre or restaurant review. This is a wobbly comparison, because he doesn't offer any reflection on how the theatre or the restaurant might react (presumably they wouldn't just meekly accept the criticism, although it might influence their future behaviour positively). Dawkins cites any number of ugly examples of culture war issues from the US (this is written around 2006) and whilst I don't see quite the same angle in the UK, some of that unpleasantness has found its way over here in the intervening years and, even if taken only allegorically, it shows the dangers of giving any ground contrary to evidence and reasoning on such issues.
There are one or two references to Lalla Ward, Dawkins' wife at the time the book was written. I particularly enjoyed the pithy footnote attributed to her, about deathbed conversions to religion:
The latest round of insanity in the Middle East prompted me to take this off the shelf; Dawkins himself refers uncomfortably to his Channel Four documentary Root of All Evil (apparently he didn't like the title, specifically the word "all") to which this book is approximately contemporaneous. In my day-to-day life, religion is an irrelevance, and it sometimes puzzles me why people get so worked up about it. I don't need convincing on this subject, so I was curious to see whether there was any moderation in the tone of the book.
Dawkins begins by muddying the waters, at least for a lay reader, by referring to Einsteinian "religion". This seems an odd approach, although it's perhaps explained by his later distinguishing of deism (the notion of some impersonal and disinterested Creator, essentially firing off a clockwork universe) from theism (a rather more active and interventionist Creator). He barely touches the speculative idea that our universe might be someone else's simulation, whilst at the same time insisting that religion is not and cannot be beyond scientific investigation.
There is some interesting material in the book, covering how religion might come about in evolutionary terms, why we can be "good" without religion, and how much of religious texts might actually be considered "good". But there is also the evangelical aspect. Dawkins insists that religion should not be placed in some special category, beyond criticism, which is fair enough; but he compares his writing to that of a bad theatre or restaurant review. This is a wobbly comparison, because he doesn't offer any reflection on how the theatre or the restaurant might react (presumably they wouldn't just meekly accept the criticism, although it might influence their future behaviour positively). Dawkins cites any number of ugly examples of culture war issues from the US (this is written around 2006) and whilst I don't see quite the same angle in the UK, some of that unpleasantness has found its way over here in the intervening years and, even if taken only allegorically, it shows the dangers of giving any ground contrary to evidence and reasoning on such issues.
There are one or two references to Lalla Ward, Dawkins' wife at the time the book was written. I particularly enjoyed the pithy footnote attributed to her, about deathbed conversions to religion:
Why mess around with deathbeds? If you're going to sell out, do it in good time to win the Templeton Prize and blame it on senility.