Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins
Clinton Richard Dawkins FRS FRSLis an English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author. He is an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford, and was the University of Oxford's Professor for Public Understanding of Science from 1995 until 2008...
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth26 March 1941
CityNairobi, Kenya
Richard Dawkins quotes about
belief moments consoling
False beliefs can be every bit as consoling as true ones, right up until the moment of disillusionment.
selfish vanity goal
Human vanity cherishes the absurd notion that our species is the final goal of evolution.
men atheism world
Yes, testosterone-sodden young men too unattractive to get a woman in this world might be desperate enough to go for 72 private virgins in the next.
book loss atheism
I am at a loss to reconcile the expensive and glossy production values of this book with the breathtaking inanity of the content.
atheist doubt pope
I'm sure Obama is an atheist, I'm sure Kennedy was an atheist, but I doubt if Pope Frank is.
mean six doe
I can't be sure God does not exist... On a scale of seven, where one means I know he exists, and seven I know he doesn't, I call myself a six... That doesn't mean I'm absolutely confident, that I absolutely know, because I don't.
mind atheism viruses
To describe religions as mind viruses is sometimes interpreted as contemptuous or even hostile. It is both. I am often asked why I am so hostile to organized religion.
simple thinking complicated-world
I don't think God is an explanation at all. It's simply redescribing the problem. We are trying to understand how we have got a complicated world, and we have an explanation in terms of a slightly simpler world, and we explain that in terms of a slightly simpler world and it all hangs together down to an ultimately simple world. Now, God is not an explanation of that kind. God himself cannot be simple if he has power to do all the things he is supposed to do.
thinking interesting people
If people think God is interesting, the onus is on them to show that there is anything there to talk about. Otherwise they should just shut up about it.
knowing mind atheism
I would, like any other scientist, willingly change my mind if the evidence led me to do so. So I care about what's true, I care about evidence, I care about evidence as the reason for knowing what is true. It is true that I come across rather passionate sometimes and that's because I am passionate about the truth. ... I do get very impatient with humbug, with cant, with fakery, with charlatans.
cousin mean people
People sometimes try to score debating points by saying, Evolution is only a theory. That is correct, but it's important to understand what that means. It is also only a theory that the world goes round the Sun - it's just a theory for which there is an immense amount of evidence. There are many scientific theories that are in doubt. Even within evolution, there is some room for controversy. But that we are cousins of apes and jackals and starfish, let's say, that is a fact in the ordinary sense of the word.
educational years ideas
If it's really true, that the museum at Liberty University has dinosaur fossils which are labelled as being 3000 years old, then that is an educational disgrace. It is debauching the whole idea of a university, and I would strongly encourage any members of Liberty University who may be here... to leave and go to a proper university.
fun long mythology
Myths are fun, as long as you don't confuse them with the truth.
believe people world
There are people in the world who desperately want not to have to believe in Darwinism .