I think I understand now...

How is Dawkins unreasonable? I've never seen him lose his cool, but if he did, I can't blame him for getting frustrated at people who continue to deny evidence when it is presented directly to them.
 
Sort of what I was going to say. Dawkins may be a bit too militant, but at least his logic and philosophy is sound.
 
Dawkins, like most mediocre debaters, argues against a patently absurd straw man because it's easier to do that, and dismisses anybody who doesn't conform to this straw man as a wuss or fence-sitter who wants to have it both ways. He's nothing special one way or the other.
 
In regards to Dawkins, to me there is no difference between him and the Jehovah's Witnesses or Mormons that come to my house trying to convert me.

If I want to choose a religion, I'll do my own research so I'll thank you to leave me the heck alone. Dawkins goes out of his way to try and convert people to Atheism and he does so in a very antagonistic and agressive manner. He does not strike me as the kind of person that is content to "agree to disagree" with someone who does not see things his way.

Just my observations.
 
This thread is sort of a reminder about how religious people can dish it out but they can't take it. I mean that the aforementioned extreme groups like to bully people and scream bloody murder when sane and rational people start to push back.
 
Whiskey_Lord said:
How is Dawkins unreasonable? I've never seen him lose his cool, but if he did, I can't blame him for getting frustrated at people who continue to deny evidence when it is presented directly to them.
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NovaKart said:
Who the hell is Dawkins? Is he like a new Madeline Murray?
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Dawkins is a jackass who loves to beat the crap out of strawmans
 
On Dawkins:

First off, Dawkins is a ridiculously awesome writer of evolutionary biology. I intensely recommend his The Selfish Gene, The Ancestor's Tale, and to a lesser extent The Extended Phenotype.

I'm not too familiar with Dawkins' views of religion, most of what I know oh his views are from a few things on the internet and a lecture he gave at a local university (HE SIGNED MY BOOKS :smug:).

I think a general problem that might explain some of the insistence that Dawkins uses strawmen is that religious views are so varied, that any atheist arguing on the subject is going to be arguing against views that aren't that of a given religious observer. In these sorts of things, who and what exactly you are arguing against is pretty tricky, and misunderstandings are going to happen.
 
NickyJ said:
I must disagree. Christianity doesn't call for suicide bombers. It also doesn't call for nonbelievers' heads to be cut off. 'Nuff said.
Click to expand...

Neither does Islam about suicide bombers. And as regards killing infidels have you read any of the Old Testament, or looked at the long history of Christian violence against non-Christians. Christianity historically has treated other faiths a lot worse than Islam, and just because it's currently better (for a short while only too), doesn't give it any moral superiority.

Oh and lay off Aimee, while she is not exactly Albert Einstein, she does show a capacity to learn and grow that far surpasses 95% of this forum (myself included) and if all you can say in rebuttal to her arguements is to lambast her grammar then your arguements hold no water.
 
@Domination: I looked it up and it is satire. Satire that these people put way too much time into. I do appreciate the thought and research you put into it though! There probably are some people that actually believe some of that stuff out there (pizzaguy's 20% rule). Don't worry I'm not going to stop being a Christian just because of that! There's crazy fanatics in every religion. Plus I believe that if you're truly a Christian you can't be "unsaved" and I think you believe that too from what I've gathered.
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Pizzaguy's 20% rule doesn't apply here. These guys (Were they serious, which they aren't), would be far outside the bottom 20%. More like the bottom 0.0001%.

You are correct however, its satire. They fooled me though...
 
Brian Shanahan said:
Oh and lay off Aimee, while she is not exactly Albert Einstein, she does show a capacity to learn and grow that far surpasses 95% of this forum (myself included) and if all you can say in rebuttal to her arguements is to lambast her grammar then your arguements hold no water.
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Oh wow. That's fancy :eek:
 
Puck Nutty said:
Unfortunately, there are individuals on both sides of the issue that make reasonable conversation impossible. However we can take solace in the fact that the Ann Coulters and Richard Dawkins' of the world are hugely outnumbered by reasonable people who are happy to agree to disagree.
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Comparing Dawkins to Coulter suggests to me that you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about. Please enlighten us with a argument made by Dawkins, in context, that you find to be unreasonable and why.

Puck Nutty said:
In regards to Dawkins, to me there is no difference between him and the Jehovah's Witnesses or Mormons that come to my house trying to convert me.
Click to expand...
Publishing books and public speaking bears no resemblance to door to door proselytizing. This argument fails.
If I want to choose a religion, I'll do my own research so I'll thank you to leave me the heck alone. Dawkins goes out of his way to try and convert people to Atheism and he does so in a very antagonistic and agressive manner. He does not strike me as the kind of person that is content to "agree to disagree" with someone who does not see things his way.
Click to expand...
Richard Dawkins has written ONE book on the subject of religion, and speaks at events that one must actively attend, usually requiring the purchase of tickets, to hear him speak. He also offers his opinion freely when it is solicited from him by news organizations. Please explain how it is at all reasonable to say that he "goes out of his way to convert people to Atheism". As far as I can tell he has never once attempted to make someone hear his opinion against their will.

civ_king said:
Dawkins is a jackass who loves to beat the crap out of strawmans
Click to expand...
Please provide an example, in context.
 
Huayna Capac357 said:
I don't want to make this a discussion about Islam, but Islam is more ambiguous than violent religion/peaceful religion. Sometimes, the Qu'ran says stuff like "there shall be no compulsion of religion" and sometimes it does say violent stuff. But so does the Bible. If you put Leviticus and the Gospels side by side, you'd never think they were the same religion. You can't just divide the world into completely black and completely white, and that's fundamentalism's flaw.
Click to expand...

I tend to think of most Fundamentalists, be they Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Old Norse Neopagan or whatever; is simply hijacking* the belief to suit their own agenda. Both the Westboro Baptist Church and al-Qaeda fit this bill as far as I am concerned.**


*Pardon the word :cringe:
** I am by no means an Expert

Oh crap, now we're talking about Dawkins. I wonder if he got rejected by a seminary when he was young and has it in for religion ever since?
 
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