Dawkins - 'The God Delusion'

Can be found here

quote:

---

Paxman (quoting Dawkins): ...'God almost certainly does not exist', you're leaving open the possibility that he does.

​

Dawkins: Of course. Any scientist would leave open that possibility. You can't absolutely disprove the existence of anything...so just as we can't disprove the existence of Thor and Zeus and The Flying Spaghetti Monster, we can't be dogmatic and say it is certain that God doesn't exist...but we can say it is as unlikely as Thor with his hammer.

---

And Dawkins' final word:- "I don't believe we were put here to be comfortable".Edited by Modulous, : changing the url, the new link should take you to the 'D' section of all the featured interviews - Dawkins is right there (currently second behind David Davis)

In the same interview he was asked if there was any purpose in humans. He said that of course there is purpose: to propagate our genes.That is why we were put here, in Dawkins' view...we were put here by our genes as vehicles to aid in those same genes to propagate.

Depends how you define purpose, this is also covered in the interview (its only 9 minutes long, check it out). It is our purpose in that the reason why genemobiles (or bodies) are put together by genes is to propagate the genes. That is the role that 'we' play, that is our purpose. It isn't a purpose in the sense that theists would have it - and Dawkins makes that clear in the interview.In the same vein one might say the termite mound's purpose is to shelter the termites to allow them to survive. One might say that this could hardly be called a 'purpose' but only in a theistic sense.Dawkins approaches the term purpose from a utilitarian perspective, not a spiritual one.Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

He explains the title by both describing what he means by 'God' and what he means by 'delusion'. Converts to any religion from another religion may well tell you the same thing. I know that it happened to me through my religious evolution. This tells us something about how our mind works with regard to our beliefs.

A persistent false belief held in the face of strong contradictory evidence. If a delusion is as defined, then being taught false beliefs and subsequently holding to them in the face of strong contradictory evidence would render one delusional. So it can be cause of delusion, yes. You'd have to read the book yourself to decide if he did it adequately. I can only speculate you would find it inadequate where I find it adequate. Essentially yes. Obviously by leading to humans who can be deluded, natural selection is a causative factor. And by creating an illusion of design, as well as tool making entities that look for utility natural selection has certainly created an environment where delusion would operate.