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In Reply to: Re: "through" a verb? (confused...) posted by Farmer on February 01, 2008 at 02:06:47:
Regarding Dawkins, I don't need to defend him as he ably answers all his critics arguments, including yours, although I get the sense that you haven't actually read his works as many of his critics haven't. Otherwise you wouldn't make claims such as "may be he would reach the end of being able to explain things and stop being that cocky". As far as I've read, he has never claimed to be able to explain all things. He is a scientist, after all, and science does not claim that it can explain all things, yet. As far as I know, he has not claimed that biology can explain with certainty (though scientists can hypothesize) the origin of life or the first cause (neither can religion, for that matter). It seems you are merely setting up a straw man in a vain attempt to discredit him. And you've taken it a step further by seeming to discredit or belittle biology, which is far more complicated and wonderful than you make it out to be. Certainly more wonderful than the Bible's simplistic explanation of life. Personally, I find the answers provided by the scientific method to be ultimately more satisfying than anything religion can offer.
What I get a kick out of though, is when his critics complain that he is too "noisey" or "cocky" to use your words. It seems to me that those adjectives could be used to describe many religionists who are so cocksure they know the truth about the universe that they go about noisily spreading their certainty, and damaging lives in the process.
For millenia, religionists of all stripes have had almost complete control over people's lives, with horrific consequences to countless individuals. Even after the Enlightenment, scientists, agnostics and atheists had to go about quietly espousing reason over faith (see ch 18 - The Resistance of the Rational, in God Is Not Great).
Today, it isn't much better, as recent studies from the U.S. show how much atheists are detested by the over 80% of Americans who are believers. So now that a few outspoken atheists write some books and speak out publicly, they are denounced for the same outspokenness that their critics have always engaged in.
By the way, regarding photography, glad you liked my photos. I'm a complete amateur. I've never read anything on photography including the manual to my camera :-), so I imagine I could probably do better if I read up on the basics like lighting, etc. I just take my camera everywhere, keep my ears and eyes open and then try to frame the best shot I can. My failures are far more than my successes, but that's the beauty of digital. I can experiment taking as many photos as I want without any extra cost. I've posted some new photos of more birds in the last few days, and have started a section for flowers and other plant life.
