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Text Birthday Messages: Group A

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1. : Happy Birthday

Dear Mr. Dawkins, I discovered your book,THE SELFISH GENE, many years ago when I was an obscure housewife in Kansas. My husband was what was then known as a country doctor but he was discovered and brought to Washington D.C. and now, I am an obscure widow in a Viginia suburb. When I first red your book it was an epiphany for me and i gave copies to a dozen friends and relatives. It changed our lives for the better and I am grateful to you.
I also appreciate your your intelectual and moral courage and I'm holding very good thoughts for your Very Happy Birthday !
Ann Reed

2. Angelia Stinnett: Happy Birthday from Jackson, TN

Happy birthday you sexy, sexy man! You are my 'god'. I would whistle but I don't know how to spell it...whhiiit....whrrril. Something like that. How about hubba, hubba. Yeah, that will do it.

My birthday is in March too. It's tomorrow, the 13th! I will be 17...no 27....OK, dammit, 37. I am having a huge Atheist birthday party with my group called the Community for the Advancement of Science and Reason. We are located in Jackson, TN. Yep, the bible belt. We have started a newsletter that goes to the printers today that will stir up some shit, 'cause I am like you and like to stir the shit. We are taking the Republican Fundies on, in their home court!

If you are in the South again soon, please stop by and see us! We'll show you some real Southern hospitality.

Look out here come Tennessee Tiger!(name coined by Eddie Tabash)


Happy Birthday Big Daddy!


Angelia Stinnett








3. Catriona Stewart: Happy Birthday from Cheshire

Happy Birthday and thank you from an art graduate and utter failure at grammar school science. One holiday on Cornwall, having forgotten to take the book I was reading, I picked up Climbing Mount Improbable, not expecting to like it but the cover was good (I was a graphic designer at the time). It provided the same spine-tingling awe and wonder that the Sistine Chapel ceiling and Bach B minor mass can achieve. I have since read many books on evolutionary biology, from yours to Jay Gould and Maynard Smith. Without your books though I doubt I'd have understood or enjoyed others. Like all great teachers you can inspire a student devoid of any natural aptitude for a subject love it, understand it and determine to know and learn more. Now as a headteacher of a state primary school we have Darwin, Dinosaurs and DNA firmly on the curriculum. Children learn that they are one species among many and are finding awe and wonder in Science because their headteacher (who loves bats) was once inspired by your chapter on echo location. You have contributed no end to the curriculum in one primary school.
Visit us at www.kingsmead.cheshire.sch.uk
Cheers.
Catriona Stewart

4. Eric MacDonald: Happy Birthday from Canada

Dear Richard,

I've had your picture hanging in my 'rogue's gallery' for several years, and have admired not only your pluck but your commitment to critical reason. I am a latecomer to the world of evolution - why didn't they teach this when I was young? Not that I ever disbelieved it - I simply wasn't aware, despite high school and university courses in biology, that Darwin stood at the centre not only of modern biology, but of the modern world view. (I have just finished reading Randall Keynes' book "Darwin, His Daughter, and Human Evolution," and am copmpletely enthralled by a view of the world which has scarcely, I am sorry to say, found its way to the level of ordinary people, more than a hundred years since "The Origin of Species" was published!)

I have read several of your books over the last few years, with enormous profit. And they drove me to Darwin, whose theory I believe I finally understand. And, although for many years a priest in the Anglican Church that you left as a youth, I have finally come to the place where I can say with great certainty, 'There is no god.'

This clearly came to you more easily than it came to me. I recall your remarks about a loved chaplain at your school, and I think I may find a hiding place there. But the truth is that religion, as you know, is something deeply embedded in young people, and it was almost indelibly imprinted on my mind at an early age. So it took me a lot longer to come to your conviction that this is the only life that we will ever know.


In recognition of your part in my journey towards unbelief, let me wish you a very happy 66th birthday! I was born in 1941 as well, and you are just a few months older than I!

With sincere greetings for a very Happy Birthday!

Yous sincerely,

Eric MacDonald

5. Jeff Barlow: Happy Birthday from Los Angeles, CA, USA

Hi Richard,
I just finished reading "The God Delusion" a few weeks back, and thank you so much for this beam of rationality. I particularly appreciate your helping me to understand natural selection much better than I have before. And for breaking out the "one time event" that led to the creation of life (and could indeed be highly improbable) from the constant inevitable incremental adapting steps up the back slope of Mt. Improbable that have taken place ever since. I've been an atheist since my parents enrolled me in a church confirmation class and I was forced to think about it. Even so, I am not a biologist, and have struggled with the concept of evolution, and how it could have resulted in the creation of complicated things like eyes. (And incidentally, I think that most of the public have difficulty with this concept, and it would be a great subject of an educational video. I am predisposed to believe in evolution and yet have struggled with this. Imagine those that are predisposed NOT to believe in evolution.) I'm really looking forward to learning more about natural selection, so you can count on at least one more sale of several of your books that apparently address this topic.
I also found the discussion about meme's fascinating… and the discussion of possible evolutionary reasons that favor religious belief. The "survival of the followers" argument (kids who listen to their elders don't get flattened by cars, for example) really rings true. I also really enjoyed your enthusiasm about the joy of understanding the world around us. Your book brought tears to my eyes on several occasions, for reasons I can't fully comprehend. I think it mostly has to do with the joy of seeing the truth stated boldly and unapologetically, when one feels constantly surrounded by such pervasive irrationality. I thank you for that.
Altogether, you've made an enormous contribution to rational thought with this book and your numerous outreach efforts. Life all may be meaningless, but I'm certain you're looking forward to a very enjoyable birthday cake. You deserve it, and happy birthday!
-Jeff Barlow

6. Jim Hurley: Happy Birthday from Tavernier, Florida, USA

Here is the best gift I can give Richard, a copy of our complaint filed in the Southern District of Florida in Federal district court.
Jim Hurley

Click to open PDF

7. John R. Selig: Happy Birthday from Dallas, Texas

Happy Birthday Richard,

Your work and the work of Sam Harris have been such a breath of fresh air and a real motivator for me. I talk openly about my beliefs (or non-beliefs depending upon ones viewpoint).

I am culturally Jewish but now identify as an atheist thanks to your work. As a gay man it is easy to be anti religion as so many condemn us. Reform Jews are positive concerning gay rights. Still, I see religion as the root of so much evil throughout the world and religion to me seems to be nothing more than a socially accepted for of cultism.

I recently has some elective surgery done and charged my husband to be sure to keep any rabbi, minister or priest as far away from me as possible.

Happy birthday and thanks so much for your work. You have made it possible for a previously taboo subject to be talked about it public.

Regards,

John R. Selig
Dallas, TX

8. Josh Timonen: Happy Birthday from Sherman Oaks, CA USA

Happy Birthday Richard! Congratulations on a HUGE year!

9. ken Grubbs: Happy Birthday from Michigan, USA

Richard,

Any effort to pen a birthday greeting to you will fall miserably short of even my own expectation, let alone yours. With that in mind, one should simply wish you all the happiness and leave it at that. However, the opportunity to believe that this is a personal meassage for you, leaves me compelled to continue.
I, like so many others, am incapable of finding the words that adequately address all the thanks that I wish to bestow upon you. What thanks do you give to someone for raising one's consciousness?
I have often pondered with whom I'd like to spend an afternoon, anyone in all of history. The list has changed over the years, but some of the regulars include Newton, Einstein, Feynman, Darwin, etc.
So my birthday offering to you is this, of all the people I would wish to spend the afternoon dringing Bourdeaux, it comes down to two; you, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
Have a wonderful birthday, and thank you for so much that you have done for so many. And be glad Elizabeth wasn't better looking, or the list would be shorter.

Ken Grubbs

10. Kevin Metcalf: Happy Birthday from Texas

I work in federal law enforcement dealing with terrorism as a direct result of the expression of religious belief. Your book offers enlightenment for those who may be "on the fence" regarding religious belief and may offer the support and reasoning they need for change. I am one of only a few openly atheistic law enforcement agents and I am amazed at how our current situation can be ignored and reconciled by cognitive dissonance resolution; religious belief is harmful no matter what label (Christian, Muslim, etc.) you put on it and the secular must start speaking out.

Happy birthday. Keep up the good work.

Kevin Metcalf

11. robert dildine: Happy Birthday

On your Birthday Richard ...
I am thinking of the Christian's Jesus
ascending bodily to the heavens
Accelerating to the speed of light
not yet 2000 years out.
Is he cold, does he have regrets,
is he bored with the view,
Has Mohamed on his winged horse caught up yet,
do the laws of physics bar warp speed,
Is Mary far behind? I wonder
if they headed out the same direction.
I do hope they are traveling together
for the next 13 billion years or more.
--rd

12. Rodney Stevens: Happy Birthday from Portland, OR. USA

Hello Mr. Dawkins,


I attended your book reading in Portland OR but when I came up to get it signed I found I was at a loss for words.

Being raised a Jehovah's Witness for 18 years, I can remember doubting what I was told from an early age. After leaving the "Fold" I also found out how much damage was done to me and how hard it was to get over it!
Your books put into words the emotional distress I have tried to explain to people and the rationale as to why I think and feel as I do today.

Needless to say, They are now reference manuals of logic which I reference almost every day. You are the snowflake that started an avalanche of logic.

Thank You Sir! And Happy Birthday.

May you have many more.


Sincerely,


Rodney Stevens



13. Ron Myers: Happy Birthday from Spokane

Twas a day so grand
When the genes formed their band
With horns and bright stockin's
To put together R. Dawkins!