Comments by hallsp

Comment #172120 by hallsp on April 29, 2008 at 8:48 am

This is a nice alternative to many of the other characterisations of Richard but it's still lacking.
Many of the points are well made but gloss over the details. Of course, you can reconcile the apparently differing perspectives. Richard never claimed religion was the only source of terror, just a very good one. Religion may indeed inspire ethical behaviour but because it borrows ethical and moral tennets from existing human experience and finally, religion played no part in the genesis of the scientific method, religious people may have but they were only religious because frankly there was no alternative.

2. Happy Birthday, Richard Dawkins!

Comment #150181 by hallsp on March 26, 2008 at 2:30 pm

Happy Birthday Richard!! Interesting fact numero 1) James Hutton died on this day 211 years ago and 2) 13 famous scientists were also born on this day (according to Wikipedia). Thanks for everything you've done. It is MUCH appreciated right across the world. Have a good year!

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Quotes of Note:

"During many ages there were witches. The Bible said so. The Bible commanded that they should not be allowed to live. Therefore the Church, after doing its duty in but a lazy and indolent way for 800 years, gathered up its halters, thumbscrews, and firebrands, and set about its holy work in earnest. She worked hard at it night and day during nine centuries and imprisoned, tortured, hanged, and burned whole hordes and armies of witches, and washed the Christian world clean with their foul blood. Then it was discovered that there was no such thing as witches, and never had been. One does not know whether to laugh or to cry."

Mark Twain

"The kindly God who lovingly fashioned each and every one of us and sprinkled the sky with shining stars for our delight -- that God is, like Santa Claus, a myth of childhood, not anything [that] a sane, undeluded adult could literally believe in. That God must either be turned into a symbol for something less concrete or abandoned altogether."

Daniel Dennett

"The patient typically finds himself impelled by some deep, inner conviction that something is true, or right, or virtuous: a conviction that doesn't seem to owe anything to evidence or reason, but which, nevertheless, he feels as totally compelling and convincing. We doctors refer to such a belief as 'faith'."

Richard Dawkins

"Beliefs are what divide people. Doubt unites them."

Peter Ustinov

"The universe is a strange and wondrous place. The truth is quite odd enough to need no help from pseudoscientific charlatans."

Richard Dawkins

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