Richard Dawkins: The God Delusion
Richard Dawkins - The God Delusion, Bantam Press (2 Oct 2006), ISBN:0593055489
The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins is a powerful attack on the religious approach to life. Using his knowledge of Darwinism, and his profound knowledge of metaphysics, Richard Dawkins presents a strong case for the concept of God being nothing but a delusion on a par with Santa Clause and the Easter Bunny.
The book concentrates on debunking the God of Abraham, i.e. the imaginary being at the core of Islamic, Jewish and Christian religion.
Many apologists for religion have suggested that leading scientists, like Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking believe in God. Dawkins quickly points out that these leading figures did not believe in anything like the God of Abraham. They speak of God only as a fictional figure used as a metaphor or simile for the universe. Dawkins recommends that other scientists should be careful in using God in this way, as Christian commentators are quick to paraphrase metaphorical comments and suggest they should be taken as literal truth.
As in previous books, like the Blind Watchmaker and Climbing Mount Improbable, Dawkins is at his best when he is arguing against the Argument from Design. This is an argument due to the 19th century theologian William Paley. He suggested that only a God-like designer could have created things as complicated as plants and animals. Paley's work was well known to Charles Darwin, and Dawkins points out that all the best arguments against the Argument from Design appeared in Darwin's Origin of the Species and subsequent works. But Dawkins updates these arguments for the modern reader.
In The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins provides such a thorough refutation of the Argument from Design that it is difficult to see how any religious person could use it again with a straight face. Certainly if every thinking person buys Dawkins' books, and masters his arguments against the Argument from Design, then this flaccid idea may be consigned permanently to the waste tip of bad intellectual ideas.
There are, of course, many other bad argument for the existence of God (are there any good ones?) For instance, the ontological argument tries to argue that the idea of a perfect being implies that such a being must exist! Dawkins is often accused of being scornful. But, when faced with the intellectual paucity of many religious arguments, can you blame him? The ontological argument was one of a handful favoured by Thomas Aquinas. The others are equally lacking, and Dawkins shoots them all down in quick measure.
Another class of bad arguments, often put forward by religious fundamentalists, are based on Pascal's wager. This suggests that you should believe in God because if he exists, and you did not believe, he would be might angry with you. Dawkins thinks Pascal might have been joking when he put forward this argument. As a leading philosopher and mathematician it is not worthy of his more serious thoughts. There are many arguments against it, if you feel it is worth arguing against. For instance, what happens if you die and it's Jupiter on the throne of heaven? If you worshipped the God of Abraham then Jupiter is likely to be more upset with you than an ordinary atheist--just look what the early Christians did to the temples of Jupiter! Dawkins had many other arguments against Pascal, and I especially liked the slightly tongue-in-cheek reverse Pascal's wager. (Read the book if you want to check this out!)
It is not only theologians who come in for the Dawkins treatment. He is especially critical of cosmologists like Paul Davies who produce woolly arguments that leave some room for God. By doing so, of course, they put themselves in with a chance of winning the Templeton prize, which hands out wads of cash to academics who make a good stab at finding common ground between religion and science This is worth $1000 000 and might tempt those who prefer cars and condominiums to intellectual consistency.
