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WillowOne's Positions

The God Delusion

Overview

Dawkins' case that God almost certainly does not exist, that belief in him is a delusion in the ordinary sense, and that religion does more harm than good. He treats the existence of God as a scientific hypothesis, works through the classical arguments and finds them empty, and offers the "ultimate Boeing 747" argument that any designer complex enough to design a universe would be more improbable than the universe. Later chapters explain religion as a by-product of useful mental habits, argue that morality neither comes from nor needs scripture, and object to the labelling of children by their parents' religion.

Notes

The book that put atheism back on the bestseller lists, and the one most people have in mind when they talk about "new atheism". Its philosophy is thinner than its biology, and the 747 argument has been fairly criticised, but the central move, treating "God exists" as a claim about the world that needs evidence like any other, is the right one and is the one I make under God. The chapter on childhood and the labelling of children is the part I would most want a religious reader to engage with.

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