Something pretty mysterious had to give rise to the origin of the universe. Richard Dawkins More Quotes by Richard Dawkins More Quotes From Richard Dawkins It has become almost a cliché to remark that nobody boasts of ignorance of literature, but it is socially acceptable to boast ignorance of science and proudly claim incompetence in mathematics. Richard Dawkins ignorancescienceknowledge Do you really mean the only reason you try to be good is to gain God's approval and reward? That's not morality, that's just sucking up. Richard Dawkins rewardstryingmean It is raining DNA outside. On the bank of the Oxford canal at the bottom of my garden is a large willow tree, and it is pumping downy seeds into the air. ... spreading DNA whose coded characters spell out specific instructions for building willow trees that will shed a new generation of downy seeds. ... It is raining instructions out there; it's raining programs; it's raining tree-growing, fluff-spreading, algorithms. That is not a metaphor, it is the plain truth. It couldn't be any plainer if it were raining floppy discs. Richard Dawkins gardenraincharacter Next time that somebody tells you something is true, why not say to them: 'What kind of evidence is there for that?' And if they can't give you a good answer, I hope you'll think very carefully before you believe a word they say. Richard Dawkins givingbelievethinking Of course you can have an opinion about Islam without having read Qur'an. You don't have to read Mein Kampf to have an opinion about Nazism. Richard Dawkins nazismmein-kampfislam We who are atheists are also a-fairyists, a-teapotists, and a-unicornists, but we don't have to bother saying so. Richard Dawkins atheismatheistreligion Scientific beliefs are supported by evidence, and they get results. Myths and faiths are not and do not. Richard Dawkins resultsatheistbelief If children understand that beliefs should be substantiated with evidence, as opposed to tradition, authority, revelation or faith, they will automatically work out for themselves that they are atheists. Richard Dawkins work-outatheistchildren People sometimes say that you must believe in feelings deep inside, otherwise you'd never be confident of things like 'My wife loves me'. But this is a bad argument. There can be plenty of evidence that somebody loves you. All through the day when you are with somebody who loves you, you see and hear lots of little tidbits of evidence, and they all add up. It isn't purely inside feeling, like the feeling that priests call revelation. There are outside things to back up the inside feeling: looks in the eye, tender notes in the voice, little favors and kindnesses; this is all real evidence. Richard Dawkins realkindnesslove Those who wish to base their morality literally on the Bible have either not read it or not understood it. Richard Dawkins atheismwishreligion The Bible should be taught, but emphatically not as reality. It is fiction, myth, poetry, anything but reality. As such it needs to be taught because it underlies so much of our literature and our culture. Richard Dawkins literaturerealityfiction The theory of evolution by cumulative natural selection is the only theory we know of that is in principle capable of explaining the existence of organized complexity. Richard Dawkins theory-of-evolutionhealthinspire Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish. Richard Dawkins thought-provokingphilosophicalselfish Faith can be very very dangerous, and deliberately to implant it into the vulnerable mind of an innocent child is a grievous wrong. Richard Dawkins vulnerablemindchildren We cannot, of course, disprove God, just as we can't disprove Thor, fairies, leprechauns, and the Flying Spaghetti Monster. But, like those other fantasies that we can't disprove, we can say that God is very, very improbable. Richard Dawkins fantasyflyingmonsters Science has eradicated smallpox, can immunise against most previously deadly viruses, can kill most previously deadly bacteria. Theology has done nothing but talk of pestilence as the wages of sin. Richard Dawkins pestilencewagesdone Being dead will be no different from being unborn -- I shall be just as I was in the time of William the Conqueror or the dinosaurs or the trilobites. There is nothing to fear in that. Richard Dawkins dinosaursdifferentdeath It often turns out on closer inspection that acts of apparent altruism are really selfishness in disguise. Richard Dawkins disguiseinspectionselfishness I shall not make an argument ad hominem. My argument is ad bullshitem. Richard Dawkins adsargument The take-home message is that we should blame religion itself, not religious extremism - as though that were some kind of terrible perversion of real, decent religion. Voltaire got it right long ago: 'Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.' So did Bertrand Russell: 'Many people would sooner die than think. In fact they do. Richard Dawkins realreligiousbelieve
