Londons Falling

DAWKINS MIRRORS DARWIN, HE IS A STUDENT OF DARWIN

Rating: 2/5
Comments:
The best thing about this book is a substantial reference to thinkers and their thoughts. Get out your dictionary and have your Internet search engine ready. All high school American history class students should demand to read not just pro and con, but the rest of the story that is being told. This is a good, educational example for them to use. Thus, the 5-Star rating. You will never learn how to think for yourself until you can spot someone who is attempting to think for you with phrases like "statistically possible" and "law of [Insert the advanced proven theory name here]." "Natural science" only means that it is what we are used to observing in nature. All things, observed long enough, have a nature about them. In my opinion, the phrase "natural science" is deceptively authoritative to children and adults alike. Please review that for yourself.

The most negative thing about this book is that it is a 400 plus page lecture that can easily be summarized in three points. 1. Numbers, statistical numbers, are the best secular godfather available to all of us. 2. Given time, and gradual steps, by purely natural laws (Darwin's natural selection!), the statistical probability of evolution marches forward and upward because large numbers of slightly improbable agents add up to accumulation, or evolution. 3. If you don't agree with what Mr. Dawkins holds, you are a/an/some [Insert adjective(s) and euphemism for bad person plus noun of Mr. Dawkin's choice Here] in need of having your `consciousness raised.'

Do you like numbers? Does even mention of statistics have the effect of increasing your belief in the presence of infallible fact? Do you accept statistical probability on hearsay evidence? Can numbers say what ever you want them to in favor of probability? Have I got a book for you.

God is irreducibly complex, and that flaw makes him unacceptable to Mr. Dawkins. God cannot be reduced to a numerical equation or tested as a law of science. I had really hoped to find some meat in this book. Instead, I found observation, rigged examples, hearsay quotes, lack of citation and footnotes, absolutist opinion, and manipulation.

If Mr. Dawkins could have scored a quote from Beelzebub himself, he would have gladly printed it and followed through with condemning Satanism as part of the problem with the CARB (Catch-All Religion Bucket). On pages 56-57, Mr. Dawkins declares that God and gods are all the same to him and under his `attacking.' Therefore, he will treat all three Abrahamaic religions `as indistinguishable' (i.e., Christianity, Islam, and Judaism) (see pg. 58). He creates the CARB, with the same logic that "No one is perfect; all people are bad because they are different and not perfect. I am correct. All people should be killed." If Mr. Dawkins were God, we'd all be... well, dead.

Mr. Dawkins uses quotes from some real bottom feeders in the university system of Great Britain with impressive titles. No one is immune: the pacifist, religious apologist, deist, theist, Catholic, Muslim, Jew, Quaker, Protestant, Christian, theology. See Mr. Dawkins on page 56 where he has a Catholic meltdown and page 80 for theologians to get their comeuppance. Changing definitions to accommodate Mr. Dawkins personal use the God hypothesis on page 52 that is then altered on page 82 because there are `many versions of the hypothesis.' How convenient. Now we can't tell if the God Hypothesis was Mr. Dawkins name for it, or his name for their name for it. But then, they will translate to anything and anyone in the CARB.

Mr. Dawkins time travels. There is a forum for anachronistic politics. For example, Mr. Dawkins tells us what the thoughts of Thomas Jefferson (and others) would be about events that are more recent. Mr. Dawkins quotes the atheist Nehru and to my surprise, even what Nehru thought he said isn't what he said. The lecture is filled with haphazard illustrative quotations, self-made and manipulated definitions, angry absolutisms, and an allegedly scientific appeal to the intelligence of real thinkers.

The section devoted to the widely held idea that the United States was founded as a Christian nation should be required reading in all high school American history classes. It's not that Dawkins takes it out of context, he takes it out of the greater picture of historical application. The book segment on the document of Treaty of Tripoli, Article 11, and the Musselmen (use the dictionary for that one if it is not familiar) on pgs. 60-61 will not tell you that the Treaty of Tripoli was on the books for 8 years, then renegotiated, and Article 11 was dropped. It was put in the document to avoid a religious war between the Muslims of Tripoli and a young America circa 1796. You would have put in whatever you needed to in order to stem piracy and a declaration of war against you.
Read "Treaty of Tripoli by David Barton" - [...]. All high school American history class students should demand to read not just pro and con, but to read the rest of the story that is being told. This is a good educational example for them to use.

You don't have to think, just believe as Mr. Dawkins does. His thought process isn't easy to follow unless you're already angry. If you're not angry when you start reading, you will be later with his subtle (and not subtle at all) snipes, snarks, and condescension.

The word religion is used in a continuous feed loop that appeals to anyone who doesn't catch on that religion is a handy straw man for all the world's evils. For Mr. Dawkins purposes, all gods are the same (once again, page 57), and every expression of belief that contains any pro theological reference goes in the CARB (once again, Catch-All Religion Bucket).

The God Delusion

Rating: 2/5
Comments:
I have no problem with the science of professor Dawkins in his book The God Delusion but lets just say I am skeptical of his views on God and religion. The following points out just three of several errors that I find in his book. 1-The opening quote is witty but not wise. To paraphrase, as I don't remember the quote exactly, "Every one is an atheist regarding all the Gods that came before the one they worship, some just go one God more" seems to miss the point the our understanding of God can evolve as much as species can evolve. As a scientist one would think he might get the concept of progress. 2-He claims that he does not need to read theology to comment on God it appears that theologists are beneath his contempt. The problem is that he then completely mangles Roman Catholic theology on the trinity, Mary and the communion of saints. At the end of his book he then shoots himself in the foot. He seems to be trying to convince me of science as god and quotes a quantum physicist "If you think you understand quantum physics, then you don't understand quantum physics". Well if you think you understand God then you don't understand God. HIs book is written from a closed perspective and allows no value to those with a different perspective.

What Do Dawkins and Hitler Have in Common?

Rating: 1/5
Comments:
They're both going to end up in the Lake of Fire!

BOOM !

Okay, first of all, if evolution is true, then people (especially teenage males) are going to act like complete animals. Seriously, we cannot let them know that they are animals. They will run out of sperm by the time they're 20 and won't be able to have children with their wives. Who wants that to happen? I know Jesus doesn't. He wants men to keep their sperm for their precious wives. So I think it's best we teach kids Biblical Creationism. Q.E.D.

Second, religion definitely does deserve respect. Jesus demanded that we follow Him and respect Him and His Father YWHW. So let's just do that.

Third, Dawkins gets it wrong in thinking YWHW is complex, when He clearly isn't. Just read the Bible. Therefore Dawkins' main argument fails.

Fourth, I don't worship "gaps" -- that's absurd; rather, I worship my God YWHW who just so happens to be in the gaps sometimes.

Fifth, the Old Testament is not evil; killing women, children and newborn babies is perfectly fine. Afterall, we are all sinners who don't deserve to live.

Sixth, the New Testament is not evil; burning people alive for ever and ever is okay as long as YWHW does it (what Hitler did was truly appalling).

Seventh, children are not being "abused" -- they're being saved from the eternal fires of Hell. That's called love, not abuse.

"The fact is, the horrors of hell are so great that no earthly language can do complete justice to them. By using the figure of unquenchable fire, undying worms, etc., Jesus selected the most horrific descriptions that earthly language would allow. As Robert Reymond observes, 'the reality they [the figures] seek to represent should surely be understood by us to be more -- not less -- than the word pictures they depict.' Likewise, Ralph E. Powell urges, 'If the descriptions of hell are figurative or symbolic, the conditions they represent are more intense and real than the figures of speech in which they are expressed.'"

Look, God loves you; He sent His Son to die for you; but if you don't accept that, repent, and live a godly life, then He will have to torture you forever.

God Bless!