... Daniel Dennett. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)
Orr's response echoes a point I have made: that if The God Delusion were the only book by Richard Dawkins that you knew, you would never guess what a good writer Dawkins can be. As for Dennett, his tenuous grasp of logic is becoming increasingly evident.
Hi Frank,
ReplyDeleteDoes Dennett think he and Dawkins are the only smart people in the world? This may be the ultimate problem with this little country club of nerds. They think that if any thought passes through one of their minds, on any subject whatsoever--could be religion, anything--it must be a world-class thought, and a gift to humanity and posterity.
Check this:
Orr ends by wondering why Dawkins— no expert on religion—wrote his book, and he might also wonder why I wrote mine. Didn't we have more intellectually satisfying problems to work on, problems better fitting our training, interests, and talents? I'll answer for myself, but I think Dawkins would give much the same answer. Yes, of course I'd much rather have been spending my time working on consciousness and the brain, or on the evolution of cooperation, for instance, or free will, but I felt a moral and political obligation to drop everything for a few years and put my shoulder to the wheel doing a dirty job that I thought somebody had to do.
Dennett should go back to his consciousness studies and not worry about the world coming to an end if he doesn't express his opinions religious matters.
Yours,
Rus