PZ Myers & Richard Dawkins on Faith

another issue that I often get criticized for is
I am accused of being a fundamentalist atheist
and you get this too
Oh, yes!
and then on the other hand, what's often said is
uh... what's often told me is, well, you shouldn't worry about the moderate christians
you shouldn't worry about the moderate Muslims
It's those extremes, fanatics
and the fact I go after
anyone...
I mean I’ll attack unitarians, ok?
I’ll go after anyone...
...is a sign I must be some kind of absolutist or fundamentalist
but what it really gets down to is...
faith
that we have a culture that regards faith
as a virtue
and faith is promoted
in all of these religions, even the most moderate liberal religions you can think of
and if
if you’re fundamental
again, I’m using fundamental? Okay, so you’re gonna say I am a fundamentalist atheist so my
fundamental core is:
No, I will not tolerate
this excuse of faith
of wallowing in ignorance as an answer to things
and it goes all across the board in religion
so no, I can't just attack the fanatics
I will go after the methodists
and anglicans, and unitarians, and the buddhists and whoever...
And the reason is that they teach children that faith is a virtue
and of course they’re nice and mild, and gentle and things
but if you teach children that it's a good thing to believe something just because you have faith
and you don't have to justify it
then those children are going to grow up and a minority of them
are going to say - well my faith tells me to go and
bombs skyscrapers and things like that, so the...
the moderate religious people
have this pernicious influence
of glorifying faith
and actually making it a positive virtue
Doubting Thomas was the least admired
of the apostles
patron saint of scientists - he actually wanted evidence
But we are taught as children
that it's better to believe without evidence than to believe
with evidence
and that is the fuse that can, after a long burning
can produce
true fanaticism which is violent and dangerous. -Yeah
And we come back to a point that was made earlier
I consider the opposite of faith to be criticism
and we come from a scientific culture that values critical thinking
that values argument and criticism
which is antithetical to what you do
when you're favoring faith
In faith you’re not supposed to question things
or what you’ll often hear from the religious is:
“Yes, you’re supposed to question things but it's okay
as long as you come up with the right answer
which is that you go on believing
I heard countless stories of
children being thrown out of the Sunday school for simply asking questions
I mean, like, I met a man
last week in Dublin
who said that he was thrown out of the Sunday school because he asked the teacher:
“But why did only Noah’s Ark float?
Why didn’t all the other boats float?”