Monday 21 April 2014

Is Richard Dawkins Telepathic?

I enjoyed this article on scientific method and the Resurrection. Which I think agrees with my own assumption that people in the 1st Century AD didn't believe that people rose from the dead, either. Let's face it, if they thought resurrection was an entirely normal occurrence, the story of the Early Church would have been Peter standing up on the Day of Pentecost, and his listeners going "well, yeah. Duh. And what exactly is a Resurrection meant to prove? Doris was resurrected last Friday. And old Matthias came back to live despite being pulled to pieces by baboons."

But I digress. It's the quote from, I believe, the God Delusion (the article, unscientifically, doesn't cite its sources) that made me sit up. I have to confess I didn't notice its implication when I read the God Delusion, preoccupied as I was with keeping a running total to check whether names dropped scored higher than random straw-person assertions about what believers believe. Still, here it is:

"The nineteenth century is the last time when it was possible for an educated person to admit to believing in miracles like the virgin birth without embarrassment. When pressed, many educated Christians are too loyal to deny the virgin birth and the resurrection. But it embarrasses them because their rational minds know that it is absurd, so they would much rather not be asked."

My conclusion from this is that there two possibilities. One is that Dr Dawkins is guessing what his acquaintances really think. The other is that he is telepathic. Since the former way of behaving is clearly unscientific, and unworthy of a great scientific work, then the latter must be true. The Good Prof is possessed of paranormal powers, thus making him a formidable adversary in debate - because he can guess what his opponent's next argument will be.

Of course, being a telepath also undercuts Dr Dawkins' own arguments that such things don't exist. That's probably why he's so shy about it.

3 comments :

  1. Telepathic AND dogmatic - a deadly combination. Deadly boring, that is....

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  2. I am told that Richard consulted his Dawkiemen before writing this nonsense.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGor7ZyCawI

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  3. I always go straight to C.S. Lewis on matters of Science and Biology...

    ReplyDelete

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