I have now read the preface to the paperback edition of The God Delusion, and the original preface. This will be a rough ride. I would so love to respond to every. single. page. But that would accomplish nothing. Thinking in terms of “blog posts” then, I’ve found inspiration for easily a dozen posts already. If you, my dear reader, have any specific section of The God Delusion that you want critically evaluated, or criticised 
for that matter, let me know. That will help me prioritise blog posts.
I’m hoping when spoken to, face-to-face, Richard Dawkins’ opinions are more nuanced than the ideas presented in the polemic that is The God Delusion. Maybe he learned something from the books that responded to his book, if he read any of them. That’s a nice way to get people to educate you: don’t bother educating yourself, just write a best-seller, and other people will respond with a collection of books targeted directly at your, um, “delusion”? Hehe. Name-calling is so much fun. (Of course, maybe that’s what I’m doing by blogging… well, at least I’m not making any money doing it. *sigh*)
So far I could respond passionately to nearly every page, tearing every page apart. Every page of the preface, anyway — this blog post is merely to announce “I’ve started reading The God Delusion“. It will take me some time, as I’m taking notes. I will survive this book in the same way I survive attending fundamentalist religious gatherings and sing their songs with them: I will understand their particular definition of the words they use, most possibly better than they understand it themselves, and everything will make sense and become beautiful. Even The God Delusion is beautiful, when viewed from the right context.
I do understand that Richard Dawkins looked at the situation of religious extremism in the world, at the death and murder and war and hatred that is spread in the name of “religion”. In some ways, it could be considered noble of him to try to play his part by writing the book instead of sitting back and moaning about how no-one is doing anything about it. (Of course, there are people trying to do something about it. Richard Dawkins made his contribution. Whether misguided or not, it does do the consciousness-raising thing, and it does give people like me a nice platform to stand on — some shoulders of giants, y’know.)
Let me leave you with one of lousirr’s zany poems:
An Ode to the Donkey
a poem by lousirr
(Most likely written during the early morning hours of 2 December).
The Donkey
The Humble Donkey
A tribute to the donkey
An ode
A song
A piece of pie
God used a donkey to talk
to puny human
God can do that
God can use anything to talk
to puny human
if human will only listen
The donkey, the ass
Oh, what a wonderful animal, the ass
RD is an ass
I do wonder how the RD-fanclub will respond if I tear into their messiah, or start tearing their Bible’s pages apart. Hehe. Nice little picture in my mind there. And for those only joining now, if you want some history, it is interesting to look at how far I’ve come in eight months. Back in May 2007, I made this blog post: Imagine No Religion. The last paragraph contains this sentence: “I am moving on, I am abandoning my little crusade, even before I really started it.” In some ways, the likes of Richard Dawkins contributed to me not giving up. Merci beaucoup.
7 responses so far ↓
1 Hugo // Jan 3, 2008 at 4:53 pm
(The title of this post is intended as an improvement to a previous post, which I titled “Bring Me Richard Dawkins’ Head!”)
2 Hugo // Jan 3, 2008 at 7:56 pm
So how about this one then: “God” is “meaning in life”.
3 Hugo // Jan 4, 2008 at 11:59 pm
I realise that many of the Richard Dawkins fans will be unable to catch lousirr’s Biblical references. Somewhere in the Old Testament (does someone want to provide the exact location?) God used a donkey to talk to humans. The poem thus states, to religious people, that maybe they should actually listen to Richard Dawkins, because he might indeed be saying something important.
Also, New Testament donkey reference: Jesus chose to rode into Jerusalem from the east, on the back of a donkey, in stark contrast to the Roman what’sit’sname coming in from the west with regiments, chariots, the whole shebang.
In the Bible, the donkey is by no means a bad creature. Christians have appreciation for it. Thus, lousirr’s poem is at the same time a complement, a “hear hear”, and a little playful stab at the end, calling him an “ass” rather than a “donkey”.
*Sigh*. What a pity that these things need explaining.
4 Ben // Jan 5, 2008 at 12:08 pm
I didn’t get that - glad you explained it. I don’t know why, but I don’t like reading or listening to Dawkins. Including TGD - I had trouble finishing it. His case against religion as harmful is poorly made, IMO.
(shrug)
5 Hugo // Jan 5, 2008 at 12:36 pm
Oh, about this:
random thought I shared without the necessary context. I’m not lamenting the fact that people don’t “know the Bible”. Not at all. (It was more a case of “pity one needs to explain things in detail in order to stop some people from thinking you’re an idiot” — some people prefer to think you’re an idiot, rather than going to the trouble to find out what you mean. That is too much trouble, information overload. The nicer conclusion, in my opinion, is “ah, I don’t understand this guy, but I don’t have the time to pursue the matter. Oh well.”)
6 Penny Lloyd // Sep 4, 2008 at 10:20 am
Maybe you should read his earlier books on genetics to get where he is coming from - it looks like you have just discovered him with this book. Not that easy to ‘just write a best seller’ my dear - wish I could - and I’m sure he didn’t know he had a best seller before it was published. Bit patronising to have to explain the bibilical references - we are living in this world after all and could hardly have missed them through life - even if one is Islamic or Jewish, as I am.
7 Hugo // Sep 4, 2008 at 11:49 am
It’s rather funny to look at old blog posts.
(If I didn’t laugh, I’d *cringe*)
Patronizing to explain biblical references? Not at all, this is the internet, a diverse audience. Ben, for one, appreciated it.
For the rest, I don’t even want to think about this post, though I do feel I may owe it to readers to reread my own writings a few months later.
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