Recently Skeptic Ink’s own Stephen Law hosted Richard Dawkins for a conversation at Oxford for “Think Week”. The discussion generally pertained to the epistemologic and sociological differences between religion and science. I enjoyed the talk and you should check it out (video embedded below). What really stuck out to me, though, were the questions in the Q&A. For example, someone actually asked,
“Do you not see that science is just the new religion, let’s say that shows people how to act..” .
I am astonished that in 2013, at Oxford, these kinds of questions pop up. Well, admission is general I must assume. I considered explaining here why science is not a religion, but you’d be just as well to listen to Dawkins explain it. Plus I find it embarrassing to make a discussion topic of. Around the 68 minute mark, a question is so out of left field that Richard Dawkins incredulously exclaims “You cannot be serious” (see index 68:14). He does then go into a more substantive reply. His first remark might not have been the most constructive, but I think we ought to give him some slack here as he gets bombarded with wacky arguments few of us could be prepared to field with grace. Here is the video.
