July 2, 2013

“The God Delusion” by Richard Dawkins – Is Religion the Enemy?

The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins (Book cover)
Quite recently it seems that a bigger division was created between “believers” and “non-believers” (for lack of better words), mainly due to Sam Harris and Daniel Dennett who basically started the anti-religion wars by scrutinizing the beliefs people have been holding dear to heart for over a thousand years now. 

Though many people like to think of Richard Dawkins as a bully, it cannot be denied that the man seeks to learn the truth through the scientific method, and in his book The God Delusion, he examines the whole concept of religion through the scientific lens.

To begin with, this is what I like to call an aggressive approach to religion, in the sense that it feels as if Dawkins has already made up his mind a long time ago and is trying to make us see what he feels to be obvious. He spends a great deal of the book discussing how religion impacted humanity, and more often than not, he concludes that it led to war, violence and death, using a surprising large number of examples from the Crusades all the way to 9/11.
 
Though he does get a bit over-zealous at times in his qualifications of various aspects of religion (he described the worship of Yahweh as psychotic), those with an open mind and seeking the truth rather than affirmation will have no trouble getting past that.

Apart from looking at religion itself, Dawkins also spends a great deal of time disproving the existence of God, or rather, showing that the probability for him being real is so negligible that believing in it is borderline insanity. 

I have to admit that Dawkins does an amazing job at creating a very compelling case for religion being a manipulation tool and God nothing but the invention of human mind. He uses actual scientific theories and facts in order to deconstruct the many arguments which favor the existence of God and the necessity of religion for the good of mankind, and of course, he proposes his own solution.

Of course, being a scientist, Dawkins doesn’t simply discredit the concept of religion and move on with his life. Rather, he also made an effort to create a case for atheism being the most logical and potentially-true system of belief we came up with. 

Presenting various examples, Dawkins explains that, from a scientific perspective at least, the world would be a more peaceful and kind-hearted place with the absence of religion rather than its presence.

On the whole, even though The God Delusion may be offensive to some people who have cemented their beliefs a while ago, I believe that it is an extremely important piece of literature anyone ought to read, regardless of their relation towards religion. It brings up many good points and questions, finally shedding a tiny of bit light on the ultimate reality behind this universe. 

The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins (Book cover)  
However, you will only get something out of this book if you go into it with an open mind, with the knowledge that regardless of how strong your faith is, there is a distinct lack of hard evidence to prove any religion true and we haven’t even come remotely close to figuring out what is really happening in this universe. 


Richard Dawkins (Author)

Richard Dawkins


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Richard Dawkins is an evolutionary biologist, English ethologist and author. He introduced many important and even revolutionary concepts into biology (such as the gene-centric view of evolution) and penned a number of books on the matter, including The Magic of Reality and The God Delusion.



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