Dawkins and his god...

Richard Dawkins loves evolution and gleefully declares himself an atheist. In a recent article, one gets a sense that his exuberance of Darwin and evolution has made him a weaker scientist and a weaker scholar.

In his latest article, he declares that evolution is not mere opinion but, instead, a "matter of scientific fact" and is therefore off limits as far as debate and criticism. You will never read those words from him, but this sentiment is clearly present between the lines of his writing. Dawkins writes,

"Whence, then, comes the oft-parroted canard, “Evolution is only a theory”? Perhaps from a misunderstanding of philosophers who assert that science can never demonstrate truth. All it can do is fail to disprove a hypothesis. "

Is not science but, first, a theory? Is the word, "theory" a bad word in the world of science these days? Before the laws of gravity were proven, they were theories. Before the laws of thermal dynamics were proven they were theories. And, no real scientist has ever said that science can never demonstrate truth, at times it does, but, at times, it does not. At times, what science states as absolute truth turns out not to be truth at all. The eruption of Mt. St. Helen's proved that strata in rock which science was absolutely certain took millions of years to form, formed in millions... of seconds.

Dawkins is a wonderfully bright man with a dazzling intellect, but his god is evolution, and he worships it in such a fanatical way that it is making him merely an average scientist. Dawkins writes,

"Evolution is, after all, the true story of why we all exist, and an exhilarating powerful and satisfying explanation. It supersedes – and devastates – all predecessors, no matter how devoutly and sincerely believed."

This article concentrates on his support of a book by Jerry Coyne entitled, you guessed it, Why Evolution is True. Dawkins goes back to his pet example of why evolution is true and creationism, his pet antagonist, is not.

"The book includes a lucid exposition of natural selection at the level of the gene (knowing nothing of genes, Darwin expressed it at the level of the individual organism). Coyne describes how a parasitic worm changes the appearance and behaviour of its ant host, turning the ant’s abdomen into a simulacrum of a red berry, angled temptingly up in the air with carefully weakened stalk joining it to the thorax. You’ve guessed the sequel. The “berry”, full of worm eggs, is eaten by a bird, which is the definitive host of the worm."

Is this example taught to all evolutionists? I have a 15 year old article by Dawkins referencing the same parasitic worm. There are other examples of devastation and dominance in the animal kingdom referenced in this article that, according to Dawkins, provide proof that a creator does not exist.

The problem for me is that Dawkins has a worldview with a presupposition that he has predetermined to exclude anything beyond the dimensions of himself. In Expelled, a documentary by Ben Stein, Dawkins is willing to jump to the far-fetched "theory" that life may have been seeded on this planet by alien beings from another planet, but he will not even give the concept of creator a chance. His constant attack of creationism, as a science it has some issues, and now, intelligent design, which is good science, becomes more arrogant, irrational and less scientific with each assault. This article is a perfect example as he writes,

"Such dishonesty by omission is lamentably characteristic of creationists. They love fossils because they have been schooled, wrongly as Coyne shows, to believe that “gaps” in the fossil record are an embarrassment to evolutionary theorists. The geographical distribution of species really is an embarrassment to creationists – and they conspicuously ignore it. "

He goes on to reference Coyne's reference to the parasitic worm but does not write about the "gaps" in the fossil record. Evolutionists have conveniently explained it a way with the "Cambrian explosion" which was the seemingly rapid appearance of most major groups of complex animals around 530 million years ago, as evidenced by the fossil record. According to Wikipedia,

"The Cambrian explosion has generated extensive scientific debate. The seemingly rapid appearance of fossils in the “Primordial Strata” was noted as early as the mid 19th century, and Charles Darwin saw it as one of the main objections that could be made against his theory of evolution by natural selection."

But, you will not read that or hear that from Dr. Dawkins, and Wikipedia is not exactly the preferred Christian reference.

I grow frustrated with those who write articles that take shots at God and Christianity with no fear of anyone or anything. Dr. Dawkins is bright, but each article he writes in defense of his god, evolution, is less scientific and less scholarly than the last. When I first began to read his work many years ago he was difficult to understand, at times, but always well written and well researched. With each passing article, I find him crawling closer to becoming what he claims is detrimental to all of us... a religious fundamentalist with a closed mind unwilling and unable to hear or discern truth. I pray Dr. Dawkins discovers the truth before it is too late. Blessings!