Richard Dawkins and agnosticism

Richard Dawkins

Atheism, as defined by the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, and other philosophy reference works, is the denial of the existence of God. In recent times, however, atheists have attempted to dilute the definition of atheism (see: Attempts to dilute the definition of atheism).

Many atheists like to make a distinction between strong atheism and weak atheism. They define strong atheism as believing God does not exist, while weak atheism as neither believing nor disbelieving. However, this usage is incorrect, and has been invented by atheists to boost their numbers. If you believe God does not exist, you are an atheist. If you neither believe nor disbelieve, you aren't an atheist, you are some kind of agnostic.

Ben Stein Interview with the evolutionist Richard Dawkins

In the film Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, a documentary concerning suppression of the intelligent design movement, Ben Stein interviewed Richard Dawkins and Dawkins revealed himself to be an agnostic/weak atheist. In addition, Ben Stein demonstrated the folly of evolutionism in his interview with Richard Dawkins (A clip of the interview has been uploaded to YouTube ). Moreover, in terms of the theism vs. atheism issue, Dawkins has shown himself to be rather ignorant in matters of theology and philosophy. For example, atheist philosopher Dr. Michael Ruse declared concerning Dawkins' book The God Delusion: "The God Delusion makes me embarrassed to be an atheist."

The Discovery Institute provides an transcript of part of the interview along with some commentary:

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BEN STEIN: "What do you think is the possibility that Intelligent Design might turn out to be the answer to some issues in genetics or in evolution?" DAWKINS: "Well, it could come about in the following way. It could be that at some earlier time, somewhere in the universe, a civilization evolved, probably by some kind of Darwinian means, probably to a very high level of technology, and designed a form of life that they seeded onto perhaps this planet. Now, um, now that is a possibility, and an intriguing possibility. And I suppose it's possible that you might find evidence for that if you look at the details of biochemistry, molecular biology, you might find a signature of some sort of designer." Ho,ho! That is precisely what the Raelians say: Years ago, everybody knew that the earth was flat. Everybody knew that the sun revolved around the earth. Today, everybody knows that life on earth is either the result of random evolution or the work of a supernatural God. Or is it? In "Message from the Designers", Rael presents us with a third option: that all life on earth was created by advanced scientists from another world. Richard Dawkins and Rael; "clear thinking" kindred spirits!

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Ben Stein

A Christian apologetics website provides some additional commentary on the Ben Stein/Richard Dawkins interview which focuses on Dawkins response to Ben Stein's questions about the likelihood of the existence of God:

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In this interview there is the following exchange between Ben Stein and Richard Dawkins. Mr. Stein prefaces the exchange with this comment: “Professor Dawkins seemed so convinced that God doesn’t exist that I wondered if he would be willing to put a number on it.” Here is Professor Dawkins response, “Well, it’s hard to put a figure on it, but I’d put it at something like ninety-nine percent against or something like that.” Mr. Stein responded with this question. “Well, how do you know it’s ninety-nine percent (“I don’t,” Dr. Dawkins interjects.) and not, say, ninety-seven percent?” Dr. Dawkins continues, “You asked me to put a figure on it and I’m not comfortable putting a figure on it. I think it’s… I just think it’s very unlikely.” “But you couldn’t put a number on it?,” Mr. Stein clarifies. “No, of course not,” said Dr. Dawkins. “So it could be forty-nine percent?,” Mr. Stein asks. Dr. Dawkins replies, “Well, it would be… I mean I think it’s… it’s… it’s unlikely, but… but… I… and it’s quite far from fifty percent.” (He's very difficult to quote.) “How do you know?,” Mr. Stein asks. “I don’t know, I mean, I put an argument in the book,” Dr. Dawkins responds.

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Stein expressed surprise in the narration that Richard Dawkins "believe[d] in intelligent design."

Instead of attempting to defend abiogenesis, Dawkins actually suggested directed panspermia—the very thing that Francis Crick once suggested to explain life's beginnings.

Richard Dawkins and deism

In 2008, the reporter Melanie Phillips wrote in the American Spectator:

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On Tuesday evening I attended the debate between Richard Dawkins and John Lennox at Oxford’s Natural History Museum. This was the second public encounter between the two men, but it turned out to be very different from the first. Lennox is the Oxford mathematics professor whose book, God’s Undertaker: Has Science Buried God? is to my mind an excoriating demolition of Dawkins’s overreach from biology into religion as expressed in his book The God Delusion -- all the more devastating because Lennox attacks him on the basis of science itself. In the first debate, which can be seen on video on this website, Dawkins was badly caught off-balance by Lennox’s argument precisely because, possibly for the first time, he was being challenged on his own chosen scientific ground. This week’s debate, however, was different because from the off Dawkins moved it onto safer territory– and at the very beginning made a most startling admission. He said: A serious case could be made for a deistic God. This was surely remarkable. Here was the arch-apostle of atheism, whose whole case is based on the assertion that believing in a creator of the universe is no different from believing in fairies at the bottom of the garden, saying that a serious case can be made for the idea that the universe was brought into being by some kind of purposeful force. A creator. True, he was not saying he was now a deist; on the contrary, he still didn't believe in such a purposeful founding intelligence, and he was certainly still saying that belief in the personal God of the Bible was just like believing in fairies. Nevertheless, to acknowledge that ‘a serious case could be made for a deistic god’ is to undermine his previous categorical assertion that ...all life, all intelligence, all creativity and all ‘design’ anywhere in the universe is the direct or indirect product of Darwinian natural selection...Design cannot precede evolution and therefore cannot underlie the universe.

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