The Root of All Evil?
The Root of All Evil? is a television documentary written and presented by biologist Richard Dawkins, in which he argues that the world would be better off without religion. The documentary was first broadcast in January 2006, in the form of two 45 minute episodes (excluding advertisement breaks), on Channel 4 in the UK. Dawkins said that the title "Root of All Evil?" was not his own choice, and he wasn't in favour of it, but that Channel 4 insisted on it to create controversy.[1]
The God Delusion
The God Delusion explores the unproven traditions that are treated as fact by religious faiths, and the extremes to which some followers have taken them. Dawkins opens the programme by describing "would-be murderers . . . who want to kill you and me, and themselves, because they're motivated by what they think is the highest ideal." Dawkins argues that "the process of non-thinking called faith" is not a way of understanding the world, rather it is opposed to modern science which tests hypotheses and builds theories to describe the world.
Dawkins first visits Lourdes which he sees as relatively benign, but questions Father Liam Griffin about its effectiveness. Dawkins states that he considers the 66 declared miracles, and claims of about 2,000 unexplained cures over about 150 years, to be statistically meaningless. He then discusses the origins of religious myths, how "faith requires a positive suspension of critical faculties", and in contrast how "a scientist is constantly asking questions and being sceptical." He cites the doctrine of the Assumption of Mary which became Roman Catholic doctrine without any evidence, even in the Bible. He describes the scientific method using evidence to find out about things like how the Sun works, and the age of the earth. He relates how as a student at the University of Cambridge he saw lecture in which a visiting American researcher demolished a hypothesis long promoted by an elderly professor, who strode to the front and shook his hands saying "My dear fellow, I wish to thank you, I have been wrong all these fifteen years". The audience "clapped their hands raw" at this example of the scientific ideal. Dawkins then sets out his "Mount Improbable" analogy of Charles Darwin's idea of gradual evolution through natural selection as being like slowly walking round a gradual slope rather than leaping up a cliff in one bound as in the supernatural hypothesis of a "designer God". Thus science explains the complexity of life, but "The design hypothesis couldn't even begin to do that, because it raises an even bigger problem than it solves, who made the designer?"
Next, he visits the United States to discuss the rise of fundamentalist Christianity and his concern that proponents "are foisting evident falsehoods on their flock. The Evangelicals are denying scientific evidence just to support bronze age myths." In an interview with pastor Ted Haggard, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, he confronts Haggard's claims that some scientists consider the world to be only 6,000 years old, and that the "evolutionists" Haggard has met "think [the eye] happened by accident." For quotations from this interview see the Ted Haggard article.
Dawkins then goes on to Jerusalem, where he interviews people on both sides of the Middle East conflict. He expects Yousef al-Khattab (Joseph Cohen), an American-born Jew who came to Israel as a settler before converting to Islam, to see both viewpoints. But Yousef turns out to hate atheists, arguing that if there were no state of Israel, there would have been no September 11 attack on New York City. Responding to charges that scientific understanding doesn't entitle one to reject religion, Dawkins describes Bertrand Russell's celestial teapot thought experiment.
The Virus of Faith
In The Virus of Faith, Dawkins makes a more emotional appeal. He examines the moral framework that religions are often cited as providing, and argues against the indoctrination of children. The title of this episode comes from Dawkins's 1976 book The Selfish Gene, in which Dawkins first introduced the concept of a meme.
Dawkins compares religious faith to a virus, being passed from parents to offspring and teachers to pupils. Dawkins visits a London Hasidic Jewish school, in which students are largely isolated from the outside world. Also in London, Dawkins visits Phoenix Academy, one of the semi-independent city academies introduced by Tony Blair's government, which follows the American Accelerated Christian Learning curriculum. Dawkins finds the pupils rote learning biblical stories, which are integrated into various academic subjects. Dawkins interviews the head teacher of the school, asking why the science curriculum includes Noah's Ark and describes AIDS as the "wages of sin." When the teacher states that without God or a law-giver people will tend to do bad things, Dawkins takes this as a cue to explore the differences between secular ethics and morality based on religious law.
Returning to the United States, Dawkins visits the Hell-House Outreach Programme, an organisation that uses hell for "moral policing," producing theatre shows and videos aimed at children as young as twelve. He also interviews Michael Bray, a friend of Paul Hill who was sentenced to death for murdering a doctor who performed abortions. Dawkins takes Bray's belief that the Bible sanctions capital punishment for adultery as a cue to discuss his views that the Bible, especially the Old Testament, clashes with modern secular ethics. Quoting from the Old Testament, Dawkins describes its God as "the most unpleasant character in all fiction," and expresses similar disregard for the New Testament's "sadomasochistic doctrine of atonement for original sin."
Dawkins interviews Richard Harries, the Bishop of Oxford, a liberal Anglican, questioning why he accepts some parts of the Bible while rejecting others, including many of its moral teachings. Dawkins suggests that in adopting the stance of religious moderation, Harries in effect "betrays faith and reason equally." Harries counters that it is quite possible to be intellectually fulfilled as a Christian rationalist.
Finally, Dawkins discusses some ideas about morality from evolutionary biology, such as reciprocal altruism and kin selection.
Response
In his New Statesman diary,[2] Dawkins stated that Channel 4's correspondence in response to the documentary had been running at two to one in favour. Journalists including Howard Jacobson[3] had accused Dawkins of giving voice to extremists, a claim Dawkins responded to by noting that the National Association of Evangelicals has some 30 million members, and also that he had invited the main UK religious leaders to participate, but they all declined.[2]
External links
- Coverage on the Channel 4 website
- Favourable review by biologist Dan Jones: The God Delusion, The Virus of Faith
- Critical review by Madeleine Bunting, The Guardian: No wonder atheists are angry: they seem ready to believe anything
- Dawkins's response to critics in The New Statesman (Note: This website limits read access for unregistered to once in a 24 hour period.)
Notes and references
- ^ Jeremy Vine Show, BBC Radio 2, 2006-01-05.
- ^ a b Richard Dawkins, 2006. "Diary." New Statesman.
- ^ Howard Jacobson, 2006. "Nothing like an unimaginative scientist to get non-believers running back to God." The Independent.
