1. Comment #5993 by Irate Harry on November 12, 2006 at 5:54 am

Three cheers to Richard Dawkins for suggesting betterment of Liberty 'students' But this might be wasted on them - Liberty is a neo-conservative christian body masquerading as a Universtity.

Consider this (excerpted from Wikipedia, duly acknowledged) - Liberty University is a Christian liberal arts university, and was founded as Lynchburg Baptist College in 1971 by conservative Christian Jerry Falwell, who is also the Senior Pastor of Thomas Road Baptist Church. Jerry Falwell is an evangelical pastor and televangelist from the United States. He is the founding pastor of the Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia.

On several occasions, Falwell described the school as 'Bible Boot Camp.' He still exhorts Liberty's students to burn it down if it 'ever turns liberal'.

Ranked to be in the 4th tier of Southern Master's Universities, and with tuition and annual fees of over $14,000 (excluding room and board) it is the most expensive university in its class, costing over twice the average of other universities in its ranking.

This 'university' has awarded honorary doctorates to ultra-conservatives like Sean Hannity, Karl Rove, Newt Gingrich and George Bush Sr. Need we say more?

Now what are the chances that the bible-thumping automatons (the students) will even hear, let alone heed, RD's advice? They probably preach that he is the Devil Incarnate anyway.

2. Comment #5994 by Jerry on November 12, 2006 at 5:59 am

Please, please, please don't use Quicktime[not]... 113MB!!!! If you've got an 8mb link (and gigs of space left), then perhaps OK - but streaming is what the web's all about. YouTube would have been YouTurkey if it hadn't used streaming.

Sadly I don't have the patience to wait for RD's words. Please, someone, put it on YouTube.

3. Comment #6013 by Zaratustra on November 12, 2006 at 7:48 am

Yes, it is clear to us that Dawkins is not insulting any human being in this world, but insulting God who is not exist! So, the one who said that he/she is being insulted by Dawkins' lecture because Dawkins insulted God, is the one who thinks either he is delutioned of being God him/her/its-self, or he/she should go see psychiatrist because it is clear something wrong in his/her mind.

4. Comment #6035 by Randy Ping on November 12, 2006 at 9:36 am

I find it absolutely confounding that the same type of people who can accept the evidence in a criminal case as scientific and verifiable enough to find a murderer guilty and sentance him to an execution would seek to overlook or dismiss much more empirical, much better and more strenuously tested evidence for Darwinistic evolution.

5. Comment #6036 by Brian on November 12, 2006 at 9:49 am

I find it ironic that a so-called 'university' calling itself 'Liberty' produces drones that fail to see the low esteem they are held in!

6. Comment #6043 by Zaphod on November 12, 2006 at 10:10 am

Those nuts actually think dinosaurs and man ran about at the same time. That we used to hunt dinosaurs and stuff lol. mmm T-Rex burger.

7. Comment #6048 by Randy Ping on November 12, 2006 at 10:18 am

Well, Zaphod, You certainly conjured up an image of a giant slab of ribs as seen in the old Flinstones cartoons.

8. Comment #6049 by Anonymous on November 12, 2006 at 10:19 am

I found Dawkins amusing in one sense, absurd in another and quite insinsre about his presentation of his "facts" from which he assures a firm foundation for his belief in Atheism. He stated that darwinian evolution and "change" must be viewed as a process that improves a system and not random change of no use. Poor little Richard played both ends of the table, in that evolution produces mutations which are haphazard and, to use his own words "mindless", and that this mindless or haphazrd process is the unified equation of usefull advantageous results?! Or, let's try your specialty, mindless mutations and haphazardness = intelligent and useful results? Really? Wow, that's some smart mud or it's a flim flam job. It lacks explatory power, I suspect you know it already. And to cite numerous dating processes such as carbon, and whatever others you had in mind, as a sort of accurate pillar( Time Machine?) for dating aged items is special pleading to the highest degree. Each dating procedure is based on at least three assumptions that are known to be totally opposite of what they claim. That's not bedrock evidence it's puff-n-stuff. Charles Lyell came up with dating the geologic culumn by pure imagination, carbon dating or any other, wansn't even heard of. But then dates are selectively chosen (only the dates that reflects charlie's imagination of course) all others are ardently rejected by evolutionists. dating (the wizard of Oz) is a bogy to get our wit off od charles' imagination the virtual lack of any meaningful support for it. Alas, I found your pitch to the young and imnpressionable weak. I heard a lot about your wit in science of course. You may take head of a fellow countryman of yours who said, "seeing through everything is to see nothing". there's no getting around first principles my dear boy. Though I suspect you already know that. To bewitch a youngster who has already been conditioned to your courageous view is no great feat, others have prepaired him. To simply show up, give him a pat on the back saying, "that's it you've got it" is for boys not men. perhaps you agree with Gould that the little love handles on the undercarraige of a snake are iseless leftovers, the old magical legs they once were? perhaps you agree with Heckael and his famous art work, or Huxley, oe Lyle? Perhaps you shall try to live out the philosophy Darwinism is drredged in to the fullest extent and prescribe survival of the fittest to Mankind, the very same way Hitler, the evolutionist did? In meantime I shall fight it with Vim and Vigour!

9. Comment #6066 by Roy on November 12, 2006 at 11:45 am

That was wonderful, the best yet, The man is impossible to "trip-up".
The thoughts of anyone teaching that dinosaurs co-existed with human beings really makes me squirm, as it did Robert Winston when he visited a 'museum' showing such a witless scenario in U.S.A.

10. Comment #6067 by Louis Perry on November 12, 2006 at 11:46 am

With all due respect to Jerry in comment #5994, please, please, please make all future video offerings available in Quicktime. On Macs the videos downloadable as flash files don't download as usable on Macs (well, on mine anyway). The opportunity to hear Richard Dawkins via Quicktime is worth all the space I have left on my hard drive, and when I run out, I'll buy an external drive to keep filing the good Doctor away! P.S. In my experience, Quicktime quality is far superior to YouTube quality (with apologies to YouTube, which I love).

11. Comment #6068 by A.Lex on November 12, 2006 at 11:49 am

Dear Anonymous,
I like your kewt spelling. The rest is undatedly unreal!
Sinsrely,
A.

12. Comment #6071 by Anat on November 12, 2006 at 12:14 pm

Anonymous wrote:
"Poor little Richard played both ends of the table, in that evolution produces mutations which are haphazard and, to use his own words "mindless", and that this mindless or haphazrd process is the unified equation of usefull advantageous results?! Or, let's try your specialty, mindless mutations and haphazardness = intelligent and useful results?"

You are commiting the most common mistake of creationists in that you totally ignore the power of *selective pressure* acting over a long course of time. You do not appreciate the fierceness of competition over resources and the arms race between predators and prey, parasites and hosts that exist in nature and what a strong selective force they exert on a reproducing populations. The genes that provide an edge up in such a competitive environment spread over time in the population because organisms that do not have them do not reproduce as efficiently as those who do.

13. Comment #6078 by Paul on November 12, 2006 at 1:02 pm

FAO Anonymous (#6049): the mutations are random, whether an organism containing a mutation survives is emphatically not random. Hence the "good" mutations can be passed on to the next generation. This is a basic point. If you want to debate evolution on this forum you really should read about it first.

14. Comment #6080 by Jonathan on November 12, 2006 at 1:06 pm

Yes, well done. Except he didn't actually answer the question, and I'm certain the one asking the question was thinking "dammit, more of the same." Bear with me now... we're talking about the question of how a religious person ought to go about proving his biblical prejudices right. In reply, Dawkins addresses the state of the art in the scientific dating of geologic time. In time, and not that we've got it all wrong, but perhaps we will have more reliably demonstrable methods of geological time than the theoretical decay rate of particles. But the bible will still be the same finished product, and this is the issue. How does a bible believer prove either that his interpretation of the scripture is wrong, or the scripture itself is wrong? (Or right?)

That could be a deep psychological, heuristic, sociological pr linguistic issue. So I think the real answer is that this is the problem of the believer. It has to be noted that scientific fact has never been an issue for the majority of fundamentalists - whether or not the bible's math or science was correct - the only issue is whether or not they have total faith in the book to solve their personal problems.

I submit that a better answer would contain a part I and a part II. Part I is a whole scientific inquiry into geologic time, natural history, and the evolution of the species. Part II is a question of what the bible really means when it says, "this happened". I think if you're going to reach out to the unfortunate fellows who have been brainwashed to believe wrong things since they were too young to know any better... you're going to have to get in the business of providing an intellectual splint so that they might hobble their way to humility. You don't do all the work of science by yourself, and you cannot expect them to do so either.

15. Comment #6081 by Andrew on November 12, 2006 at 1:06 pm

In every century there are a handful of people who are ahead of their time. Dawkins is one of those people. Hopefully soon the rest of the world will have their consciousness raised by his arguments.

16. Comment #6086 by B on November 12, 2006 at 1:24 pm

I was raised in the Evangelical community (which, in its defense, always regarded Falwell as being borderline loony), and like Charles White in his comments above, my chief feeling about staying in that community all the way through college is primarily one of embarrassment. He's dead on there.

In any case, I just thought that I would note that I went to a Christian high school, and 4 out of about 40 students in my graduating class were accepted to Liberty University. What is primarily noteworthy about this, however, is that the two least intelligent members of that graduating class were among the four. Even at that time, that told me all I needed to know about Liberty University.

Incidentally, I also have a friend who attended the elementary school founded by Falwell. She has some horror stories about that, but at least she was innoculated against Christianity from an early age.

17. Comment #6094 by Mike on November 12, 2006 at 2:45 pm

I read the account of this event, then heard some (poor quality, but gripping) audio, and finally, the video is here!

This was a very pleasant surprise gift for my Sunday evening viewing (how appropriate). Thank you for posting it! And please, keep providing downloadable files, I love them.

18. Comment #6103 by goddogit on November 12, 2006 at 4:14 pm

It was very nice that someone thought to put the plants on the stage, since the questions from the so-clever theists and "Liberty" students certainly needed a bush to beat endlessly around.

19. Comment #6121 by Linda on November 12, 2006 at 6:32 pm

I recently read The God Delusion and happened across the Cspan program tonight. Having been raised in an evangelical family, it took going to a secular college to open my eyes to the "programming" I received. But I always clung to the "agnostic" label, thinking that I couldn't be sure if there was a god or not. Dawkins has helped me cross over and acknowledge what I know deeply to be true. He has also helped me to realize that I can keep the "good" values I was raised with, without attributing them to a gray bearded (male) god in the sky. It was wonderful to see the students and faculty at Virginia Macon applauding him. We just don't hear presentations like this much on TV and I hope many will listen.

20. Comment #6123 by Randy Ping on November 12, 2006 at 6:42 pm

Yinka, nothing could be a indicative of ignorance and proud stupidity as your wretched excuse for typing.

Roy, And what proof have you that the so-called Apostle actualy wrote anything? Or that the Bible is in any way right about much of anything, for that matter?
Why, then, does every SINGLE piece of evidence ever found show that the so-called 'Holy' Bible is right about any of it's claims?
Here's an idea, why don't you go buy some real science text books and learn some things about the process of science.

21. Comment #6127 by Cynthia on November 12, 2006 at 6:59 pm

Bravo! As an American who simply cringes at the superstitious idiocy that informs the thinking of so many of my countrymen, I was buoyed by your energetic and compelling defense of reason and atheism. Between you and Sam Harris, we might have a chance yet to wrest our nation back from the Luddites.

22. Comment #6130 by David Williams on November 12, 2006 at 7:06 pm

After a belated viewing of Dawkins' speech in Lynchburg re The God Delusion, I looked at richarddawkins.net and the comments regarding the speech. I found Dawkins' comments in Lynchburg close to my own thoughts. The comments on the website troubled me (although they were not dissimilar to pro and con arguments on the existence of a god I have previously been privy to). The majority of those comments in favor of god and those in favor of athiesim were very angry in tone. I have come to expect pro god commentators to be very heated but I thought the athiests would be more rational. Gloating in Dawkins shooting down the undergraduate Liberty students does nothing to further the cause of a dialogue. Most religious believers live in fear of their god; their beliefs honed at their parents' and educators' knees; criticism and ridicule only hardens their resolve. To the extent that it is either necessary or proper to convince them of the wrong headed nature of their beliefs, it will not be accomplished by calling them stupid. As Dawkins alluded to in his Lynchburg address it is more appropriate to show that although athiests are not "god fearing" they are moralistic. That being said it is notable that the pro god comments were seemingly written by undereducated if not illiterate luddites. Their comments on the website and at the Lynchburg address do nothing to contradict Dawkins admonition to Liberty students to quit now and attend a real educational institution.

23. Comment #6134 by rob on November 12, 2006 at 7:36 pm

"do not merely comment cos it'l only bring out ur low minded sense of reasoning. explain wat u mean and do so like ur making sense and not repeatin wat ur told but u dnt noe!"

Intelligent design advocates who suggest there are no transitional forms.....take note!

24. Comment #6135 by Greg100 on November 12, 2006 at 7:56 pm

After viewing the video, I come away disappointed that this very brilliant man is wasting his time with all these sophomoric responses to his book which is an obvious ploy to make money rather than contribute. I would far prefer that he spend his time working the problem of developing an ethical system based on secular foundations, teaching people how to contribute to the unification of humanity, developing scientific understandings of the pathologies of modern society such as terrorism and how to deal with them, promotion of the concepts associated with the role of the human species in the biosphere, etc etc. I prefer to see less "anti theism" and more of the positive objectives and projects of philosphical naturalism.

25. Comment #6143 by Randy Ping on November 12, 2006 at 9:04 pm

The only appropriate response to the willfully ignorant is to rebuke them as harshly as they deserve. Playing nice hasn't worked for the last century adn a half. The circular logic and same old tired and defeated arguments that theist use deserves no respect. We should be radical. We should be confrontational, because there is nothing worthy of respect in the superstitionist arguments (and I am loathe to even dignify their non-sense based, laughable attempts at retort with the word 'argument').

26. Comment #6154 by Kingasaurus on November 12, 2006 at 10:40 pm

Nothing like a Dawkins speech broadcast on C-Span to bring the creationist wingnuts out to this website in droves.

27. Comment #6155 by Badger on November 12, 2006 at 10:49 pm

I've posted the video on YouTube for all those poor souls frustrated by QuickTime. RealPlayer also works with .mov files these days, but here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0Y7lhqkiig

I have to say, I saw the recent South Park crap... I've met Professor Dawkins and he can be playfully childlike on the stage and then horribly curt face-to-face, which feels like an overt slap. But this is how all serious professors (especially the British) tend to be, and I suspect it is in self defense more than anything else... so the sick images conjured up for Comedy Central viewwers on his behalf do nothing but demonstrate just how low the cheap gimmick of "not taking anything seriously" can go. I guess it might be fun to insult everyone in your world, without having a point to it, particularly when you know nobody's going to do it back to you (because you are so pathetically irrelevant). But it is, ultimately, pointless, and blatantly denigrates the human species. Why bother? I was mistaken to think South Park was a vehicle to accomplish something. Maybe this is just Parker & Stone covering their butts after all the religious people they've upset.

28. Comment #6161 by Anonymous on November 12, 2006 at 11:56 pm

3000 year old Dinosaurs--have they applied for the James Randi's million dollar challenge?

29. Comment #6171 by Steve on November 13, 2006 at 1:05 am

Sounds good, if confrontational (which maybe the USA and some others deserve). Sadly I haven't read 'The God Delusion' yet, as my S.O. is saving it for my Christmas present(!). But scientists are good at discussing hypotheses neutrally and one I'd like to see addressed here is not very far from 'What if you are wrong?' - "What if this all-pervasive religious thing has, or had, or may yet have a survival value (as an irrational 'meme'), nevertheless selected for improved utility irrespective of its 'truth'?" Has human civilisation (all of it?) passed that stage, or might the (selfish gene) survivors of the next ice-age depend on an intellectual 'bios' which drives then-necessary compulsive behaviour?

30. Comment #6175 by Basil on November 13, 2006 at 1:47 am

Yinka,

Please, do yourself a favour. Read some books on evolutionary theory. Try at least to grasp its more subtle concepts and implications. Of course, you could read Prof. Dawkins' books as they are the clearest and most understandable. But if you have some objection to his words, you could try just about any accredited scientist. There is nothing to be afraid of. You might even enjoy it.
Remember, they don't ask you to believe anything that they haven't observed through consistent, replicable evidence.

31. Comment #6176 by goddogit on November 13, 2006 at 1:48 am

Would the Lokis please cut it out.

it aint funy for u too muck te igernant, it tire some.

32. Comment #6182 by Hipshot Percussion on November 13, 2006 at 2:50 am

I feel the need to respond to Comment #6143 by Randy Ping. While frustration with the willfully or innocently ignorant lead by the dishonest and deluded is understandable, your suggestion that we should hold the lot of them in contempt will be ineffective in defeating this monster. We need to win their hearts and minds, by showing them respect as fellow seekers after truth and teaching them what we know.

Reading these comments I'm struck by how poorly educated and defensive they sound. Imagine feeling the need to defend a logically indefensible position against your intellectual superiors.

I've had some success discussing these issues with Bible literalists. I use arguments such as "Jesus spoke in parables, that shows that scripture should be understood symbolically, it wasn't supposed to be a science book" or "a million years would be like a day to God, so he could have used evolution to as his means of creation", or "maybe Genesis was talking about the divine principal arising from animal consciousness when it says 'in the beginning was the Word' which was God who gave us dominion over the beasts and kicked us out of the Garden as soon as we tasted Knowledge".

In other words, I assume they take the subject seriously and try to stretch their interpretation rather than dismiss them as fools or blast away at something that's important to them. Mostly they're good honest simple people who haven't had any reason to question what their family taught them, and who see a lot of good flowing from their beliefs.

Of course that doesn't apply to the cynical power-driven bastards who take advantage of them. You gotta wonder how much Jerry Falwell or Ted Haggard actually believe of what they preach, but it's easy to see where Karl Rove stands.

33. Comment #6188 by A.Lex on November 13, 2006 at 3:55 am

Josh,
Can you weed out the incoherent, insulting, bandwidth wasting, atrociously spelled babble from this forum (e.g. yinka's)?

34. Comment #6285 by Tatarize on November 13, 2006 at 1:30 pm

It is actually acceptable to allow people to download large files as via bittorrent and save your bandwidth. You should still have the static link, just also have other methods of download that aren't so draining.

Another interesting thing is that it would get placed on bittorrent tracker search sites after a short while and could easily get tens of thousands more downloads.

35. Comment #6322 by Tatarize on November 13, 2006 at 4:00 pm

The 23 feet answer is correct.

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&hl=en&saddr=San+Francisco,+CA&daddr=New+York,+NY&ie=UTF8&z=4&om=1
Looks up the missing data for distance.

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&safe=off&q=2%2C915+miles+%2F+%284+billion+years+%2F+6000+years%29+in+feet&btnG=Search
Google search:
2,915 miles / (4 billion years / 6000 years) in feet

36. Comment #6349 by Peter on November 13, 2006 at 7:36 pm

Thank you very much for streaming this for us. Professor Dawkins really does a service and I'm so glad that given some of the rather preposterous questions from the Liberty folks that he got to tell them to go to "a proper university."

37. Comment #6443 by Kingasaurus on November 14, 2006 at 9:28 am

Oh fer cryin' out loud...

38. Comment #6445 by Youssef51 on November 14, 2006 at 9:50 am

To WJG #101

I would like to help you with a reasoned explanation but all the relevant data was destroyed by the Great Flood.

Which also drowned all the fish.

Please review Genesis 19.

Yours faithfully,

Youssef

39. Comment #6607 by Kingasaurus on November 15, 2006 at 4:39 am

You forgot the fourth option, genius. "Legend."

When you want to play in the intellectual sandbox, it helps to bring some weapons. Thanks for playing.

Long live Poe's law!

40. Comment #6680 by IANVS on November 15, 2006 at 10:30 am

Richard, you may find this useful.

Joey was raised by Polish-American Catholic family in Ohio River Valley, schooled by dedicated nuns at Cathedral Grade School, served as altar boy, recruited & studied at Catholic HS Seminary & Jesuit University.

The Jesuits taught Joey to question everything, esp. his faith, because it strengthens understanding & faith. Joey did. He served in the military, married & raised 5 boys, and evolved into an agnostic-atheist.

Now 50-something, educated, financially successful, and independent-minded, Joey conceals his non-belief to avoid hurting his family, relatives, and good friends whom he deeply cares about, widowed & infirm mother, elderly Polish aunts, seminarian classmates some ordained priests.

41. Comment #6945 by IANVS on November 16, 2006 at 9:05 am

The dearth of logic amid the posted attacks against believers argues that Richard Dawkins has no little task before him, even amongst the unshackled.

Do rants from either side persuade any man or woman?

Does seething anger lead to understanding and enlightenment?

Recall what Descartes didn't say: "I think not, therefore I ain't!"

Rock on, Richard, we have miles to go before we sleep!

42. Comment #7451 by Robert on November 18, 2006 at 2:53 pm

@Gary 114

Dawkins does not advocate violence. You are taking his point and extrapolating it far too far. He believes religion is wrong. Yes, perhaps it is natural to question and which is why we formed beliefs for these hard questions and why religion came about. However, these 'groups and beliefs' that we have formed are now outdated. Their questions are not only unsatisfying but outright untrue. That I think is a good reason for not welcoming religion. It no longer fits in with the world we live in now and it is a very destruction force in ones life.

43. Comment #7490 by Brian on November 18, 2006 at 4:08 pm

Check out Lewis Black's recent HBO special. He calls creationists "stone-cold fu*% nuts" and said they watch the Flintstones like it's a documentary. He even speaks of our "president" saying the jury is still out on evolution. Brilliant stuff!

44. Comment #8021 by wayne on November 20, 2006 at 7:54 am

Is an almighty God the ultimate atheist?

45. Comment #9215 by Richard on November 24, 2006 at 6:23 am

I've just been listening to it and really enjoying it. I've also added the book to my Amazon shopping basket, which I think will cause some concern amongst family members.

An interesting exercise is to try comparing all the religions from the point of view that none of them have any external reason to be any better than any of the others. There are common ideas which are interesting, the morality side and bits about too much egoism being a bad thing, but then we see where other ideas have run away and been taken to extreme. It leads you (or me anyway) to just trying to find the common denominator and answering questions like "What happens after I die" answered as "I don't know, and don't really care".

The book will be filed in the "various religious books" section as opposed to the "engineering books" or "natural world" one. I'm hoping when the kids grow up they can look at the various arguments, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, Pure Science, and make up their own minds.

46. Comment #9490 by Simon on November 24, 2006 at 10:49 pm

You picked Liberty to challenge you and then use that as some sort of a victory cry? No wonder you made a joke of them. These are the bible-thumpin' predominately Baptist kids who were never allowed to think for themselves. You should be ashamed of yourself. At any rate, I was slightly disappointed that you used the crowd as a tool to strengthen your ego instead of objecting with them on their level. You only impressed the weakest of theist minds.

47. Comment #9507 by Chase on November 25, 2006 at 12:20 am

Very impressive: One of the world's top (if not the top) philosophical atheists, while holding the high ground (most advantageous position....from the speaker's podium) is able to fend off several green college students.

Isn't this kind of like getting excited about the U.S. military repelling an invasion from the Swiss? Yeah, come to think of, it's not very impressive at all, is it? It's not worth getting too worked up about, and I'm a little surprised to see this crowed about on your site, Dr. Dawkins.

Commentors: wouldn't you rather see him go up against Oxford University philosopher Alister McGrath, who has written a book in response to Dawkin's blind watchmaker, or perhaps even Francis Collins, head of the Human Genome project?

The Mcgrath book:
(http://www.amazon.com/Dawkins-God-Genes-Memes-Meaning/dp/1405125381/sr=11-1/qid=116444

Just because some Christians are a little (a lot?) on the green/ignorant/obnoxious side doesn't mean that they all are, nor does it mean that what they advocate isn't true.

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