Dawkins Raises the Rhetorical Stakes

The world's most famous atheist, Richard Dawkins, is coming out with a new book next month, The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution. In his book, Dawkins claims that people (like me) who question the Darwinian Theory of Evolution should be placed on the same level as Holocaust deniers.


According to Dawkins:

"Evolution is a fact. Beyond reasonable doubt, beyond serious doubt, beyond sane, informed, intelligent doubt, beyond doubt evolution is a fact. The evidence for evolution is at least as strong as the evidence for the Holocaust, even allowing for eye witnesses to the Holocaust.... Evolution is a theory in the same sense as the heliocentric theory."

Lawrence Auster - who's been on a roll lately - asks a question that answers itself...

If Darwinian evolution is as factual as the fact that the earth orbits the sun, why would Dawkins have to say it so insistently? If he were speaking about heliocentrism, would he use the same terms in which he speaks about Darwinian evolution?...Clearly he wouldn't speak so hysterically, "protesting too much," about the earth orbiting the sun. Why? Because there's no question that the earth orbits the sun. But there is a lot of question about Darwinian evolution. And that's why when he asserts its absolute facticity he becomes openly unhinged.

I've written about Dawkins many times - usually in a critical way (see here, here, and here, for instance), but one time I praised him (see here).

Also, you many have noticed a resemblance between Dawkins and one of the characters in my book. The name similarity ain't a coincidence.

H/T: Lawrence Auster.

Read Auster's entire essay for a happy fisking of Dawkins.