Richard Dawkins Quotes

English - Scientist | March 26, 1941 -

Design can never be an ultimate explanation for anything. It can only be a proximate explanation. A plane or a car is explained by a designer but that's because the designer himself, the engineer, is explained by natural selection.

Richard Dawkins

CarDesignNeverAnythingNatural

Scientists disagree among themselves but they never fight over their disagreements. They argue about evidence or go out and seek new evidence. Much the same is true of philosophers, historians and literary critics.

Richard Dawkins

FightGoNewTrueNeverOver

Something pretty mysterious had to give rise to the origin of the universe.

Richard Dawkins

UniverseRiseMysteriousPrettyGive

If you were to actually travel around schools and universities and listen in on lectures about evolution, you might find a fairly substantial fraction of young people, without knowing what it is they disapprove of, think they disapprove of it, because they've been brought up to.

Richard Dawkins

TravelPeopleThinkYouFindYoung

How can you take seriously someone who likes to believe something because he finds it 'comforting'?

Richard Dawkins

BelieveSomeoneYouSeriouslyTake

People say I'm shrill and strident.

Richard Dawkins

PeopleSayPeople SayShrill

We've all been brought up with the view that religion has some kind of special privileged status. You're not allowed to criticise it.

Richard Dawkins

ReligionViewYouKindSpecialUp

I think there is a sort of box-ticking mentality. Not just in the teaching profession. You hear about it in medicine and nursing. It's a lawyer-driven insistence on meeting prescribed standards rather than just being a good doctor.

Richard Dawkins

GoodDoctorMedicineThinkYouJust

I certainly would absolutely never do what some of my American colleagues do and object to religious symbols being used, putting crosses up in the public square and things like that. I don't fret about that at all; I'm quite happy about that.

Richard Dawkins

HappyColleaguesAmericanNeverUp

I live in a post-Christian world in Oxford; it is quite rare to meet somebody who is religious in academic life now, and there is absolutely no tendency for rioting and mayhem, and it is extremely civilised.

Richard Dawkins

LifeLiveWorldNowMeetRare

Religion teaches you to be satisfied with nonanswers. It's a sort of crime against childhood.

Richard Dawkins

ChildhoodReligionYouCrimeAgainst

It is immoral to brand children with religion. 'This is a Catholic child.' 'That is a Muslim child.' I want everyone to flinch when they hear such a phrase, just as they would if they heard, 'That is a Marxist child.'

Richard Dawkins

ChildrenReligionChildBrandWant

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