With all due respect (because you are one of my heros) whadaya mean, consciousness is some big mystery?! Don't give 'em that wedge! Follow your own implacable logic. Consciousness is merely the end result of Homo Sapiens' survival adaptation. Consciousness is what makes us the supreme predator. Consciousness is as much a logical end of evolution as a bird's wing.

As for the rest, humans do what makes them FEEL GOOD. We FEEL GOOD when certain brain chemicals are activated. So we keep doing the stuff that activates those brain chemicals so we can keep on FEELING GOOD. Everything from love, to sex to suicide bombing can be explained by the action of our brain chemicals.

If we would just use our consciousness to modulate our addiction to our own brain chemicals, we might actually evolve beyond our supreme predator state. But those damned chemicals are strong. As is our love of them. Seems to me the challenge of being human is to use consciousness to control the action of our primitive brain and its chemicals. Until we do that? We're the great predator..mostly on each other.

All religious experience? Just brain chemicals at work. No god required. It is the great tragedy of the religious among us that they just cannot accept this, even though the evidence is as plain as ABC.

Love ya Richard. You are THE MAN!

I'm a big fan of Dawkins because he refuses to dilute his opinions (and facts) to suit current sensitivities. I suspect that almost every scientist (and thinking person) agrees with him, but it's still a bit of a shock to see someone talk so openly about the falsity of religion.

Compare and contrast with other liberal writers on religion like Karen Armstrong (who has also featured on Salon) for instance. I can't imagine for a second that Armstrong really believes in a personal god. She writes whole books documenting the various mythologies that gave rise to contemporary religious beliefs- but she becomes annoyingly vague and mystical about the big question- i.e. does god actually exist or not?

Not only does the emperor have no clothes, but She never existed in the first place.

(By the way- I'm convinced that God does not exist- but Dawkins' attacks on Thor are offensive and leave me cold. How dare he insult the mighty T on a Thursday? The holy day for us Thorists.)

Religion is a part of human society that will, eventually, evolve out of humanity like the tail we once had but now lose in the womb. Religion has allowed men to live in communities with shared purpose, it has controlled the masses, as Marx pointed out, and it has simplified existence for eons of humanity. It has also led to more murder and violence than any other human creation, which for me at least, outweighs any benefit that it may have brought with it. I have come to accept that in my lifetime religion will not be erased from the human experience, that people will continue to self-deceive themselves into horrific acts of violence in its name and that my own disbelief could someday put my own life at risk. Dawkins is leading the way to a brighter future, and I applaud him. The next great step in evolution will be the triumph of reason over religion, the alternative is the same as that faced by all creatures maladapted to their environment, extinction.

Think as ye like matey, but be careful next time you be in yer mess, making up a pot o cheese macaroni! You risk experiencing the wrath o the Flying Spaghetti Monster first hand, and he may jest send ye down to Davey Jones Locker.

Essentially I agree with everything Dawkins says about religion, but the only problem is that he sees the problem of religion as primarily an intellectual one.

His answer to how we know right from wrong--that we can apply the Golden Rule--is perfectly rational if we are dealing with perfectly rational people who are susceptible to education, but most of the time we are not.

The difficulty I have is this. I don't want to give any credit to the Falwells and the Robertsons of this world (or the next, if any), but I am a landlord of low rental apartments, and it is my observation that if I have tenants who are religious types, then they pay their rent on time, don't make a lot of noise, don't throw cigarette butts and litter around the property, put their trash out on the sidewalk, keep their apartments clean, occcasionally pour some bleach in the toilet, etc., etc., whereas if I have tenants who are not of a religious bent, they tend to have all the opposite qualities.

Same goes for dealing with businesses. I have no interest in patronizing businesses that identify themselves as Christian per se, but they are often more honest to deal with, and although the people who repair my car are devout Muslims who have articles about what unclean animals pigs are posted in their waiting area, I (a habitual consumer of pork) find them to be totally trustworthy, which is more than I can say for most of their secular brothers in the motor carriage trade.

Hence, I think that what Dawkins say is all techically correct, it is not very practical at the current stage of the evolution of homo sapiens.

...to find out where summons button resides. For some people it is race, for others ethnicity, here in California it's fat people, and for Richard Dawkins and his ilk it's religion. I am simply stunned that so much religious bigotry gets a free pass - even admiration! And don't tell me you have to believe in it to be a bigot about it. You don't, and here's the proof.

Right after Dawkins' words make me laugh out loud at the wonder of a logical mind that is this articulate and demanding and uncompromising, it strikes me that ignorance and superstition will always win out at the end of the day. Sad but true. Consciousness, that mystery, lies very uncomfortable on all but the brightest minds, and so fairy tales must be told, and will be believed, for a very long time. Because the fairy tales are what shield believers from their utter, abject terror at their own impermanence, they will fight bloody tooth and nail against those who do not believe -- whereas scientists are more likely to say, "Whatever. Believe what you want, I have a paper to write." So thank goodness for Dawkins, but we need another few billion of him if reason is going to win the war.