Some believers are fundamentalists about everything, but every believer is a fundamentalist about something.
Jerry A. CoyneCan a geology teacher blithely tell his students that the earth is flat, or a European history professor that the Holocaust didn't happen? That's not academic freedom, but dereliction of duty.
Jerry A. CoyneReligion is based on dogma and belief, whereas science is based on doubt and questioning.
Jerry A. CoyneThe fact that both Jews and Christians ignore some of God's or Jesus's commands, but scrupulously obey others, is absolute proof that people pick and choose their morality not on the basis of its divine source, but because it comports with some innate morality that they derived from other sources.
Jerry A. CoyneNow, science cannot completely exclude the possibility of supernatural explanation. It is possible though very unlikely that our whole world is controlled by elves. But supernatural explanations like these are simply never needed; we manage to understand the natural world just fine using reason and materialism.
Jerry A. Coyne