Just because science so far has failed to explain something, such as consciousness, to say it follows that the facile, pathetic explanations which religion has produced somehow by default must win the argument is really quite ridiculous.
Richard DawkinsBut, however many ways there may be of being alive, it is certain that there are vastly more ways of being dead, or rather not alive.
Richard Dawkins[Jay] Gould sets up an artificial wall between the two worldviews that doesn't exist in my life.
Richard DawkinsYou are born into a dangerous world, there are all sorts of ways in which you could die, and you need to believe your parents when they tell you don't go near the edge of the cliff, or don't pick up that snake, etc. There could very well be a Darwinian survival value in that sort of brain rule of thumb. And a by-product of that could be that you believe your parents when they tell you about the juju in the sky, or whatever it might be.
Richard Dawkins