I think we don't do a service to dialogue between science and faith to characterize sincere people by calling them names. That inspires an even more dug-in position.

All life evolves by the differential survival of replicating entities.

There isn't [in new atheism]. Nothing that wasn't in Bertrand Russell or probably Robert Ingersoll. But I suppose it is more of a political effect, in that all these books happened to come out at the same time. I like to think that we have some influence.

I just would like to say that over more than a quarter-century as a scientist and a believer, I find absolutely nothing in conflict between agreeing with Richard [Dawkins] in practically all of his conclusions about the natural world, and also saying that I am still able to accept and embrace the possibility that there are answers that science isn't able to provide about the natural world - the questions about why instead of the questions about how. I'm interested in the whys.

If you are asking me if my more global purpose is a battle against religion, it is.

When we started out and we were talking about the origins of the universe and the physical constants, I provided what I thought were cogent arguments against a supernatural intelligent designer. But it does seem to me to be a worthy idea.

A gene might be able to assist replicas of itself that are sitting in other bodies. If so, this would appear as individual altruism but it would be brought about by gene selfishness.