Mr. Dawkins, why was Darwin right? – Richard Dawkins

Richard Dawkins, the world's most famous atheist and author of numerous best-selling books, decided to abandon the enlightenment of adults, and with his new book “The Magic of Reality: How We Know What's Really True” he focuses on 5-year-olds, claiming that they have to learn the theory of evolution along with their first letters. 

Richard Dawkins is no longer satisfied with his books that challenge the existence of God and which are sold in millions of copies, or with the fact that “liberal” media is placing him among the stars and call him “the most famous atheist in the world”. He is also no longer interested in suing Pope Benedict XVI for "crimes against humanity", because of alleged covering up of sexual abuses in the Catholic Church. Dawkins now has a new target audience, which he wants win and teach them how religion is bad – the kids, preschool kids. 

Richard Dawkins, great intellectual, evolutionary biologist, writer and professor at Oxford University, has recently published his latest book “The Magic of Reality: How We Know What's Really True”, aimed primarily at preschool children. In just as short period, this book raised more dust – and more calls for a ban – than his best-sellers like “The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe without Design” (in which he challenged the theory that any invention must have its inventor, and which served to believers as a great analogy and key evidence for the existence of the Almighty),  or The God Delusion (in which he brings many proofs that there is no God that supposedly governs our lives).

Dawkins says that he was annoyed because the opponents Darwin's theory of evolution are occupying too much space in the media, especially in the United States, where nominated Republican candidates for the next presidential elections are regularly competing who will more effectively end successfully challenge the thesis that man has evolved from apes.

Therefore, this scientist concluded that children have to get lessons regarding basic principles of evolution already during kindergarten. And especially in the first grade.

“No educated person believes the Adam and Eve myth nowadays, but it is surprising how many parents think that it is somehow fun to pass on this falsehood (and others in the same vein) to their children. Evolution is a truly satisfying and complete explanation of existence, and I suspect that this is something a child can appreciate from an early age. But I would want to argue that the truth of evolution is more interesting and more poetic — even more fun — than this myth, or any of the hundreds of creation myths from around the world. And — perhaps surprisingly — evolution could be taught in such a way as to make it easier to understand than a myth. This is because myths leave the child’s questions unanswered, or they raise more questions than they appear to answer.” – said Dawkins

The book begins with a dedication to Dawkins’ father, John Dawkins, who died last year at the age of 95.

„I learned from my father that we need continual reconsideration, skepticism, search for evidence and understanding in order to comprehend what evidence is” – says Dawkins.

Dawkins has actually inherited faith from his father. Although he claims that he had already, at the age of nine, started questioning the existence of God, he says that he was persuaded into it, and that is why he, at that age, wholeheartedly accepted Christianity. However, in his teenage years he concluded that the theory of evolution is a much better explanation for the complexity of life and he ceased to believe in God.

From there, through education at Oxford and the first professorial job at Berkeley, to what his opponents call "militant atheism", it didn’t take long.

“Like computer viruses, successful mind viruses will tend to be hard for their victims to detect. If you are the victim of one, the chances are that you won't know it, and may even vigorously deny it. The patient typically finds himself impelled by some deep, inner conviction that something is true, or right, or virtuous: a conviction that doesn't seem to owe anything to evidence or reason, but which, nevertheless, he feels as totally compelling and convincing. We doctors refer to such a belief as ``faith.''” – Dawkins wrote in his famous essay “Viruses of the Mind”.

He is convinced that if there was no organized religion, the terrorist attacks from 11 September 2001 wouldn’t occurred. The critics say that when he publicly said that, he became dangerous opponent of religion. And not only Christian, but all the others.

“Many of us saw religion as harmless nonsense. Beliefs might lack all supporting evidence but, we thought, if people needed a crutch for consolation, where's the harm? September 11th changed all that. – says Dawkins. “Revealed faith is not harmless nonsense, it can be lethally dangerous nonsense. Dangerous because it gives people unshakeable confidence in their own righteousness. Dangerous because it gives them false courage to kill themselves, which automatically removes normal barriers to killing others. Dangerous because it teaches enmity to others labeled only by a difference of inherited tradition. And dangerous because we have all bought into a weird respect, which uniquely protects religion from normal criticism. Let's now stop being so damned respectful!”

His works are controversial – and the word “controversial” is even an understatement. A large number of Christians - especially educated ones – found it necessary to slap him in his face regarding how wrong he is. Oxford theologian Alister McGrath (author of The Dawkins Delusion and Dawkins' God) claims that Dawkins has no knowledge of Christian theology, and therefore, he can’t possibly intelligently reflect upon religion and faith.

Dawkins immediately fired back:

“Do you have to read up on leprechology before disbelieving in leprechauns?"

In 2007, Dawkins had, similarly to the associations of homosexuals who organize parades and insist that people should "get out of the closet" and admit they are gay, founded the "Out Campaign" to encourage as many people around the world as possible to publicly say that they are atheists. According to his opinion, this may well change the mindset of most people – and further, the mindset of Richard’s atheists – who will once again think about their faith.

The biggest "excursion to the mainstream," other than his written word, Dawkins had in 2008. Then, he was one of the first people who supported the first atheist initiative in UK, called the “Atheist Bus Campaign”.

Guardian journalist Ariane Sherine and her colleagues from the "British Humanist Association" decided to raise money in order to place atheist adverts on buses in the London area.

On January 2009, across Britain appeared buses with the message: "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life."

On one occasion he agreed to answer questions from readers of reputable newspaper "Independent". On that occasion, he spoke for the first time about children’s education from the perspective of religion.

Do you consider parents forcing children to accept their religion a form of child abuse?- asked  reader James Macdonald.

Dawkins answered:

“Yes. What would you think of parents who forced their children to accept their politics, or their taste in architecture? Have you ever heard anyone speak of a "Leninist child" or a "Postmodernist child"? Of course not. Why, then, do we all go along with "Christian child" and "Muslim child"? Such labeling of children with their parents' religion is child abuse.”

Dawkins has a solution and for adults:

“People who would laugh at the idea that a pumpkin could turn into a coach, and who know perfectly well that silk handkerchiefs don’t really turn into rabbits, are quite happy to believe that a prophet turned water into wine or, as devotees of another religion would have it, flew to heaven on a winged horse.”

“Without contraception, we will starve”

Besides God and gods, Dawkins is opposed to all those who do not want to think about family planning and control of world’s population. In his book “The Selfish Gene”, he gives the example of Latin America, where the population doubles every few decades. He didn’t of course miss the chance to mention Catholics because their church clearly opposes contraception.

“... leaders who forbid their followers to use effective contraceptive methods ... express a preference for "natural" methods of population limitation, and a natural method is exactly what they are going to get. It is called starvation.”

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The faithful servant – Count Alessandro di Cagliostro (Giuseppe Balsamo)

During Count Alessandro di Cagliostro’s (1743 – 1795) lifetime, and especially after his death, many incredible stories were circulating among the people about his wizarding powers.

One of many was a rumor that he had discovered the potion of “eternal youth” and that he was more than 300 years old.

Unfortunately, curious people were unable to confirm nor refute these rumors.

One of them asked Cagliostro’s servant if he knew how old his master really was.

Bearing in mind the kind of answer the curious man was expecting, witty servant replied:

- I have no idea how old my master is! I am in his service for merely a century!

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How the Legends Are Born: The Magic Rope.

Apparently, witnesses saw a child climbing to a rope that stands in the air, and then it disappeared... This was, like breaking news, published in a newspaper in 1890, and after that, many have unsuccessfully attempted to perform this amazing magic trick.

For more than a century around the world is orbiting an incredible story about the appearance that originates from India. It is about illusion trick with a rope and a boy who disappears.

The original performance was like this: in the open space, fakir takes a long rope and throws it into the air where it remains standing upright, as if hung on something. Fakir’s assistant, a boy, then climbs the rope, and when he comes to the end, he suddenly disappears. Fakir then calls him to return, but there is no trace of the boy. After a few moments fakir himself climbs up, armed with a knife, and he also disappears. Then from the sky dismembered body parts begin to fall. Fakir however comes down from heaven, pulls the rope, covers the remains of body with canvas and, suddenly, hocus-pocus - here's the boy alive and well.

“It would be truly amazing performance” - says Peter Lamont, magic historian and researcher from the University of Edinburgh. “Too bad it was not true. About this performance was first heard in 1890 thanks to the writing of the American newspaper the Chicago Tribune. Journalist John Elbert Wilkie admitted later that it was an ordinary summer canard. What he certainly did not expect was that this canard will gain so much fame.”

Wilkie’s article from the Tribune was re-published in many other papers, even overseas, but when the article that was published four months later, in which editorial was refuting the news, came out, everyone else remained quiet. In 1904 even the first alleged witness appeared claiming that he saw with his own eyes the Indian rope trick. His name was Sebastian Burchett. But as soon as the members of the English Society for Psychical Research began to ask him questions, it was immediately clear that he had too vivid imagination. And this was the umpteenth example of "unreliability of memory when it comes to these things," the experts said.

“However, this legend, which spoke about the unknown and mysterious India, just in the way the colonial culture of that time seen it, became so famous that she could no longer be forgotten or even destroyed” - explains Lamont. “Thus, some people tried to explain this game with a rope, claiming that it was a case of mass hypnosis. Fakir would lead into a trance all viewers and then they saw what really was not happening. The explanation was so unconvincing that the first photographs have begun to appear in an effort to overturn assumptions about the mass hypnosis.”

"Strand Magazine", a magazine that published the adventures of Sherlock Holmes, was first that, in 1919, delighted readers with a photo of "the most famous magic trick in the world." It was made by certain F. V. Holmes, multi-decorated officer (who is not in any relationship with the famous detective from stories). According to Holmes, the rope was unwounded, thrown into the air and there was left to stand like it was rigid. Then a boy climbed up and remained standing at the top. Just when the officer shot the photo, the boy disappeared. "I do not know how to explain it," was his response.

Therefore, other explanations of this puzzle were offered. In the thirties of last century, a German illusionist said that the rope was, in fact, masked, and that it consisted of sheep bones, stuck one in another, so that it made a kind of a pole on which the boy could climb up. In the fifties yet another interpretation was argued, that the trick was performed in some valley. Wire, as thin as a strand of hair, was torn between two mountains, and the rope was, after being thrown in the air by fakir, attached to this invisible wire with a hidden hook. The performance was showed at night, and the boy was climbing the rope and disappearing into the darkness and smoke of burning fire. Then would the fakir, wearing wide cape, climb to the top of the rope from where he will throw pieces of limbs of a monkey, which he slashed previously, to the ground. Finally, the boy would hide under the cape and come along with a magician so that everything looks like he came out of nowhere.

“All these explanations are much more astonishing than the very performance of this story” - says Peter Lamont. “Who could replace sheep bone for a rope? And where did existed a wire, as thin as a hair, that could be crucified between two hills and withstand the weight of two people? All of them had, in fact, tried to clarify a mystery that never existed. Photos like the one Holmes depicted did not show an Indian rope, but something else entirely: keeping the balance on the long stalks of bamboo, which is still active in some parts of India and China. There the acrobat girds himself with a thick rope around his waist, and akimbo a long bamboo pole and elevate it. Along it, then, climbs another guy who, when he reaches the top, is standing on it for a few moments keeping his balance.”

Because of this, Lamont was, as a researcher, interested in how did the various magician witnesses were able to substitute a regular game of balance with an incredible trick with Indian rope. Along with an English psychologist Richard Wiseman, he assumed that there is a connection between a sensationalism of a story and the time that elapsed between events and reports of it. In other words, the researchers started from the fact that telling of a witness becomes more astonishing as time goes on.

They gathered all attestations that they found in books, studies and newspaper articles: total 48 of them. They eliminated all recounting of hearsay, as well as documents which do not indicate year of the event or did not contain detailed descriptions. The remaining evidences - they counted 21 - were divided into five groups, according to the degree of sensationalism. Their conclusion, for the umpteenth time, confirmed the assumption of extreme unreliability of memory regarding the magic performances. Witnesses from the documents that they found had actually seen people standing on a pole, but as the years passed, they added to their description elements from what they had read or heard from stories. And, what a surprise: from the thirties and onwards there was no one who claimed that he saw the climbing a rope trick.

The real secret of the show with an Indian rope is in our head and there it withstands time. Our mind mixes real events we witnessed and legends we heard, creating in this way a compelling story. It never happened, but it is nevertheless convincing and exciting.

There is more ;)

In the late 19th and early 20th century the performance with the Indian rope has become so popular that some magicians began to consider it a threat to their profession. It seemed to them that the Indian illusionists were far more skilled than their colleagues from the West, and the most prominent among them started climbing to discover what the trick is. They even went to India to examine the gurus and fakirs, apparently without success. Then they tried to perform this trick in the theater, with weights that they themselves invented. Unfortunately, no one succeeded: one thing was to hear stories about this art, and completely other to try to perform it in an entirely different environment, such is the stage.

Because of this, for magicians the trick with Indian rope is even today "the greatest illusion ever conceived in the world," though never carried out. Nor it can be grasped, experts in this field say: it is like the Holy Grail in the magician’s world.

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