Dawkins on Newsnight argues that god is a delusion.
But, what's this got to do with teapots you ask? Well, the allusion is to philosopher Bertrand Russell's argument quoted by Dawkins:
"If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time."
-- Bertrand Russell, "Is There a God?" commissioned by, but never published in, Illustrated Magazine (1952)
The Dawkins' interview has inspired a lot of venom and bile on both sides of the argument at Digg for instance and on the YouTube page hosting it.
You can order Dawkins' latest book The God Delusion
here
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