Reading 2 books currently, "Did God Create The Universe From Nothing: Countering William Lane Craig's Kalam Cosmological Argument" by Jonathan MS Pearce & re-reading "Gulliver's Travels" by Jonathan Swift.

@phxbillcee another multiple book reader. It's hard to stick to just one at a time when there are so many to read, isn't it?

@Condor5 I'm so bad at this that over the years I've tried to make a rule of no more than 3 at a time. Doesn't always work, but I'm much better now!!!

@phxbillcee and @Condor5, Guys! I'm lucky reading one at a time. If I was to read more than one, I'm afraid the information or stories would be so intertwined that by the time I finished, it would be one big mess. LOL

@WizardBill no, not a failure, everybody is different. I'm on the same page with you about women, however. Except right now it's none at a time.

I read one book at a time, save for studies in college. As mentioned above, I immerse and it's hard for me to keep the story lines 'disentangled' if I do more than one at a time... that said, I have recently started listening to books on long drive and I find that I can listen to one book while reading another... um, not at the same time. I mean that I can basically read two books in the same time frame if one is print and the other audio.

What I like about audio is that some of the readers (and plays!) are amazing! What I dislike about audio is I find that the details are just lost. I retain so very little about them... which means that audio is strictly pleasure for me, and more, strictly the reading equivalent of cotton candy.

Thank you!

Well, that's somewhat true, but books like his also help the non-believer organize his thoughts/arguments & work out questions they may still have or haven't considered.

@phxbillcee Fair point. I only read it about a year ago, and I'd already had considerable exposure to Dawkins on YouTube, along with other prominent atheists, so I didn't actually find any completely new arguments. It was a good read, though, and it definitely helped me refine my pre-prepared barrage of common sense.

Thanks for you comments.

Thanks!

Thanks for sharing!

Great! Thanks!

I don't agree at all!

Thanks! Every penny counts!

I get just the opposite vibe. I don't think Dawkins comes across as the least bit arrogant.

@Eazyduzzit I agree. I have seen videos where he has been so patient with absolutely rude idiots & kept his composure throughout! He's a great educator & a great spokesman for rational thought!

I don't agree at all!

I imagine your opinion extends to Sam Harris who accuses the Koran as a "wellspring of bad ideas". I am sure that much of their ire for Islam stems from the actions of driven individuals. It became a sort of low hanging fruit that drove the conversation of the validity of religion as a whole. The term "islamophobia" is a nonstarter. Makes about as much sense as christophobia, judeophobia or hindophobia.

@phxbillcee do you have that saved on your clipboard to paste?

With regards to religion, I don't agree with all of Hitchens views, when I came across him a couple of years ago he articulated exactly what I felt about religion. I wouldn't consider myself either Islamaphobic nor xenophobic but quite possibly theistophobic. But wouldn't this forum be boring if we all agreed on everything?

@Hicks66 The koran AND the bible ARE a wellspring of bad ideas! & they have both driven otherwise possibly decent people to horrific acts over the centuries. & in a way I have theo-phobia! I think they are all potentially dangerous!

@EricTrommater So, no, I don't think I'll be posting that, I find that argument spurious & a complete red-herring, as I do with most of the complaints on Dawkins. I have seen many of his video clips & he's been much more soft-spoken & patient than I believe much of the rest of us would be. I think most of his bad rap came from his "Most unpleasant character in all fiction." list & quote from chapt. 2 of "The God Delusion".

@EricTrommater, I just wish you could be more open, tell me how you really feel. We are all friends here (I thought, LOL). Thanks, I do appreciate ALL points of view!

While I do not find Hitch or Dawkins to be small minded in their commentary, I'm intrigued to know which representatives of unbelief you prefer to read or listen to.

@atheist I shouldn't have to since anyone with Twitter knows Dawkins views, but he has asked why Islamic scholars haven’t produced as many Nobel prizes winners as Jews; he has said that it is immoral not to abort a fetus known to have Down syndrome; he has tried to logically differentiate between rape at knife point and date rape. Remember the way he went after the kid who got confused for a terrorist when he made a clock for his high school project? How about his little stunt with the fake letter presumably from a Muslim woman who had been genitally mutilated to shut down the woman who legitimately complained about guys hitting on her in the elevator at an athiest convention?

@atheist ...and Hitchen's list is twice as long. If you want specifics just Google, well his name, and you'll find 100 on one page.

@phxbillcee Dawkins posted this video just recently....funny as it is, is this how we want to sell the cause?

@pnullifidian Robert Fisk, Mick Hume, Lynn Barber, Steven Weinberg, Daniel Dennett, and Michael Martin to name a few of the adults.

@Hicks66 so you are actually saying that there has NEVER been a wide spread, irrational fear of Jews? Think about what you just said for a moment....I'll wait.

@BeeHappy everyone's a critic lol. I find them both immature name callers and rabble rousers. I read both books and my honest assement was they were full of ideas I outgrew when I was like 14.

@ipdg77 Ayn Rand was an atheist who expressed a lot of the same views as Dawkins and Hitchens and I hardly think I'd get an argument for calling her work vapid. Hitchens's undying support for the war in Iraq is another thing that gets slid under the table. As The Guardian put it in their obituary: "on the most consequential political issue of the last decade of his life, the bullshit got him."

@EricTrommater Gee, they're not perfect! the point about Islamic scholars, if you would have looked further into it, was that Islamic culture was the flower of learning for some time during Europe's "Dark Ages", & even helped them come out of it. In areas of Spain, which the Moors controlled, European scholars came by the droves to learn what they couldn't under the Catholic Church. Now, under this flavor of Islam in control now, no matter the sect, learning beyond the Koran is discouraged, sometimes lethally!

So you outgrew all their ideas by the time you were 14! Really, so did you move on to nihilism? Dazzle me with your mature take on atheism & the state of the world with warring, power-hungry religions that transcends what they have written. Hell, put it in book form, rather than a meme & you may not just have a best-seller but a Nobel Prize!

@EricTrommater I said it didn't make sense, not that it didn't exist.

@EricTrommater Those are some good names, thanks.

I think you mean "acrid." There is nothing dry about either of their writing. Anything but.

@Aristopus autocorrect strikes again#

Thanks!

Another good one! Plus, Harris' "Letter to a Christian Nation" & his "The End of Faith"; Hitch's "The Portable Atheist" that he edited; Daniel Dennett's "Breaking the Spell"; David Mills' "Atheist Universe";...Looking to pick up some Michael Shermer soon.

Thanks @BillF and @phxbillcee, for all the suggestions.

Yes, I have heard of Sam Harris and have seen several video clips. Thanks for the suggestion.

Hitch was undoubtedly one of a kind. Will take a very special person to fill his shoes, if any can. I don't subscribe to all of his views, for instance, I thought he was absolutely wrong on Iraq, but you have to give him a hearing, nonetheless, because he was so often right. & eloquent about it!

@phxbillcee Yes, and Hitch was very outspoken and I can appreciate that.

Thank you kindly for all the suggestions. My list is getting really long! LOL

Thanks for the suggestions!

Thanks. Another book to add to the ever growing list.

Watch the movie, it might be easier. LOL

@BeeHappy The original not the sissy version. Made it through Huck Fin wore the dictionary out in the process.

Hahaha!

Thanks for the suggestion!

Most of Dawkins' books on evolution are worth reading, but I think "Climbing Mount Improbable" is more accessible to the uninitiated than some of his others. "The Selfish Gene" takes more concentration, imho.

@phxbillcee I agree that Climbing Mount Improbable proves Dawkins is a marvelous educator. I readily admit that at first reading, I didn't finish Selfish Gene with a full comprehension. But it did catapult my understanding of Origin of Species (which makes me believe that SG is a dependent compendium) in further rereading. Though my understanding of evolution may never be complete, it develops because of Dawkins.