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Well known rationalist Richard Dawkins, who is an expert evolutionary biologist, thinks religion is on the way out in New Zealand.
“…Science is advancing all time and religion is not, and religion is slowly dying,” Dawkins told TV3 show The Nation on Saturday.
“It’s dying much faster in some countries than others. It’s dying very fast in western and northern Europe, I suspect in New Zealand as well.”
Dawkins said on Twitter last week he was considering a visit to New Zealand soon.
Dawkins holds the belief that the supernatural does not exist, and he rejects mysticism.
The interviewer on The Nation, Lisa Owen, asked how he explained his acceptance things like poetry, music and love, things she said that “arguably are irrational.”
Dawkins replied,”Oh, well, no. I mean, I think they’re rational. “I mean, they have a rational explanation. Things like love, poetic sensibility, music, these are very, very real, very important human experiences…”
“So although we may not yet have a scientific explanation for what goes on in the brain, we do know that – well, I think we know – that it’s things that are going on in the brain when you do fall in love or when you swoon at a piece of Schubert or something like that.”
When asked if religion worked in the same way he replied, “Very probably it does, but, of course, that doesn’t make it true, because religion is not just an emotion.”
“I mean, religion actually does make factual claims about the universe, which, in my view, are false, and the mere fact that people have emotional reactions to them doesn’t make them true.”
Dawkins opposes all forms of religion, but he says at present Islam is the most dangerous
He said 500 years ago, Christianity was similarly dangerous but today its “teeth have been drawn”.
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