Dr Paul Allen

Richard Dawkins at the 34th American Atheists Conference in Minneapolis. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Many of the New Atheists — Richard Dawkins , Sam Harris , Daniel Dennett , and Christopher Hitchens . These authors have been causing quite a stir in recent years, both inspiring fellow atheists and shaking up the faith of believers.  Unlike more substantive atheists in the academy, this new wave of atheism typically engages in emotional argumentation and rhetorical bluster—often with little substance and plenty of distortion.  God is “not good” and is “a moral monster.” Religion is the chief source of humanity’s problems—“the root of all evil.” One particular point of attack is Old Testament ethical issues, including claims like these: “the Bible promotes owning other human beings,” “the Old Testament demeans women,” or “God commands genocide.”  Q. Some people claim that the Old Testament allows polygamy. What do you say? A.   For one thing, the Ol...

Dawkins at the University of Texas at Austin. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) The public has moved on from the anti-religious vitriol of the 2000s.  Amid all the warm words expressed by public figures after Pope Benedict announced his retirement one comment rather stood out. “I feel sorry for the Pope and all old Catholic priests. Imagine having a wasted life to look back on and no sex,” wrote Richard Dawkins on Twitter . Even with the generally low standards of decorum on the site, the 71-year-old biologist’s comment caused groans. For while he still has his fans and admirers, Prof Dawkins has been preaching to the choir for some time, and the choir shrinks as embarrassed followers slink away from the scene. New Atheism has finally had its day. As atheist writer Douglas Murray recently noted, after sitting alongside Dawkins in a debate: “The more I listened to Dawkins and his colleagues, the more the nature of what has gone wrong with their argument seemed clear. Religion was p...

Author: Paul Copan.  Today's "new atheists" are not at all impressed with the moral credentials of the Old Testament (OT) God . Oxonian Richard Dawkins thinks that Yahweh is truly a moral monster: "What makes my jaw drop is that people today should base their lives on such an appalling role model as Yahweh-and even worse, that they should bossily try to force the same evil monster (whether fact or fiction) on the rest of us." [1] Dawkins deems God's commanding Abraham to sacrifice Isaac to be "disgraceful" and tantamount to "child abuse and bullying." [2]  Moreover, this God breaks into a "monumental rage whenever his chosen people flirted with a rival god," resembling "nothing so much as sexual jealousy of the worst kind." [3]  Add to this the killing of the Canaanites-an "ethnic cleansing" in which "bloodthirsty massacres" were carried out with "xenophobic relish." Joshua...