Talk:Richard Dawkins

Criticism of Dawkins

I am pro-atheist and pro-Dawkins but I want this article to have some balance. It may be that there is no room for any other criticism of Dawkins except a list of ISBN-bearing books, but I ran across

Darwin’s Rottweiler and the Public Understanding of Scientism (2003) by Peter S. Williams

This is an credentialed academic Christian who has made some effort to study Dawkins' work and provide some criticism. Williams writes in a careful style and leads off his Conclusion section with "The fact that Dawkins routinely employs fallacious arguments does not mean that his conclusions are wrong." I happen to think that his criticisms are more points of style than of substantance, but I would hope that we could include this, if for nothing else that to demonstrate NPOV balance on our part as we move this article towards FA status.--Livingrm (talk) 10:59, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

It's unclear where that essay might be used. Are you suggesting the dreaded "criticism" section? Skimming the page makes me think that Williams is fundamentally objecting to Dawkins' statements re God, but there is already quite a queue of such objectors mentioned in the article. Johnuniq (talk) 00:55, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

You are right in that it should not be a section. But I think it deserves a sentence in the flow of the text, placed in it chronologically because RD has done a lot since 2003.--Livingrm (talk) 20:23, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Fellow atheist here (and leftist as well actually), but I do agree that we sould have a criticism section, as I've heard a lot of criticisms regarding Dr. Dawkin's approach (which I personally give 2 thumbs up btw). What I think we can do is sub-divide the criticism section into subsections, such as "Criticism by Evangelical Christians", "Criticism by Fellow Scientists", etc. It's only fair. But having the subsection title will give us an idea of how to take the criticisms that's going to be listed. For example, when I see section title such as "Criticism by Evangelical Christians", I'm thinking: here we go, more bullsh*t about Dr. Dawkins not trying to teach the controversy or something like that....Children of the dragon (talk) 10:07, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

What's wrong with in-line inclusion of critical material as is the case now? WP:BLP and the related WP:COATRACK give some guidance here. Having a specific criticism in a BLP is asking for trouble (my POV). It makes more sense for an article to focus on those aspects that makes its subject notable, and to note where these aspects attract criticism in the same place. A disconnected grab-bag of criticism is unlikely to improve the article, and instead is liable to draw in "has-also-been-criticised-by" trolls. That said, there's no formal prohibition of such sections, so this can be discussed further in specific cases. However, at the moment, this article is under heavy revision, and may even revert to an earlier state depending upon discussions here. For this reason, I'd definitely suggest avoiding adding such a section in the near future. Cheers, --PLUMBAGO 10:55, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Another thing to bear in mind is that it is (or should be!) Dawkins' specific ideas and statements that attract the criticism, not the man himself. Creating a separate "criticism" section would weaken the specific nature of the criticism (what precisely is being criticised), and tend towards a rag-bag of "I don't like Dawkins" trash. SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 15:20, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

http://www.arn.org/authors/williams.html here is the bio of the subject, credentialed yes, notable no, ID "researcher" and after reading the article you cite i put in doubt the expertise or bias of the subject, "Rather, it is a philosophical dogma (called ‘positivism’)" is quite telling. --190.159.165.12 (talk) 15:14, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Poorly prepared opponents

One of the things that is remarkable about Dawkins is his history of attracting opponents who fairly badly against him directly or afterward. I suppose I could start a new page, but please examine this three-paragraph text:

After the publication of The God Delusion and Dawkins' strong promotion of it while intensifying his criticism of religion resulted in him attracting attention to himself and more focused opposition to his message. Some events during this period that resulted in minor public relations coups for Dawkins were:

• Ted Haggard's confrontational dialog in the God Delusion segment of The Root of All Evil? and Haggard's later resignation, both in 2006
• In that same segment, convicted and unrepentant criminal Michael Bray fairs poorly.
• Ben Stein's 2008 film Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, where an associate producer Mark Mathis blocked PZ Meyers from an early showing of the film, which Dawkins immediately created and released a follow-up video interview with Meyers.
• Adnan Oktar's 2008 reaction to a negative review by Dawkins to his book and Oktar's later conviction of crimes in Turkey.
• Ray Comfort becomes know as the "Banana Man" after challenging Dawkins to a debate

During the book tour and for years afterward, to questions such as the one posed by a young woman at Randolph College in 2006 "What if you are wrong?", Dawkins made a point of re-iterating a list of non-Christian religions that one might otherwise believe in such as current popular religions or in ancient gods such as Zeus, Apollo, Wotan, Thor, Baal, Mithras, Amon-Ra, Juju and others parody religions such as the Flying Spaghetti Monster, the Invisible Pink Unicorn and Russell's teapot, suggesting that the only difference between himself and his critic was that he did not believe in any such gods and that he was merely going them "one god better" than they. This response at that even was met with thunderous applause.

In the 2009 "The Genius of Charles Darwin Uncut Interviews", Concerned Woman for America president Wendy Wright show weak knowledge and logic about DNA.

Ref: Wendy Wright, uncut interview 2009

I have already seen a reaction that this is OR. Any more feedback about pointing this out in the BLP?--Livingrm (talk) 15:20, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

This is the paragraph that has just been deleted from The God Delusion. Yes, it's pretty meaningless original research and personal opinion. Basic Wikipedia policy is that an observation such as "one of the things that is remarkable about X is that ..." must be based on a reliable external source. Once it has become the judgement of history that Dawkins attracted remarkably feeble opponents, or whatever, then it has a place in an article about him. Until such time, no. SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 15:27, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, OK. I will look around see if anyone else is keeping track of the this sort of thing. Oh, I know: the list of other gods can go over to Wikiquote.--Livingrm (talk) 15:35, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

The same goes for Shmuley Boteach. Ugh!--Livingrm (talk) 03:02, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Dawkins as scientist

I would like us to discuss the nature of Dawkins' scientific legacy. He does not seem to be much of an experimentalist (i.e. make predictions or identify distinct possible outcomes and then conduct experiment in a credible fashion in the lab or the field - and I do *not* mean something like Creatures (artificial life program) because that could be a flawed emulation of reality - really, such exists more just for the purposes of pedagogy. His theories do not seem to result in any significantly new predictions. To be harsh, he merely re-applied Darwin's notions of biological fitness to genes, which had only recently been discovered and confirmed as the underlying implementation of the "traits" that Darwin was already aware of. My training is in chemistry and I would rather that he had written about the "selfish base pair", but I understand how that would have even further alienated his fellow biologists. Did he make a new equation (As Einstien said: "An equation is forever")? Did he make a theory that was authentically distinct from Darwin and was disprovable? Dawkins is a profound scholar and a world-class intellectual; he is a wonderful teacher of the public, but as a scientist, even as a biological theorist, I find that his work merely rhapsodizes about and is thus rather derivative of Darwin. Upon critical reflection, I find my mind drifts back to Amadeus (film) and I perceive a tinge in the mediocrity of Antonio Salieri in Dawkins (rather exaggerated in the film for the sake of dramatic effect). Please disabuse me of my grandiose delusions (god delusions?) of being able to be an informed critic of Dawkins. He is a world-class scholar, teacher, theorist and philosopher of science. But a scientist? A researcher? Such can be said of Watson and E. O. Wilson, but Dawkins? What is he? I tried the following but Plumbago reverted:

Dawkins came to prominence with his 1976 book The Selfish Gene, which popularised the gene-centred view of evolution, applying the ideas of Charles Darwin at the molecular level. In that work, he introduced the term meme. In 1982, he followed up on this effort with the book The Extended Phenotype, emphasizing that the biological fitness and survival of genes from generation to generation are evaluated not just by their phenotypic effects within the organism's body, but how those effects play out via biochemical and behavioural interactions with the surrounding web of life and environment. He is well known as a presenter of the case for rationalism and scientific thinking.

So who is this Dawkins-man? What is his legacy? That is what the lead should express. That is our task and we must strive for NPOV without deference to anyone's feelings. This is a job that requires information and objectivity, no matter how much we admire Dawkins' efforts towards encyclopedic knowledge and mastery of his subject matter and his profound deference to the scientific legacy of Charles Darwin. I want the quality of the article Richard Dawkins to approach the quality of the aritlce Charles Darwin, but I need your help. As it stands (in my opinion), we are not even yet ready for peer review. Help!--Livingrm (talk) 11:24, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Hi there. I reverted simply because the text implied a connection to molecular biology that does not occur in TSG. The genes of TSG are more in the classical mould, with barely a A, C, T or G in sight. Given that there are plenty of pop-sci books on molecular biology, it needed to be clear that TSG is not one of them — it is an evolutionary biology book, and base pairs do not come into it.

On the wider point about Dawkins' reputation, he was a regular scientist working in ethology who started writing pop-sci books (although both TSG and, especially, TEP are definitely at the heavier end for popular works on biology). As time passed, this role as a writer-of-books came to dominate over his job as a writer-of-papers. I don't understand the problem that you have with the article on this score. It's very clear that he's known as both an academic and as a writer, and the article doesn't make any huge claims on his reputation as the former (TSG is described as "popularising" the gene-centred view of evolution). In passing, and although it is a book, TEP is actually heavily cited in the scientific literature, so he has had some impact scientifically.

So, IMHO, the paragraph above seems to cover it pretty well. More generally, the article's balance between scientist/writer seems accurate: Dawkins is known much more for the latter than the former, and this is reflected in the current draft (though it's possibly a little heavy on his pop-sci). It almost sounds like your objection is more to do with Dawkins' standing as a scientist rather than anything to do with Dawkins-as-Wikipedia-article. For our purposes here, it's irrelevant whether he's in the same scientific league as Crick or Wilson. He is clearly notable and requires an article. What's important is that the article is accurate. Since it doesn't overplay his scientific reputation (it sounds like you might think that it does), it's not clear to me that it is inaccurate. But if you think some aspect of his professional life is misrepresented, correct it. Cheers, --PLUMBAGO 12:07, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

It is from his scientific legacy, his credentials and the honors bestowed him that he derives his gravitas, his right to speak.. for the Brights movement if no one else. It is paragraph #2 of the lead that defines that gravitas. It is *vital* that we assess it correctly in terms of its historical importance. He ranks high on the "Top 100 intellectuals" list but will it last beyond the span of his lifetime? That is the question that we are expected to assess now in his status of academic emeritus if we are to claim any level of perspective on the matter. I want this article to be on the WP front page for his 69th birthday, but we must earn that.--Livingrm (talk) 12:50, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Erm, I don't think we are to assess whether he will rank in the top 100 intellectuals beyond his lifetime (though that he's currently in such lists is of interest). We're here to write a biographical article about a notable (potentially for more than one reason) individual, and which is accurately reported based on reliable and appropriate sources. Given that your previous edit muddied the waters around TSG, I'm not certain of your definition of "correctly". The version that I reverted to (which I did not write) was more accurate on this particular point. And I'm still uncertain of what, exactly, you think is missing here. If you're looking for some grand edifice of science that Dawkins has erected for eternity, well, I don't believe that he has produced the selfish gene equivalent of E = m c². So you may be looking in vain. I would suggest that his writings in TSG about memes, and in TEP about genotype/phenotype relationships will probably best stand the test of time, but that's my POV. Are you perhaps looking for sources that suggest/support a particular interpretation of his legacy? Anyway, I think we may be at cross-purposes here. --PLUMBAGO 13:19, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Let me provide an example: New Discovery Proves 'Selfish Gene' Exists. If you have some better ability to track the Web, you would see that the content for that link went offline less than 24 hours ago. "His embarrassed reaction was: "I would totally ignore the Science Daily article. It is utter nonsense that resulted from a waaaaaaaaaaay overblown press release at my university. There's no way for me to take it down. Please, don't link it. Good luck with your up-dating." He was wrong: he followed up with some way to request to take it down and it was taken down because it was an embarrassment to sciencedaily.com . Let me remind you of the subtitle: " ScienceDaily (June 22, 2008) — A new discovery by a scientist from The University of Western Ontario provides conclusive evidence which supports decades-old evolutionary doctrines long accepted as fact." The problem is: any 12-year-old could confront us and say: "Not so fast LUMBAGO or Livingrm or whomever. I assert Copyright © 2008 ScienceDaily LLC — All rights reserved — Contact: editor@sciencedaily.com, its editorial staff and blah blah blah and I insist that so-and-so LLC or Inc. or whateven and some access date proves that the Dawkins predictions are verified as fact. Period. I win and you lose."

Now, back to my voice as the pseduonym Livingrm: Wikipedia can do better than that. It is not just a publisher and accessdate that proves verifiablity. It is our judgment and the better angels of our nature (who the heck do I think I am quoting Lincoln? Me, a more hard-core atheist than Dawkins can ever aspire to...?) Look: sometimes even the press gets it wrong. Now is the time for this community to collaborate and describe Dawkins as well as we can. You may think that my crossreference is waaaaaaaaaaay overblown but it has produce this demonstration. Please study what it links to and help us to get that lead right.--Livingrm (talk) 16:47, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Ummm, I don't follow what you mean re: ScienceDaily. Are you suggesting that such a story would, at least in principle, be useful here? The ScienceDaily item is (clearly, I would argue) the end product of "Chinese whispers" that has little to do with the original source paper. Support for Dawkins' work that could be used for illustrative purposes in this article would ideally be sourced from the primary science literature (or, perhaps better, from the associated review literature). Press releases, such as this one, are frequently (as here) misleading and inaccurate. Furthermore, as Dawkins has pointed out from the get-go, the "selfish gene" concept is one that he popularised rather than invented. If anything, this source merely provides evidence that Dawkins is associated with the study of altruism in biology, even though he would argue (I'm sure) that he's a secondary figure behind the likes of John Maynard Smith or Bill Hamilton. Anyway, I still get the feeling that I'm completely misunderstanding what you're after here. It would certainly be great to get this article promoted to FA status, but I'm clearly reading from the wrong page. --PLUMBAGO 17:15, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Fair enough. Again, I believe that RD is quite notable and worthy of an FA article in the near future. I made the cross-reference so that we can use the power of Wikipedia is to break him down to our language of "notable concepts" and then build up a profile of him based on his notability. If I may be so bold: since you yourself suggest that RD takes his lead from JMS and BDH, I will add them as "influences" to his infobox. I was not confident to so previously because they are his near-contemporaries, but your reference to them sets aside my concerns. It is just this kind of interaction (collaboration) that we need in order to paint the complete RD picture that we can all agree upon. If the mood takes you, revert me at will. This is exactly as it should be: hash it out, corner this man of 68 years and tie him down and thereby implicitly challenge him to surprise us again while this article remains a BLP. May he live to be 101 with his health and his mind, but for now: get it right.--Livingrm (talk) 18:37, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

(←) I am concerned about the directon this discussion is heading. Livingrm, you seem to be intent on (a) promoting the article about RD to FA status, and (b) somehow proving that RD is notable and worthy and wonderful and one of the greatest people ever. Both aims are no doubt laudable, but:

1. There is no connection between the two. FA status is all about how well the article is written, and how well it is sourced, and not at all about how notable the subject is.
2. The notion - which becomes ever more evident in your comments here - that it is the job of a Wikipedia article to promote the subject's notability is completely wrong-headed.

I am worried about your desire (above) to "discuss the nature of Dawkins' scientific legacy", and your evident impulse to promote "his scientific legacy, his credentials ... his gravitas, his right to speak..." It looks remarkably Victorian, as if Wikipedia editors were a committee of the Great and the Good tasked with determining who is worthy of elevation to some sort of higher status, and who had a "right to speak". No - we merely report, as clearly and objectively as we can, what is alreay out there in the published sources. Try to restrain yourself from proving and promoting, and concentrate on reporting. That will result in a much better encyclopaedia article. SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 19:48, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

The points are well-made. FA status has nothing to do with how notable a topic is. And, it is not the job of an article to promote (or denigrate) a subject but to report on it. It is particularly important in a BLP to be even-handed ... overly praiseworthy comes off like a press-release and turns off readers ... just a an overly critical tone would turn off readers. Furthermore, it leads to a situation where the article flip flops from one POV to another as editors change text ... which is of course one reason why NPOV is so desired, i.e., it is a more stable article. I think everyone here very much appreciates the hard work, but it does need to be tempered ... even if something is NPOV, it can feel as if it isn't if there is an over-inclusion of laudatory commentary (even if every comment is verifiable and true). BobKawanaka (talk) 22:30, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

I sense that I am being psychoanalyzed and found wanting. I do not really mind the former, but please refrain from the latter: I am not giving you enough information for you to make such a diagnosis. I am not here to promote or denigrate: I am here is capture the essence of RD.--Livingrm (talk) 11:44, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

My comments are based entirely on what you say yourself about your aims in editing the article. I am commenting on the article, and the shape it should take, not on you! SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 11:48, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Darwin's Rottweiler

Dawkins did not declare "I am Darwin's Rottweiler." He earned the sobriquet. Please allow me be provide the evidence that he has earned such. Give me 24 hours. If after 24 hours, I have failed, then you are welcome to revert me. If you think I have suffering from some bias then ponder this: *I* removed the sobriquet from the lead. Give me some leeway; 24 hours on a weekend is all I ask. I am focusing on his public persona of the past three years — it may not be what you know of, but please give me a chance. After all, he is making his money from such. Watson flubbed in 2007 and Dawkins make his assertion in later 2007 (or early 2008). That is a fair assessment of "what happened".--Livingrm (talk) 21:11, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

"He has been referred to in the media" is still better than the archaic "sobriquet" and it does not suggest that he declared he was it. --Bduke (Discussion) 22:57, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Charles Darwin in the lead...

I have been collecting "the evidence" at WP for weeks that our rendition of the intellectual legacy of RD should explicitly acknowledge CD in the lead. Here is an example of a recent BBC Two broadcast Discussion on Darwin and Life's Purpose 2009-09-13:

"Prof. Richard Dawkin has spent his life studying and writing about evolution building about the ideas of his great hero, the 19th century Charles Darwin. I have come to his home in Oxford..."

Is that unfair or prejudicial? I know of no protests to such a characterization. It is merely because of his book or his book tour? If it is fair and professional, then please talk about it and consider adding such to the lead. If he later departs from Darwin, then we can update at that time.--Livingrm (talk) 20:44, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Anybody who is studying and writing about evolution is building on the ideas of Charles Darwin. It is not notable enough for the lead. --Bduke (Discussion) 20:59, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

My point is that the label of Neo-Darwinian in the lead is not sufficient. RD mentions an advocacy of Darwin's ideas (not the ruthless competitiveness but rather CD's intellectual legacy) in many, many of his public appearances and I think that such should be mentioned in the lead.--Livingrm (talk) 21:08, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I imagine anyone asked by the BBC to present a programme in honour of Darwin's bicentenary would refer to Darwin in similar terms! It means nothing. There is no specific connection to Darwin, other than that shared by all evolutionary biologists. SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 21:12, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

The lead, quite accurately, refers to Dawkins as neo-Darwinian: he's a Darwinist in the sense of being a proponent of the primacy of natural selection in the modern synthesis, much to the annoyance of his Kimuranian opponents. He is not a Darwin scholar, as was all too evident in his recent C4 series (don't recall him doing any for the beeb, the clip is from the BBC documentary secular believers and is about Darwkins rather than Darwin. Oddly enough, it refers to Paley as an 18th century philosopher, when the book in question was published by Paley in 1802, but guess that was at the end of the theologian's life). . dave souza, talk 22:36, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I dunno. If there was a non-parody Darwin Awards, he would clearly make the short list, but not because of his scientific results but because of his modern-day promotion of Darwin and his encyclopedic knowledge and expounding of Darwin and his ideas. There is nothing disrespectful about that, but I want the reader of this BLP to know that if they listen/watch/read an hour's worth of RD's media presence, Darwin is likely to be mentioned. Let me ruminate for a few days to see if such can be properly indicated in the lead (i.e. without overemphasis).--Livingrm (talk) 03:00, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

John Maynard Smith as influence

It is my impression that John Maynard Smith was a influence on RD but I am not an expert. I added him as an influence but I now have some doubts because of that BBC 2003 profile. JMS bothers to deprecate the notion of the "selfish gene" in the BBC profile. This is a ticklish question: was he an ally or opponent of RD? By that I mean: were his objections to RD's ideas substantial? I updated my cross-reference, but now I want more evidence and a more clarification in the body of the text. Perhaps JMS is an influence but "has reservations" in the style of Gould. Is that fair? Does anyone involved here know?--Livingrm (talk) 03:34, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Dawkins wrote the foreward to JMS' 1993 2nd edition of his book The Theory of Evolution. That is more of a "peer" relationship than an "influence."--Livingrm (talk) 21:45, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

But hey, Jamie is now gone and is in RD's thoughts, so I will leave it in as an "honorary" influence. I do not think that DickyD will have a problem with that.--Livingrm (talk) 19:56, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

The atheism section and the quotes...

I am going to try to re-work the atheism section and do without those specific quotes. My reasoning is that they focus in on minor matters of RD's overall views on atheism. They are an abrupt change of subject and they help to make the section large and choppy and I want to try to get it to read better and appear as a better-organized arrangement of the information. The short quote I added was, I thought, the best isolated example of RD's "Rottwieler" reputation where he only gets a few minutes in that BBC documentary. I will try to find a better way to introduce those quotes (to put them in a sensible context), but I am inclined to cut them to a brief reference using our own prose.--Livingrm (talk) 04:44, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Automated peer review

Please remember to run this every several edits: http://toolserver.org/~dispenser/view/Peerreviewer#page:Richard_Dawkins At this point, it only complains about American and British English spelling differences and the standard copyedit reminder.--Livingrm (talk)

anti-relition

Can someone fix the typos please? -- 23:16, 25 October 2009 88.167.71.127

Done. Somebody fixed the two typos.--Livingrm (talk) 02:46, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I can't work out where to post this comment, so I'm doing it here!

In the biography box, Dawlkins is said to be an atheist, whereas in The God Delusion he cleary states that he is an antitheist. This is an important distinction, especially in relation to the development of Dawkins theories and personal take on religions. Could it be amended please? Ta.

Paragraphs...

So.... now the article is composed of paragraphs and they have lead sentences that introduce the subject of the paragraph. Please ensure that if you feel the need to associate cites back to individual sentences that you leave it go at that. In particular, if you examine User:AndyZ/PR/footspace will be reminded to "keep inline citation tags right after the punctuation mark, without a space". Let me suggest that the punctuation mark should almost invariably be the period ("."). Let us also try to ensure that any other quotations be *entire sentences* that

• clearly summarize an important aspect of the subject in a way they cannot be done as succinctly with our own prose
• are clearly intended by the speaker to be such a summary
• that follow logically from the text

In particular, on that last point: quotations should mesh with the nearby text. Quotes derived from Q/A interviews should be avoided unless it is clear that Dawkins is trying to summarize a complex point. I expect the article to slowly decay back into something a little less organized, not so quickly that we will fail to reach FA this time.--Livingrm (talk) 03:36, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I finally noticed some collaboration. It was a delete of a sentence in the lead with the comment "Remove nonsense and speculation. I am concerned about the ongoing degradation of style and substance in this article." I do not mind it if you trim away *lightly* at the text and snip out the weaker sentences but your overarching condemnation is silly. Several sections of the article from few weeks ago were drivel. Their structure was driven by articles rather than by themes. Because some of you seem to be still missing the point, let me make a few more suggestions:

• The God Delusion book should not be handled all in one paragraph. It covers way too much ground and it has its own WP article; mention pieces of it with the appropriate paragraph.
• Please continue to look at the development of the paragraphs as a narrative line. The "Atheism and rationalism" now follows this structure:

1. Detailed assertion of RD as world-class, influential atheist/rational/whatever who is well-connected with the appropriate organizations
2. Focused review of his long-term basis of his atheism with a change after 9/11 to include the notion that "religion is not just wrong; the wrong should now be corrected in our world forever"
3. Outline of how RD is going to go after the public and "the children" to get his point across via "consciousness raising" and secure what might be his desired legacy
4. Resistance to RD's thrust
5. Demonstrating how RD is properly coordinating his thrust with the other big players of the planet and is almost becoming a brand
6. Example of significant recent street-level effort to continue the thrust

Now, *that* is a story that is organized by the continuing themes of this man's mind; a lot of what was there before was dribble, factoid and isolated quote. The isolated nature of the Oktar thing is a good example: Yes, it is an isolated incident, but now is it *organized* as part of the resistance. Why should the reader have to go through an otherwise unorganized list of isolated events? We *could* list every event sorted by date, but then it would suck.--Livingrm (talk) 09:33, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

It is true that the edit summary you mention above ("remove nonsense and speculation") was a little blunt, but what the edit did was to remove the following text recently-added to the lead:

While 9/11 and post-Bush stimulated him to an intense anti-religion phase, he has claimed this phase over and he plans a children's book designed to provide an accessible explanation for rationalism and to provide rational explanations for selected, often religion-based, fairy tales.

Of course everyone is civil and assumes good faith, and your work is commendable, however editors have to get to the point quickly, and avoid leaving doubt with euphemistic language. Accordingly, I believe that the above edit summary is an extremely reasonable remark given the nature of the text that was removed.

I do not know about other editors, but I have decided to skip watching your frequent changes for a while. I am waiting until you pause for a few days, and will then compare the article with its earlier state. If you believe the "While 9/11..." text should be in the article, there may also be a significant difference of opinion with regard to other changes. Johnuniq (talk) 22:36, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you, Johnuniq. I am the guilty part in relation to the edit summary you mention. Apologies for the bluntness of it - I simply do not have time to go through the whole thing right now and give a more considered judgement point by point, but I felt I had to say something about what seemed to me a particularly bad addition. I am delighted to see someone working so hard on the article, but I am concerned about some general trends. Looking at the changes over the last few weeks, I see (1) an increased tendency to dramatise and speculate and a reduction in the encyclopaedic tone, (2) increased attention paid to the "human interest" angles and a reduction in the scientific content, (3) a move towards assessing and judging (mostly praising) and away from recording simple verifiable facts. I also find some of the language cheap and nasty, and some of it badly written and clumsy. The previous broadsheet article has become sadly tabloid in places. Concern for consistency and WP:ENGVAR also seems to have gone out of the window. The sheer number of small edits (something like 300 since mid September) makes it impossible to keep track of what is going on - but I too would like to stand back and review it at some future date, once the present round of editing by Livingrm is finished. I strongly suspect that some things were done better in the mid-September version, and that in due course we will want to revert a few sections of the article to the way they were then. SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 08:21, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

If I can put my oar in too, I'd completely agree with Johnuniq and Snalwibma. Livingrm — it's really great that you're taking such an interest in this article (and other RD topics), but: (a) some of the edits are making the article considerably less encyclopaedic in tone and content; (b) several of your talkpage statements strongly suggest that there are some misunderstandings about what a WP is and what it's for; and (c) you are making huge numbers of small edits that are making it very difficult for other editors to follow the article's evolution. On the latter point, that many of your edits are good is undone by the fact that some (e.g. the tendency to elevate Dawkins; your synthesis of material to tell a coherent, if questionable, story) are deleterious. While it's possible to pick through edits undoing some and retaining others, it's extremely laborious to do this when 30+ small edits have appeared overnight. Is there any way that you could do fewer, more substantial edits? Finally, to be honest, I'm still not entirely sure what you're trying to accomplish with the article. While, as with all articles, the mid-September version was flawed, I've not a coherent picture of how it's now "improved". But sorry if my reversions appear brusque — that's certainly not my intention. --PLUMBAGO 08:59, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Career in academia vs. career as a popular science author

This split does not work. The former section ends with a comment about Dawkins as "the third most successful science writer ever", which surely belongs in the latter section. If the split is to be maintained, the latter section needs a subsection on evolution, to which the final paragraph of the present "academia" section should be moved. But I'm not sure the split is helpful, in any case. Or is it just that I don't like the word "academia"? Maybe "Academic career" would make me happier! SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 09:30, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Reference positioning

What's happened to the reference positioning in the article? While some references coincide with the information they relate to, there are a number of places in the article where the references seem to be getting "stored up" and then dumped in long lines. As well as being ugly, this creates paragraphs which at first appear unsourced. Then, when you work out that the sources may be listed in that long line of numbers, you've got the joyous task of working out which citation supports which statement earlier in the paragraph. This is absurd.

I can't see any one edit (or set of edits) that has created this situation, so am tempted to revert wholesale again (cf. earlier discussion above). Unless someone would like to unpick these? --PLUMBAGO 10:57, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

It was progress when we got to a lead that has no cites. I advocate that we continue to move in the direction of a compositional style that stresses organizing the information into paragraphs with proper (and uncited) lead sentences. We are almost to the point where the inappropriateness of some of the more banal pieces of sourced information are becoming more obvious, now that such trivia is imprisoned within the appropriate paragraph and juxtaposed with somewhat more brilliant prose. One source of friendly and constructive collaboration I have experienced at Wikipedia recently was with that "automated peer review" I mention above. It does not seem to mind if the cites are at the end of the sentence or the paragraph and it seems to know how to help get the article to FA. To help make you more joyous, I will be re-associating some more of the cites back to the individual sentences. It is a rather easy and I will proceed to do so now — using the latest version and in a collaborative spirit.--Livingrm (talk) 12:13, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

The article currently lists 155 references. Working out what reference applies to what is a gigantic job. There must be verifiability. In addition, common sense dictates that the reader who is seriously interested can readily follow a reference. I agree that there is often no need to put a reference at the immediate clause where it applies, but it must be at the end of the applicable sentence. Unfortunately, as noted above, I have been ignoring this article while waiting for the editing to pause. Thanks to Plumbago's comment I have just looked and the references are not acceptable.

The situation is quite difficult because Livingrm has done a lot of work, and we have stood back while that was in progress. However, I do not see how we can hope to restore the correct positioning of the references without a total reversion. I am not going to check 155 references, and I am not inclined to accept that someone else is going to do it either.

I am still not going to take the time to evaluate the article as it currently stands because significant changes are likely (particularly in view of the references situation). However, a very quick look makes me think that the language may be inappropriate: "Dawkins is one of Britain's best-known academics", "continues to enjoy success", and more. I may agree with the obvious truth of many of the points in the article, but we just do not write like that on Wikipedia, particularly when describing a scientist. Johnuniq (talk) 23:19, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

And the atheism section alone has 65 of those citations and was the main reason why this article could never make it to FA. I am confident that I am more of a godless materialist than Dawkins but I care that this article be the result of design of some mind or set of minds. I care about the citations and I am examining all of them and at times repairing them. I am moving some around so that they find their canonical place within the design of the article. You would think that with 150 or so references, that we would not add material that is only supported by a single article because perhaps it is not germane to the BLP. How can you possibly hope to recognize such if you cannot get your mind and your attention span to transcend the goosestep of sentence-cite-sentence-cite? If you think that the purpose of paragraph #2 in the lead is otherwise, then please replace its lead sentence with something more acceptable and that better reflects its purpose.--Livingrm (talk) 01:59, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I am not sure that you are correctly judging the general direction of the conversation here. Wikipedia is one place where a fait accompli does not necessarily stick because any of us can quite easily revert the article back to what we believe is a stable state. Particularly for an article like this, consensus will overcome enthusiasm. Johnuniq (talk) 03:47, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

WP has quite a reputation for allowing some to build Sand Castles of Knowledge and then have someone else joyously kick them over. I would guess that the goosestep tyranny I mentioned above is in order to sacrifice of all other considerations to the ease of fact-checking by amateurs. The professional fact-checker that Stacy Schiff used did not detect Essjay's "persona" as merely a pseudonym... In the mixed language of Eric S. Raymond and E. O. Wilson: what do you want for this BLP: to be more like a cathedral or a termite hill? Let's keep trying to find a healthy compromise, OK? I am working on the cites and intend to tie most of them back to their individual sentences. Then...let the terminate have at the results.--Livingrm (talk) 07:21, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Closing sentences...

As properly documented at Paragraph#Body paragraph, closing sentences also matter. IMO, the paragraph, when properly composed, should be as poetry and worth reading out loud in order to celebrate the beauty of the coherency and clarity of the train of thought. If that is asking too much, then we could at least try to make the recording for Wikipedia:WikiProject Spoken Wikipedia a pleasure, with each paragraph started like colostrum, continue nourishing our minds and then properly completing the package of information before moving on.--Livingrm (talk) 02:25, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Proposal to revert to mid-September version

I am growing increasingly unhappy with the current wholesale rewriting and cheapening and enfeebling of the article. And the way it is being done, in hundreds of small changes, makes it impossible to keep track. I vote to revert to the way it was in about mid September, and then to use that as the basis for a discussion on how to improve the article. SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 07:37, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I am reverting back. I cleaned up a lot of problems with this article and your "unhappiness" about it is vague. I have done real work and you have hit the revert button. Let us try this approach: please enumerate exactly what new information you have added to the article in the past six months. I have avoided the adjective "controversial" for RD because, despite his impeccable credentials, it makes him sound like crackpot. For instance, this Sept. 2009 radio transcript starts out with "Richard Dawkins is one of the best-known and most controversial scientists in the world." But that is not what we want. Why I changed the lead to, at first blush be a little more vague to prepare the reader for exactly the correct scope of him. You have to give the reader a heads-up that RD's work is in ethology and evolutionary biology and that it will somehow segue over to atheism. I said "life and culture" and that is too vague, and the collaborative results are better. For the non-biologist reader: most of the ideas of RD cannot be proven with scientific experiment (despite what that ScienceDaily article said and which was deservedly requested yanked by the original researcher). I finally found my template: Edward Witten. I think that it is not a coincidence that they both show up on Charles Simonyi#Philanthropy with Simonyi professorships. It is perhaps because they are hard to pin down and their results cannot simply be proven. Physicists fret how string theory implies no testable predictions. (I have not yet found the clip from the Elegant Universe, but I will put it here when I find it). Please look at the first two minutes of the 2003 BBC profile. What I am trying to fit in is what JMS says: "I have very little sympathy with that view . I don't think that "selfish gene" ever confused a biologist; it only confuses philosophers." I think we can point that out to the reader and that it will be helpful as they try to sort out and understand the sentences in the "self gene" section. I am not doing OR and it is not cheapening the article; I am trying to forewarn the reader of the scope of the material that follows.--Livingrm (talk) 09:43, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Livingrm: Thank you for your work. However, your recent replies indicate that you do not accept the reservations that three editors have expressed. Above, I have given several examples of text that should not be in the article, the most recent being "While 9/11...", and I have not seen any specific response. Your comment just above is not appropriate. First, you should give other editors a chance to review Snalwibma's proposal and not do another barrage of edits. Second, it's not up to you to revert back or whatever because no one owns this article. Third, you have used a lot of words but they are off-topic for this section which is to discuss a proposal to revert to a mid-September version. Please stop making edits and allow at least 48 hours for other editors to catch up. From the time of Livingrm's first edit in this article (13:54, 8 October 2009), there have been 282 edits (13.4 edits/day); 238 of the edits (84%) were by Livingrm.

Snalwibma: I have resisted following this suggestion in the hope that Livingrm's edits would naturally come to an end so we could make an assessment then. However, I am now inclining to the view that we may not be able to avoid a dispute, so we may as well have it now rather than going another month and having a dispute after even more edits. I can see the virtue of reverting back. Then we could look at each section in turn, by making one or two large edits to the section. That would allow a reasonable "before" and "after" comparison for some consensus to emerge. Repeat for all sections. Do another pass for rearranging sections. Johnuniq (talk) 11:00, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I am pretty-much done. I have done lots of picky little improvements, but I guess I would have done better to take a copy of the article and work on it under my own userpage for a few weeks and then incorporate a few weeks worth of your work, but I really was helped when you guys pointed out where I was drifting off the mark. Thanks.--Livingrm (talk) 02:14, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

No more big cite clumps

I have re-meshed the cites so that there are none larger than four-in-a-row anywhere, most of such being at the end of the paragraph. I think that the fact-checkers have a manageable task. I have tried to help by adding many subtitles so that you can see/recall what the scope of the web cite was about. I do not feel that this is an excessive burden because only a few years ago, the style was to just have a "further reading" and a "external links" section at the bottom of the page. The balance now is pretty good and I think that we agree that it is progress that there are no inside-a-sentence refs.--Livingrm (talk) 01:32, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

No, I disagree. The references are generally better at the end of a sentence than within the sentence (unless clarity demands that they are within the sentence), but they really need to be attached to the relevant sentence, not dumped at the end of the paragraph where it is impossible to tell which reference supports which statement. SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 15:16, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm more agnostic on the in-sentence / end-sentence distinction, but Snalwibma's right: the main thing is that a source is at least tied to the end of the sentence that refers to it. I think that if a sentence contains a number of long, separate clauses (e.g. "This is known to be caused by reagent X, process Y, and reaction Z."), then in-sentence references may be preferable. But willy-nilly insertion (e.g. "She travelled on Tuesday from London to Paris on the Chunnel") should definitely be avoided. Still, it's at least much easier to deal with this sort of referencing problem than the one we had before. Cheers, --PLUMBAGO 16:08, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Poorly worded statement

"A Church of England spokesman asserted that Christian belief is not about worrying or not enjoying life, but rather the opposite."

This statement, part of the wiki article, should be removed or re-worded.

First, it is a religious comment on the bus campaign against religion, and as such seems as out of place in this article as an atheist comment would be in an article on Francis of Assisi (I checked, there are none).

Second, taken literally, its meaning is possibly contrary to what is intended by the writer, since the literal opposite of the Christian belief is not about [worrying or not enjoying] life is the Christian belief is about worrying or not enjoying life (the opposite of 'not... not' is 'not'). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Corylus n (talk • contribs) 09:17, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Indeed! A month ago that statement read A Church of England spokesman said: "we would defend the right of any group representing a religious or philosophical position to be able to promote that view through appropriate channels. However, Christian belief is not about worrying or not enjoying life. Quite the opposite -- our faith liberates us to put this life into a proper perspective." - which at least makes sense, even if its relevance is still questionable (and the reference for the statement was actually alongside the statement, rather than dumped with a lot of other unrelated references at the end of the paragraph). This, I'm afraid, is another example of the sort of scrambling that the article has suffered from in its recent editing - and another example of why we should probably revert to the mid-September version. SNALWIBMA ( talk - contribs ) 09:30, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

I have restored the fuller version of the quote. However, I do not see why a religious comment on a campaign against religion is "out of place", and no more would I regard quoting an atheist comment on Francis of Assisi as out of place. Wikipedia is supposed to give a balanced coverage of all viewpoints; it is true that it does not tend to do so in articles on religious topics, but the answer to that is to improve those articles, not to use it as a justification for similar bias in other articles. JamesBWatson (talk) 09:53, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Next book

I added information on the next book a couple of weeks back (click), only to come back and see that it's been deleted. Despite coverage on Dawkins' official site of the new book there's now not a single reference to it in the article. Can anyone explain to me why this isn't worthy of inclusion? If not, I'm reinserting it. AC+79 3888 (talk) 22:49, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

I don't know why it was deleted, but coverage on Dawkins's site scarcely qualifies as independent coverage, so in the absence of anything else it fails WP:Notability. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:03, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

It has been mentioned elsewhere too, for example this article from the Guardian. MFlet1 (talk) 15:28, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes, JamesBWatson clearly didn't bother to look at the references I inserted in the link given above. I'm putting the information back into the article. AC+79 3888 (talk) 21:49, 6 November 2009 (UTC)