Well this is disappointing; I like Dawkins. But this seems to me like an “us vs them” thing so obvious that it should be embarassing. When an atheist most competent for a job is denied it, that’s bad, but when it’s a creationist, Dawkins gets busy looking for a way to justify it. His wording pretty much says that all the real arguments are against him but he wants the particular conclusion and gets busy on trying to get there.
Putting myself in the shoes of an employer, I’d have no problem hiring a stork theory believer to operate on eyes if he was a great eye surgeon. The fact that he’s a great eye surgeon screens off any other considerations—I already know everything that matters for the decision.
On the other hand, I’m not sure I’m a fan of the law interfering with employers’ choice whom to let into their business, but that’s a different debate. IF we are to have anti-discrimination laws, then they should be applied fairly to everyone.
Perhaps Dawkins is forgetting to take into account, because of how alien that way of thinking is to him, how well religious people tend to compartmentalise their views so that they can have real-life knowledge contradictory to their religious beliefs and neither really affects the other—that would require the dragon in the garage doing something detectable.
Well this is disappointing; I like Dawkins. But this seems to me like an “us vs them” thing so obvious that it should be embarassing. When an atheist most competent for a job is denied it, that’s bad, but when it’s a creationist, Dawkins gets busy looking for a way to justify it. His wording pretty much says that all the real arguments are against him but he wants the particular conclusion and gets busy on trying to get there.
Putting myself in the shoes of an employer, I’d have no problem hiring a stork theory believer to operate on eyes if he was a great eye surgeon. The fact that he’s a great eye surgeon screens off any other considerations—I already know everything that matters for the decision.
On the other hand, I’m not sure I’m a fan of the law interfering with employers’ choice whom to let into their business, but that’s a different debate. IF we are to have anti-discrimination laws, then they should be applied fairly to everyone.
Perhaps Dawkins is forgetting to take into account, because of how alien that way of thinking is to him, how well religious people tend to compartmentalise their views so that they can have real-life knowledge contradictory to their religious beliefs and neither really affects the other—that would require the dragon in the garage doing something detectable.