The God Delusion

By: Richard Dawkins

Narrated by: Richard Dawkins, Lalla Ward

Length: 13 hrs and 52 mins

Publisher's summary

Discover magazine recently called Richard Dawkins "Darwin's Rottweiler" for his fierce and effective defense of evolution. Prospect magazine voted him among the top three public intellectuals in the world (along with Umberto Eco and Noam Chomsky). Now Dawkins turns his considerable intellect on religion, denouncing its faulty logic and the suffering it causes.

He critiques God in all his forms, from the sex-obsessed tyrant of the Old Testament to the more benign (but still illogical) Celestial Watchmaker favored by some Enlightenment thinkers. He eviscerates the major arguments for religion and demonstrates the supreme improbability of a supreme being. He shows how religion fuels war, foments bigotry, and abuses children, buttressing his points with historical and contemporary evidence. In so doing, he makes a compelling case that belief in God is not just irrational, but potentially deadly.

Dawkins has fashioned an impassioned, rigorous rebuttal to religion, to be embraced by anyone who sputters at the inconsistencies and cruelties that riddle the Bible, bristles at the inanity of "intelligent design", or agonizes over fundamentalism in the Middle East or Middle America.

©2006 Richard Dawkins (P)2006 Tantor Media, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Richard Dawkins is the leading soothsayer of our time....The God Delusion continues his thought-provoking tradition." (J. Craig Venter, decoder of the human genome)
"The God Delusion is smart, compassionate, and true....If this book doesn't change the world, we're all screwed." (Penn & Teller)
"The world needs...passionate rationalists....Richard Dawkins so stands out through the cutting intelligence of The God Delusion." (James D. Watson, co-discoverer of DNA, author of The Double Helix)

The idea of religion

I am reading a lot of books about the negative effect of religion these days. I started out with no intention to read any of them, but first tackled Sam Harris’ The End of Faith because an online discussion was just too interesting not to participate. I found the Harris book an eye opener. The number one idea I took away from it was that it doesn’t make sense to exempt religious ideas from any sort of logical argument. Our culture tacitly agrees that anyone can believe anything they want and the result is often that once someone interjects a religious sentiment into the argument or discussion, the debaters silently slink off, whether they agree or not, on the theory that the person is “entitled to his belief”. Believe it or not it had not occurred to me that that practice was not exactly correct. It was tolerant and humane. Harris convinced me it was also dangerous. I think he also convinced me that religion was dangerous when it was “moderate”. Then I read Kevin Phillips’ American Theocracy which was notable primarily for the statistics on the numbers of Americans who believe literally in the Bible and the growth of fundamentalist believers and churches—at the expense of the mainline protestant denominations like the one I was raised in. In the interim I read several articles and speeches such as the one by Bill Moyers on why Christians in thrall to The Rapture don’t care about conservation because they expect the world to end soon anyway. (I see he’s even published a short book on the subject called Welcome to Doomsday). The God Delusion is my third read on this topic in less than a year, despite the fact that I would not say that religion is one of my priority topics.

I must say that while my response to Dawkins’ book was a series of "buts", in all honesty I must stay that he had anticipated my responses and gave answers that satisfied me. Which is not the same thing as saying I loved the book.

Hits the nail on the Head

If you have ever read a Dawkins book before you know how he can make you feel at home. Never letting his emotion affect the purpose of his writing. Making you feel like you are his friend not his pupil. Again with a confidence that speaks to his passion and knowledge of the subject I was simply drawn in. He is a great reader as well as writer and knows when to put inflections where most vital, not all the time.

His opinion on religion was already my own but I could have never put it so elegently. I am in his debt once again.

worth every penny

Dawkins does a fantastic job explaining his reasoning of atheism. regardless of belief system I think everyone should take time to read this book, even if it's just to understand the atheist perspective and thought process.

My Sacred Cows Lay Slain Everywhere

My sacred cows lay slain every where. I learned many things about many organized religions and contradictions and little known facts about the Bible. I was put off by what I found as the minimizing of pedophilia when comparing its damage to that of the religious brainwashing of children. Other than that Dawkins makes a logical well supported case against believing in any god. However, to accept his hypothesis, you must restrict your systems of perception to rationalism and empiricism. If you live by faith and not by sight, his arguments will be vacuous.

Enlightenment

This book explains exactly why I don't believe in god, never have and never will. If you are an atheist it will vindicate you. If you believe in god at least you will come to understand why atheists don't. I wish all believers in god would read this book. At the very least they may learn a little tolerance.

Fascinating!

I found the subject mattor of this book fascinating and very thought provoking. I enjoued it so much I intend to listen to it several more times to better absorb the complexity and depth of the subject matter.

Richard Dawkins is a wonderful narrator with clear speech and impeccable pronunciation. As other reviewers have mentioned, I too didn't care for having two narrators jumping back and forth while reading, but it was quite tolerable and I got used to it.

The God Delusion

To qoute a Amish cabinet maker working in my house-What came first the institution or the man?The answer is man.If this book doesnt at least cause society to question dogmatic norms society is doomed.This book is outstanding.

Closet Atheists Unite!

This is a good book for confirmed and closet atheists... and a good bait for religious people...

In this book, Dawkins does not expect to convert the truly religious, but hopes to nudge those sitting on the fence towards atheism. I think he will succeed in many cases.

I enjoy the author's enthusiasm, which is even more evident in this audio format. The dueling narration by Dawkins and his wife Lalla Ward works well. I found the quality of the audio and narration to be top notch.

Beautiful

Dawkin's book provides great ammunition for those rare conversations with christians that can actually discuss their religion - rather than condemning you, the non-believer, to hell after two minutes of ranting about how god is totally real and how much he loves you, regardless of your faults.

Outstanding book

Dawkin's book has helped me shape my thinking and made me feel more at ease with my long held belief that all religions are basically fairy tales, perpetuated by people who are more into power and money than righteousness and charity. Dawkins is far less cynical than I am, and his articulate and insightful defense of atheism is motivating to those who instinctively feel that religious teachings and behavior just don't make sense and that the hypocrisies contained in the bible and Koran are ludicrous. He makes a rational and balanced argument, and I, for one, was very impressed.

I did not like the narration method of this book which uses two readers who quickly interchange passages for no apparent reason. It detracts from the book's message and somehow makes it less credible and more gimmicky. Atheism is already open to enough criticism and ridicule. It would have been better, in my opinion, if the book was read solely by Dawkins, which would have added to the scholarly nature of the content.

Nonetheless, the content of Dawkin's writing far outweighs this minor issue. Very highly recommended.