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)

Excellent. Highly recommended.

i highly recommend this book/audio book. The book is really well organized for making the overall argument. it is amusing, insightful, and inspiring.

A must read!

As an audible book, it is a very well read, sounds great and could get real funny at times.
This book should not be avoided by anyone. He raises important points and more importantly tries to raise consciousness - although I think he goes too far when he tries to explain the origin of religion by Natural selection. Also, his critisicm of some aspects of religion can best be desribed his own point of view. He brilliantly detsroys the dogmatic aspects of religion and the way people think about religion.
The book is out to convert you. In my case it did not but I learned a lot!

God Bless Richard Dawkins

I had to say that, I would buy this book for everybody in the U.S. If I thought they would read it. I was already an Atheist when I read this book and I suspect that most of you who will read this are as well. Thats great you will love this book its a masterpeice. Just promise to give it to a Christian when your done.

An Engaging New Ideology

There are plenty of reviews detailing this book. Due to so many who will be disturbed by it, I'd like to focus my review more on cautioning the reader in certain respects.

This book represents an ideology; meaning that it seeks to explain everything in the world in light of a stringent set of dogma - the main one being Natural Selection. To make a somewhat crude analogy, Natural Selection is "God" for Dawkins and Charles Darwin is its prophet.

Ideologies have always been rigorously defended, almost as if the ideology was the lifeblood of the defender. The person is a "Christian" an "Atheist" an "Agnostic" and so on. And this is what gets people into trouble. The identification with the ideology, by default, blinds the person to anything else that might truly serve him. It stops him from asking true questions instead of questions that are merely restatements of what he already believes.

Like all ideologies that catch on and have a lasting effect, Darwinism, too, will eventually fade and pass away. In the interim however, it will certainly have a profound effect upon society and the world in general. Some of those effects will be beneficial and some, I have little doubt, will bring unimagined horrors to mankind in the same way Christianity has.

If anything is consistent in this world, it is the mind. It operates in a congruent fashion. Actions spring from beliefs and are inspired in no other way. Yet the believer, the ideologue and defender of those beliefs, seldom evaluates the darker side because he is too preoccupied with making himself "right" and "good" while at the same time, trying to make everyone who doesn't agree with him as "wrong" and "evil."

Like a true ideologue, Dawkins has in no way presented the darker side of Darwinism. He's convinced it's a "consciousness raiser."

Don't neglect your only life

Would you consider the audio edition of The God Delusion to be better than the print version?

I must say that I'm a Christian atheist. I was raised as a Christian and became an atheist as I became more knowledgeable on history and science. It’s a path people must follow on their own. I don’t think arguing with someone will convince them to drop their religious beliefs. Even though you won’t won the discussion, you might plant a seed that may make people search for the truth themselves.


This book presents great arguments against how much time is wasted on religious practices and how prejudice from religious sources negatively impacts our society. The arguments are elegant and presented with a scientific approach.


On the down side, I don’t appreciate the sarcastic tone against religion, especially noted in the first two chapters. That might prevent people from having an open mind throughout the rest of the book. Also some arguments are sort of incomplete or use religious extremists as the only example.


Anyway, this is a must read if you are on the fence. Being on the fence probably means that you have a feeling that it can’t be true but haven’t exactly written down a list of plausible versus implausible arguments.


Two Suggested audible (even better if listened to before this one):
1. On the Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin, Narrated by Richard Dawkins (ABRIDGED)
2. The Moral Animal: Why We Are the Way We Are: The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology, by Robert Wright, Narrated by Greg Thornton

Disturbing,,,

This book is disturbing, really disturbing. Without any apology, Richard Dawkins will demonstrate you in 10 hours that there is no God. He will look at almost every facet of the problem and will carefully word his arguments showing impeccable logic. He will go over the intelligent design, morality, the need in a God, the scriptures. He will develop every argument and he will never jump to a conclusion. He will go as far as explaining why we should be intolerant of religious faith!
The problem is that after listening to his book 4 times, I don’t see any flaw in his arguments and I spent nights after nights researching his facts.
I guess I need to come out to my parents as an atheist now…. See what you did Mr. Dawkins!

Very thick material, you really have to pause

What did you love best about The God Delusion?

Richard is far and away one of the smartest people on the planet

Has The God Delusion turned you off from other books in this genre?

No, in fact, it's turned me on to more Richard Dawkins books.

What does Richard Dawkins and Lalla Ward bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

The material is so deep and thick, I don't know if I would have been able to read it as a book. Hearing them speak the words and place emphasis where it needed to be and pause when it needed it was invaluable.

If you could give The God Delusion a new subtitle, what would it be?

Intelligence over fantasy

Liberating

The book confirms ideas I had growing up about god and religion: which is just a thick soup full of superstion!
I find courage to break out from my deeply religious background. IF indeed there is life after death, I will seek out Jesus and this god and DEMAND for explanations; they've got a lot of explaining to do!!!!
By the way Mr. Dawkins, I know how the magic trick of catching live bullets with one's mouth is done :)

Interesting

Very informative and well written. I highly recommend this book to ANYONE, whether you’re theist or atheist.

A strong case made

Dawkins is known for his views and while this is more of a philosophical text, it makes several good points and draws from his own science background in genes and evolution. The switch in narration between Dawkins and his wife caught me off guard at first but it flowed well after I got used to it.