British author Richard Dawkins’s The God Delusion sold over one million copies and touched off an international debate about the existence of a higher power. Critics denounced him as “Christainophobic” and a “secularist bigot.” In Turkey, the book was banned as “an attack on holy values,” and its publisher was put on trial. Now the evolutionary biologist—the world’s most prominent atheist—has set his sights on creationists and advocates of “intelligent design.” His new book, The Greatest Show on Earth, was just released.
Q: Your new book is subtitled The Evidence for Evolution. Why do you think society needs a primer 150 years after Charles Darwin first laid it out in The Origin of Species?
A: It is a very, very important idea. It is the explanation for all of life—a stunningly simple, yet powerful explanation. If you think about it, before Darwin, we hadn’t the foggiest idea of how we came into being. Now we do. It’s still such an exciting idea that it is well worth everybody understanding it.
Q: You compare creationists to Holocaust deniers—history deniers is the term you’ve coined. Isn’t that a little over the top?
A: No. They are both very similar—both are denying what is a perfectly manifest fact. In the case of Holocaust deniers it’s more recent history, but in both cases the evidence— in favour of the Holocaust and evolution—is simply overwhelming. That doesn’t mean they are morally or politically equivalent. But they are equivalent in denying history.
Q: You cite polls suggesting 44 per cent of Americans believe God created human beings 10,000 years ago. But you also acknowledge that figure really hasn’t changed since the early 1980s. I’m curious about this book’s timing. If the number of creationists isn’t increasing, do you think they are gaining more credence?
A: They are possibly gaining more political power. In the U.S., you are constantly hearing stories of school boards harassing teachers and trying to get textbooks banned.
Q: Traditionally, we’ve associated that school of thought with evangelical Christians, or the Sarah Palin crowd. But you’ve identified Islamic creationists as a growing threat. Why?
A: That’s a particular problem in Britain. I read in the paper today the list of the most popular boys’ names in the country. The first was Jack, the second was Mohammed. That makes me feel a little bit worried.
Q: What is it in particular? Do Islamic creationists hew to a different set of myths?
A: No, they are mostly actually plagiarized from the Christian ones, both biblically and in terms of modern creationism. If you read Islamic creationist literature, it’s pretty much lifted from American evangelical literature.
Q: You’ve mentioned the harassment of teachers of evolution in the United States. What’s the situation like in Britain?
A: I wouldn’t say that it’s bad here, but we have to be vigilant. There are two or three schools which are notorious in Britain. And sometimes when I go around the country, talking to schoolteachers, I do hear that they get a fair bit of hostility from their pupils, often those of Islamic origin.
Q: Hostility in what way?
A: When they try to teach evolution, students fold their arms with a fixed stare of rejection on their face. That sort of thing.
Q: You’ve been at this for nearly 40 years. What sort of attacks have you faced?
A: I don’t have anything to complain about. I actually don’t mind facing an argument about this. But I could see how a schoolteacher whose job it is not just to teach evolution but the whole of science—who hasn’t got the time that I’ve got to devote to this particular topic—could be given a hard time. I can handle heckling on evolution because it’s my own field.
