The New Republic kindly offered to print (and offer a bit of remuneration for) a revised version of the post I wrote criticizing John Gray’s vicious ad hominem attack on Richard Dawkins—a smear thinly disguised as a review of Dawkin’s autobiography. Curiously, Gray’s ill-tempered screed was originally published in The New Republic as well. Kudos to them for trying to get editorial balance on a piece that, I think, should never have appeared.
My rewritten response is called, “Richard Dawkins doesn’t deserve this fellow atheist’s smears” (subtitle: “Philosopher John Gray should attack his ideas, not his character”). Go have a look, if you wish, and join in whatever debate ensues.
Note: your NR piece was retweeted by Stephen Pinker (with approval).
I couldn’t reply to that article on my iPhone but having read some of the comments I’m glad I haven’t been sucked into their maelstrom of stupid.
I was going to go on there as well, but there isn’t anything worth replying to. The novella by JulianPenrod in the comment section is somewhat entertaining though. Poe’s Law certainly must be invoked, for it is nearly unbelievable that anyone could project as much as he does and not realize it; but, being that we observe it all the time,it’s well within the realm of possibility.
It’s like a compendium of brain-wrongs, from the atheism-is-a-religion stuff at one end to the Dawkins-is-a-mysogynist crap at the other from some poster who appears to be half-pissed on wine.
There’s no point arguing with these people, it’s like wack-a-mole.
Yes, the hatred, delusions, lies and ad hominem attacks in the screed by JulianPenrod is hilarious. It just shows that you can educate someone in various disciplines but that doesn’t mean they participate in rational thinking.
Hah! I’d already found it and retw**ted it with gusto. I don’t know how Richard and Sam do it. It would be quite disheartening for me.
Indeed, it can be really disheartening to watch. It is really frustrating to be misunderstood and mischaracterized!
I watched the Maher/Harris/GnuBatman segment on Real Time. Sam couldn’t get a word in for the interruptions, and yet he was quite gracious to Affleck in a later blog post about it.
Meh.
Yes, for me, what was memorable was Sam saying, “it’s ideas not people” to Affleck’s closed ears & opened mouth.
Richard is used to it. He’s been willfully misunderstood since the publication of his first book, “The Selfish Gene”. As now people who hadn’t even read the book got stuck into him simply because they didn’t like the title. Sam likewise is used to be misrepresented but it must become tiresome. They have my admiration for their ability to deal with it though, I couldn’t.
Sometimes I wonder if Sam just yells “Fuuuuuuuuuuuck” in some big open space sometimes. 🙂
Amazing how so many commenters don’t see anything wrong with Gray’s piece, even when they are reminded that was supposed to be a ‘book review’
Bravo, Jerry, and thank you. What an astonishingly shallow, vitriolic attack by Gray.
Went through the bulk of commentary. Wore me out.
That was brave of you. I didn’t have it in me today.
It’s hard to master just the right level of ennui and rancor at the same time. I imagine they must need a nap too.
Jerry has some real “fans” over there.
Oy vey.
Eric MacDonald and some loons are being very busy over there. I wouldn’t bother again.