Richard Dawkins: Why Atheism Is Winning

Today's guest is evolutionary biologist and outspoken atheist Richard Dawkins, whom Reason's Nick Gillespie interviewed last fall in Milwaukee as part of his "Final Bow" tour. Gillespie and Dawkins talked about why he believes science can't thrive without freedom, why gender ideology is starting to look a lot like Soviet Lysenkoism, and why some truths—like the binary nature of biological sex—shouldn't be up for political negotiation.

Dawkins discusses his new book, The Genetic Book of the Dead, what it means to live in a "colony of cooperating viruses," and why he thinks both religious dogma and postmodern relativism are enemies of progress (as an unapologetic postmodern libertarian, Gillespie argues about that last point).

They also explore how moral progress happens, whether atheism needs a replacement as a social and intellectual movement, and how cultural Christianity still casts a long shadow in an increasingly secular world.

This is a conversation for anyone who believes that science, skepticism, and freedom belong together—and who refuses to kowtow to ideological orthodoxy, wherever it comes from.

Upcoming Reason events:

• Rise Above: Nick Gillespie and Scott Barry Kaufman in Conversation, May 19
• Reason Speakeasy: Susannah Cahalan on The Acid Queen, June 3
• Reason Versus debate: Jacob Sullum and Billy Binion vs. Charles Fain Lehman and Rafael Mangual, June 24

 

0:00—Introduction

2:06—Dawkins' new book, The Genetic Book of the Dead

6:13—Selfish and cooperative genes

16:50—Heritability, variance, and twin studies

20:50—Cultural change leads to physical change

22:37—Ancient Babylon was just yesterday

24:28—Dawkins' first memory

25:13—New Zealand's "indigenous science" initiative

34:43—"Sex is the only biological binary"

37:46—Gender, transgenderism, and intersex

47:31—The folly of gender "norms"

49:42—Liberal inquiry and the shifting moral zeitgeist

53:15—Atheism's influence on knowledge and culture

57:27—Is Dawkins really a "cultural Christian"?

1:02:00—Death and legacy

1:03:50—Q&A

• Video Editor: Cody Huff