Just got The God Delusion

[theVOID]

So how come these wonderful theists philosophers haven't managed to make a concise summary of these great works.

Oh, and you have a concise summary of all the great works on naturalism tucked away somewhere do you?

I don't respect the ability to befuddle, to create such long and convoluted arguments that make you doze and not notice their intrinsic curvature until the circle is complete.

What about the ability to make us re-examine our assumptions? To make us come up with new solutions to exposed problems? To think about concepts that would have otherwise gone unexplored? They have achieved a great deal of that. The philosophical work on Atheism and Naturalism wouldn't be a fraction as impressive, creative and thoughtful were it not for those in opposition.

Religious leaders have told us for millennia they are the keepers of truth

And religious leaders with their unwavering dogma are not the same people as those in the school of natural theology. You've got nothing but a red herring here, it's just like the Gnu Atheists who go from debating moral philosophy to preaching about the horrors of genital mutilation in the same paragraph, a needless distraction that has fuck all to do with the arguments from the other side - If you wan't a stunning and rather embarrassing example of this I suggest you go and watch the following debate by William Lane Craig and Sam Harris (Atheist commentary included);

http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=15167

I'm not going to surrender it now to Atheists who dismiss others as first year philosophy equivalents.

I couldn't care less whether or not someone has studied philosophy at a university, I care about the quality of the arguments. Dawkins philosophical arguments are pretty bad, if you want to contest that statement then feel free to present one of his arguments from the book that you feel is of a good quality and I'll gladly discuss it.

The God Delusion suffices for me

Suffices how? As an introduction to atheism? As a response to creationists? As a guide to secular thinking? As an advocate of humanism? In all these aspects it's pretty good, it suffices for me too - What it fails at is the philosophy of it all.

the argument doesn't seem to deserve much more exploration

Which one? There are multiple arguments in that book. Are you referring to the main argument, the typical "who designed the designer"? If that is what you think doesn't deserve more exploration then you're dead wrong, it's a BAD argument. I'll issue you a challenge, go read through his book and try to determine what exactly it is he is saying, then present it here in your own words.

there are more practical things to be explored as dear old Dawkins does.

Right, I agree, I've already said that - However, his contributions to other areas does NOTHING to change the fact that his philosophical arguments are shit.

So the fact that Dakwins gets these 'stupid' arguments so completely backwards must suggest he's a bit of an idiot too, right?

No it means he recognizes mental masturbation when he sees it and treats it accordingly.

Bollocks, he treats their arguments in the same light as if someone responded to string theory as "the idea that the universe is made from cotton wool". A theory of 11 dimensional spacetime with multiple universes and extraordinarily complex mathematics could just as easily be called "mental masturbation".