Dawkins' Debate Rejections

[ScepticOrganism]

"I do not, by nature, thrive on confrontation. I don't think the adversarial format is well designed to get at the truth, and I regularly refuse invitations to take part in formal debates." The god delusion/Chapter 8/ Section 1 ~ Richard Dawkins

I think that settles it.

[comet]

I think dawk understands the less he says the better off he is. His "science conclusions" are weak at best. Unlike myself, I just keep running my mouth and am at the point where I have a negative IQ.

[Shuffle]

I think dawk understands the less he says the better off he is.  His "science conclusions" are weak at best.  Unlike myself, I just keep running my mouth and am at the point where I have a negative IQ.

Is english your first language?

[Rhondazvous]

The problem with debating evolution/creation is that biology is a VERY complex subject.  Someone like Ken Hamm, for example, could ask, 'If evolution is true, how did woodpeckers evolve?'  This isn't a question that can be answered in the one, three, or five minutes usually allowed for responses in a debate.  When the biologist in the debate tries to answer, topics like morphology, co-evolution and habitat pressure tend to make audiences glaze over.

Boru

I wish I could give you 5 or 6 kudos. They should have a super kudos. This is the whole truth. The format of a formal debate just isn't suitable for real understanding of what someone like Dawkins has to say. Christians would feel the Christian apologist won simply because he was always able to come up with little clever quips and come-backs, while Dawkins would be tongue-tied by the sheer stupidity of a question like how did woodpeckers evolve.

Religious beliefs are not best on intellectual argument. Asking Dawkins to debate the matter is like asking someone to play an AM radio program on an FM radio.

When I was a Christian, no argument that Dawkins or anyone else might devise could have disabused me. I may have walked away shaken, but I would not have walked away feeling that my beliefs were wrong. Nor would I have been caught dead in the same room with one of Dawkins’ books. Anybody whose mind is not open enough to read what he has already written will not benefit from a debate with him

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

That's basically it. Dawkins (I think, but it may have been someone else) has proposed moderated online debates. Basically what we do here, but each response would be moderated by a panel agreed upon by both parties. The responses could potentially be held up from posting if they are off-point, non-responsive, etc.

I think Dawkins and other biologists would come off MUCH better doing this than on a stage.

Boru

[Cephus]

That's basically it.  Dawkins (I think, but it may have been someone else) has proposed moderated online debates.  Basically what we do here, but each response would be moderated by a panel agreed upon by both parties.  The responses could potentially be held up from posting if they are off-point, non-responsive, etc.

I think Dawkins and other biologists would come off MUCH better doing this than on a stage.

Boru

You'd never get creationists to agree to any moderated panel because they wouldn't be able to pull all of the dishonest crap that they do on stage.  Online, you can take as much time as you need to answer all of the questions in as much detail as you need, something the creationists simply do not want.  They want to Gish Gallop across the stage and pretend that their complete lack of any actual answers is reasonable because there are time limits and scientists can't answer a dozen questions, thrown at random, in that amount of time.  As has been said though, science isn't done on a stage, it's done in a laboratory.  Turning it into a stage show, especially with inherently dishonest creationists, is a complete waste of time.

[Spooky]

As most of you know, Professor Richard Dawkins refuses to have any debates with creationists. This is because he feels that it will give them the status of a real scientist. He compared it to a geographer having a debate with a flat-earther and a reproductive scientist debating a person who believed in stork theory.

I wanted to know what you guys thought of this stance. I know it has received heavy criticisms from atheists and theists alike.

Personally, I think he is right. Debates should be discussions between two people about real world problems. Arguing whether or not evolution is a better model than creationism is not a topic that would affect the world. That being said, the discussion of what should be taught in our schools is a topic that would and is affecting our world.

There's a saying I heard in grade school: Don't argue with idiots, they drag you down to their level and beat you with experience. 

I've failed many times to follow that.

All told though, I agree with Dawkins.