I don't do formal debates, because formal debates where you have two people up on a stage in equal status, and each of them is given 20 minutes to give their point of view, and then 10 minutes for a rebuttal, or whatever, that creates the illusion that you really do have here two equal points of view of equal scientific standing.
Interpretation
Debates can create a false sense of equality between opposing views, regardless of their actual merit.
In this quote, Richard Dawkins critiques the format of formal debates, arguing that they can mislead audiences into believing that two opposing viewpoints are equally valid and scientifically supported. He points out that giving equal time to both sides can lead to the dangerous illusion that all perspectives hold the same weight, which is not true when one view is based on sound evidence and the other is not.
In practice
In a discussion on the value of education, someone might reference this quote to highlight the importance of recognizing credible sources.
No educated person believes the Adam and Eve myth nowadays, but it's surprising how many parents think that it's somehow fun to pass on this falsehood to their children...I would want to argue that the truth of evolution is more interesting and more poetic
If the history-deniers who doubt the fact of evolution are ignorant of biology, those who think the world began less than ten thousand years ago are worst than ignorant, they are the deluded to the point of perversity.
The population of the U.S. is nearly 300 million, including many of the best educated, most talented, most resourceful, humane people on earth. By almost any measure of civilised attainment, from Nobel prize-counts on down, the U.S. leads the world by miles.
When you make machines that are capable of obeying instructions slavishly, and among those instructions are 'duplicate me' instructions, then of course the system is wide open to exploitation by parasites.
Even if not a single fossil has ever been found, the evidence from surviving animals would still overwhelmingly force the conclusion that Darwin was right.
The bitter hatreds that now poison Middle Eastern politics are rooted in the real or perceived wrong of the setting up of a Jewish State in an Islamic region. In view of all that the Jews had been through, it must have seemed a fair and humane solution. Probably deep familiarity with the Old Testament had given the European and American decision-makers some sort of idea that this really was the historic homeland of the Jews.
You will be required to do wrong no matter where you go. It is the basic condition of life, to be required to violate your own identity. At some time, every creature which lives must do so. It is the ultimate shadow, the defeat of creation; this is the curse at work, the curse that feeds on all life. Everywhere in the universe.
Eventually I saw that the path of the heart requires a full gesture, a degree of abandon that can be terrifying. Only then is it possible to achieve a sparkling metamorphosis.
There is a great deal of pain in life and perhaps the only pain that can be avoided is the pain that comes from trying to avoid pain.
For men are not equal: thus speaks justice.
I was sure that somewhere a grandiose carnival was going on in the sky, and I was missing it.
Equal protection under the law - for race, religion, gender or sexual orientation - should not be subject to the most popular sentiments of the day.
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