I think looking back to my own childhood, the fact that so many of the stories I read allowed the possibility of frogs turning into princes, whether that has a sort of insidious affect on rationality, I'm not sure. Perhaps it's something for research.
Interpretation
Childhood stories can influence our thinking and perception of reality.
In this quote, Richard Dawkins reflects on how the fantastical elements of childhood stories, such as the transformation of frogs into princes, may shape our understanding of rationality and reality. He suggests that while these narratives might not directly promote rational thinking, they could have a subtle impact on how we perceive the boundaries of possibility and the nature of reality, inviting further exploration into this phenomenon.
In practice
This quote can be used in a discussion on the importance of storytelling in childhood development.
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.
A woman reading Playboy feels a little like a Jew reading a Nazi manual.
The belief in authority is the source of conscience; which is therefore not the voice of God in the heart of man, but the voice of some men in man.
I am the inferior of any man whose rights I trample underfoot.
The progress of the world means more enjoyment and more misery too.
Remorse is violent dyspepsia of the mind.
God how I hate new countries: They are older than the old, more sophisticated, much more conceited, only young in a certain puerile vanity more like senility than anything.
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