I would like to find a way in which people in Saudi Arabia could learn that they can be something other than a Muslim. Some people may not realize this. Of course, there is the problem that you can get in trouble or get stoned.
Interpretation
The quote highlights the importance of personal freedom and the pursuit of individual identity, particularly in a context where beliefs can lead to severe consequences.
Richard Dawkins expresses a desire for individuals in Saudi Arabia to understand that their identity and beliefs need not be confined to Islam alone. He acknowledges the societal repercussions of deviating from religious norms but emphasizes the importance of exploring one’s own beliefs and potential, advocating for the idea that individuals should have the freedom to question and redefine their identity.
In practice
In a speech about personal growth, one might use this quote to encourage questioning societal norms.
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.
The tourist was the great conservative who hated novelty and adored dirt.
It was both odd and unjust, a real example of pitiful arbitrariness of existance, that you were born into a particular time & held prisoner there whether you wanted it or not. It gave you an indecent advantage over the past and made you a clown vis-a-vis the future.
It is never right to do wrong or to requite wrong with wrong, or when we suffer evil to defend ourselves by doing evil in return.
My desire to live is as intense as ever, and though my heart is broken, hearts are made to be broken: that is why God sends sorrow into the world.
Viva Las Vegas with your neon flashin' and your one arm bandits crashin' all those hopes down the drain. Viva Las Vegas turnin' day into nighttime, turnin night into daytime. If you see it once, you'll never be the same again.
THEOSOPHY, n. An ancient faith having all the certitude of religion and all the mystery of science.
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