Evans' position fits well with that of the American philosopher of
science Michael Ruse,

Such a truce would have a chance of working only if it were reciprocal
— if the world's religions agreed to value the atheist position and to
concede its ethical basis, if they respected the discoveries and
achievements of modern science, even when these discoveries challenge
religious sanctities, and if they agreed that art at its best reveals
life's multiple meanings at least as clearly as so-called "revealed"
texts.

From the article:
-----------------------------------------------------------
"Not believing in God is no excuse for being virulently

or naïvely pro-science," says Dylan Evans, a professor of robotics

the University of West England in Bristol.

Evans has written an article for the Guardian of London deriding the
old-fashioned, "19th-century" atheism of such prominent thinkers as
Richard Dawkins and Jonathan Miller, instead proposing a new, modern
atheism which "values religion, treats science as simply a means to

end and finds the meaning of life in art."

Indeed, he says, religion itself is to be understood as "a kind of
art, which only a child could mistake for reality and which only a
child would reject for being false."

Evans' position fits well with that of the American philosopher of
science Michael Ruse, whose new book, The Evolution-Creation

lays much of the blame for the growth of creationism in America -

for the increasingly strident attempts by the religious right to have
evolutionary theory kicked off the curriculum and replaced by the new
dogma of "intelligent design" - at the door of the scientists who

tried to compete with, and even supplant, religion.

A staunch evolutionist himself, he is nevertheless highly critical of
such modern giants as Dawkins and Edward O. Wilson.

Evans' "Atheism Lite," which seeks to negotiate a truce between
religious and irreligious world views, is easily demolished.

Such a truce would have a chance of working only if it were

- if the world's religions agreed to value the atheist position and

concede its ethical basis, if they respected the discoveries and
achievements of modern science, even when these discoveries challenge
religious sanctities, and if they agreed that art at its best reveals
life's multiple meanings at least as clearly as so-called "revealed"
texts.
-------------------------------------------------------------

Read it at

or http://tinyurl.com/7ka2y

(get a username & password at
http://www.bugmenot.com/view.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.thestar.com)

From the article:
-----------------------------------------------------------
"Not believing in God is no excuse for being virulently

or naïvely pro-science," says Dylan Evans, a professor of robotics

the University of West England in Bristol.

Evans has written an article for the Guardian of London deriding the
old-fashioned, "19th-century" atheism of such prominent thinkers as
Richard Dawkins and Jonathan Miller, instead proposing a new, modern
atheism which "values religion, treats science as simply a means to

end and finds the meaning of life in art."

Indeed, he says, religion itself is to be understood as "a kind of
art, which only a child could mistake for reality and which only a
child would reject for being false."

From the article:
-----------------------------------------------------------
"Not believing in God is no excuse for being virulently anti-religious
or naïvely pro-science," says Dylan Evans, a professor of robotics at
the University of West England in Bristol.

Evans has written an article for the Guardian of London deriding the
old-fashioned, "19th-century" atheism of such prominent thinkers as
Richard Dawkins and Jonathan Miller, instead proposing a new, modern
atheism which "values religion, treats science as simply a means to an
end and finds the meaning of life in art."

Indeed, he says, religion itself is to be understood as "a kind of
art, which only a child could mistake for reality and which only a
child would reject for being false."

a new, modern
atheism which "values religion, treats science as simply a means to an end
and finds the meaning of life in art."