Science vs God: Richard Dawkins takes on Archbishop of Canterbury

Richard Dawkins & Rowan Williams The Archbishop of Canterbury discuss Human Beings & Ultimate Origin, 23rd February, Oxford, moderated by Anthony Kenny

Yesterday (23/2/12) Richard Dawkins went head-to-head with Rowan Williams in a televised debate about evolution. So who won?

Oxford university hosted what seemed tantalisingly like a similar clash of great minds, between the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, and Professor Richard Dawkins – a bulldog on behalf of Darwin's theories. But anyone hoping for a dust-up would have been sorely disappointed, for the conversation was conducted with utmost politeness. The cleric even confessed his belief in evolution, and agreed with Dawkins that humans shared non-human ancestors.

Could Dawkins disprove the existence of God? He could not, he confessed, describing himself not as an atheist but as an agnostic – to gasps from Twitter, where the unlikely #dawkinsarchbishop hashtag was trending.

They did, finally, come to verbal blows – or gentle nudges, at least – over the origins of the universe. "The writers of the Bible, inspired as I believe they were, were not inspired to do 21st-century physics; they were inspired to pass on to their readers what God wanted them to know," Williams argued. "In the first book of the Bible is the basic information – the universe depends on God, humanity has a very distinctive role in that universe, and humanity has made rather a mess of it."

"I am baffled," responded Dawkins, "by the way sophisticated theologians who know Adam and Eve never existed still keep talking about it." God, he said, "cluttered up" his scientific worldview. "I don't see clutter coming into it," Williams replied. "I'm not thinking of God as an extra who has to be shoehorned into it."

Read more: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/science-vs-god-richard-dawkins-takes-on-archbishop-of-canterbury-7440051.html
Are you surprised this was not more of a heated argument? Are you suprised by some of Dawkin's or Williams' comments? Do you think God does 'clutter' our view of the world?