{"id":2757,"date":"2007-10-20T11:37:00","date_gmt":"2007-10-20T19:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=2757"},"modified":"2007-10-20T11:37:00","modified_gmt":"2007-10-20T19:37:00","slug":"2757","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=2757","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

We live in an increasingly rational society, in which “a rising tide of irrational religiosity infecting mainstream life” has been substantially curbed thanks to the efforts of philosophers and authors like Richard Dawkins.<\/p>\n

So says Mark Chadbourn, in a post entitled Richard Dawkins Is Killing SF!<\/a> [via<\/a>]<\/sup> And while it’s an interesting theory, I think the basic premise is a little absurd — and perhaps even a little insulting. <\/p>\n

Chadbourn acknowledges that “[i]f you’re interested in magic, it doesn’t mean you think Einstein is a charlatan.” But that’s essentially what he’s suggesting when he asserts that the enjoyment of magical stories, and the success of science fiction and fantasy as genres, hinge on widespread irrational beliefs.<\/p>\n

You can<\/i> believe in magic and believe in Einstein. But you can also enjoy stories about magic without<\/i> believing in it. I can enjoy science fiction and fantasy without believing in unicorns, ogres and orcs, faster-than-light travel, vampires, ghosts, God, telepathy, Frankenstein’s monster, artificial intelligence, or any number of other things.<\/p>\n

In short, I can be as Richard Dawkins insists I should be and still find plenty to keep me coming back to science fiction and fantasy.<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We live in an increasingly rational society, in which “a rising tide of irrational religiosity infecting mainstream life” has been substantially curbed thanks to the efforts of philosophers and authors like Richard Dawkins. So says Mark Chadbourn, in a post entitled Richard Dawkins Is Killing SF! [via] And while it’s an interesting theory, I think … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[238],"class_list":["post-2757","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2757"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2757"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2757\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}