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Richard Dawkins


Apollon

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Les ennemis de RD vont adorer :icon_up: la dénonciation de l'obscurantisme rampant : le gateau d'anniversaire !

THE ENEMIES OF REASON

(Silly music. Elderly donnish figure wearing casual clothes and expression of deep concern gazes earnestly into camera)

Professor Richard Dawkins (for it is he) : It is frightening to think that in the 21st century there are millions of people all over the world who believe that they can change the future by a simple act involving a birthday cake.

(Cut to shot of family group clustered around Marks & Spencer chocolate cake covered in lit candles. Woman blows out candles while the rest of her family shout "Go on, Mum - make a wish!" Close-up of woman with eyes closed, accompanied by sinister music. Cut to Dawkins, looking shocked and incredulous.)

Dawkins (interviewing woman) : Mrs Simpkins, can I ask you what you think you were doing just now?

Mrs Simpkins: Well, I just made a wish while I was blowing out the candles, like I always do.

Dawkins: And you really thought that what you were wishing for would in some mysterious way come true?

Mrs Simpkins: Well, you never know, do you?

Dawkins: But how could blowing out candles on a cake have any influence over a future event? Isn't that just the most crude, primitive, infantile, unscientific superstition?

Mrs Simpkins: Well, if you're going to be like that, you're not going to have any of my cake.

Dawkins: As a control test, tell me what it is you wished for?

Family: Don't tell him, Mum, or it won't come true.

Dawkins (to camera) : So obviously the followers of this cult are under a vow of silence not to divulge the object of the "wish", to prevent any analysis of the outcome of their pathetic ritual, thus exposing it as an empty and futile act of self-deception for insecure neurotics.

(Cut to men in white coats looking through microscopes at pieces of birthday cake)

Dawkins: For the last five years, a team of researchers from the University of New Dworkins has been analysing over 2,000 case histories of the Birthday Wish cult. The leader of the team, Professor Hiram Moonbat, gave me his findings.

Bearded Scientist: In examining 2,522 samples, we could find little or no correlation between the expression of the "wish" by the anniversarial celebrant and any ultimate wished-for event.

Dawkins: Well, that proves it, doesn't it? The whole thing is rubbish, isn't it? And it is deeply alarming that, in the 21st century, the dark forces of unreason should still have so many millions of people in their grip, still indulging in…

Professor Moonbat (in background): … however, our researchers were somewhat hampered by the fact that no one would tell us what they had wished for, which rather invalidated…

Dawkins (intervening): So there we have it, Everyone in the world is mad except me, and very, very dangerous.

(Cut to shot of birthday cake exploding, destroying family home. Caption reads "Reconstruction ")

NEXT WEEK: Professor Dawkins looks at the bizarre practice of shooting fish in a barrel, concluding that it is deeply unscientific and boring to watch.

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