What I hear over and over is a strong concern over a fairly rigid set of beliefs that may fit under the broad definition of "traditional" - recognizing that traditional is much larger than this. This concern seems to be centered on religions that define themselves at least to some extent as explaining that which science does not explain. To try to nail it a bit further - a group that wishes in some way to live in the past or without the bother of the rest of the world. I do recognize that there may be exceptions to this.

Well, if fundies who are stuck in the past would just leave the rest of us the hell alone, I suspect that most people would be more than happy to let them get on with being stuck in the past. Whatever floats their boat and all that. (Now, whether this is an entirely ethical position to take is a somewhat more sticky issue.)

What appears to be done is to take this group - admittedly extremely large in some countries - and make the claim that this group is religion.

That is clearly not what Dawkins does in the interviews posted in the diary (as I said above, I can't comment on the totality of his work). Leaving aside the fact that going after fundamentalism with full force and not worrying about stepping on some religious moderates' (sometimes overly sensitive) toes can certainly be viewed as an entirely ethical thing to do...

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.