Atheist philosopher Daniel Came says that Richard Dawkins's refusal to debate William Lane Craig is cynical and anti-intellectualist

In this recent article, an atheist philosopher from Oxford named Daniel Came argues that Richard Dawkins' refusal to debate William Lane Craig is cynical and anti-intellectualist and adds that such position is typical of the so-called New Atheists.

Dr.Came comments:

Richard Dawkins is not alone in his refusal to debate with William Lane Craig. The vice-president of the British Humanist Association (BHA), AC Grayling has also flatly refused to debate Craig, stating that he would rather debate "the existence of fairies and water-nymphs".

Given that there isn't much in the way of serious argumentation in the New Atheists' dialectical arsenal, it should perhaps come as no surprise that Dawkins and Grayling aren't exactly queuing up to enter a public forum with an intellectually rigorous theist like Craig to have their views dissected and the inadequacy of their arguments exposed.

Came's article is a reply to Dawkins' recent article where he poses another silly excuse to avoid debating William Lane Craig.

I haven't read any professional paper or book by Dr.Came, but given his straightforward position regarding Dawkins' obvious cowardice, dishonesty and anti-intellectualism, I must assume that Came is an intellectually honest atheist. This kind of atheist is worthy of respect and admiration, even if you disagree with him (regarding their atheistic worldview).

Moreover, as a trained and competent philosopher, Came castigates Dawkins' fallacious arguments against theism. In Came's words: "Dawkins maintains that we're not justified in inferring a designer as the best explanation of the appearance of design in the universe because then a new problem surfaces: who designed the designer? This argument is as old as the hills and as any reasonably competent first-year undergraduate could point out is patently invalid. For an explanation to be successful we do not need an explanation of the explanation. One might as well say that evolution by natural selection explains nothing because it does nothing to explain why there were living organisms on earth in the first place; or that the big bang fails to explain the cosmic background radiation because the big bang is itself inexplicable."

Note that Came's objection to Dawkins's argument is exactly the same objection that William Lane Craig has raised against Dawkins:

This is evidence of intellectual honesty and rigour by Came. (You can see that, contrary to the very common atheistic cranks, irrationalists and charlatans, there are a few atheists out there who are intellectually honest and competent thinkers, worthy of intellectual respect and admiration).

Just for the record (and as a personal addendum): In his article, Richard Dawkins says that he won't debate Craig because Craig is an "apologist for genocide". A smart (and hypocritcal, as we will see) excuse by Dawkins, indeed.

That excuse by Dawkins provides more evidence of his intellectual dishonesty, sophistry and personal cowardice (giving support to Dr.Came, who suggested in a previous article that Dawkins is a COWARD).

Consider the evidence:

Dawkins poses an apparently "moral reason" (the alleged defense of genocide by Craig) as a valid excuse to avoid debating Craig. However, the hypocrital and coward Dawkins himself is sympathetic ("quite open") to the persuasion that the murdering and killing of human beings is right. In this interview, Dawkins says: "Now, if you then ask me where I get my 'ought' statements from, that's a more difficult question. If I say something is wrong, like killing people, I don't find that nearly such a defensible statement as 'I am a distant cousin of an orangutan... The statement 'killing people is wrong', to me, is not of that character. I would be quite open to persuasion that killing people is right in some circumstances... I couldn't, ultimately, argue intellectually against somebody who did something I found obnoxious. I think I could finally only say, "Well, in this society you can't get away with it" and call the police... I realise this is very weak, and I've said I don't feel equipped to produce moral arguments in the way I feel equipped to produce arguments of a cosmological and biological kind" (Emphasis in blue added).

Now, on what moral grounds is Dawkins going to criticize Craig' (alleged) endorsement of genocide, if in Dawkins' own view the statement "killing people is wrong" or "genocide is wrong" or "killing people is right in some circunstances" cannot be defended rationally and intellectually?

Moreover, for Dawkins, "killing people" is not morally evil or bad because in his own opinion the evil doesn't exist objectively in this universe. In his work River Out Of Eden, Dawkins wrote: "The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference." (p.155. Emphasis in blue added)

So, the "observable universe" (which includes the observable cases of murder, rape, genocide, terrorism, poverty, drug additcion, frauds, bigotry and persecution against atheists, etc.) is not, at the bottom, "evil" at all for Dawkins, then which is the rational and intellectual basis of Dawkins' moral complain against Craig? Is Craig being "evil" in Dawkins' view? Can Dawkins argue that Craig is defending something morally wrong and evil, and at the same time to claim that the evil doesn't exist in this universe?

The above suffices to prove that Dawkins is an intellectually incompetent, dishonest sophist and a straightforward coward atheist.

Consistent with his stupidity, incoherence and cowardice, Dawkins ask "Would you share a platform with him? I wouldn't, and I won't."

But Dawkins DID shared a plataform with Craig in Mexico some time ago, as you can watch in this video:

And as you can watch in that video, Dawkins' replies to Craig were ignorant, stupid and intellectually inept (which is typical of most atheists, according to my experience).

You can agree or disagree with Craig's arguments; but I think any rational person would easily see that Dawkins is an intellectual lightweight amateur in comparison with Craig (just compare the logical structure, rigour and coherence of the argumentation of both men).

Craig would destroy Dawkins very EASILY in a debate about God's existence. Dawkins knows it and this is the ACTUAL reason why Dawkins WON'T debate Craig. Ever.