AND God said: "Let there be Dawkins, " and there was Dawkins. And Dawkins was clever, angry, charming, petulant, eloquent, arrogant and cold of eye. And God looked at Dawkins, and saw that he was good; well, pretty good. And damned irritating as well.

(Mind you, Dawkins himself is a very controversial figure within the scientific community. The Darwin Wars by The Independent's journalist, Andrew Brown, and Dawkins Versus Gould by Kim Sterelny cover some of the territory. And one of his fiercest philosophical critics is the formidable Professor Mary Midgley. ) If science and rationality lead inexorably to atheistic conclusions, why are so many thoroughgoing Darwinists religious people? What about the likes of John Polkinghorne and Richard Swinburne, or the great evolutionary biologist and Russian Orthodox Christian, Theodosius Dobzhansky?

AlisterMcGrath, who holds a PhD in molecular biophysics and used to be an atheist, was, and still is, an admirer of Richard Dawkins. Now professor of historical theology at Cambridge, McGrath subjected Dawkins's writing to a critique in his recent book, Dawkins' God. His considered verdict was that the God of Richard Dawkins was a caricature.