Originally Posted by
gneiss 
Dawkins is a scientist at heart. Read some peer-reviewed articles sometime. Most of them conclude by asking more questions, saying what the study did not teach them. I think he goes too far sometimes (having read a very limited selection of his work), sometimes he gets frighteningly close to, "...and then a miracle occurs..." to justify his views. This is why I lump both ends of the spectrum, the absolute believers and absolute non-believers, into one group.
You make a good point here, I think..
Even when I was an atheist, I found that there were many who I described as "fundamentalist atheists" - that is: mindless militant atheists who went out of their way to slam theists.
In my two decades of philosophical and theological research (mostly cross-sectional studies with people), I've found that most people on both sides of the fence are
moderates.
It is the fundamentalists, both theistic and atheistic, that give the bad name to both of their causes, typically though their attempt to slam that which is not part of their cause.
--Outvoid--