Root of All Evil?
Root of All Evil?
| 09 January 2006 (USA)
Root of All Evil? Trailers

In this two-part Channel 4 series, Professor Richard Dawkins challenges what he describes as 'a process of non-thinking called faith'. He describes his astonishment that, at the start of the 21st century, religious faith is gaining ground in the face of rational, scientific truth. Science, based on scepticism, investigation and evidence, must continuously test its own concepts and claims. Faith, by definition, defies evidence: it is untested and unshakeable, and is therefore in direct contradiction with science. In addition, though religions preach morality, peace and hope, in fact, says Dawkins, they bring intolerance, violence and destruction. The growth of extreme fundamentalism in so many religions across the world not only endangers humanity but, he argues, is in conflict with the trend over thousands of years of history for humanity to progress to become more enlightened and more tolerant.

Reviews
Incannerax

What a waste of my time!!!

... View More
Kodie Bird

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

... View More
Kaydan Christian

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

... View More
Ezmae Chang

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

... View More
TBJCSKCNRRQTreviews

This is a 90-minutes documentary that examines and challenges religion. It covers an impressive amount, addressing Judaism, Islam, Christianity and Catholicism, without any of them being glossed over. It raises questions that have to be asked, and makes remarkable points. The aggressive and uncompromising way of more than one of the groups should not be ignored. Like The Enemies of Reason, this has disturbing material. This is put together of footage taken from the various areas(including famous sites) that writer Dawkins visited in making this and interviews with people from both sides, several of which are specifically known for their views on the subjects. This is more confrontational and impassioned than the later-produced, aforementioned piece, and this is sure to offend some. I don't think that is as much the intent as a side-effect... I would say that Richard means to provoke exploration, reflection, independent, free thought. I doubt he is particularly likely to go for shock value. The subject matter does perhaps make for more emotional responses, what with the deeply personal nature of it. Richard Dawkins asks great questions, and argues impeccably well. Not always equally respectful, but invariably eloquently and intelligently. I recommend this to any skeptic, and anyone in general who is willing to hear him out. 8/10

... View More
siderite

This is a show about nothing! :) Well, about how ridiculous it is to believe in a god that simply isn't there. Dawkings is clearly an anti-theist, not simply an atheist, being rather violent in his search for the supremacy of evidence based logic over dim witted religion.That is actually the problem with the documentary. The people interviewed on the religious side are simply too far gone to sound remotely lucid. Dawkings chose the people on their religious fervour, therefore they can only look ridiculous in a film based on logic.The arguments are solid though, no matter their aggressive delivery. One of the things I liked is the ending of the first part from where I quote: "we are all atheists about most of the gods that societies have ever believed in, some of us just go one god further".By omitting the few good things about religion, Dawkings appears just a extremist as the religious fanatics that preach on about holy armies and the true god. Bottom line: if you are an atheist, there is nothing new in the film that you haven't already thought of yourself; if you believe in god, you will most likely feel attacked and dislike the film.

... View More
Brian Bagnall

I'm an Atheist, but I found Richard Dawkin's behavior around religious people in this series to be disrespectful. He visited an evangelical church in the US, similar to the type in my city, and he was just rude. The pastor has 3 sins against an elitist like Dawkins: 1) He has a southern accent 2) He was religious 3) He was positive and outgoing. I noticed Dawkins lip trembling through the conversation in apparent anger, and he did *not* approach the conversation coolly as he should have. It is possible to remain friendly and have a debate, something the minister realized but Dawkins seemed oblivious to.I also noticed he seemed to favor bashing Islam and Christianity, but when he visits Jerusalem he is extremely sympathetic to the Jews, even though they behave like the Third Reich when it comes to Palestinians.When he meets with a New York Jew who converted to Islam and now lives in Palestine, he seems curiously relaxed at first, then when he realizes the fundamentalist is hard core he loses his temperament again. The fundamentalist raises good issues - in our lands (the Western world) we are seeing more and more human degradation on TV, on the Internet, and in our daily lives. He argues that our women are dressing and acting like whores, and Dawkins doesn't seem to have an answer to this and doesn't seem concerned about this, saying women are deciding to do it themselves. The truth is these young girls are being fed these messages from TV and society - it isn't coming from within these young girls. The culture is becoming bankrupt, and the people foisting these values on the Western world certainly are not Islamic, and they are not devout Christian. Why isn't Dawkins concerned about what Atheists are doing? Overall, I was not impressed with his supposed free thinking. He seems very leftist establishment oriented to me.

... View More
Jose Maria Norton

This documentary provides a great view at religion and its contradictory evilness. As we live in a world that's threatened by religious fanatics and almost all major conflicts are based on religion, shouldn't it be time we start questioning religion? Dawkins does question religion and everything else. And he continually stresses that as opposed to faith, science tries to discover the world and congratulates everyone who makes theories obsolete.There's a common word used against people like Dawkins - arrogance. But isn't arrogant the one who says he knows everything? Dawkins says he knows nothing but what the facts reveal him.Fear the one who offers all knowledge for he is lying.

... View More