‘The Root of all Evil?’

In January 2006, a documentary entitled ‘The Root of all Evil?'' was presented by Prof. Richard Dawkins on British television. In this documentary, Dawkins advanced a number of arguments against religion and in favour of atheism. This book reports a study that looked at the introduction of Dawkins'' ideas and their circulation in the British public, through argumentation analyses of the documentary and articles which appeared in the British press. Subsequent interviews undertaken with people who expressed a belief in a supernatural faith and others who did not revealed two prevailing representations: that of religion as good, and that of religion as evil. Further study revealed that religion, science, and morality can be represented along three distinct continua. The book dispels the idea of a single continuum along which religion and science are organised; it demonstrates the complexity of the representations in circulation and it highlights the relevance of the study of belief systems for understanding social behaviour.