Okay good Bunglawala thinks Muslims should avoid going the “intelligent design” route lest they end up throwing off “their burqas as soon as they set foot on a plane to go overseas” and wrongly blaming Islam rather than the ill-informed interpretation of the Qur’an by some Muslims. Whatever. Of course interpretation of the Qur’an whether informed or ill-informed is beside the point, since the Qur’an isn’t a book about biology or even evolution – but whatever. But I do take issue with this (all too predictable, all too familiar) bit:

Dawkins’ work was forcefully argued and took no prisoners from the creationist camp; however, I did find his militant atheism quite off-putting…Gould on the other hand…gently chided those scientists who

Now really. That’s just silly. And yes I know he’s being jokey, but I bet he also means it, and he ought not to.

Would we even remember Little Nell if she hadn’t died in such spectacularly mawkish fashion? Would we prefer that Emma Bovary didn’t swallow the poison and instead became a clochard, cadging francs at the agricultural fair? And do we really want to contemplate Harry, now bald and grizzled, the lightning-shaped scar faded into an age spot, retired from magic and, pint in hand, prattling on about old quidditch matches? Surely it makes more sense to employ the other kind of magic, and go back to Volume 1 and start over.

Little Nell is welcome to die … Read the rest

One or two items from Christopher Hitchens’s The Missionary Position.

When Malcolm Muggeridge did his 1969 BBC documentary about Ma Teresa, one day they were taken to what MT called ‘the House of the Dying.’ It was badly lit, and the director was doubtful they could film inside, but they had just received some new film made by Kodak, and the cameraman, Ken Macmillan, a very distinguished cameraman, Hitchens says, known for his work on Kenneth Clark’s Civilization, said let’s try it, and they did. Then when they got back to London and were watching the rushes they were surprised when the shots came up: they could see every detail. And Macmillan said ‘That’s amazing, that’s extraordinary,’ and … Read the rest