Ha! Didn't I liken Dawkins to Ian Paisley myself on this very thread?  This is a very thoughtful article and frankly I agree with it so much I could have written it myself.  For the most part he's taken the words right out of my mouth and I've bookmarked it to forward to all my friends, atheist, agnostic and religious for more discussion.   Thank you for bringing it to my attention.

I'd had a look at that article before, Milly. As you might know, Fred Hoyle was a maverick kind of scientist who pursued theories which were often at variance with those of the scientific community at large. Some of his work (eg. on the evolution of stars) has been upheld by subsequent observation and experiment, while other aspects (eg. the "steady-state" theory of the universe) has been falsified by the same process (good examples both of how the development of scientific ideas works). Hoyle and Wickramasinghe's "panspermia" theory isn't really supported by any hard evidence, but then neither is any other theory on the origin of life on Earth. The H&W theory has always seemed to me contrived and unlikely, but it does sem likely to me that we shall probably know one way or another before very long, especially with upcoming missions to Mars and other parts of the solar system.

Returning to Dawkins for a moment, I don't generally like his writing that much but I'd recommend his recent-ish The Ancestor's Tale as a fine example of the beauty and explanatory power of evolutionary theory. If he only wrote books like that, his thinking would be a lot more convincing to a lot more people.

And returning to Derren Brown for a shorter moment, I don't know that much about him but I don't think he claims that what he does (if he really does it) is in any way connected to paranormal abilities, right?

I think you and I must be viewing it from opposite directions! To me it's packed full of fascinating facts, anecdotes and speculations about life and its development, and dwells hardly at all on theory. The things that irritate me about Dawkins' books are the long-winded justifications, ultimately aimed at creationists and advocates of "intelligent design". I'm at least as convinced about evolution as I am about any scientific theory (with the proviso that if it were disproved tomorrow I'd have to abandon it again!). David Deutsch (qv) has the interesting idea that the mechanism of natural selection is a fundamental principle not just of the evolution of life but of physical reality as a whole. (I think you'd find his Fabric of Reality interesting too - knowing a bit about your interests from what you post here, I think I can guarantee that you'd find reading it a vastly thought-provoking experience, and I'm sure George will back me up on this.)

I don't think he's as important a scientist as Dawkins 

I'm still pondering this sentence.... the verb übergehen has turned into "to take the form of," which has none of the sense of transition or assumption. It's almost better, though infinitely more awkward  , to say that "enlightenment has taken over the role of mythos, and mere objectivity the role of nature."

Improvements welcome! Or just leave it as it was...

For both you and qt, as native German speakers: would you say that übergehen, when used in this context, has a relatively precise meaning, just one that it is difficult to render satisfactorily in English, or is it ambiguous (or at least polysemous) in German as well?

Same for me. I breezed through the first part of the book and then hit maths so far in advance of my abilities that I completely stalled. But I eventually picked it up again and persevered, and it is possible to slide past the equations and still get a feel of the concepts he's describing. Probably the most difficult text book I've ever read but ultimately very rewarding.

I was thinking that too. I wonder what kind of social life he has.