quote:
Richard Dawkins in writings that "Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist" is making a philosophical statement.
He's making the fairly obvious statement that evolution explained some major issues that previously had no good non-theistic explanation. It's not disputed becuase it is so obvious. But it isn't science.
Science is non-theistic in that it explains natural phenomena without reference to a God (e..g as the germ theory of disease explains plagues without reference to a God). It is not inherently atheistic although it can come into conflict with some theistic beliefs. And naturally successful scientific explanations are useful to atheists in combatting those theistic beliefs.
quote:
His science is not judged by the atheistic presuppositions that he approaches Science with, but YEC's and ID theorists, who have
theistic presuppositions, have their science (however bad it might be) criticized as religion.
If Dawkins were publishing bad science to bolster atheism there is no doubt that he would be criticised for doing so. But if he is not - and you have produced no evidence that he is - your claim of a double standard evaporates.
And let me add that it is the ID movement that is at the head of the queue to claim that science, as it currently is, is synonymous with naturalism. Philip Johnson is notorious for conflating the methodological naturalism of science with philosophical naturalism.c
™ Version 4.2