You were lucky!

Richard Dawkins, author of the God Delusion, amongst other books is what you might call an 'evangelical athiest'. No doubt he gets under a lot of people's skin in his vigorous attempt to dispel religious dogma.

This lecture which he gave in 1991 has now made its way to TED. You will have to forgive me for another 'Yay technology' post, but I love the fact that there are sites like TED, Academic Earth, and YouTube Edu.

When I was at school and had a project to do, I went to the Library and got 2 or 3 books, went home and pulled together the project. There was absolutely no way I would have access to all the books, other than those written in the language that I spoke, by people similar to me, that found their way into the library at the school I was at, that my parents had chosen. A small window on the world. But, as the Four Yorkshiremen would say, 'You were lucky'! It is not long ago that the only people who could read were Priests. It was only around 1439 that the printing press was invented.

Although even Hitler was upset with the iPad, we are in exciting times when a small hand held device the same size as a book is going to give us access to almost any book that has ever been written, lectures like the one before from 1991, Martin Luther's 'I have a dream speech' and the ability to interact with other students or curious people from around the world instantly.


I think we are in very exciting times.