PZ Myers & Richard Dawkins: The Danger of Teaching Children to believe in Faith rather than Evidence

Listen from 27 minutes.

PZ Myers (PZM)
i'm often told by the relgious 'you shouldn't worry about the moderate christians or muslims, its only the extremist fanatics that should worry you'. I will attack unitarians, buddhists, methodists, anglicans, etc. What it comes down to is [Relgious] Faith. We have a culture that regards Faith as a virture. Faith is promoted in all these religions even the most moderate. I will not tolerate this excuse of Faith. Wallowing in ignorance is not the answer!
Richard Dawkins @ 28 minutes: mild and gentle people teach children that faith is a virtue, that it's a good thing to believe something just because you have faith and you don't have to justify it. Then those children will grow up and a minority of them will say, well my faith says 'go and bomb skyscrapers' and such. Moderate religious people have this pernicious influence of glorifying faith and actually making it a positive virtue. Doubting Thomas, the least admired of the disciples, the patron saint of scientists, actually wanted evidence, but we are taught as children that it is better to believe without evidence than with evidence. That is the fuse that after a long burning can produce true fanaticism and violence.
PZ Myers @ 29': The opposite of Faith is criticism. We come from a scientific culture that values critical thinking, argument and criticism. Which is antithetical to what you do when you are favouring Faith. In Faith you are not supposed to question things. Or its ok to question things as long as you come up with the right answer - that you go on believing!
Richard Dawkins at 30': I've heard countless stories of children being criticised for simply questioning. I met a man in Dublin last week who said he was thrown out of Sunday School for simply asking 'why didn't all the other boats float along with Noahs!'