Good cop, bad cop. Maybe. Though you are missing things like the Veritas Forums, which has been doing it right all along:
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Sureā¦ I am stating how I perceive the situation. There could be more to it.
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Dr. Swamidass would make a great choice for the next Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford.
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Well that is kind and flattering of you. Though I am no where near as famous as Dawkins, it is kind but not surprising that a Christian would end up taking that chair after he is gone.
Deep rot in scientific institutions?!? Where do you come up with this stuff? Scientific Institutions are providing incredible enhancement to human life including life expectancy, medical advancements, food production and safety, clean water and air. There is not one aspect of human existence that these Scientific Institutions have not played a key role in advancing and improving the human condition for all people across the entire globe.
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After Dawkins dies, which I am hopeful will not be for decades. So it is a reasonable long-term goal for you.
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More likely and hopeful is that I would get a chair like that here at WUSTL. That way Dawkins does not even need to die in order to pass it on 
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It will be kind of surprising if we are going to know what the personal beliefs of the next Chair of Public Understanding of Science are and whether it will matter in the selection process.
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One step at a time. Full Professorship, Department Chair, then ā¦
Ugh, not department chair. That is something to wish on your worst enemies. I want to do science, education, and public engagement, not admin.
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Dept Chairman: I missed one meeting and wouldnāt you know it, I was elected Department Chair.
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That is a job that seems to go quite frequently to people that arenāt present when those decisions are made! 
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Itās a bit excessive to equate Dawkins with Darwin and Newton, donāt you think? He was still a Reader (i.e. associate professor) of Zoology when he was appointed to his fancy chair. AFAIK he has not published a lot of scientific papers in his career. Donāt get me wrong, heās a brilliant science writer, and The Selfish Gene is one of the most well-written popular science books there is. I wish there were a Christian version of him that was just as good in writing. But he was basically given that chair for science communication (as it says), not because heās actually a distinguished scientist.
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I would never equate Dawkins with Darwin and Newton in terms of the greatest scientists who had extraordinary insights and profound impact in understanding of the natural world.
Richard Dawkins is a great writer of popular science books and an excellent advocate of universal human rights.
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You are definitely right about the contributions of Scientistsā¦
However there has also been a sustained campaign to use science to promote atheismā¦Dawkins, Krauss etc are all examples of this.
I look at it as a sustained campaign to use science to promote science AND to keep theism out of science AND to stop theism from impeding science
You can look at it whatever way you want. However if you identify the methodical materialism of Science with the philosophy of materialism, you are not being neutral with respect to theology.
Then why make a false claim you are?
That is a good way to look at it.
As long as he does that outside of science, who cares? It is just an atheist being an atheist.
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Except that itās part of the above mentioned sustained campaign. The line is quite blurred in this area and methodical materialism lapses in philosophical materialism .
So just call them out for being rule breakers and you win. It is really not that hard. They are supposed to keep the line sharp.
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