In Australia, Dawkins observed that to take seriously the views of contemporary science, especially the cosmology that argues about getting something from “absolutely nothing,” we need to be willing to move well beyond our “common sense” understandings of the world. In this particular case, we will otherwise misunderstand what physicists like Krauss mean by “nothing.” According to Dawkins, the “whole point of modern physics is that you cannot do it by ‘common sense.’”

This from a man who ridiculed the use of the word “body” in Catholic teaching about the Eucharist because it went against common sense. The vocabulary of faith, like that of physics, needs to be understood in technical terms. But Dawkins does not allow for the kind of specialized vocabulary in theology and philosophy that he is so willing to grant to physics.

I take this (the part I've highlighted) to mean that in order to understand modern physics one has to stop thinking along linear, intuitive lines and embrace thinking processes which may at first seem illogical.

What William Carroll (interesting surname by the way; a spiritual descendant of the Rev. Dodgson?) seems to be saying is that because Richard and others are forced to dispense with the common sense approach in order to get to grips with one particularly esoteric discipline, they should be expected to reject rationality when dealing with everything, including religion. But it's a false equivalence; and some things can be approached from a purely logical, common sense position. Religion is patently silly, and just doesn't require any deeper, logic-subverting change in the thinking process in order to understand its inherent silliness.

Only those who are viewing religion from the inside out are blind to this, because most of them have been brought up to take this stuff seriously. And I don't think they can necessarily be blamed for getting umpty when others see what they believe - no, not believe, know - to be true as unscientific, nonsensical balls. To them it is scientific and logical, because their minds have been conditioned to accept it as such.

Edit: I should try and schedule the posting of my comments on a thread to a time when both Steve Zara and Cartomancer are not commenting. I might as well be confessing to a murder. Or is it may as well? Ah, I feel stupid again.