Here’s a handy tip for religious fundamentalists who question evolution: you’re not going to win any friends by telling an 82-year old man beloved by pretty much the whole of the UK that he’s going to “burn in hell”.

Wildlife documentary maker and general good egg David Attenborough has admitted he receives hate mail from Christians for not giving due credit to God in his programmes.

Quoting from an interview in Radio Times, a number of papers are running stories about the unpleasant letters Sir David has received – “They tell me to burn in hell and good riddance.”

Still, having in the course of his career encountered some of the world’s most venomous animals, Sir David is clearly able to deal with them. He says:

They always mean beautiful things like hummingbirds. I always reply by saying that I think of a little child in east Africa with a worm burrowing through his eyeball. The worm cannot live in any other way, except by burrowing through eyeballs. I find that hard to reconcile with the notion of a divine and benevolent creator.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Attenborough also says he finds people scarier than animals (PA):

The times when I’ve thought that things were getting a bit too hairy for comfort have always been with other human beings. If you are with a man on a road and he’s got a gun and he’s drunk and he doesn’t speak a single word of your language and he doesn’t like the look of your face, that’s not nice.

Headline watch

My vicious hate mail ordeal, by Attenborough the evolutionist – Daily Mail

Burn in Hell, Christians tell David Attenborough – The Scotsman

Related

‘I wish I could believe in God’: What happens when Sir David Attenborough turns his thoughts to human existence? – Daily Mail

Interview: David Attenborough – Daily Telegraph