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I'm halfway through Richard Dawkin's "The Greatest Show on Earth" and enjoying it immensely - except for the parts where Dawkins inexplicably gets in behind a minor argument that is distracting to the important one he is arguing - and potentially annoying to the readers that want to read him most.

For example, at one point, after a lengthy chapter about how pedentic zoologists can be with respect to class naming conventions, Dawkins takes us to a footnote to explain, basically, his prejudice in favor of colonial-era names for foreign cities, such as "Peking" instead of Beijing, and "Bombay" instead of Mumbai.

His book is written in English, he explains, so the use of "Peking", rather than "Beijing", should be expected, and, by inference of the tone of his explanation, henceforth encouraged.

I simply don't understand this. The majority of English words have foreign origins - including, no doubt, Peking. And it is perfectly natural that the Chinese should wish others to use the name that they themselves use for their captial city. In discussions with Beijing-ren in Beijing, I have found them quite attached to the name and rather more fond of their own entimologies ("Bei-jing" properly identifies the capital as the "northern capital", as opposed to the older, southern capital, "Nan-jing").

It's a strange thing - when caught using the word "mankind" to formulate an argument, Dawkins quickly (and properly) apologizes to women for the linguistic slight before continuing. He correctly uses the word "Inuit" to describe folks the old colonists of the polar regions knew only as "Eskimos". So what is so wrong with calling Beijing, "Beijing"?

With this argument, Dawkins stops the reader in his tracks, and asks him to question the author's broader judgement based on something far less important than his main theme - the evidence for Darwin's theory of evolution. Which is unfortunate - if the Gallup stats are right, Dawkins already has more than enough opposition. He doesn't need China and India in the opposite corner as well.