Richard Dawkins sparks controversy, slams schoolboy Ahmed for 'pretending to invent' clock

Courting controversy, evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins has slammed 14-year old  American schoolboy Ahmed Mohamed  on Twitter, who was arrested after a clock he built was mistaken for a bomb sparked international outrage.

In a series of tweets, Professor Dawkins suggested Ahmed might have “wanted to be arrested”, and then further criticised the boy for claiming the clock was his “invention”.

Though Dawkins did not dispute that his arrest was wrong, he strongly questioned his invention. He tweeted:

Dawkins then went on to say that Ahmed was just trying to impress his teachers. Of course, the barrage of protest tweets Dawkins got quickly led him to state that he still thought arresting the boy was wrong.

The media interest in Ahmed’s story, which Dawkins referenced in his tweets, has seen the boy being invited to meet Barack Obama.

As if the boy’s command over English was the main issue, Dawkins also said that maybe Ahmed did not know what the word ‘invention’ meant.

He then retweeted President Obama’s White House invitation to the boy.