The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design
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Bindung: Taschenbuch
Dewey-Dezimalklassifikation: 576.82
EAN: 9780393315707
Ausgabe: Subsequent
ISBN: 0393315703
Label: W W Norton & Co
Hersteller: W W Norton & Co
Anzahl Seiten: 400
Erscheinungsdatum: August 29, 1996
Herausgeber: W W Norton & Co
Studio: W W Norton & Co
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Produktbeschreibung:Amazon.co.uk:Richard Dawkins is not a shy man. Edward Larson's research shows that most scientists today are not formally religious, but Dawkins is an in-your-face atheist:
I want to persuade the reader, not just that the Darwinian world-view happens to be true, but that it is the only known theory that could, in principle, solve the mystery of our existence.
The title of this 1986 work, Dawkins's second book, refers to the Rev. William Paley's 1802 work,
Natural Theology, which argued that just as finding a watch would lead you to conclude that a watchmaker must exist, the complexity of living organisms proves that a Creator exists.
Not so, says Dawkins: "All appearances to the contrary, the only watchmaker in nature is the blind forces of physics, albeit deployed in a very special way...it is the blind watchmaker".
Dawkins is a hard-core scientist: he doesn't just tell you what is so, he shows you how to find out for yourself. For this book, he wrote Biomorph, one of the first artificial life programs.
Amazon.com:Richard Dawkins is not a shy man. Edward Larson's research shows that most scientists today are not formally religious, but Dawkins is an in-your-face atheist in the witty British style:
I want to persuade the reader, not just that the Darwinian world-view happens to be true, but that it is the only known theory that could, in principle, solve the mystery of our existence.
The title of this 1986 work, Dawkins's second book, refers to the Rev. William Paley's 1802 work,
Natural Theology, which argued that just as finding a watch would lead you to conclude that a watchmaker must exist, the complexity of living organisms proves that a Creator exists. Not so, says Dawkins: "All appearances to the contrary, the only watchmaker in nature is the blind forces of physics, albeit deployed in a very special way... it is the
blind watchmaker."
Dawkins is a hard-core scientist: he doesn't just tell you what is so, he shows you how to find out for yourself. For this book, he wrote
Biomorph, one of the first artificial life programs. You can check Dawkins's results on your own Mac or PC.
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Zugegeben, Richard Dawkins wäre sicherlich kein guter Politiker geworden. Dazu vertritt der in Oxford lehrende Evolutionsbiologe seine Thesen mit zu viel Feuereifer und mit teils wenig diplomatischen Geschick. Aber gerade das macht auch die Stärker der Bücher Richard Dawkins aus. Keiner schreibt so prägnant und verständlich und gleichzeitig auf einem so hohen inhaltlichen und rhetorischen Niveau über das Thema Evolution wie er.
Nach "The Selfish Gene" (1976) und "The Extended Phenotype" (1982) war "The Blind Watchmaker", erschienen 1986, das dritte Buch von Richard Dawkins. Hier vertritt er eine auf Charles Darwins Evolutionslehre basierende Weltanschauung, die weit über das Biologische hinausgeht, wie Dawkins im Vorwort der 2006 veröffentlichten Ausgabe darlegt: "Darwinism encompasses all of life - human, animal, plant, bacterial, and, if I am right in the last chapter of this book, extraterrestial. It provides the only satisfying explanation for why we all exist, ...
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Next to The Selfish Gene, this is probably Dawkins' most impressive and worthwhile book. Darwin's idea of evolution by natural selection remains under fire from those determined to find a ghost responsible for human beings and the rest of life. Dawkins answers the obstructionists with clear logic and good science. He directly addresses the big compound question of who we are and whence we came. It's a daunting task, not only because of the tenacity of resistance to the answer. Dawkins asks readers to open their minds to envision vast stretches of time and conceive of the collection of minute changes that must have occurred to arrive here from such remote beginnings. His writing ability gently leads readers along the many steps necessary to come to an understanding of how life works.
His choice of Paley's 1802 publication "Natural Theology" to outline the roots of obstructionist attitudes is excellent. Although he wasn't challenging Darwin [who wasn't born yet!], ...
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This books is a very interesting and thorough account of evolution and is made accessible to most readers even without a profound biology background. I found the book easier to read than the author's "Selfish Gene". However, in terms of concepts and ideas conveyed "Selfish Gene" is a notch above "Watchmaker".
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It's pretty obvious that a fair few people criticising this book have not read it - and have no intention to. Or if they have attempted to read it they simply haven't grasped the most basic concepts. General assumptions that a pro-evolution stance is just an "opinion", or that evolution is "just a theory" (a complete misunderstanding of the meaning of the word in a scientific context), or statements like "given enough time, dirt can turn into people." show that clearly. One person even takes one of the central aims of the book - where Dawkins takes Paley's watchmaker analogy and attempts to show how a complex object like an eye could evolve by selection - and berates Dawkins because because he apparently doesn't grasp the fact that because a watch or computer has a designer, that life must have a designer as well! Awe-inspiring. If I remember he also accuses Dawkins of circular reasoning!
The whole case of the book is that this "it's all chance" thing is precisely ...
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Fans of Dawkins need be frustrated no more. There are two reasons why Dawkins' Blind Watchmaker thesis requires faith. The first is because Dawkins claims that all life, consciousness and being itself is inherently purposeless and accidental. The second is because Dawkins claims that natural selection is the sole mechanism of evolution. Both of these assertions are belief-systems and are not the results of imperative science. (See Stuart Kauffman's book 'At Home in the Universe' for a strong alternative for naturalistic mechanisms of evolution). Many of Dawkins' readers seem to assume there are only two possibilities - (1) that natural selection is the sole driving force of all life, and (2) that the fundamentalists' notion that God created all life spontaneously is the only alternative. To believe in these 'black or white' options is very narrow minded in itself and the fundamentalists' shallow concepts of God - as professed by the likes of Behe and Demkski - proves to be very ...
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