TagRichard Dawkins
On Atheism’s Watch, Rationality in Science Flew Out the Window
Why did atheists, in charge of science during the last few decades, yield the floor to irrational forces?
Why Materialism Will Probably Drift Into Panpsychism
I predict that “Nothing is conscious” will be superseded, among fashionable thinkers, by “Everything is conscious.”
Humanists Cancel Steven Pinker’s Lecture Over Trans Issues
The Humanist Society of Australia pulled out of sponsoring his lecture because they linked him with a defense of the idea that humans are male or female
Dawkins Watches as Science Skeeters Off a Cliff, Learns Nothing
The decline is mainly due to the loss of traditional insights gained in large part from religion
Can Cultural Christianity Save Christian Culture?
People cannot reconnect with a view on life that they don’t believe, simply to save the things that only such a view can create and maintain
Proof of Darwinism Lies in a Book That Was Never Written…
Terry Scambray looks at Robert Shedinger’s Darwin’s Bluff, which tells the tale of the proof that Darwin was always “going to” provide
New Atheism Is Shrinking and It’s Not Entirely Clear Why
Now, there is an eerie unfashionable silence that fashionable media are beginning to notice. For one thing, it is affecting Richard Dawkins
Decade-Long Study: No Evidence Found for Darwinian Evolution
After many generations, water fleas showed no evidence of changing genetically to adapt to their environment, as the theory would predict
Darwin’s Bold Bluff: He Never Demonstrated His Evolution Theory
He often promised he would demonstrate it. But, as Robert Shedinger shows, when he didn’t, his supporters decided to just act like he had
Bill Dembski: Einstein’s Advice to Bright Young University Grads
His advice, bellowed in parting, may seem obvious but it is challenging in a world that often protects sacred cows over evidence
Are the New Atheists Losing Their “Cool” Quotient?
And taking Darwinism with them? A look at what’s happened in the last two decades would seem to suggest that
Does Deep Social Change Underlie the War on Math?
Why is the universal language of science sinking under the weight of claims about trauma and privilege?
If DNA Is a Language, Who Is the Speaker?
Philosopher Steve Meyer talks about the significance of Francis Crick’s sequence hypothesis that shows that DNA is literally a language of lifeIn a talk at the Dallas Conference on Science and Faith (2021), philosopher Steve Meyer looked at the question of whether a multiverse, as in Multiverse of Madness (2022), or God, as in many traditions is the origin of our universe. That is, is our universe designed — as considerable evidence suggests — or is ours just one of a few lucky universes whose extra-lucky conditions allow for advanced life? Dr. Meyer is the author of The Return of the God Hypothesis (Harper One, 2021) which argues that the evidence from science favors God over a multiverse. (Sample here.) In this first of four transcripts of the talk, he talks about how and why it matters to ordinary people which Read More ›
Dawkins’ Weasel Program vs the Information Life Acquires En Route
To demonstrate what is wrong with fully naturalist assumptions like those of Richard Dawkins’ Weasel program, I developed Weasel Libs, modeled on Mad LibsIn his famous Weasel program zoologist and philosopher Richard Dawkins shows that the simple combination of random mutation and natural selection (Darwinian evolution) can produce the English sentence, “Methinks it is like a weasel”, in a short time period. The point of his program is to demonstrate that evolution can generate the complex, pre-specified DNA sequences we find in biology before the heat death of the universe. His argument sounds persuasive because both English sentences and DNA sequences are made up of symbols. Both can be randomly modified anywhere, and by cumulative selection, they can plausibly adapt to the environment in reasonably short order. Writers in English can learn to pen best-selling novels through trial and error and audience feedback. Read More ›
Dawkins’ Dubious Double Weasel and the Combinatorial Cataclysm
Dawkins has successfully reduced a combinatorial explosion to a manageable problem...or has he?In Richard Dawkins’ book, The Blind Watchmaker, he proposed a famous (and infamous) computer program to demonstrate the power of cumulative selection, known as the “Weasel program.” The program demonstrates that by varying a single letter at a time, it is possible to rapidly evolve a coherent English sentence from a string of gibberish. The way the program works is as follows: First, a sequence of characters is randomly assembled by drawing from the 26 English letters and the space. Then, one character is randomly reassigned. The resulting sequence is compared to the phrase from Hamlet, a quote uttered by Polonius: “methinks it is like a weasel.” For every character that matches, a point is scored. If the new sequence Read More ›
Can Computers –- and People — Learn To Think From the Bottom Up?
That’s the big promise made in a recent article at AeonTufts University biologist Michael Levin and Columbia University neuroscientist Rafael Yuste have an ambitious project in hand: To explain how evolution “‘hacked’ its way to intelligence from the bottom up,” that is, from nothing. They base their thesis on computer science: This is intelligence in action: the ability to reach a particular goal or solve a problem by undertaking new steps in the face of changing circumstances. It’s evident not just in intelligent people and mammals and birds and cephalopods, but also cells and tissues, individual neurons and networks of neurons, viruses, ribosomes and RNA fragments, down to motor proteins and molecular networks. Across all these scales, living things solve problems and achieve goals by flexibly navigating different spaces – Read More ›
Books: Cancel Culture As an Invisible Army of Censors
The new censorship is different from traditional “banned” or “challenged” lists because a younger, much more active crowd is behind itFor authors, Cancel Culture, powered by social media, is becoming a serious business. A poorly thought-out tweet from years past — or merely one to which socially powerful people take exception — may destroy a career. The mob has hit genre fiction hard. One author, studying the trend, recounts, Since March, I have been sending discreet messages to authors of young adult fiction. I approached 24 people, in several countries, all writing in English. In total, 15 authors replied, of whom 11 agreed to talk to me, either by email or on the phone. Two subsequently withdrew, in one case following professional advice. Two have received death threats and five would only talk if I concealed their identity. This is Read More ›
The Coolest Tech on the Planet (Hint: It’s Inside You!)
The intricate design of the living cell has left many materialists stumpedThese days, we surround ourselves with technology to stay in touch, to keep ourselves informed, and to manage the challenges of our daily lives. We also recognize in our devices and machines all the hallmarks of design, understanding reflexively that they express the ingenuity of engineers or software developers. Our appreciation for applied intelligence comes as second nature to us — we intuitively recognize the work of other minds. But what happens when we look up from our technology and survey the world of nature? When we look up at the movement of the planets, or into the eyes of our children, or when we peer through a microscope into a living cell? Do we see signs of minds in Read More ›
Richard Dawkins is not just ableist, he’s unscientific
He refuses to see the joy that people with Down Syndrome bring into the worldOriginally published on MercatorNet on June 2, 2021 by Ann Farmer Way back when, one of life’s great certainties used to be that no matter how obnoxious, prejudiced, jaundiced or snooty Richard Dawkins, the Grand Poobah of Atheism, was, the accolades would continue to roll in. Alas! Those were the Good Old Days for poor old Richard. Nowadays he is looking more and more like a bewildered T-Rex the day after the Cretaceous extinction event. Earlier this year Richard was cancelled by the American Humanist Association. It revoked his 1996 humanist of the year award because he had expressed scepticism about trans people in one of his recent tweets. It turns out that Richard needed his mouth washed out with soap Read More ›