| |  | Books : The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design |  | | | | | | | | | |
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 576.82
EAN: 9780393315707
ISBN: 0393315703
Label: W. W. Norton
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 400
Publication Date: September 19, 1996
Publisher: W. W. Norton
Sales Rank: 2832
Studio: W. W. Norton
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
'The best general account of evolution I have read in recent years.'—E. O. Wilson. With a new introduction.
Twenty years after its original publication, The Blind Watchmaker, framed with a new introduction by the author, is as prescient and timely a book as ever. The watchmaker belongs to the eighteenth-century theologian William Paley, who argued that just as a watch is too complicated and functional to have sprung into existence by accident, so too must all living things, with their far greater complexity, be purposefully designed. Charles Darwin's brilliant discovery challenged the creationist arguments; but only Richard Dawkins could have written this elegant riposte. Natural selection—the unconscious, automatic, blind, yet essentially nonrandom process Darwin discovered—is the blind watchmaker in nature.
Amazon.com Review:
Richard Dawkins is not a shy man. Edward Larson's researchshows that most scientists today are not formally religious, butDawkins is an in-your-face atheist in the witty British style:
I want to persuade the reader, not just that the Darwinianworld-view happens to be true, but that it is the only known theorythat could, in principle, solve the mystery of ourexistence.
The title of this 1986 work, Dawkins'ssecond book, refers to the Rev.William Paley's 1802 work, Natural Theology,which argued that just as finding a watch would lead you to concludethat a watchmaker must exist, the complexity of living organismsproves that a Creator exists. Not so, says Dawkins: 'All appearancesto the contrary, the only watchmaker in nature is the blind forces ofphysics, albeit deployed in a very special way... it is theblind watchmaker.'
Dawkins is a hard-core scientist: hedoesn't just tell you what is so, he shows you how to find out foryourself. For this book, he wrote Biomorph, one of the firstartificial life programs. You can check Dawkins's results on your ownMac or PC.
Customer Reviews Average Rating: 
Rating:  - A good introduction
This is a very good introduction to the concepts of evolution for someone who is new to the subject.
Rating: - A good Dawkins primer
This is a truly wonderful place to start for anyone interested in Dawkins' series of forays into being human. Dense, but with some jargon and some lovely prose, it will educate even the most seasoned biology student.
Rating: - Why Does Blind Produce Design?
The whole thesis of "The Blind Watchmaker" is that there is no design in nature.
Yet we see design everywhere: Is it merely an illusion?
The human body is an amazingly designed machine;
The biosphere of the earth is amazingly designed for human and animal life;
If natural selection is blind and random (and I concede that it is)how and why does it result in astonishingly designed organisms and environments?
I claim that Richard Dawkins ... Read More
Rating: - Excellent book
Dawkins says evolution consists of two things: variation and selection. Variation (in the form of mutation) is indeed the result of random chance. Selection, however, is not at all random, and (when acting on variations) eventually results in the things we recognize as "life".
Most people are unaware that science is now starting to focus in earnest on prebiotic evolution, or what Dawkins has called "universal evolution". Just this week the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published ... Read More
Rating: - The Blind Watchmaker
Not an easy book to read, but well worth the effort. Understanding the evidence and arguments for evolution requires effort and thought, whereas believing in invisible and untestable gods is easy, which is why most people choose the latter. Dawkins explains clearly why evolution is the best, indeed the only rational explanation for life as it exists on Earth (other than the FSM, of course. Arrrr!)
The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design | | | |
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