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Did Newton unweave the rainbow by reducing it to its prismatic colors, as Keats contended? Did he, in other words, diminish beauty? Far from it, says acclaimed scientist Richard Dawkins; Newton's unweaving is the key to much of modern astronomy and to the breathtaking poetry of modern cosmology. Mysteries don't lose their poetry because they are solved: the solution often is more beautiful than the puzzle, uncovering deeper mysteries. With the wit, insight, and spellbinding prose that have made him a best-selling author, Dawkins takes up the most important and compelling topics in modern science, from astronomy and genetics to language and virtual reality, combining them in a landmark statement of the human appetite for wonder. This is the book Richard Dawkins was meant to write: a brilliant assessment of what science is (and isn't), a tribute to science not because it is useful but because it is uplifting.… (more)
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Chapter 8 of 'Unweaving' to me makes the most interesting reading, that's because I have a psychological bent and in this chapter Dawkins tells us (unwittingly) rather a lot about his modes of thinking.
Dawkins considers himself above the general argument of this chapter, which is that there really are metaphors unhelpful to understanding of science. He admits that 'Selfish gene' uses the word 'selfish' in a rather unusual way, but then claims that his use of selfish really is justified in this case. I argue, along with Denis Noble that it clearly isn't and that this is just special pleading.
Later in this chapter, the author takes Stephen Jay Gould to task. Its obvious that Dawkins doesn't like Gould as he's careful to point that that his criticism doesn't stem from personal rancour. However the wording he uses shows that he considers Gould a good writer but a very poor scientist because he's seduced by his own inappropriate metaphors.
Dawkins considers that its the 'calibre' of the scientist which determines whether or not they get hoodwinked by misleading metaphors - into the calibre where there's a lot of delusional thinking he puts such luminaries as Kauffman, Leakey and Lewin - clearly Gould doesn't make it even this high in his estimation. And so on... if you'd like more debunking please drop me a message.
Like, Bill Nye the Science Guy is apparently a populist whore.
It's also a very interesting collection of ideas. But, like other Dawkins books, it takes a certain fortitude to withstand his attitude and get to the good stuff. It was a good read.
However, I was bored by reading again and again about the bad guys who do not believe in science and are not impressed by the explanation of a phenomenon (e.g. the rainbow). E.g. Dawkins cannot stop castigating Keats just because he found Newton's
I am really a fan of science, sceptic and agnostic. But I can also tolearate Keats' opinion. And somehow I am not really interested in how Dawkins argues with others. The book would have been much more enjoyable and appealing without the constant rage.
Of course, that would have been another book - not one about scientific thinking, but just a collection of fascinating phenomena.
I entirely agree that understanding how a rainbow is produced doesn't destroy the beauty of the rainbow, but I found little beauty or illumination in the rest of this book. Disappointing - an anti-recommend from me.
There are a couple of things that bear a little more analysis; one is Dawkins comments on law and lawyers. Dawkins criticizes the systematic exclusion of people who have some knowledge of probability theory and/or science from juries in cases where probability or science is relevant. On the surface, this seems reasonable; why wouldn’t you want experts on the jury? After all, a juror who had a PhD in mathematics could see through probabilistic arguments by the lawyers and presumably render a more accurate judgement. The catch here is that juries are supposed to base their judgement solely on the arguments presented by the lawyers, not on their own knowledge. If a legal case involves probability and/or science, and there is a scientist or mathematician on the jury, that juror effectively becomes an expert witness who cannot be cross-examined.
Another is Dawkins’ comments on Stephen J. Gould. Dawkins concedes that Gould is a skilled and “poetic” writer, but holds that Gould is also misleading which makes his writing skill that much more dangerous. Dawkins uses a quote by John Maynard Smith to illustrate: “Gould occupies a rather curious position, particularly on his side of the Atlantic. Because of the excellence of his essays, he has come to be seen by non-biologists as the preeminent evolutionary theorist. In contrast the evolutionary biologists with whom I have discussed his work tend to see him as a man whose ideas are so confused as to be hardly worth bothering with…”. This might be a little too harsh; Gould was certainly somewhat off the wall when it came to the “Cambrian explosion”, but his other writings are not that far off base.
I don’t want to seem too critical; this is overall an excellent book. Again bringing up Gould vs. Dawkins, Gould is a better writer than Dawkins, but Dawkins is a better explainer. No illustrations, footnotes, or endnotes, and the index is sparse; I couldn’t find some things I wanted. But there are lots of literary and poetic quotations that illustrate Dawkins theme and ideas.
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An odyssey through seas of science and culture aiming to reclaim the poetic sense of wonder for ‘real science’.