Discount Dawkins

[Svartalf]

I guess that's been discussed at length already, do a rediredt to the appropriate thread would be a significant favour...

[hackenslash]

Not sure if it's been discussed here, but 'absence of evidence' has been hashed out in this thread.

In this post, Cali proves not merely a negative, but what people actually mean when they say you can't prove a negative, namely a non-existence postulate.

In both cases the problem is one of ensuring that the entities in question are sufficiently well defined, but any example of a counter renders the statement false.

[Hermit]

absence of evidences is not evidence of absence and
You can't prove a negative, actual facts or too oft repeated fallacies and sophisms?

The problem with both of those 'saws' is that they're factually incorrect.

To me absence of evidence is just that, and no more than that, but yes, Svartalf is right; such issues are better discussed in threads dedicated to them.

[Bella Fortuna]

Every publication gets remaindered eventually.

It's very rare you see science books remaindered.

That's true in this country, mainly because they don't publish the books in the first place...

[hackenslash]

Science is pretty well published here, but you still don't see science books remaindered. I know quite a few places that are very good for remaindered books, and their science selections are inevitably very poor, and in fact only contain material that's quite poor. You don't see them much even in second-hand shops and charity shops. I guess the sort of people who read science books aren't the sort to dispose of books.

It's hell.

[Rum]

I'm feeling guilty for damning with faint praise r.e. Dawkins. I owe him and the God Delusion a huge debt of gratitude for clarifying my thinking and getting me off the middle of the road agnostic rung and into the 99% strand of the fence as it were.

[JimC]

I have all the Dawkins books I require - his memoirs would not interest me in the slightest...

[SteveB]

I'm feeling guilty for damning with faint praise r.e. Dawkins. I owe him and the God Delusion a huge debt of gratitude for clarifying my thinking and getting me off the middle of the road agnostic rung and into the 99% strand of the fence as it were.

Me too. It wasn't his books that did it. It was Dawkins the person. This video specifically:



The holy light shone on me after seeing this video and I was forever an atheist. Hallelujah!

[Tero]

I've no interest in reading his memoirs. He's not very interesting as a person.
I'll still read his books on science.

[this]

[klr]

Judging where some celebrity/sports auto-biographies end up - in the basement bargain bin - I'd say he's doing quite well. For now.

[Hermit]

I'm feeling guilty for damning with faint praise r.e. Dawkins. I owe him and the God Delusion a huge debt of gratitude for clarifying my thinking and getting me off the middle of the road agnostic rung and into the 99% strand of the fence as it were.

Me too. It wasn't his books that did it. It was Dawkins the person. This video specifically:

The holy light shone on me after seeing this video and I was forever an atheist. Hallelujah!

Having been on 6.9 in the Dawkins scale of atheism before he even published The Selfish Gene, (a book the central thesis of which I have major problems with), TGD had no influence on me at all, and I know enough about him to be even slightly interested in reading his biography. That said, I really do appreciate very much how (along with a slew of other authors) Dawkins has become a major catalyst for discussions about religions and the alleged existence of a monotheistic god.

[pErvinalia]

What was your problem with TSG? I haven't read it for a very long time, so i can't even remember what I specifically thought about any aspect of it.

[Hermit]

What was your problem with TSG?

The primacy of the gene as the principal - arguably sole - driver of evolution.

[pErvinalia]

What are the alternatives? Gene complexes, whole organism, populations (aka EO Wilson)?

[JimC]

What was your problem with TSG?

The primacy of the gene as the principal - arguably sole - driver of evolution.

A quibble; it was the process of selection, acting on gene frequencies, that he saw as the principal (but not sole) driver of evolution. His key point was to more carefully define what the "gene" could be...