Selfish genes-book review (Introduction)

by David Turell , Saturday, September 01, 2012, 18:00 (4444 days ago) @ David Turell

A late retrospective of Dawkins' famous work. Favorable, but the comments section is biting in many entries.-http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/aug/31/the-selfish-gene-richard-dawkins-review#start-of-comments-The whole thing is a giant metaphor that often gets lost in the criticism. Perhaps if the subtitle used the word metaphor, it might have helped. From my standpoint the shame is that Dawkins went on to use evolution as an excuse for atheism. Evolution can be viewed in theistic ways, just as reasonably as in the opposite way. -Is his view too simplistic, yes, but his intent probably was to awaken folks to the puzzle of evolution, as well as to promote his one-sided view of the theory. He has succeeded in becoming famous and controversal all at the same time. All to the good, for we all now arguing about Darwin and the validity of the theory. The theory was invented when cells were blobs of protoplasm. Now they are micro-factories, and cellular biochemical studies reveal a tortuously complex set of processes with check and balances, molecules that act as if they had minds of their own. It raises the question of where did the controlling information come from? Can a stochastic process create information? Can a code invent itself? Just tell me how, and I will join the materialists. May I hear some answers from anyone out there.