Delusion and the Appetite for Wonder - Unweaving the Rainbow

Dawkins fans like me will be horrified by this book. Roughly speaking , it could be sub-titled 'Why Science isn't boring' but, unlike the thrilling romp of 'The Selfish Gene' or the interest of 'The Blind Watchmaker', here Dawkins bangs wearily on, often on his own hobby horses or things he evidently knows little about.
He hectors us about watching the X-Files, he has a predictable go at Stephan Jay Gould, he repeats earlier work almost verbatim. His previous books demonstrated brilliantly how science can be rivetting, enlightening, enthralling and elegant. This is very sad, a little like watching a once-great dancer try his old stunts after drinking to excess. The little flashes of brilliance simply serve to remind you of what has gone.

I positively love Dawkins literary style. The more of his books you read, the more you can feel how passionate he is about science and the natural world. The "official" book reviews call "Unweaving The Rainbow" a "love letter to science." I suppose you could call it that. I actually found it extremely informative on many scientific subjects, without being overly scientific or complicated. This would be an excellent read for someone who wants to learn something about natural sciences without getting drowned in all the professional, scientific jargon. The only reason I took a star away from this book is because I do feel that he gets a bit carried away with the poetry inserts. I'm not much of a poetry buff anyway, and the regularly inserted poems or poetic briefs only seem to get in the way of the interesting stuff in the book. Otherwise I loved this book immensely and would highly recommend it to anyone, whether scientifically inclined or not!!

I applaud the scrupulous research and integrity that went into the making of this book, and the warmth and generosity (and righteous indignation when necessary) of its tone. "Unweaving the Rainbow" will become a classic, sections excerpted into anthologies to be taught as examples of clear, rational content and of powerful, persuasive, and effective prose.
Bravely, honestly, logically, with good humor and grace, Dawkins stands up for what he believes. And he believes that the study of science is essential for helping us to understand and appreciate ourselves and others and the world around us: why we do what we do, feel the way we feel; how the laws of nature work and what that means to the way we live our lives. If I could sum up the message of twentieth-century literature (which I have taught at the university level for nearly thirty years now) in one sentence, it would be the same poignant conclusion that Dawkins reaches in this book of science: We are able to care for each other and the world more deeply when we realize we are all we've got, and our time here is brief indeed: "The feeling of awed wonder that science can give us is one of the highest experiences of which the human psyche is capable. It is a deep aesthetic passion to rank with the finest that music and poetry can deliver. It is truly one of the things that makes life worth living and it does so, if anything, MORE effectively if it convinces us that the time we have for living it is finite." [caps mine]
Science can reveal why we do what we do, feel the way we feel. All of us in different countries, unlike in so many ways - Dawkins shows us a common ground, a way to touch each other's lives in communication, a way to live lives of exuberant celebration. Poetry tells the story of what it means to be human in this particular time and this particular place, universal connections between all the things in the world and all the people. So does this exhilarating book of science, which (like listening to Beethoven's "Ode to Joy") makes me happy to be alive.
As a poet and teacher of creative writing (the headline above is taken from one of my Darwin poems), I find the POETRY of Unweaving to be as good as any being written anywhere today - and better than much of it. I would give anything to have described "the thread . . . by which our existence hangs" as "wincingly tenuous" ( 2). The joy of those last two words, one sound briefly kissing the other and passing gracefully on, my favorite kind of rhyme and devilishly difficult to accomplish.
The diction: "A fawn's pelage is a painting of the dappled pattern of sunlight filtered through trees onto the woodland floor" (240).
The metaphors and similes: "[Scientists] assist the imagination back to the hot birth of time and forward to the eternal cold . . ." (16). I have given birth, and "hot" is le mot juste. How beautifully intuitive he is: how else could a male know? A perfect analogy weds the factually accurate (literal truths) with the non-factually accurate (figurative truths). And Dawkins calls always for accuracy. That's where he departs from those who insist on holding on to an [eternal]- life preserver, the supernatural faith of their childhoods, instead of taking the trouble to build, plank by thoughtful plank, a boat that will float in real water. He understands and sympathizes with their needs - most of the book is devoted to explaining how such delusions are born of our very natural "appetite for wonder." But their needs (and all the false analogies in the world) cannot turn wishful thinking into fact, cannot unwrite the laws of nature. When I was a child, I thought as a child; as an adult, I want to put away believing that childish (irrational) things are reality, while maintaining a child-like (imaginative) sense of curiosity and awe. "Unweaving the Rainbow" helps me do both.
The humor: how the skin of a squid behaves like an LED screen, and "the skinflicks it shows are spectacular" (7). "The total area of membranous structure inside one of us works out at more than 200 acres. That's a respectable farm" (9).
The eloquence of Unweaving goes on and on, every page with the teeming abundance of a Burgess Shale. BUT (I can tell you as a writer) such a work can evolve only by "gradual accumulation," many drafts ending in the trash can, many excursions down dead-end streets. No "long-jump mutations." No "top- down" inspiration. Just hard work and perspiration here on the ground.
A few readers might say he treads on their cherished flowers (some of these flowers being "wild" indeed); but most will thrill to the way he treads on the weeds of superstition and ignorance, plants new seeds of thought to bloom in our minds, points out new "flowers" of beauty in the natural world that we had not noticed before.
Thank you, Richard Dawkins, for sharing with us your extraordinary mind, your passionate quest for honesty and accuracy, your perceptive awareness of the importance of human relationships - and most of all for this splendid rendering of the natural world.

Oh, and entertaining! If Dawkins ain't your thing...well, really, what's to say? Unweaving the Rainbow is as good, inspiring, informative, forceful, etc., etc., as popular science writing gets. God bless the Dawkins of the world for taking time away from the bench to share their (scientific) insights and their own sense of awe at the splendor of all things great and small. To read Dawkins, in book after wonderful book -- this one no less so -- is to partake in the richest of intellectual feasts. Great stuff!

Dawkins lives by the beauty and wonder of science and wants his readers to share his enthusiasm. He was more convincing when he wrote brilliantly about science than when he wrote bitterly about people. He often seemed to be trying to group huge and disparate people (from xfile fans to all of Christianity) in one broad brushstroke, and that did bother me. Still, a clear and lucid thinker, and a pleasure to read.

As a scientist myself, I looked forward to another great book from one of the masters of scientific explanation, Richard Dawkins. However, what I was treated to was more a collection of unconnected essays, some good, some attrocious and most having the irritating feature of prose smattered with poetic quotes, presumably intended to give the text an added boost. I was particularly shocked to see Dawkins's murderous and wanton mutilation and debasement of Keat's "Ode to a Nightingale". Like a clumsy oaf treading on a wild flower, Dawkins proceeds to try and explain and add to this great poem by tacking on some interesting but utterly irrelevant scientific details about birds. The very fact that he felt he needed to do this, suggests strongly to me that he has not understood this poem at all, nor poetry in general for that matter. Poetry conveys emotional content, allowing one human being (perhaps centuries dead) to cause another to laugh or cry or sing. This channel of communication is totally orthogonal to lucid metaphor and imagery used to explain scientific facts and concepts, which Dawkins invokes with great effect in his earlier and far superior books such as "The selfish gene". He should definitely stick to what he is good at. Dawkins redeems himself somewhat when he devotes some book space to giving a vitriolic and righteous good kicking to a new branch of feminism which demeans and debauches both true feminism and true science by seeking to replace reason, science and common sense with "women's ways of knowing". (If scientific enquiry were left up to this bunch, humanity would be in deep trouble!) However Dawkins then sinks to new depths when his inflated ego cannot resist the urge to take another swipe at Stephen Jay Gould. On the sidelines, we are supposed to cheer loudly as these two Herculean gladiator heroes knock each other's tiny straw men to the floor with their big swords. Well, er, no actually...it makes them both look rather silly. The last two chapters are probably the best, giving a very nice outline of the evolution of human intelligence, however, overall this is a rather poor effort, with Dawkins clearly riding on his reputation to enable him to broadcast to a much wider audience than he would otherwise reach if this book were his first effort. Don't bother buying this book unless you are truly a rabid disciple of Dawkins. (Only high priests and priestesses of the Dawkins cult need place it on their altars!)

I agree with Richard Dawkins that people should find in science that sense of wonder which they too often seek in new-age nonsense. And I agree with an earlier reviewer that in the first fifth of this book, he states his case well and with great sincerity. But soon after that, his bitterness takes over, and except for a few lapses into excited (and sometimes exciting) discussions of natural history, the book becomes little more than scripture for the faithful.
I can't join earlier reviewers in finding Dawkins' prose beautiful or poetic, but it is competent and admirably straightforward. Most of his humor is deployed destructively, which gets wearying; the remainder of his wit I would class as an affected sort of whimsy. The passages in which he gets carried away by the beauty of the world--and the principles that govern it, where sufficiently known--are often charming, but many of his angrier passages are at best coarse and at worst slightly subliterate. Anyone who admires Dawkins is unlikely to be put off by these flaws (or even to see them as flaws). Still, if Dawkins' intention was to coax new sheep into the fold, he may find that the noise of axes being ground frightens them off.
As a passably intelligent rationalist who doesn't take everything Dawkins says as Holy Writ, I must say that I wish he would occasionally allow people to disagree with him without calling them ignorant, stupid, crazy, or evil. There is nothing more eloquent than scientific fact--nothing more corrective of error--so I'm not sure why Dawkins feels the need to add this shrill enumeration of personal grievances to the far more impressive testimony of science. Since he does, I'm not surprised that people who remain unconvinced by his ideas are suspicious of his methods and motives. After all, there are many like-minded popularizers of science who don't allow themselves such venomous outbursts...Sagan and Pinker spring to mind. And although Daniel Dennett can be just as infuriating in his prejudices, I think he's a slightly more levelheaded and engaging prose writer than Dawkins.
Apropos of prejudices, it seems to me that when Dawkins hears words like "religion" or "mysticism," he reflexively conjures up a cabal of inbred fundamentalists, young-earthers, newspaper astrologers, and glassy-eyed new-age chatterboxes. As people interested in scientific truth, most of us do not admire such people any more than Dawkins does.
But when Dawkins pits himself against metaphysical ideas per se, he also pits himself against such deeply religious scientists as Newton, Kepler, Pascal, Boyle, Descartes, and Faraday. All of these men discovered mathematical equations that form the basis of modern empirical science. These equations are unexcelled in their predictive and descriptive power, and are objectively incontrovertible to a degree that a theorist like Dawkins might well envy.
Did religious notions in any way inspire these men to seek and discover these equations? If so, I suggest that to a certain extent, such equations must be classed among humanity's religious productions. If they devised their equations despite being afflicted with false religious notions, then it surely proves that a) religious belief is not necessarily a barrier to excellence in scientific endeavor; and b) the most brilliant scientists can be mistaken about the nature of existence (which would ideally be a lesson in humility for Dawkins and his most cocksure adherents).
Even in the enlightened twentieth century, some of our greatest scientists were outright mystics. While Dawkins might despise the religious notions so poetically expressed by the physicist Erwin Schrodinger in "My View of the World" or "What is Life?", there is no doubt that Schrodinger finds poetry precisely where Dawkins instructs us to look for it: in evolutionary processes. And notwithstanding his flights of fancy, Schrodinger managed to discover the most fundamental equation of quantum mechanics. Kurt Godel and Albert Einstein were not without their religious notions either, and although Dawkins is well regarded in his field, I submit that the productions of his intellect thusfar are not able to stand with those of Godel, Einstein, or any of the other scientists I've listed here. (And though it's a little unfair, I can't help saying that I would not put even his most enchanting works in the same qualitative class as those of religious artists like Tolstoy, Bach, Raphael, Blake, Flannery O'Connor, or T.S. Eliot.)
Science cleans its own slate, thank heavens, though not as quickly as some of us might wish. My guess is that in one hundred years, Richard Dawkins will be thought of much as Herbert Spencer is today. In Spencer's day, some people called him the most profound philosopher of all time. Today, he's remembered more for his errors and excesses than for any truths he expressed.
(As a postscript, I should note that there are a number of atheist/materialist artists who have made science the focus of their work. Dawkins would do well to consider the Italian Futurists, who praised science and machinery above all else, and were staunch Darwinists to boot. (They were also fascists, and their ranks were considerably thinned by their eagerness to go to war, which they saw as a biological imperative.) And for a look at religion-bashing, science-deifying artwork at the opposite end of the ideological spectrum, try the book "Chinese Propaganda Posters" or the Russian film "Salt for Svanetia," both of which are available through the store. Atheism may make for better science, but I remain unconvinced that it makes for better art. And if artists often misunderstand science, it's no more unfortunate than that scientists often misunderstand art.)

Dawkins vs. Gouls? Give me Dawkins any day of the week. This book is heavily laced with poetry, which is a sort of proof of concept, that a book about science need not be dry or without feeling. while certainly not as important as the selfish gene, it is a nice escape. and it is utterly refreshing to read a man who really understands science elevate it with such beautiful language.

Naturalistic Darwinian evolution cannot account for the laws of logic which isn't natural! Therefore evolution is false!
Dawkins `science' is poetry that is true, no more, no less. Playing with words can mesmerize the reader, intoxicate the reader like Mozart's music but in the end is only for entertainment purposes, to beguile the unstable, unscientific, non philosophical. His work is full of magic, it has nothing to do with testable science, it is the same as the serpents beautiful, poetic subtlety of words to deceive mankind into hell. It reminds me of the sinister story of Alice in Wonderland where the unscientific can only be entertained by fanciful creatures [demons] before he gets bored and moves on, hopefully to real science this time and not poetry. Read the book, the Dawkins Delusion to see what real science is.

Below are atheists claiming the KJB is not of God because it contains contradictions, well my answer to that is not every contradiction in the end turns out to be a real contradiction, it is merely an apparent contradiction which can easily be resolved by the humble Bible student. For Example in Gen 1:31 God was satisfied with His works because He does all things well. In Gen 6:6 God is Dissatisfied with His Works but here is indeed the crux of the matter, why did God become dissatisfied with His works? It is because man has corrupted His work. But because the atheist does not want to believe in mans inherent sinfulness but want to pass the buck to God and does not want to take responsibility for his own actions, he will not even try to find the apparent paradox to this problem but will merely call foul play every time he does not understand something in the Bible. The bible is a spiritual book that can only be understood by Born Again believers who loves God. For example, God is light and reveals His light to people who seek the Truth but he cloaks himself in darkness to those hard hearted proud atheists who would not believe in God even if God should appear to them! God was light to the Israelites and darkness to the Egyptians! I am a tri part being, soul, spirit and body, God is also Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Now when you read the Bible you must see everything in context and you must rightly divide the text and allow the AUTHOR to speak for Himself. The demon that backs up the atheist will try to shed doubt and unbelief concerning everything written in scripture because the atheist does not want to believe so that God sends him a spirit of `blindness' of heart so that he cannot believe! Let's look at another apparent `contradiction', God doesn't dwell in temples, God dwells in temples. Ultimately God who holds the universe in the palm of His hand doesn't dwell in temples `for heaven is My thrown and earth is My footstool, where and how can you build a house for God? On the other hand God does manifest Himself in buildings and it's totally appropriate to invite the Holy Spirit into buildings and ask God to heal His people as is seen in Benny Hinn Miracle Crusades. Jesus is still God and He still heals people!

A second point of contention is Gods moral character. Buy the book, `Is God a moral monster' recommended by William Lane Craig. God never prescribes immorality, but the Bible `describes' mans sinful acts in the Bible, so there are no contradictions there either. The crux of the matter is this; the atheist will find every excuse to flee from a Holy and Just God because of his unholy and sinful nature! Repent!

Beautifull, inspiring and insiteful - Dawkins eloquetly argues the point that regretably few people see: that science is not dry, desolate or cold. At it's best science aspires in beauty to the level fo the greatest symphonies. In capasity to invoke awe in the minds and hearts of people, it far surpasses the cheap thrills of mysticism and day-dreams of the supernatural. And if that was not enough, it's useful too...
I would recommend this book to any student strugling to find motivation to weed through the more tedious parts of their science education - and also to any layman who dares to open their mind to a world of discovery and wonder.
-Jarno

This book as another complement to Dawkins's fine books (see my review of other books written by Dawkins).

Science and Beauty

Unweaving the Rainbow is a good guide on the beauty of science. Dawkins rightly argues that by deconstructing a rainbow one does not de-mystify its beauty but magnifies it. I like his injection of poetry into his explanation of science.

The book is also about unweaving scientific jargon and explaining it simply to the reader so that the reader is in awe of science. I also like his treatise on genetics and his clarification of the meaning of the `selfish gene'.

Science vs Fraud

My favourite chapter is ch.6, `Hoodwinked with Faery Fancy'. Dawkins unfolds the quakery of Astrology and people who claim supernatural insights or have witnessed supernatural events (he calls it bad poetry). He argues persuasively that when these alleged events are analysed scientifically, they fade into statistical probabilities. The human brain is constructed to filter out what it deems to be important and magnanimous, such as predictions made by astrologers that come true, and blocks out events that have not been fulfilled. When taking everything into context and statistical probabilities, I am certain that majority of predictions do not come true, but some might... and it is these minority of events that we tend to focus on, thus making people believe there is something supernatural in these predictions. This chapter is good medicine for the Fox Mulders out there who just want to believe without evidence.

Carl Sagan and Religion

This is probably the only disagreement I have with the author as far as this book is concerned. At the beginning of Ch 6. `Hoodwinked with Faery Fancy', Dawkins quotes from the late Astronomer, Carl Sagan, who asked in his book, `Pale Blue Dot', how it was that no major religions looked at science and concluded that the universe is better than we thought. That it is larger than the prophets said and grander. Sagan goes on to say that the religionists say that their God is a little god and they want him to stay that way. Sagan said at end that the end that a religion that stressed the magnificence of the universe as revealed by modern science might draw reserves of awe hardly tapped by conventional faiths.

Sagan clearly did not read the Quran. The Quran does ask the reader to look at the heavens and see how it was created, as well as look at a camel and see how it was created. There are things mentioned in the Quran that do tally with the discoveries of modern science, like in the field of Astronomy and the reader of the Quran is continually asked to ponder over creation and find out how it came about. Now I have read materials by Atheists who criticise Muslims who draw attention to science and the Quran. One such Atheist asked whether differential equations would be mentioned in the Quran if it is a science book. The Quran is a book of signs not a book of science. Differential equations, refractive indexes, hyperspace, quantum mechanics etc. would not be mentioned but there are verses that do deal with science (Astronomy, embryology, geography etc.) that can be tested and verified by modern technology. Thus Carl Sagan's criteria would be met by the Quran. Any religion that claims to be of Divine origin should be able to do this and I agree with Sagan's premise, but not his conclusion.

Summary

In general a good book on the beauty of science, especially for someone who is not acquainted with science. Hence a reasonably high rating.

Hasan Ali Imam

Richard Dawkins reminds me of the protagonist in Plato's Cave analogy: one of those rare individuals who staggers out of the stygian depths of human ignorance and catches a brief but blinding glimpse of the way things actually are. However, on his joyous return to the cave to tell people about the marvel and wonder of what he has just witnessed, he is attacked and killed for ruining our blissfull stupidity. In other words, Dawkins is attempting to spread his (and science's) message about the external reality that we reside in, but the masses just don't want to hear it. They want their "spirituality" and "mysticism", whatever those things are supposed mean (looked 'em up in the dictionary and all i got were a few vague, circular, and ultimately meaningless definitions-not that i was surprised, however). Dawkins thinks that as long as people have an open mind and a decent ability to comprehend english, they will see the beauty of what he is saying-that the universe is bigger, better, more beautiful, amazing, awe-inspiring, and just completely more mind-blowing than anything that any religion or cult purported it to be. Judging from the many of the reviews, this is simply not the case. They would rather have their tiny, impotent god, their narrow-minded ideology that is responsible for much of the hatred and bigotry that we find lurking around us. People do not want to be told that they are just another animal, on just another planet, orbiting just another star, found in just another galaxy, which in turn, is perhaps in just another universe. We shout out against this clear voice of reason that we are the center of the universe, because our collective ego knows no bounds. We are not just animals we say desparately, trying to convince ourselves more than anyone else. Poor Mr. Dawkins; his intelligence, wit, clarity, and excellent prose style is wasted on these philistines, these "christians" and other self-righteous types, who would like nothing more than to see Mr. Dawkins "sin" of thinking rationally and not assuming that we, that hateful, murdering, genocidal portion of the animal kingdom that calls itself humanity, are the reason for the existence of everything, although our existence is necessary for nothing. Give us back our purpose, we shout at Mr. Dawkins, so that we won't have to realize how empty and shallow our lives actually are. Do not tell us that we are not immortal, we howl, so that we won't realize how much of our lives have been wasted in the pointless rat-race of capitalist America, home of the free and land of the depraved. We retort "your science cannot explain art, music, or literature", ignoring the fact that our god cannot even explain our existence-the same god who told us that the earth is flat and slavery is a-ok, as long as you give money to the church. However, Mr.Dawkins is not afraid of us, the great anti-intellectual american beast, and that is what makes us hate him even more.

I got into this book more any Stephen King novel. Richard Dawkins writing style is really easy to read. Dawkins presented Science in such a way that it reads like a thriller. You will be anxiously turning every page.
Don't make the mistake of NOT buying this book.

A sample of Dawkins' poetry:...."the minors's son, might have turned fresh eyes on his coal fire, whose glowing energy last saw the light of day--was the light of day--when it warmned the Carboniferous treeferns, to be laid down in earth's dark cellar and sealed for three million centuries." If only artists could appreciate science the way our top scientists (Dawkins, Pinker, Sagen) wax poetic! But this book is more than lyric writing; it is full of insights and connections and clarity of thought. His images are so compelling, I intend to use Dawkins' discussion of statistics and coincidence in my high school math classes. This is a wonderful book!

Review : Tries to mix science and poetry, often waffles and over explains could have written the same book in 150 pages not 320, he tends to make a point and then spend 20 pages reinforcing it.

meaning : It is an important book cos without truth you can't make good decisions, so junk science is an enemy of the people. His book explains why "good scientific practice" is important and successfully trashes a lot of wacky theories.

Synopsis : Science vs Poetry - science is undervalued.

- facts can defeat romantic belief, but people don't like it

- Eventually science reduces romantic ideas. Light and DNA can be explainned as bar codes.

- Explains when DNA evidence can and cannot be reliable

- worried about normal peolpe juging scientific evidence.

- Explains why people believe in paranormal much more strongly than they should.probably doesn't exist

- Expains some of the problems against logical thought, e.g. our prehistoric brains confused by modern life, feminists saying logic is a male conspiracy

- Doesn't believe in Gaia, but explains how we are merged with other organisms

- other interesting scientific other bits and pieces

- humans are special cos they have language and imagination which gives us both poetry and science

Intro :

- Responds to criticism that book will seem negative, but it is a positive thing : to get rid of falseness, dreams etc.

- People are romantic, but surely reality is better than a tricked imagination.

- squids can change colour and convey messages. like inside of human brain

- Evolution timescale is so huge that it would take more than the Earth's matter to have an example of each fossil. Which explains missing links to evolutionists.

- Science and Poetry - science is undervalued.

- Science is insulted - hijacking, dumbing down- hostility from other field scientists

- courts take more notice of religion - science is seen as another myth

- X-Files bad cos reinforces bad science.

- Proper scientists admit their mistakes

- In UK culture people feel it's OK not to know about science

- whinge at media people feeling threatened and criticising science

- Until science defines, explains, you are allowed to indulge romantic dreams.

I think : when we don't know about something we imagine it usually in a romantic positive way

- digresses as he explains the science of DNA ID and when it's reliable ..interesting

Barcode of light

refracting light thro a substance reveals a barcode - so each substance has a bar code

Barcode of DNA

scientists sometimes get ideas from poets

way of analysing DNA produces barcodes, but there are problems

1. clerical - wrong name on sample

2. One in a million problem : In China red haired people are one in a million, but in a town with many many foreigners the numbers would be much higher. So if you caught a criminal and you arrested a a red hair it might be one of the other red haireds in town.

If the crime happened in Manchester and the criminal was wearing a Ulan Batar United T-shirt and you caught a man wearing a Ulan Batar United T-shirt then there's a million to one chance that you have the right guy, but if the crime happened in Ulan Batar then the chances of a false positive would be much higher.

DNA is not perfect, but better than an identity parade of less than a million people

national DNA database : would be good, but problems would arise : people finding out who there real father is

could be used in a malicious way, or eugenics

He says in courts scientists would make better judges.

Paranormal

- Moans astrology outsells astronomy - takes the piss out of it.

- If paranormal worked it would have been proved already

- uncomfortably- he adopts a scoffing tone e.g. ridiculous for companies to use diviners etc it might not be provable, but if companies feel in their experience works for whatever reason. What's wrong with that ?

- quotes Hume's reverse way of thinking " can only believe in something if the evidence it doesn't exist is unbelievable"

MISSING ??

people are gullible

In a large number of people you get a large nuber of coincidences e.g. If 23 people in a rooms 2 will probably have the same birthday

- superstition - In tests when no probe to food pattern exists animals look for patterns and end up with superstitions ie it rain last time I danced, so if I dance it will rain.

- false positives - if some results arise in 1 expt it doesn't mean the case is proved cos in 1000s of expts will have good guesses

I would add that people are reluctant to accept they don't know

Genetics

Argues that world has changed, but our brains are still hardwired to the old world. So our instinct is out of touch. There are more coincidences than we can deal with.

- Science often contradicts intuition e.g. heavy objects falls as fast as a light one.

Scapegoat - tradition from a jewish village

When we call for execution of a thief are we scapegoating ..i.e. thinking that he will take our sins away with him also. Instead of accepting we all have sins

- science words have been hijacked by newage crackpot theories

- Bee in his bonnet about feminism prob fueled by feminist teachers saying logic is a masculine conspiracy

Stats and probability can confuse normal people

selfish vs Coop

- scientists can get confused by bad analogies

- rubbishes Gaia as a stupid romantic notion

argues species in no way have awareness of the whole planet. They selfishly work for themselves. They can't see the long term benefits.

selfish vs Coop argues it can be selfish to cooperate

- Part of our bodies come from bacteria parasites, which have somehow merged with us so are incuded in our own DNA

- chloroplasts in plants actually first came from bacteria

- each organism is really a community

- termites have bacteria as part of their stomachs

- genes reflect the history of a species i.e. if it once lived in the sea etc ?

Conned Brain

- Brain uses redundancy techniques only takes notice of things that have changed

surely that means that one part of our consciousness is completely photographic, but I can access it completely with conscious, why is this. My brain knows exactly what the room was like 2 minutes ago. It's not really just scanned it all a millisecond ago only a fraction of it.

our brains con us half the time interesting hollow mask illusion we read a hollow mask as a face, but put it on a turnable see how it moves

We have 2 pics of the world : one from our genes another from our senses

- human brains are much bigger. Why ?

- maybe there is a link to communication, people with the best brains are the best communicators they can draw and handle language syntax.. really helps teamwork and hunting

- meme - a routine tool - e.g. how a bird can open a milk bottle

- The software in our head carries a copy of the world, put this together with language and you get poetry

- humans are the only species that, can guess what the world was like before they existed and can predict how it will change after.... surely this is a romantic notion

This books begins well, arguing about the sense of wonder and awe a life in science brings. When I read the blurb, I wondered if it was possible to write a whole non-fiction book on such a subject. Dawkins exhausts himself by the first 3 or so chapters and then spends the rest of his time ranting and raving about his own personal hang-ups, which have nothing to do with the title. The individual chapters make good reads, but stand better as separate essays rather than several stages in an argument. I would recommend this book only to those who are very interested in the psyche of the ulta-Darwinist that is Dawkins.

Like a real sorcerer's spprentice, Richard Dawkins mops away the mindless cobwebs of pseudo-sciences such as parapsychology, astrology, and assorted other pop-culture mumbo-jumbo, so that the reader can see the authentically awe-inspiring wonders of the natural universe. Not only that, but he does so in some of the most beautiful prose (fiction or non-fiction) that I have read recently. His science is pure poetry; I felt invigorated after reading it. A must read for anyone who believes truth is beauty!

Unweaving The Rainbow is not only a great science book for a casual reader, but it is also very inspiring because Dawkins' writing shows science and the natural world in a light that fills the reader with awe and wonder. Very well done and pleasant to read.

After reading Richard Dawkins lucid explanation of why things are they way they are, the rainbow seems even more beautiful. The book is yet another example of Richard Dawkins' ability to eloquently provide simplified and lucid explanations to the wonders around us without resorting to the fantastic.

"Better than all measures
Of delightful sound
Better than all treasures
That in books are found,
Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground.
Teach me half the gladness
That thy brain must know,
Such harmonious madness
From my lips would flow
The world should listen then, as I am listening now."

Let's assume that Gould is right in his observation that the Burgess Shell is a testimony to an incredibly hectic period diversification, on a different time scale from what we experience now. The high rate of change in life forms (new phyla "bursting") in the period leading to the Cambrian and through its early stages surely doesn't have to mean large evolutionary "jumps", but rather a different "natural frequency" of the standard, gradual evolution process by the tried and true Darwinian mechanism. What has to be explained is the causes of the different rate. It is quite safe to postulate that this rate is determined by the feedback between different parts of the Darwinian mechanism, just as is the case for other cyclic phenomena. The cycle in this instant is the generation and elimination of life forms. It seems that the current rate is "optimize" to populate every possible ecological niche, but that does not mean it's the one and only possible rates. On the contrary. Different ecological situation surely must influence this rate. For example, in a resource-rich and under-populated environment, such as a "virgin" island, mutations that normally would be considered "unfit", will survive. This is the conventional rationalization behind the "Explosion" metaphor, if you don't take it to mean "instantaneous", just incredibly fast. So it boils down to the question the speed of the evolutionary process and what controls it.
We know the engine of change and mechanism of "Quality Control" by which most of the changes are rejected. Those two work as a superbly coordinated team' at least as far as the end result is concerned. Evolution might be a blind watchmaker, but also a very successful one. Creationists may even ask who created the watchmaker! In other words, how come that the parameters of the evolutionary process have the values that actually produce evolution? We surly reject the "Intelligent Design" type of answers, but that does not free us from the need to provide a satisfactory scientific answer. Which brings me to speculate, that the apparent correspondence between the different parts of the evolutionary equation is too well fine-tuned to escape the conclusion that the evolutionary mechanism itself evolved in a similar process. The blind watchmaker was fine-tuned by a blind watchmaker - and it's not a meaningless recursion.
We all know the essential ingredients of the formula used to tune natural evolution:
1. The conservative force of genetic inheritance, operating like gravity on pendulum
2. The erratic drive of mutation, generating the required perturbations from stasis, pushing the pendulum in every possible way
3. The environment enhancing the successful "modes of oscillation" to be conserved, as in a resonant mechanism, and rejecting the non-resonant modes.
(The clockwork metaphor is intentional, but should not be take to imply one-to-one correspondence between the two mechanisms. It's just "poetics"' hopefully a good one.)
In the Pre-Cambrian environment, the initial survival rate of new mutant was presumably higher, but not for a long time. Soon enough, the available resources must have been fully utilized and the Darwinian competition begun. The conventional rationalization about overly abundant environment can't be justified in geological time-scale. However, the mutation rate and the conservative constrains of the genetic mechanism could be quite different than what we see now. Actually, even today we do see a great variation in mutation (successful ones too!) rate between different life forms. For example, certain microbes mutate before out eyes almost day to day. With a much higher rate of evolution than we experience today in multi-cellular life forms, it would seems that phyla were "invented" during the Pre-Cambrian in a very short geological time span, requiring large successful "jumps", while actually the great many steps required to accomplish the transition just happened very quickly. But the environment is the "negative" aspect of the Darwinian process, culling the unfit, not the "positive" force blindly experimenting in new life forms. To understand the "explosion" we must allow for a different equilibrium of checks-and-balances between the conservative and the mutating forces in the genetic mechanism itself, namely the copying of DNA.
Of the many "exotic" life forms populating the Pre-Cambrian world, few survived. The new environmental condition narrowed the criteria for passing the survival test, a change that was mirrored in the optimal balance between conservation and change in the selection formula for the genetic material (DNA, RNA, what have you) and its associated molecular mechanism. Gone were the days when sloppy copying was tolerated - even encouraged - by the QA department. The fast mutating life forms lost to the ones based on a very pedantic DNA copy machine. The conservatives won the day and the wild variation of gene-inheritance alternatives dwindled to one. Only phyla that adapted this mechanism survived. This mechanism is so biased towards conservatism, that no new phyla could arise since it came to dominate file. The explosion deserves its name only if you assume that the current mechanism is what always was - an idea as absurd as assuming that the species themselves are what they always were.
In other words, we have to apply the Darwinian adaptation mechanism to the molecular infrastructure underlying the genes, as we do to the genes themselves, in order to understand the fine-tuning of the evolutionary rate we see today. In the early stages of the evolution of multi-cellular life form, before low mutation rate was selected (frequency-locked) by natural selection, the appearance of radically new life forms took just millions of years, rather than hundreds of millions. The natural selection of gene conservation mechanism was affected, probably, by selecting the very stable and predictable DNA/RNA one over alternatives (for example "horizontal" transfer of genes, as in bacteria) and all the other parts of the fine molecular dance of the genes. You may think of this as the mirror process to the one leading to the selection of sexual strategy. The later was selected to enrich the variation after the first fixed the rate at a too low value relative to environmental changes.
To summarize, what I'm trying to propose is that the same logical thinking that make Classic Darwinian evolution inhabitable apply also to the evolution of the genetic mechanism underlying the Darwinian process. It couldn't be as good as we experience it now if it didn't undergo a multi-staged fine-tuning under selective forces. Once this postulate is accepted, the "Cambrian Explosion" becomes a legitimate part of evolutionary orthodoxy.

I've read most of what Richard Dawkins has written in book form... Unweaving the Rainbow is at the top of my list. This book includes many refreshing arguments for the scientific method and is a tremendous literary work--a rarity nowadays for books filed under "science". I strongly recommend this book.

Richard Dawkins is a gifted writer, and has a wonderful sense of creative writing designed to appeal to those who follow his religion. On this I applaud his efforts, and admire his consistent ability to restate the same theme in different contexts. Truly, he is skilled and adept at leading his followers where they want to go.
The only problem with his most current book, is that it contains the same flaws as his other works: namely, Richard is so preoccupied with trying to conince himself and his followers of his own theories of philosophy that nearly all his work is designed to suit his base assumptions, and he never is really open to any other ideas except to refute them.
There are those who find his prose exceptional, his passion encouraging and his views comforting, but therein lies the problem. Richard Dawkins is wrong. No, his writing is not intentionally false, but rather he has simply made a career of piling more and more weight on a cracked and flawed foundation. To anyone who has ever experienced meaning beyond instincts, his base philosophy of pure naturalism is exposed for what it is: a fantasy which requires more faith to believe than the spirituality he tries so hard to prove doesn't exist. I liken his work to that of the moral relativist who states boldly: "there are no absolute truths". Well, except for the simpleton whose worldview requires everyday justification, the self refuting nature of the statement is obvious. If there are no absolute truths, then the statement itself must not be an absolute truth and therefore is false. If however, there are absolute truths then the statement is also false. Either way, it is self refuting and false. The same can be said for the base philosophy of Richard Dawkins.
If you really want to believe (note it requires the word "believe") that all of life is merely the result natural and deterministic causes, then you are a follower of Dawkins and will love this book. In fact, I highly recommend it. If however, you believe that there is more to life than the firing of synapses and the evolution of physical beings, then you will find his work, including this book, to be just the pathetically desparate rant of someone who wants more than anything to be right, yet is afraid deep down that they are not. Your call.

The depth and profundity of life and human spirituality are so clearly apparent, yet Richard Dawkins and his crew of materialists just don't want to hear it. Dawkins clings on to his tiny, impotent, narrow minded perspective of materialism and the laws of natural selection, and he refuses to acknowledge the sheer depth and awe-inspiring meaning of God, Creation and human spirituality.
In this book, Dawkins writes: "We have an appetite for wonder, a poetic appetite, which real science ought to be feeding but which is being hijacked, often for monetary gain, by purveyors of superstition".
'Hijacked' is the apt word here. But the spiritual appetite for poetry and wonder is not being hijacked by purveyors of superstition. It is being hijacked by the purveyors of materialism. The dictionary definition of 'spiritual' is: "of the nature of, relating to, spirit; the higher faculties; the soul; naturally looking to things of the spirit." Un-surprisingly, these are most certainly not meaningless definitions, and one definition which stands out is "naturally looking to things of the spirit."
Dawkins is well aware that since the dawn of man, an integral part of human nature has been to search, to BELIEVE in the unseen, and to express our spiritual creativity. But materialists do not want to be told that there is 'meaning' to our existence, so they hide behind a wall of elocution and prejudice, and they truly revel when their Chief guru writes a book called 'Unweaving the Rainbow', which aptly acknowledges the modality of human spirituality, yet strangely denies the very essence, source and heart of it.
Spirituality clearly distinguishes the difference between human beings and other animal life: We humans can experience, understand and appreciate life, Creation, love and friendship. We have the capacity to ponder life, to search, to express our spiritual creativity through music, art and literature; we can free-willingly pray or meditate in order our fulfil our own spirituality.
But 'Unweaving the Rainbow' sees Richard Dawkins highlighting the nature of sentient awareness and the existence of human creativity such as art and poetry - yet Dawkins not only fails to explain any of it, but the issue itself completely contradicts the nature of materialism. Dawkins cannot explain why the universe is coherently and intelligently structured with an overpowering trend toward the existence of sentient beings and intrinsic purpose. So what does the author do? He blatantly exclaims: "It's all purposeless!"
To his crew, this can only mean that human beings are accidents and that we are free from God who knows our every move, who knows every thought in our heads, and who will meet us in our spiritual form when our time comes.
Materialists are blinded into thinking that their guru's message is bursting with clarity, intelligence and truth. Yet the prejudice surrounding Dawkins' message prevents his lambs from seeing that Dawkins, as the ultimate materialist, is shooting himself in the foot. Some of Dawkins' 'scientific' assertions are so misled and biased, they can even be classed as "lies".
But Mr Dawkins is not afraid of the spiritually enlightened beast - Theists - and that is what makes the religious even more robust against materialists' prejudice, chauvinism and narrow-mindedness. That is why Theists truly thank the Lord for the gift of faith.

Actually Dawkins is quite upfront about his evil, like the villain who wears a black cowboyhat. He says that at the bottom of the universe is "blind pitiless indifference", and that this affords him his freedom to do as he likes. He may look the champion of freedom when railing against religion, but this freedom conceived in blind pitiless indifference, turns to horror when applied in the real world. So far Dawkins hasn't personally killed anyone, but it should be expected he might. Fortunately there are less oppurtunities for him to do so. Like his forebearer Konrad Lorenz who enthusiastically joined the Nazi-race office, we might expect Dawkins to go on a commission to advise about population control. You see, medicine is in a race to find cures for the genetic damage that mounts up in the human genepool. In times before, this genetic damage was filtered out by Natural Selection, so the story goes. It's just a fantasy of course, just like Dawkins saying that people are born selfish is a fantasy. Dawkins doesn't care about the complaints of peadiatricians about his modern superstition, because, is he not free to write what he likes? We should expect Darwinist parents to view their children, and all children, as selfish, and treat them accordingly.
These demonic influences of Darwinism on society are much checked in the West by democratic organizations, although that would be different if there was a recession or some crisis like that. In countries such as Russia and China however, the impact of the pseudoscience of Darwinism is much unchecked. There genocide, or having Natural Selection take it's course in human society, is a popular tool of political leaders and docters alike, in making their population more healthy in an affordable way.

Currently, january 2002, former president of Bosnia, Plavsic, who holds a proffessorship in biology, stands trial for warcrimes in The Hague. Plavsic sold the policy of ethnic cleansing to the Serb population using Darwinian terminology.
But don't take that as evidence of the demonic influence of Darwinism. Just pick up a dictionary or science textbook, and read the definition of Natural Selection. Then, as Dawkins encourages you to do, freely philosphise for some hours about what this theory tells you about your greed, your genoristy etc. After recognizing that your mind has turned into a sewer of pseudoscience, you may start to wonder about what your own doctor thinks about Darwinism.

I honestly admit I did not finish this book. The topics jump from one to the next with no focus. The author reminded me of my worst profs in college; a self proclaimed genius with NO ability to write or communicate.