Features
- Cover Type: Paperback with 586 pages
- Published by: Simon & Schuster June 12, 1996
- Written in: English
- ISBN 10 Number: 068482471X
- ISBN 13 Number: 978-0684824710
-
Book Dimensions:
9.2 x 6 x 1.2 inches
- Weighs: 1.3 pounds
Product Review
One of the best descriptions of the nature and implications of Darwinian evolution ever written, it is firmly based in biological information and appropriately extrapolated to possible applications to engineering and cultural evolution. Dennett's analyses of the objections to evolutionary theory are unsurpassed. Extremely lucid, wonderfully written, and scientifically and philosophically impeccable. Highest Recommendation!
From Publishers Weekly
Dennett's philosophical argument in support of Darwinism was a National Book Award finalist.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Reader ReviewsDarwin's idea is very very simple; it goes like this. 1-Organisms pass their characteristics on to their descendants, which are mostly but not completely identical to their parent organisms. 2-Organisms breed more descendants than can possibly survive. 3-Descendants with beneficial variations have a better chance of surviving and reproducing, however slight, than those with non-beneficial variations. 4-These slightly modified descendants are themselves organisms, so repeat from step 1. (There is no stopping condition.) That's it. That's all there is to Natural Selection: a simple four step loop; a mindless algorithm that displays no intent, no design, no purpose, no goal, no deeper meaning. This simple algorithm has been running on Earth for four billion years to produce every living thing, and everything made by every living thing, from the oxygen atmosphere generated by plants to the skyscrapers and music created by man. Dennett writes that it is the algoritm's complete mindlessness that makes Darwin's idea so dangerous. Dennett devotes the major portion of his book to aggressively arguing the above. He reviews how the algorithm could have "primed life's pump" eons ago and spends some time on describing evolution and biology. He argues that biology is engineering and thus reducible to algorithms. He also explains how simple algorithms can lead to computers that play brilliant chess and here he makes an important distinction: brilliant chess doesn't have to be perfect chess. There is in fact an algorithm to play chess perfectly: examine all possible moves and discard all moves that do not lead to a win. The problem is that the number of possible moves is Vast, and the number of good moves is Vanishingly Small; there isn't enough time in the universe to use this algorithm. Therefore, software designers have developed imperfect but powerful (i.e. heuristic) algorithms that play merely excellent chess. Dennett uses this nuance to refute Godel's and Penrose's objections to Mind as being something "special", something more than the result of a Darwinian process. Having argued that mind can evolve through a Darwinian process, he goes one step further: ethics can too. Darwin's world is amoral, without good or evil. We have invented the concepts of good and evil and Dennett ends with this. He reassures us that while a mindless, godless, amoral Darwinian process is at the root of everything, we can embrace morality, ethics, and beauty. To quote Dennett, "the world is sacred". Vincent Poirier, Tokyo
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