Forty years ago Richard Dawkins’ book The Selfish Gene launched NeoDarwinism to the general public. It is still as controversial as it was then. Philosopher Jos de Mul examines the case of Dawkins' biggest critic: Denis Noble. Text: Jos de Mul Illustrations: Siegfried Woldhek IT IS FORTY YEARS since the publication of Richard Dawkins' book The Selfish Gene, published in Dutch as De zelfzuch...

This paper is a critique of Richard Dawkins’ “argument from improbability” against the existence of God. This argument, which forms the core of Dawkins’ book The God Delusion, provides an interesting example of the use of scientific ideas in arguments about religion. Here I raise three objections: (1) The argument is inapplicable to philosophical conceptions of God that reduce most of God’s com...

Through the Second Vatican Council, Catholic Church asserts import of religious liberty for every individual and believes that one is entitled to live out one’s faith. Thus, through Dignitatis Humanae, has revealed her intention create inter-religion dialogues encourage respect positive values different religions. This raises a question as whether such voiced in Humanae are applicable when it c...

A partir da análise estrutura argumentativa do livro Deus, um delírio, de Richard Dawkins (Dawkins, 2007), é feita a verificação argumentação autor, que pede o fim das Religiões, no capítulo 8. O objetivo examinar, se texto 8, parte central livro, apenas uma opinião ou científico. técnicas Análise Discurso e chega à conclusão não científica. Para chegar esta conclusão, aplicou-se mesma Ciência ...

Replicators don't. Replicate, that is. This is the shocking conclusion to which I have been forced by my attempt to gure out what precisely Richard Dawkins means by the term \replicator". Actually, it seems that Dawkins uses the term in at least two fundamentally diierent ways; but according to Dawkins' own speciication of the problem which the \replicator" concept was intended to solve (namely...

The notion that genes play a uniquely distinguished rôle in biological evolution has been championed by Richard Dawkins (1976; 1989b). Furthermore, Dawkins has argued that this idea can be generalised in a way which makes it applicable to any properly Darwinian evolutionary process, at least if that process gives rise to a growth in adaptive complexity (Dawkins 1983). It is evident, therefore, ...

In writing this paper I hope to lessen the polarization of religious discourse by making space for agnosticism between atheism and religious faith. I do this by critiquing two arguments against agnosticism, one offered by a ““new atheists,”” Richard Dawkins, and the other offered by a defender of faith, William James. The new atheists are notable not only for the strident rhetorical attacks on ...

The notion that genes play a uniquely distinguished rôle in biological evolution has been championed by Richard Dawkins (1976; 1989b). Furthermore, Dawkins has argued that this idea can be generalised in a way which makes it applicable to any properly Darwinian evolutionary process, at least if that process gives rise to a growth in adaptive complexity (Dawkins 1983). It is evident, therefore, ...

HAMILTON’S theory of kin selection is much misunderstood. This paper lists and refutes 12 of the commonest misunderstandings, for example: “Kin selection is a special, complex kind of natural selection, as opposed to ‘individual selection’”; “Kin selection is a form of group selection”; “All species members share the majority of their genes, so selection should favour universal altruism”, “Kin ...