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Richard Dawkins and pseudoscience (view source)
Revision as of 16:38, September 26, 2015
, 16:38, September 26, 2015no edit summary
Even renowned evolutionary biologists H. Allen Orr, David Sloan Wilson, and Massimo Pigliucci have called into question the power that Dawkins once had as an intellectual, since he has made elementary errors in ''[[The God Delusion]]''.<ref>http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/send-clowns-–-richard-dawkins-obliges</ref>}}
Even renowned evolutionary biologists H. Allen Orr, David Sloan Wilson, and Massimo Pigliucci have called into question the power that Dawkins once had as an intellectual, since he has made elementary errors in ''[[The God Delusion]]''.<ref>http://www.truefreethinker.com/articles/send-clowns-–-richard-dawkins-obliges</ref>}}
In the prestigious peer-reviewed journal ''Nature'', Nathaniel Comfort gave a negative review of Richard Dawkins' contribution as a scientist and he wrote:
{{cquote|Much of Dawkins's research has been in silico, writing programs for evolutionary simulations. In his simulations, life is utterly determined by genes, which specify developmental rules and fixed traits such as colour. The more lifelike his digital animals ("biomorphs") become, the more persuaded he is that real genes work in roughly the same way. Dawkins's critics accuse him of genetic determinism. This synopsis of his work shows that his life virtually depends on it.
A curious stasis underlies Dawkins's thought. His biomorphs are grounded in 1970s assumptions. Back then, with rare exceptions, each gene specified a protein and each protein was specified by a gene. The genome was a linear text -- a parts list or computer program for making an organism --insulated from the environment, with the coding regions interspersed with "junk".
Today's genome is much more than a script: it is a dynamic, three-dimensional structure, highly responsive to its environment and almost fractally modular. Genes may be fragmentary, with far-flung chunks of DNA sequence mixed and matched in bewildering combinatorial arrays. A universe of regulatory and modulatory elements hides in the erstwhile junk. Genes cooperate, evolving together as units to produce traits. Many researchers continue to find selfish DNA a productive idea, but taking the longer view, the selfish gene per se is looking increasingly like a twentieth-century construct.
Dawkins's synopsis shows that he has not adapted to this view. He nods at cooperation among genes, but assimilates it as a kind of selfishness. The microbiome and the 3D genome go unnoticed. Epigenetics is an "interesting, if rather rare, phenomenon" enjoying its "fifteen minutes of pop science voguery", which it has been doing since at least 2009, when Dawkins made the same claim in The Greatest Show on Earth (Transworld). Dawkins adheres to a deterministic language of "genes for" traits. As I and other historians have shown, such hereditarianism plays into the hands of the self-styled race realists (N. Comfort Nature 513, 306-307; 2014).<ref>[Dawkins's Contributions as a Scientist Are Already Past Their Sell-By Date, Says Nature Reviewer] by David Klinghoffer September 10, 2015 12:33, Evolution News and Views</ref>}}
The works of [[New Atheism|New Atheist]], including the work of New Atheist Richard Dawkins, often betray an amateurish knowledge of philosophy/religion/science. For example, atheist philosopher Dr. [[Michael Ruse]] declared concerning [[Richard Dawkins]]' book ''The God Delusion'': "''The God Delusion'' makes me embarrassed to be an atheist."<ref>http://www.alternet.org/media/47052?page=entire</ref> [[Vox Day]]'s book ''[http://www.voxday.net/mart/TIA_free.pdf The Irrational atheist]'' found multiple errors in reasoning and factual errors when it came to the works of New Atheist authors.
The works of [[New Atheism|New Atheist]], including the work of New Atheist Richard Dawkins, often betray an amateurish knowledge of philosophy/religion/science. For example, atheist philosopher Dr. [[Michael Ruse]] declared concerning [[Richard Dawkins]]' book ''The God Delusion'': "''The God Delusion'' makes me embarrassed to be an atheist."<ref>http://www.alternet.org/media/47052?page=entire</ref> [[Vox Day]]'s book ''[http://www.voxday.net/mart/TIA_free.pdf The Irrational atheist]'' found multiple errors in reasoning and factual errors when it came to the works of New Atheist authors.