Table Of Content

RICHARD DAWKINS HOW A SCIENTIST CHANGED THE WAY WE THINK This page intentionally left blank RICHARD DAWKINS HOW A SCIENTIST CHANGED THE WAY WE THINK Reflections by scientists, writers, and philosophers Edited by ALAN GRAFEN AND MARK RIDLEY 1 3 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford ox2 6dp Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York © Oxford University Press 2006 with the exception of To Rise Above © Marek Kohn 2006 andEvery Indication of Inadvertent Solicitude © Philip Pullman 2006 The moral rights of the authors have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published 2006 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Data available Typeset by RefineCatch Ltd., Bungay, Suffolk Printed in Great Britain by Clays Ltd., St Ives plc ISBN0–19–929116–0 978–0–19–284055–8 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 CONTENTS List of Contributors viii Preface xi BIOLOGY Ballooning Parrots and Semi-Lunar Germs 3 Andrew F. Read The Battle of the Sexes Revisited 14 Helena Cronin Richard Dawkins: Intellectual Plumber—and More 27 John Krebs What is a Puma? 32 Michael Hansell THE SELFISH GENE Living with The Selfish Gene 45 Marian Stamp Dawkins The Gene Meme 50 David Haig The Intellectual Contribution of The Selfish Gene to Evolutionary Theory 66 Alan Grafen An Eye on the Core: Dawkins and Sociobiology 75 Ullica Segerstråle vi Contents LOGIC The Selfish Gene as a Philosophical Essay 101 Daniel C. Dennett The Invention of an Algorithmic Biology 116 Seth Bullock Selfish Genes and Information Flow 125 David Deutsch Deep Commonalities between Life and Mind 130 Steven Pinker ANTIPHONAL VOICES Richard Dawkins and the Problem of Progress 145 Michael Ruse The Nest’s Tale: Affectionate Disagreements with Richard Dawkins 164 Patrick Bateson What’s the Matter with Memes? 176 Robert Aunger HUMANS Selfish Genes and Family Relations 191 Martin Daly and Margo Wilson Why a Lot of People with Selfish Genes Are Pretty Nice Except for their Hatred of The Selfish Gene 203 Randolph M. Nesse The Perverse Primate 213 Kim Sterelny Contents vii CONTROVERSY The Skeptic’s Chaplain: Richard Dawkins as a Fountainhead of Skepticism 227 Michael Shermer A Fellow Humanist 236 Richard Harries Dawkins and the Virus of Faith 243 A. C. Grayling To Rise Above 248 Marek Kohn What the Whale Wondered: Evolution, Existentialism, and the Search for ‘Meaning’ 255 David P. Barash WRITING Richard Dawkins and the Golden Pen 265 Matt Ridley Every Indication of Inadvertent Solicitude 270 Philip Pullman Index 277 LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS Robert Aunger, Senior Lecturer in Evolutionary Public Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, author of The Electric Meme, and editor of Darwinizing Culture. David P. Barash, Professor of Psychology, University of Washington, author of Madame Bovary’s Ovaries: A Darwinian look at litera- ture, The Myth of Monogamy, Revolutionary Biology, and other books. Sir Patrick Bateson, FRS. Emeritus Professor of Ethology, Cambridge University, co-author of Design for a Life: How Behaviour Develops. Seth Bullock, Senior Lecturer in the Science and Engineering of Natural Systems, School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton. Helena Cronin, Co-Director, London School of Economics Centre for Philosophy of Natural and Social Science, organizer of the Darwin@LSE programme, and author of The Ant and the Peacock. Martin Daly, Professor of Psychology, McMaster University, Canada, co-author of The Truth About Cinderella and other books. Marian Stamp Dawkins, Fellow in Biological Sciences at Somerville College and Professor of Animal Behaviour, Zoology Department, Oxford University, author of Through Our Eyes Only and Animal Suffering. Daniel C. Dennett, Professor of Philosophy, Tufts University, author of Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, Consciousness Explained, Freedom Evolves, and other books. David Deutsch, Professor, Centre for Quantum Computing, Clarendon Laboratory, Oxford University, author of The Fabric of Reality. Alan Grafen, Professor of Theoretical Biology, Oxford University. A. C. Grayling, Professor, Department of Philosophy, Birkbeck College, London University, author of The Meaning of Things, What is Good?,Life, Sex and Ideas: The Good Life Without God,Philosophy, and other books. List of Contributors ix David Haig, Professor, Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, author of Genomic Imprinting and Kinship. Michael Hansell, Professor, Institute of Biomedical and Life Sciences, Glasgow University, author of Animal Architecture and other books. The Rt Revd Richard Harries, Bishop of Oxford, author of Art and the Beauty of God,God Outside the Box, and other books. Sir John Krebs, FRS. Professor, Department of Zoology, and Principal, Jesus College, Oxford University; former chairman, Food Standards Agency. Marek Kohn, Visiting Fellow at the School of Life Sciences, University of Sussex, author of A Reason for Everything, As We Know It: Coming to Terms with an Evolved Mind, The Race Gallery, and other books. Randolph M. Nesse, Professor of Psychiatry and Professor of Psych- ology, University of Michigan, author of Why We Get Sick and other books. Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor, Department of Psychology, Harvard University, author of The Language Instinct, How the Mind Works,The Blank Slate, and other books. Philip Pullman, author of His Dark Materials trilogy, Ruby in the Smoke, and other books. Andrew F. Read, Professor of Natural History, Edinburgh University. Matt Ridley, writer and former journalist, author of Nature via Nurture,Genome,The Red Queen, and of a forthcoming biography of Francis Crick. Michael Ruse, Professor of Philosophy, Florida State University, author ofThe Evolution–Creation Struggle,Darwin and Design, and other books. Ullica Segerstråle, Professor of Sociology, Illinois Institute of Technol- ogy, Chicago, author of Defenders of the Truth, and editor of other books. Michael Shermer, founding publisher of Skeptic magazine, contribut- ing editor of Scientific American, author of How We Believe: The Science of Good and Evil, and In Darwin’s Shadow: The Life of Alfred Russel Wallace.