Clipe do Dia nº 441

MC5 full concert. Kick out the jams!

Três livros sobre seleção natural

I well remember the thrill when I first learned the whole system of evolutionary logic as applied to biology from Dr. [William] Drury. It was similar to the feeling I had when I first fell in love with astronomy as a twelve-year old. Astronomy gave you inorganic creation and evolution over a 15-billion-year period of time. Evolutionary logic gave you the comparable story over 4 billion years and evolutionary logic applied to life. In both cases, I felt a sense of religious awe. Astronomy spoke of vastness of time and space while evolutionary biology did the same thing for living creatures. The living world was not created 6 thousand  years ago, in one blinding flash of creation, or in seven days, perhaps. Living creatures have been forming over a 4-billion-year period of time, with natural selection knitting together adaptive traits over time. Living creatures are expected to be organized functionally in exquisite and even counterintuitive forms. In no way did this perspective diminsh my sense of awe, nor did it argue, one way or another, for the existence of an omnipotent force to which personal attention was suggested.
- Robert Trivers ("Natural selection and social theory: selected papers of Robert Trivers", 2002, Oxford University Press, p. 57)

Sometime around my early thirties I stumbled upon evolutionary biology, particularly in the form of Richard Dawkins's books The Selfish Gene and then The Blind Watchmaker, and suddenly (on, I think the second reading of The Selfish Gene) it all fell into place. It was a concept of such stunning simplicity, but it gave rise, naturally, to all of the infinite and baffling complexity of life. The awe it inspired in me made the awe that people talk about in respect of religious experience seem, frankly, silly beside it. I'd take the awe of understanding over the awe of ignorance any day.
- Douglas Adams (Interview with American Atheits)

Successful biological research in this century has had three doctrinal bases: mechanism (as opposed to vitalism), natural selection (trial and error, as opposed to rational plan), and historicity. [Historicity] is the recognition of the role of historical contingency in determining properties of the Earth's biota. (...) Mechanism implies that every physico-chemical processes are at work in an organism. Every vital function is performed by material machinery that can in principle be understood from a physical and chemical examination. (...) The second basis of modern biology is the assumption that the Darwinian process of natural selection accounts for all aspects of the adaptation of an organism to a particular way of life in a particular environment.
- George C. Williams ("Natural selection: domains, levels and challenges", 1992, Oxford University Press, pp. 3-5)

Clipe do Dia nº 440

Grande Muddy Waters.

Viva la révolution!

Em 14 de julho de 1789 ocorria a tomada da Bastilha, estopim da Revolução Francesa. Uma frase interessante no verbete da Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_revolution):

The modern era has unfolded in the shadow of the French Revolution. The growth of republics and liberal democracies, the spread of secularism, the development of modern ideologies, and the invention of total war^[5] all mark their birth during the Revolution.

Clipe do Dia nº 339

Feliz dia do Rock.

Clipe do Dia nº 338

Pedrada.

Clipe do Dia nº 337

I never thought work could be so rewarding.

Clipe do Dia nº 336

Rolling Stones quebrando a vala.

Darwin Debate

Baita discussão. Na minha opinião, o Steven Pinker é o que defende as posições com as quais eu concordo mais. O Jonathan Miller também levanta ideias interessantes. O Steve Jones é daqueles biólogos críticos das explicações evolutivas para o comportamento humano, mas é um crítico de alto nível. A Meredith Small se posiciona mais próxima ao Steve Jones, mas também não fala bobagem.