'He argues for rationality, but can't comprehend how and why we've developed irrationally.'Except for his many attempts to explain how concepts like altruism and religion might have evolved and developed in social environments...he's only been working in that field since about 1976 but let's not let that get in the way of criticising his character.
[edit] Just go and read his wikipedia page - most of his work in the field of evolutionary biology has been dedicated to investigating the 'irrational' behaviour of altruism - helping others without expectation of reward. If spending most of your career studying why people are nice to each other is being 'wilfully ignorant of human nature', then yep, well done, you've got him bang to rights.
([edit] Just go and read his wikipedia page - most of his work in the field of evolutionary biology has been dedicated to investigating the 'irrational' behaviour of altruism - helping others without expectation of reward. If spending most of your career studying why people are nice to each other is being 'wilfully ignorant of human nature', then yep, well done, you've got him bang to rights.
emvee cruor deo cruoris,
Fri 18 May 2012, 11:28,
archived)
And yet after all that still considers that faith is the meme equivalent of a 'virus' to be 'eradicated',rather than, say, his 'meme' equivalent of a redundant organ or some other piece of genetic junk from our evolutionary past, which is where logic would ordinarily take his argument.
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joefish It's hard for thee to kick against the pricks,
Fri 18 May 2012, 15:12,
archived)