How Evolutionary Theory Undermines Everything You Thought You Knew
Steve Stewart-Williams
University of Wales, Swansea
Paperback
(ISBN-13: 9780521746403)
Also available in Hardback
If you accept evolutionary theory, can you also believe in God? Are human beings superior to other animals, or is this just a human prejudice? Does Darwin have implications for heated issues like euthanasia and animal rights? Does evolution tell us the purpose of life or does it imply that life has no ultimate purpose? Does evolution tell us what is morally right and wrong or does it imply that ultimately nothing is right or wrong? In this fascinating and intriguing book, Steve Stewart-Williams addresses these and other fundamental philosophical questions raised by evolutionary theory and the exciting new field of evolutionary psychology. Drawing on biology, psychology and philosophy, he argues that Darwinian science supports a view of a godless universe devoid of ultimate purpose or moral structure, but that we can still live a good life and a happy life within the confines of this view.
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Contents
1. Darwin and the big questions; Part I. Darwin Gets Religion: 2. Clash of the Titans; 3. Darwin and design; 4. Darwin's God; 5. God as gap filler; 6. Darwin and the problem of evil; 7. Wrapping up religion; Part II. Life After Darwin: 8. Human beings and their place in nature; 9. The status of human beings in nature; 10. Meaning of life, RIP?; Part III. Morality Stripped of Superstition: 11. Evolving good; 12. Remaking morality; 13. Uprooting the doctrine of human dignity; 14. Evolution and the death of right and wrong.
Reviews
‘Steve Stewart-Williams explains how evolutionary thought challenges many deep-seated assumptions about God, morality, and human superiority and raises significant questions about such things as euthanasia, suicide, and the way we treat non-human animals. While it has become commonplace for many to equate Darwin's legacy with the stripping away of the moral and the good and to replace it with unpalatable ‘Darwinist' alternatives that advocate amorality, nihilism, and a world where ‘might makes right', Stewart-Williams carefully and entertainingly shows that, on the contrary, the world after Darwin remains meaningful, wondrous, and intrinsically moral.' Stephen Hill, Massey University
‘This is an important, accessible, and timely book for anyone wishing to understand the implications of evolutionary theory for standard views of human nature, morality and religion.' Stephen Boulter, Oxford Brookes University
Source: Cambridge University Press
Blog Excerpt/Excerto do blog:
"Ao minar tanto a tese da racionalidade e a tese da imagem de Deus, a cosmovisão darwiniana mina a doutrina da dignidade humana. Ela a deixa sem fundações intelectuais. Isto tem implicações importantes para muitas questões importantes em ética. A ideia de que a vida humana, e somente a vida humana, é infinitamente valiosa tem impregnado os sistemas éticos do mundo, especialmente aqueles do Ocidente. Embora a doutrina da dignidade humana tenha suas raízes na concepção religiosa de humanidade, ela tem entrelaçado suas gavinhas em nossos códigos seculares de ética. Ela está implícita nas crenças éticas de muitos que duvidam ou até rejeitam os diversos relatos religiosos de origens humanas, e que acreditam que o certo e o errado existem independentemente da religião. Assim, mesmo que nós no Ocidente vivamos em um mundo semi, pós-cristão, no qual a tese da imagem de Deus e a tese da racionalidade estão amplamente rejeitadas, as atitudes éticas que elas inpiraram subsistem. Mas o que acontece a estas atitudes quando nós realmente lidamos com o fato de que as fundações de moralidade tradicional se erodiram?"
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Steve Stewart-Williams blog na Psychology Today
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NOTA CAUSTICANTE DESTE BLOGGER:
Ideias têm consequências. Mesmo as científicas. No livro “Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon”, [Quebrando o encanto: a religião como um fenômeno natural] Daniel Dennett há muito afirmou que o darwinismo é um “ácido universal”que corrói todos as noções tradicionais de Deus e da moralidade.
Matar inimigos é, segundo Dennett, uma ação válida autorizada pela teoria da evolução de Darwin. Afinal de contas, o mais apto sobrevive. Vale até matar os evolucionistas? Cruz credo, vade retro Dennett et caterva. Pereça tal pensamento, mas é o que implica a teoria da evolução de Darwin levada às últimas consequências e aplicabilidade prática. Não foi um dos personagens de Tolstoi em "Irmãos Karamazov" que disse: Se Deus não existe, então vale tudo?
Darwin, bambino, onde foi que lhe mal interpretei no 'The Descent of Man' onde você mesmo preconizou a destruição de 'raças inferiores' pelas 'raças superiores'. Lembra??? Vide abaixo:
“At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.”
“The partial or complete extinction of many races and sub-races of man is historically known….When civilised nations come into contact with barbarians the struggle is short, except where a deadly climate gives its aid to the native race…. The grade of their civilisation seems to be a most important element in the success of competing nations. A few centuries ago Europe feared the inroads of Eastern barbarians; now any such fear would be ridiculous.”
“At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.”
“The partial or complete extinction of many races and sub-races of man is historically known….When civilised nations come into contact with barbarians the struggle is short, except where a deadly climate gives its aid to the native race…. The grade of their civilisation seems to be a most important element in the success of competing nations. A few centuries ago Europe feared the inroads of Eastern barbarians; now any such fear would be ridiculous.”
Fui, nem sei por que, pensando que esta postagem vai causar um 'furore' entre os darwinistas ortodoxos, fundamentalistas, xiítas, ateus pós-modernos, chiques e perfumados a la Dawkins. Gente,por esta e outras, a Nomenklatura científica já me condenou eternamente para ser lançado no inferno de Darwin, oops de Dante.
