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Quotes from The Blind Watchmaker — Richard Dawkins

born 1941 England

← All quotes by Richard Dawkins

17 quotes

There are people in the world who desperately want not to have to believe in Darwinism.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

Our subjective judgment of what seems like a good bet is irrelevant to what is actually a good bet.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

Human vanity cherishes the absurd notion that our species is the final goal of evolution.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

Contrary to earlier prejudices, there is nothing inherently progressive about evolution.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

Natural selection is all about the differential success of rival DNA in getting itself transmitted vertically in the species archives.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

However many ways there may be of being alive, it is certain that there are vastly more ways of being dead.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

Evolution normally does not come to a halt, but constantly ‘tracks’ the changing environment.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

This not only misses the point, it is the precise antithesis of the point.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

There has been progress in design, but not progress in accomplishment.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

Mutation is random; natural selection is the very opposite of random.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

To explain the origin of the DNA/protein machine by invoking a supernatural Designer is to explain precisely nothing, for it leaves unexplained the origin of the Designer.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

It is generally characteristic of arms races, including human ones, that although all would be better off if none of them escalated, so long as one of them escalates none can afford not to.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

If you don't know anything about computers, just remember that they are machines that do exactly what you tell them but often surprise you in the result.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

There is one particular property of living things, however, that I want to single out as explicable only by Darwinian selection. This property is the one that has been the recurring topic of this book: adaptive complexity.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

This belief, that Darwinian evolution is "random", is not merely false. It is the exact opposite of the truth. Chance is a minor ingredient in the Darwinian recipe, but the most important ingredient is cumulative selection which is quintessentially non-random.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

The successful scientist and the raving crank are separated by the quality of their inspirations. But I suspect that this amounts, in practice, to a difference, not so much in ability to notice analogies as in ability to reject foolish analogies and pursue helpful ones.

The Blind Watchmaker (1986)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Richard Dawkins (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.