Darwin's Ghosts, by Rebecca Stott: Review

PUBLISHER:

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Shaun Johnston:
In modern times we've made two revolutionary discoveries. One is, how changes in physical matter can be accounted for in terms of physical laws that can predict precisely what will happen next. Having given rise to science (how this can be studied) and industry (how it can be applied) this revolution is well under way.

The second revolution is, how emergence of species of living creatures can be accounted for in terms of them evolving from one another. This revolution, despite its promise of how much it could tell us about ourselves, remains stillborn through the mistaken application to it of principles coming out of the first revolution--reductive physicalism.

For this second revolution to advance it should be taken from under the wing of science and studied on its own terms. Tip: one recent product of evolution is creatures with minds. Minds are better studied through methods of the humanities than through those of science. Tell me, does this interest you?

Details: Written by Shaun Johnston Shaun Johnston; Published: July 12, 2012 July 12, 2012; Hits: 3638 3638

Approaching the end of this book I felt deeply satisfied. I felt much more intimately connected to the stages leading up to the discovery of evolution than I had before. Stott is a gifted storyteller/historian. Other books had informed me of the thinking of each of Darwin's forerunners individually, but Stott's book conveyed a sense of what obstacles precluded the emergence of the idea at each stage and how those obstacles could be surmounted only as knowledge increased. More...