Following Quotes - page 20
While our view of the world is filtered through our senses, evolution has, by and large, molded those senses to perceive the world accurately, for there's a severe penalty to be paid for seeing things wrongly. That holds not only for the external environment, but also for the character of others. Without accurate perceptions, we couldn't find food, avoid predators and other dangers, or form harmonious social groups. And following those perceptions is indeed the pursuit of "true beliefs”: beliefs based on evidence. Natural selection doesn't mold true beliefs; it molds the sensory and neural apparatus that, in general, promotes the formation of true beliefs.
Jerry Coyne
The question really arises is it a republic if you can keep it, question have we kept it? And the answer is no! No we have not kept it. Since 2001 we have in effect an elected monarchy. And ah, meaning a country which Nixon's view 'when a president does it, it is legal'. The president says it's not illegal. That is the attitude long after Nixon of John Yoo, who was the advisor to George W. Bush, of David Addington, Bush Cheney's legal advisor. Essentially there are no limits on presidential power except those which he chooses to put on himself. Obama following on, has in effect decriminalized torture which is as illegal and criminal as anything can be under international law and domestic law, a number of domestic laws and international laws, which we have ratified to investigate, and follow-up if there is any credible charge. Obama has chosen not to investigate or indict any higher up for that process of torture.
Daniel Ellsberg
Almost all of the material phenomena which occur under terrestrial conditions are recognized as quantum mechanical consequences of the electrical attraction between electrons and nuclei and of the gravitational attraction between massive objects. We should be able, therefore, to express all the relevant magnitudes which characterize the properties of matter in terms of the following six magnitudes: M, m, e, c, G, and h; M is the mass of the proton, m and e are the mass and electrical charge of the electron, c is the light velocity, G is Newton's gravitational constant, and-most importantly-h is the quantum of action ...
Victor Frederick Weisskopf
We are playing for different fans, we are united by our love to football. Ukraine is diverse, Ukraine is united - Kiev, Donetsk, Dniepropetrovsk, Kharkov, Odessa, Sevastopol, Lutsk... all of Ukraine. Lets say "stop!" to violence. Lets be united, in what we love - we love Ukraine, Tymoschuk talking about the political crisis in Ukraine following the Euromaidan events.
Anatoliy Tymoshchuk
Ben Stein: What do think is the possibility that intelligent design might turn out to be the answer to some issues in genetics, or in evolution?
Richard Dawkins: Well, it could come about in the following way: it could be that at some earlier time, somewhere in the universe, a civilization evolved by probably some kind of Darwinian means to a very, very high level of technology, and designed a form of life that they seeded onto, perhaps, this planet. Now that is a possibility, and an intriguing possibility. And I suppose it's possible that you might find evidence for that if you look at the details of our chemistry, molecular biology, you might find a signature of some sort of designer, and that designer could well be a higher intelligence from elsewhere in the universe. But that higher intelligence would itself have had to have come about by some explicable, or ultimately explicable, process. It couldn't have just jumped into existence spontaneously. That's the point.
Richard Dawkins