Money and Finance
- Charlie Munger On Practice Evolution
From Whitney Tilson's 2000 Wesco Annual Meeting Notes:Practice Evolution "This is really important. For example, Hertz and Enterprise Rent-a-Car through practice evolution have developed personnel systems, etc. that work for them. They are...
- Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey Some Of The Things That Molecules Do (episode 2)
If you missed Episode 1, it is available HERE. Link to video: Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey: Some of the Things That Molecules Do ................... The episode above was largely about evolution. If you're new to the subject and want to learn more,...
- Publication Of The Gorilla Genome Opens Window Onto Human Evolution
Found via the RDFRS. The sequence of the gorilla genome is published today, completing the set for the living great apes. The findings provide a unique perspective on our own origins and are an important resource for research into human evolution and...
- Fossil Find Challenges Theories On T. Rex
Paleontologists said Thursday that they had discovered what amounted to a miniature prototype of Tyrannosaurus rex, complete with the oversize head, powerful jaws, long legs — and, as every schoolchild knows, puny arms — that were hallmarks of the...
- Unfinished Business
Charles Darwin’s ideas have spread widely, but his revolution is not yet complete THE miracles of nature are everywhere: on landing, a beetle folds its wings like an origami master; a lotus leaf sheds muddy water as if it were quicksilver; a spider...
Money and Finance
Why We Don’t Believe In Science – By Jonah Lehrer
I knew the numbers were high, but if the 46% number is an accurate reflection, that is pretty remarkable. 10,000 years? Really?
Last week, Gallup announced the results of their latest survey on Americans and evolution. The numbers were a stark blow to high-school science teachers everywhere: forty-six per cent of adults said they believed that “God created humans in their present form within the last 10,000 years.” Only fifteen per cent agreed with the statement that humans had evolved without the guidance of a divine power.
What’s most remarkable about these numbers is their stability: these percentages have remained virtually unchanged since Gallup began asking the question, thirty years ago. In 1982, forty-four per cent of Americans held strictly creationist views, a statistically insignificant difference from 2012. Furthermore, the percentage of Americans that believe in biological evolution has only increased by four percentage points over the last twenty years.
Such poll data begs the question: Why are some scientific ideas hard to believe in? What makes the human mind so resistant to certain kinds of facts, even when these facts are buttressed by vast amounts of evidence?
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Some evolution recommendations seem to be in order....
Link: Growing Up in the Universe
Books:
The Origin of Species
The Voyage of the Beagle
The Greatest Show on Earth
The Blind Watchmaker
Evolution
Why Evolution is True
The Selfish Gene
Climbing Mount Improbable
The Ancestor's Tale
The Extended Phenotype
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It would be so much more convenient if the laws of physics lined up with our naïve beliefs—or if evolution was wrong and living things didn’t evolve through random mutation. But reality is not a mirror; science is full of awkward facts. And this is why believing in the right version of things takes work.
Of course, that extra mental labor isn’t always pleasant. (There’s a reason they call it “cognitive dissonance.”) It took a few hundred years for the Copernican revolution to go mainstream. At the present rate, the Darwinian revolution, at least in America, will take just as long.
...................
Some evolution recommendations seem to be in order....
Link: Growing Up in the Universe
Books:
The Origin of Species
The Voyage of the Beagle
The Greatest Show on Earth
The Blind Watchmaker
Evolution
The Ancestor's Tale
The Extended Phenotype
- Charlie Munger On Practice Evolution
From Whitney Tilson's 2000 Wesco Annual Meeting Notes:Practice Evolution "This is really important. For example, Hertz and Enterprise Rent-a-Car through practice evolution have developed personnel systems, etc. that work for them. They are...
- Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey Some Of The Things That Molecules Do (episode 2)
If you missed Episode 1, it is available HERE. Link to video: Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey: Some of the Things That Molecules Do ................... The episode above was largely about evolution. If you're new to the subject and want to learn more,...
- Publication Of The Gorilla Genome Opens Window Onto Human Evolution
Found via the RDFRS. The sequence of the gorilla genome is published today, completing the set for the living great apes. The findings provide a unique perspective on our own origins and are an important resource for research into human evolution and...
- Fossil Find Challenges Theories On T. Rex
Paleontologists said Thursday that they had discovered what amounted to a miniature prototype of Tyrannosaurus rex, complete with the oversize head, powerful jaws, long legs — and, as every schoolchild knows, puny arms — that were hallmarks of the...
- Unfinished Business
Charles Darwin’s ideas have spread widely, but his revolution is not yet complete THE miracles of nature are everywhere: on landing, a beetle folds its wings like an origami master; a lotus leaf sheds muddy water as if it were quicksilver; a spider...