'¿Qué libro escribiría un capellán del diablo sobre el trabajo torpe, derrochador, primitivo y horriblemente cruel de la naturaleza?', se preguntaba Darwin en 1856. Conocer los procesos naturales y las conductas de seres vivos puede ponernos la piel de gallina o dejarnos maravillados. Richard Dawkins nos invita a mirar con los ojos abiertos y sin hipocresía lo peor y más perfecto que la naturaleza produce y recuerda que los límites entre aquello que podemos soportar y lo que rechazamos los ponemos nosotros. Comenta los aspectos más controvertidos de los descubrimientos científicos recientes: embriología, clonación o las manipulaciones genéticas de vegetales comestibles, para mostrar que muchas condenas se deben a la falta de conocimiento y valentía de aceptar la semejanza de nuevos hechos con fenómenos familiares. No se limita a explicar nuevos hallazgos, sino que conecta temas dispares en función de cierta enseñanza.

It's always a pleasure to read Dawkins, who thinks for himself and thinks well. The last chapter alone makes the book worthwhile. It is a letter to his 10-year-old daughter about how to start deciding whether or not to believe something she is told. Man, could 100 million Americans profit from it today (2021) if they ever read from this kind of book! I saw news today about renewed interest in UFOs and so expect stories again from people who claim they got ushered into one and probed, just like people swore to in the 1950s. ( )

A collection of essays, some quite short. Individual reviews:

1.1 A Devil's Chaplain
The basic message of this essay is that you should be tough, face the fact of evolution, and then act correctly. No need to say: I must act according to the dictates of evolution, and no need to say that evolution is cruel, so I need to not believe in it. Obvious, but well said.

1.2 What is True?
A diatribe against post-modernism. I agree entirely. What's sad is that the essay was written in the year 2000, and the situation has only gotten worse since then. Some good references, though.

5. "Even the ranks of Tuscany"
Reviews of some books by Stephen J. Gould. The intro discusses their mutual respect and their disagreements.
5.1 Rejoicing in Multifarious Nature: Review of "Ever Since Darwin" by S. J. Gould
Generally approving, but challenges Gould on his rejection of genetic selection. Not surprising, since Dawkins had written or was about to write "The Selfish Gene", his first bestseller.

Classic Dawkins and as such, a bit redundant, but never an easy read. Stick with it. ( )

Richard Dawkins more often than not is labeled arrogant, whther in print, in lecture or in person. Having read, listened and talked to Dawkins, I would be hard pressed to argue the contrary. Nevertheless, I still like him and what he has to say, even if I don't understand everything.

The Devil’s Chaplain is a collection of essays published in 2003, that according to the backleaf of the paperback, is “an enthusiastic declaration, a testament to the powers of rigorous scientific examination to reveal the wonders of the world.” Well, I think it is a wonderful collection ranging from the pedantic to the candid, from righteous to humble (if you look close, you’ll see this). He can be wittily entertaining and maddeningly academic, but never boring. And he doesn’t pull punches (no expects that anyway).

Dawkins grouped his essays into six (actually seven) sections and provides a foreword to each, explaining his choices for inclusion.

In “Science and Sensibility” he talks about Darwin (of course). He examines the relativity of truth as related to perspective, with science as the only real truth. He looks at the human ape family tree, ethics in genetic studies, relates his experiences as a jury member (prompting me to rethink the jury concept). Two of my favorite essays in this section look at quackery of new age crystal proponents and a brilliant review of “Intellectual Impostures” by Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont (published in the US as “Fashionable Nonsense”)offering Dawkins’ Law of Conservation of Difficulty and a web link to a hilarious site: The Postmodernism Generator (http://www.elsewhere.org/cgi-bin/postmodern/” that “will spontaneously generate for you, using faultless grammatical principles, a spanking new postmodern discourse, never before seen.”

In “Light Will Be Thrown”, the chapters look at Darwinism’s effect outside biology and Darwinism as a universal truth. He also relates with palpable distaste his experience with the “murky underworld of creationist propaganda.” Within that chapter is a fascinating look at information transfer, one of the best, if dry, reads in the book.

In “The Infected Mind”, Dawkins concentrates all barrels on religion. He revisits memes and his view of religions as viruses of the mind. He dismisses claims of the convergence of science and religion, and does a number on the tendency to afford religious spokesmen a “privileged platform”, such as including their opinions in scientific discussions where they have no place.

“They Told Me, Heraclitus” is a collection of tributes and eulogies to Douglas Adams, W.D. Hamilton and John Diamond, the last exposing some of the snake oil masquerading as “alternative medicine.”

“Even the Ranks of Tuscany” blows the lid off the exaggerated conflict between Dawkins and Stephen Jay Gould. Dawkins freely admits he was neither close friends with Gould nor in agreement on their respective views of evolution, but he was highly respectful of Gould’s scientific approach and laudatory of Gould’s writing. The chapter contains some reviews of Gould’s books, both favorable and unfavorable, and concludes with a sad recounting of a final collaborative effort against the intelligent design movement that was cut short before publication by Gould’s death.

After a chapter on Africa, he concludes with a moving letter to his (then) ten year old daughter entitled "Good and Bad Reasons for Believing" ( )