“The Bishop goes on to the human eye, asking rhetorically, and with the implication that there is no answer, 'How could an organ so complex evolve?' This is not an argument, it is simply an affirmation of incredulity.”

Source: The Blind Watchmaker: Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design

Last update June 3, 2021. History

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Richard Dawkins322

English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author 1941

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“Never say, and never take seriously anyone who says, "I cannot believe that so-and-so could have evolved by gradual selection". I have dubbed this kind of fallacy "the Argument from Personal Incredulity."”

Richard Dawkins book River Out of Eden

Time and again, it has proven the prelude to an intellectual banana-skin experience.
River out of Eden (1995)

Richard Dawkins (1941) English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author

River out of Eden (1995)

“If we want to postulate a deity capable of engineering all the organized complexity in the world, either instantaneously or by guiding evolution, that deity must have been vastly complex in the first place. The creationist, whether a naive Bible-thumper or an educated bishop, simply postulates an already existing being of prodigious intelligence and complexity. If we are going to allow ourselves the luxury of postulating organized complexity without offering an explanation, we might as well make a job of it and simply postulate the existence of life as we know it!”

Richard Dawkins book The Blind Watchmaker

Source: The Blind Watchmaker (1986), Chapter 11 “Doomed Rivals” (p. 316)

“There wasn't any answer to that. So he tried harder, and the question got more circumstantial and tentative, and at the same time more precise and exact; and still there were no answers, only the fuller and fuller form of the question, evolving as Auberon had described to her all life evolving, reaching out limbs and inventing organs, reticulating joints, doing and being in more and more complex yet more and more compact and individuated ways, until the question, perfectly asked, understood its own answerlessness.”

John Crowley (1942) American writer

Bk. 2, Ch. 1
Little, Big: or, The Fairies' Parliament (1981)

“You could not have evolved a complex system like a city or an organism - with an enormous number of components - without the emergence of laws that constrain their behavior in order for them to be resilient.”

Geoffrey West (1940) British physicist

2010s <br class="br">Source: Ben Lillie. " The sameness of organisms, cities, and corporations: Q&A with Geoffrey West http://blog.ted.com/qa-with-geoffrey-west/." at blog.ted.com. July 26, 2011.

“Things evolve to evolve. Evolutionary processes are the linchpin of change. These processes of discovery represent a complexity of simple systems that flux in perpetual tension as they teeter at the edge of chaos. This whirlwind of emergence is responsible for the spontaneous order and higher, organized complexity so noticeable in biological evolution—one–celled critters beefing up to become multicellular organisms.”

L. K. Samuels (1951) American writer

Source: In Defense of Chaos: The Chaology of Politics, Economics and Human Action, (2013), p. 335

“Every system that has existed emerged somehow, from somewhere, at some point. Complexity science emphasizes the study of how systems evolve through their disorganized parts into an organized whole.”

L. K. Samuels (1951) American writer

Source: In Defense of Chaos: The Chaology of Politics, Economics and Human Action, (2013), p. 118

“There's just one person who's allowed to ask, or answer, rhetorical questions in my courtroom -- and that's me! Understand? No, don't answer! There you go again.”

Judith Sheindlin (1942) American lawyer, judge, television personality, and author

Source: Quotes From Judge Judy Cases, Dress, Stand, and/or Speak Properly

“While birds can fly, only humans can argue. Argument is the affirmation of our being. It is the principal instrument of human intercourse. Without argument the species would perish.”

Gerry Spence (1929) American lawyer

Getting Started, p. 5
How to Argue and Win Every Time (1995)
Context: While birds can fly, only humans can argue. Argument is the affirmation of our being. It is the principal instrument of human intercourse. Without argument the species would perish. As a subtle suggestion, it is the means by which we aid another. As a warning, it steers us from danger. As exposition, it teaches. As an expression of creativity, it is the gift of ourselves. As a protest, it struggles for justice. As a reasoned dialogue, it resolves disputes. As an assertion of self, it engenders respect. As an entreaty of love, it expresses our devotion. As a plea, it generates mercy. As charismatic oration it moves multitudes and changes history. We must argue — to help, to warn, to lead, to love, to create, to learn, to enjoy justice — to be.

“If one wants to make a machine mimic the behaviour of the human computer in some complex operation one has to ask him how it is done, and then translate the answer into the form of an instruction table. Constructing instruction tables is usually described as "programming."”

Alan Turing Computing Machinery and Intelligence

Computing Machinery and Intelligence (1950)

“The Bishop goes on to the human eye, asking rhetorically, and with the implication that there is no answer, 'How could an organ so complex evolve?' This is not an argument, it is simply an affirmation of incredulity.”

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Richard Dawkins322

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