
“Our culture is teleological-it presumes purposive development and a conclusion.”
Source: Barbarian Sentiments - How The American Century Ends (1989), Chapter 6, Japan, China and the Making of nations, p. 164.
Healing Gaia (1991)
“Our culture is teleological-it presumes purposive development and a conclusion.”
Source: Barbarian Sentiments - How The American Century Ends (1989), Chapter 6, Japan, China and the Making of nations, p. 164.
Academy of Achievement interview (1991)
Context: I am interested in a phase that I think we are entering. I call it "teleological evolution," evolution with a purpose. The idea of evolution by design, designing the future, anticipating the future. I think of the need for more wisdom in the world, to deal with the knowledge that we have. At one time we had wisdom, but little knowledge. Now we have a great deal of knowledge, but do we have enough wisdom to deal with that knowledge?
Source: 1860s, Evidence as to Man's Place in Nature (1863), Ch.2, p. 127
“When neither our fellows nor our gods spoil our plans, we spoil them ourselves.”
Volume 4, Ch. 15
Fiction, The Book of the Long Sun (1993–1996)
"The Face of Miranda", p. 496
Bully for Brontosaurus (1991)
" Is atheism irrational? A philosopher says “yes” http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2014/10/15/is-atheism-irrational-a-philosopher-says-yes/" October 15, 2014
L.K. Frank (1948) "Foreword". In L. K. Frank, G. E. Hutchinson, W. K. Livingston, W. S. McCulloch, & N. Wiener, Teleological mechanisms. Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sc., 1948, 50, 189-96; As cited in: Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1968) "General System Theory: Foundations, Development, Applications". p. 16-17
Essay Do We Survive Death? (1936)
1930s
Context: It is only when we think abstractly that we have such a high opinion of man. Of men in the concrete, most of us think the vast majority very bad. Civilized states spend more than half their revenue on killing each other's citizens. Consider the long history of the activities inspired by moral fervour: human sacrifices, persecutions of heretics, witch-hunts, pogroms leading up to wholesale extermination by poison gases … Are these abominations, and the ethical doctrines by which they are prompted, really evidence of an intelligent Creator? And can we really wish that the men who practised them should live for ever? The world in which we live can be understood as a result of muddle and accident; but if it is the outcome of a deliberate purpose, the purpose must have been that of a fiend. For my part, I find accident a less painful and more plausible hypothesis.