Retro: Best of the Blog: Concepts

Biology is harder to learn than quantum physics. Why? Because most people think they totally get biology, but everyone knows nobody gets quantum physics. Therefore, any effort to explore quantum physics will result in new learning, but people rarely learn new biology. The bottom line is that our brains are full of biology, which would be good if most of it did not consist of ...

The Falsehoods and The Falsehoods II

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Biology is harder to learn than quantum physics. Why? Because most people think they totally get biology, but everyone knows nobody gets quantum physics. Therefore, any effort to explore quantum physics will result in new learning, but people rarely learn new biology. The bottom line is that…
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Hehe, I never read those posts before, but you sound an awful lot like me when explain evolution to people.

The problem with understanding evolution is this: If you ask a typical (decently educated) person if he understands quantum mechanics, he will admit that no, he does not. But he is willing to accept that smart people who study it diligently DO understand it, and he is willing to believe them. Ask him about evolution though, and he will believe that he understands it intuitively, and has no need to study it. "Competition", "Survival of the Fittest", and he starts reasoning by analogy with the other kinds of competition he is familiar with, like sports and business.

By CherryBomb (not verified) on 27 Dec 2010 #permalink

You are preaching to the Choir...

Well, yes and no. My point really is that people who claim to believe in evolution often don't actually understand it any better than those who claim they don't. Most people have a pretty superficial understanding of how evolution works, and whether they will admit it or not, they are, yes, taking it on faith.

By CherryBomb (not verified) on 28 Dec 2010 #permalink