Purpose & Desire (eBook)

What Makes Something &quote;Alive&quote; and Why Modern Darwinism Has Failed to Explain It

J. Scott Turner (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2017
352 Seiten
Harpercollins (Verlag)
978-0-06-265158-7 (ISBN)

Infos

A professor, biologist, and physiologist argues that modern Darwinism’s materialist and mechanistic biases have led to a scientific dead end, unable to define what life is—and only an openness to the qualities of "e;purpose and desire"e; will move the field forward.Scott Turner contends. "e;To be scientists, we force ourselves into a Hobson’s choice on the matter: accept intentionality and purposefulness as real attributes of life, which disqualifies you as a scientist; or become a scientist and dismiss life’s distinctive quality from your thinking. I have come to believe that this choice actually stands in the way of our having a fully coherent theory of life."e; Growing research shows that life's most distinctive quality, shared by all living things, is purpose and desire: maintain homeostasis to sustain life. In Purpose and Desire, Turner draws on the work of Claude Bernard, a contemporary of Darwin revered among physiologists as the founder of experimental medicine, to build on Bernard’s "e;dangerous idea"e; of vitalism, which seeks to identify what makes "e;life"e; a unique phenomenon of nature. To further its quest to achieve a fuller understanding of life, Turner argues, science must move beyond strictly accepted measures that consider only the mechanics of nature. A thoughtful appeal to widen our perspective of biology that is grounded in scientific evidence, Purpose and Desire helps us bridge the ideological evolutionary divide.

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 12.9.2017
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Geisteswissenschaften ► Religion / Theologie
• Themenwelt: Naturwissenschaften ► Biologie ► Evolution
• ISBN-10: 0-06-265158-7 / 0062651587
• ISBN-13: 978-0-06-265158-7 / 9780062651587