Many people have found ways to find meaning in the world without subscribing to the notion of
ultimate meaning, a concept traditional religion is obsessed with but one that renders traditional religion
as intellectually stagnant and militantly authoritarian as ever.
I am dogmatic about one thing: learning is a lifelong pursuit. Anything that stands in the way of free
learning, discovery and verification is harmful to mankind. Theology has a history of such a malevolent
tradition. Natural science does not. I choose science to educate me and rely on the great work of my
parents to become a good person.
Sincerely,
Greg
Man's most sacred duty, and at the same time his most glorious opportunity, is to promote the maximum
fulfillment of the evolutionary process on earth.
Julian Huxley, biologist and author (1957)
The choice between transcendentalism and empiricism will be the coming century's vision of the struggle
for men's souls. Moral reasoning will either remain centered in the idioms of theology and philosophy ...
or it will shift toward science-based material analysis.
E. 0. Wilson, biologist (1998)
History... reveals that man does not need any brand of transcendental metaphysics-his lasting contentments
and achievements he has found wholly within the frame of reference that takes things as they are in the
here and now.
Homer W. Smith, physiologist (1952)
Dear Greg:
I've just returned from the racquetball court, where I got my butt kicked in three consecutive games by a
guy in his mid-fifties who's up for major surgery in a few weeksand I run marathons! That's a reality
check.
I appreciate your note. There's a lot to respond to. The only thing I'll say now is that you're obviously
right that "truth comes from the empirical investigation of the universe." But who, really, believes that the
sum of all truth lies there?
The feelings you have for your children (and that I have for my daughter) are inextricably linked to
physicalneurological activity and psychological processes. Snip off the relevant piece of my brain (so to
speak), and I would lose the capacity to feel love for my daughter. Yet I can't imagine a
neuropsychologist, who isn't himself a humanoid, saying that a father's love for his child is only the sum of
these processes.
In the case of living systems, nobody would deny that an organism [such as person] is a collection of