Before I explain the rot at the heart of this chapter (Chapter 5 of From Extraterrestrials to Animal Minds: Six Myths of Evolution, The Myth of Animal Minds, by Simon Conway Morris), I'd like to show you my...
It's one of the most famous misquoted lines in the English language, spoken by Lady Gertrude (Hamlet's mom) during the intense scene featuring a play ("The Mousetrap" aka The Murder of Gonzago) within a play,...
There are some truly vexing and annoying myths of evolution. They are almost exclusively recited and embellished by religious propagandists, some of whom actually know what they're doing. Rarely but notably,...
If you read about natural history, even just popular accounts, you know about the epic mass extinctions visited on the living world throughout life's tenure on Earth. Words like 'devastating' and...
The concept of randomness is caught up in evolution, in two broad ways. The first and most famous aspect is the oft-misunderstood randomness of mutation. The second aspect is the role of chance in the...
One motivation for relaunching Quintessence of Dust was my desire to write about things I'm reading, whether books or articles. So here is the second (late) entry in my new series, What I'm reading, posted at...
Warning: this post includes spoilers for Black Widow, Avengers: Endgame, and Spider-Man: No Way Home. Seems a small price to pay to understand the biophysical limits of the biosphere, but it's your call.So,...
Which superpower would you choose and why?This seems a somewhat common "get to know you" question. Sometimes you're forced to choose between two (invisibility or teleportation?), perhaps to reveal particular...
It was the subtitle of this book (From Extraterrestrials to Animal Minds: Six Myths of Evolution by Simon Conway Morris) that reeled me in, combined with my inability to resist reading the thoughts of Conway...
One of my motivations for relaunching Quintessence of Dust was my desire to write about things I'm reading, whether books or articles. So here is a new series, pretty basic: What I'm reading, posted at the...
I have been thinking regularly about complicity for the last several years. It became a central ethical theme of mine in 2016 and it has occupied my thoughts and ideas since. And yet, it recently occurred to...
Bardolatry has been a cornerstone of Quintessence of Dust since I conceived it. I love the plays, sure, but there's always been something else going on."Jane Anger"Shakespeare is one of those extraordinary...
My first post on John Farrell's The Day Without Yesterday identified two themes the book raises for me: the intellectual milieu into which modern cosmology came to be, and the reasons why Georges Lemaître was...
In my first post on John Farrell's The Day Without Yesterday, I identified two themes the book raises for me: the intellectual milieu into which modern cosmology came to be, and the reasons why Georges...
Let's start with full disclosure. John Farrell is a good friend, and we met here at Quintessence of Dust more than 15 years ago. John was one of the first people to read and comment on (and link to) the blog....