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Freedom Evolves
Freedom Evolves
Author: Daniel C. Dennett
Daniel C. Dennett is a brilliant polemicist, famous for challenging unexamined orthodoxies. Over the last thirty years, he has played a major role in expanding our understanding of consciousness, developmental psychology, and evolutionary theory. And with such groundbreaking, critically acclaimed books as Consciousness Explained and Da...  more » (a National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize finalist), he has reached a huge general and professional audience.

In this new book, Dennett shows that evolution is the key to resolving the ancient problems of moral and political freedom. Like the planet's atmosphere on which life depends, the conditions on which our freedom depends had to evolve, and like the atmosphere, they continue to evolve-and could be extinguished. According to Dennett, biology provides the perspective from which we can distinguish the varieties of freedom that matter. Throughout the history of life on this planet, an interacting web and internal and external conditions have provided the frameworks for the design of agents that are more free than their parts-from the unwitting gropings of the simplest life forms to the more informed activities of animals to the moral dilemmas that confront human beings living in societies.

As in his previous books, Dennett weaves a richly detailed narrative enlivened by analogies as entertaining as they are challenging. Here is the story of how we came to be different from all other creatures, how our early ancestors mindlessly created human culture, and then, how culture gave us our minds, our visions, our moral problems-in a nutshell, our freedom.
ISBN-13: 9780670031863
ISBN-10: 0670031860
Publication Date: 2/10/2003
Pages: 352
Rating:
  • Currently 2.5/5 Stars.
 3
2.5 stars, based on 3 ratings
Publisher: Viking Books
Book Type: Hardcover
Other Versions: Paperback
Members Wishing: 0
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 Marke avatar reviewed Freedom Evolves on + 19 more book reviews
If you do not read this book, you will die ignorant of things you should know about free will. Dennett is the 20th/21st century's best philosopher.
reviewed Freedom Evolves on
A very indepth read on the thought processes involved with free thinking, self-made choices and an interpretation on where it will lead us. The beginning goes through some statistical math and computer code how even something programmed can evolve above the inputs given. Further reading yields some philosophy and other reaching ideas. overall a good one to have read once.


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