Daniel C. Dennett
author profile
born
March 28, 1942
gender
male
place of birth
Boston, Massachusetts, The United States
website
genre
Philosophy, Science, Nonfiction
influences
Gilbert Ryle, W.V.O. Quine, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Charles Darwin, David Hume, Alan Turing, Richard Dawkins
about this author
"Daniel Clement Dennett (born March 28, 1942 in Boston, Massachusetts) is a prominent American philosopher whose research centers on philosophy of mind, philosophy of science and philosophy of biology, particularly as those fields relate to evolutionary biology and cognitive science. He is currently the co-director of the Center for Cognitive Studies and the Austin B. Fletcher Professor of Philosophy at Tufts University. Dennett is also a noted atheist and advocate of the Brights movement.
Dennett spent part of his childhood in Beirut, where, during World War II, his father, a covert counter-intelligence agent with the Office of Strategic Services posing as a cultural attaché to the American Embassy in Beirut. The young De...more
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"Human consciousness is just about the last surviving mystery. A mystery is a phenomenon that people don't know how to think about - yet. There have been other great mysteries: the mystery of the origin of the universe, the mystery of life and reproduction, the mystery of the design to be found in nature, the mysteries of time, space, and gravity. These were not just areas of scientific ignorance, but of utter bafflement and wonder. We do not yet have all the answers to any of the questions of cosmology and particle physics, molecular genetics and evolutionary theory, but we do know how to think about them .... With consciousness, however, we are still in a terrible muddle. Consciousness stands alone today as a topic that often leaves even the most sophisticated thinkers tongue-tied and confused. And, as with all of the earlier mysteries, there are many who insist -- and hope -- that there will never be a demystification of consciousness."
— Daniel C. Dennett (Consciousness Explained)
— Daniel C. Dennett (Consciousness Explained)
"If you can approach the world's complexities, both its glories and its horrors, with an attitude of humble curiosity, acknowledging that however deeply you have seen, you have only scratched the surface, you will find worlds within worlds, beauties you could not heretofore imagine, and your own mundane preoccupations will shrink to proper size, not all that important in the greater scheme of things."
— Daniel C. Dennett (Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon)
— Daniel C. Dennett (Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon)
tags:
inspiration,
science
9 people liked it
"If you want to teach your children that they are the tools of God, you had better not teach them that they are God's rifles, or we will have to stand firmly opposed to you: your doctrine has no glory, no special rights, no intrinsic and inalienable merit. If you insist on teaching your children false-hoods—that the Earth is flat, that "Man" is not a product of evolution by natural selection—then you must expect, at the very least, that those of us who have freedom of speech will feel free to describe your teachings as the spreading of falsehoods, and will attempt to demonstrate this to your children at our earliest opportunity. Our future well-being—the well-being of all of us on the planet—depends on the education of our descendants."
— Daniel C. Dennett (Darwin's Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life)
— Daniel C. Dennett (Darwin's Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life)
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