Prediction in a complex world is a chancy business. Every decision that a survival machine takes is a gamble, and it is the business of genes to program brains in advance so that on average they take decisions that pay off. The currency used in the casino of evolution is survival, strictly gene survival, but for many purposes individual survival is a reasonable approximation.
Tags: science, evolutionary-biology

Other Quotes by "Richard Dawkins"

But failure to disprove something is not a good reason to believe it.
Tags: reason, god, faith, disprove, belief, atheist, atheism
We are a unique ape. We have language. Other animals have systems of communication that fall far short of that. They don't have the same ability to communicate complicated conditionals and what-ifs and talk about things that are not present.
Tags: fall, language, unique, communication
Let us understand what our own selfish genes are up to because we may then at least have the chance to upset their designs.
Tags: own, upset, understand, chance, selfish
If something is true, no amount of wishful thinking will change it.
Tags: true, will, thinking, change
Once a viral program gets started, there is nothing to stop it.
Tags: started, once, nothing, stop
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