We do not find obvious evidence of life or mind in so-called inert matter…; but if the scientific point of view is correct, we shall ultimately find … - J.B.S. Haldane

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We do not find obvious evidence of life or mind in so-called inert matter…; but if the scientific point of view is correct, we shall ultimately find them, at least in rudimentary form, all through the universe

It seems to me immensely unlikely that mind is a mere by-product of matter. For if my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true. They may be sound chemically, but that does not make them sound logically.

And hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms.

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About J.B.S. Haldane

John Burdon Sanderson Haldane (5 November 1892 – 1 December 1964) was a British geneticist and evolutionary biologist.

Biography information from Wikiquote

Also Known As

Native Name: John Burdon Sanderson Haldane
Alternative Names: J. B. S. Haldane
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It seems to me immensely unlikely that mind is a mere by-product of matter. For if my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true. They may be sound chemically, but that does not make them sound logically. And hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms.

Additional quotes by J.B.S. Haldane

If the only available genes produce rather large changes, disadvantageous one at a time, then it seems to me probable that evolution will not occur in a random mating population. In a self-fertilised or highly inbred species it may do so if several mutations useful in conjunction, but separately harmful, occur simultaneously. Such an event is rare, but must happen reasonably often in wheat...

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The conservative has but little to fear from the man whose reason is the servant of his passions, but let him beware of him in whom reason has become the greatest and most terrible of the passions. These are the wreckers of outworn empires and civilisations, doubters, disintegrators, deicides.

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