The value of blogs ...

... is well demonstrated, I think, in this post at Thought Experiments and the comments appended thereunto: Edward O. Wilson. I hardly say this because of my own exceedingly modest contribution. I say it because, if you read all of it, you will see that a subject has actually be dilated upon in a perfectly civil manner. I happen to think that Andrew's observation that "an awareness that attempts to reduce itself to subordination to reason and nothing but, must end up in absolute nihilism, ie total scepticism about thought itself" is absolutely correct. Which of course underscores Bryan's own point about "using rationality to undermine reason." My own point is that a strictly deterministic evolutionary theory provides no grounds whatsoever for any ethical postulates. Hence, the importance of what Andrew terms " the self-evident or intrinsic values that speak loudly and directly to our sense of life." I do not believe in strict determinism because I sense myself to be free. I also believe that humans have a responsibility toward the environment that other species apparently do not. But then I'm a Christian and the mythos to which I subscribe posits that God created man and woman to be gardeners.