Hello.
After lurking here for a couple of weeks, I'm just about to join in the
discussion. I thought I'd briefly introduce myself first.
I live in Bristol, England. My educational background is in maths (BSc in
Statistics and Operational Research from the Universty of Manchester). I've
worked mostly in software development, but also as a freelance technical
translator (Russian to English).
Since religion plays a large part in these discussions, I should mention
that I'm an atheist, but not a card-carrying one. I was raised in
progressive Judaism and have briefly tried other religions, but ultimately
found no reason to believe in the existence of God. Nevertheless, there are
two great mysteries of which I'm in awe: the existence of the universe (and
its physical laws) and the existence of consciousness. Perhaps the latter
will be less of a mystery once I've read Dennett's book "Consciousness
Explained", which is next on my reading list.
As you might expect from the above, I'm an "evolutionist", that is I think
the neo-Darwinian theory of evolution is broadly correct. I consider
creationism and ID to be pseudoscience, in a similar league to astrology,
dowsing and Atlantis.
Best wishes,
Richard Wein (Tich)
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