The premise is intriguing: "Did Newton unweave the rainbow by reducing it to prismatic colors, as Keats contended"? But to no-one's surprise, Dawkins thinks not. This book is his attempt to demonstrate that science can be as "uplifting" as poetry. Along the way, he tries to separate the "good" science poetry from the "bad." Unfortunately, Dawkins failed to inspire me. While some of his digressions into probability theory, genetics, and evolutionary theory are fascinating, it's hard not to feel that Dawkins is preaching to the choir (a choir I myself belong to) here. If I was really skeptical about evolutionary theory, or if I suspected that there really might be something to astrology, I'd probably not be picking up this book at the Book Fair, as I did. I don't really need to be convinced, and so Dawkins's sincere attempt to debunk "bad poetry" is kind of a drag. Worse, his arguments against Stephen Jay Gould seem out of place and a bit strident. This was my first Dawkins book, and I think I probably should have started with The Selfish Gene, which I will probably seek out in the future. ( )

There are really fascinating facts in this book.

However, I was bored by reading again and again about the bad guys who do not believe in science and are not impressed by the explanation of a phenomenon (e.g. the rainbow). E.g. Dawkins cannot stop castigating Keats just because he found Newton's rational explanation disappointing.

I am really a fan of science, sceptic and agnostic. But I can also tolearate Keats' opinion. And somehow I am not really interested in how Dawkins argues with others. The book would have been much more enjoyable and appealing without the constant rage.

Of course, that would have been another book - not one about scientific thinking, but just a collection of fascinating phenomena. ( )

Whilst Dawkins deserves kudos for his work in the past, I'm overall no fan of his. Here are a few pointers to why I find Dawkins' thinking unimpressive. Let's start with the fact that the title has a subtext on 'delusion' (pre-echos of the rather tedious 'The God Delusion') - Dawkins is ill-placed to reveal other scientists' delusions precisely because he's subject to so many of his own.

Chapter 8 of 'Unweaving' to me makes the most interesting reading, that's because I have a psychological bent and in this chapter Dawkins tells us (unwittingly) rather a lot about his modes of thinking.

Dawkins considers himself above the general argument of this chapter, which is that there really are metaphors unhelpful to understanding of science. He admits that 'Selfish gene' uses the word 'selfish' in a rather unusual way, but then claims that his use of selfish really is justified in this case. I argue, along with Denis Noble that it clearly isn't and that this is just special pleading.

Later in this chapter, the author takes Stephen Jay Gould to task. Its obvious that Dawkins doesn't like Gould as he's careful to point that that his criticism doesn't stem from personal rancour. However the wording he uses shows that he considers Gould a good writer but a very poor scientist because he's seduced by his own inappropriate metaphors.

Dawkins considers that its the 'calibre' of the scientist which determines whether or not they get hoodwinked by misleading metaphors - into the calibre where there's a lot of delusional thinking he puts such luminaries as Kauffman, Leakey and Lewin - clearly Gould doesn't make it even this high in his estimation. And so on... if you'd like more debunking please drop me a message. ( )

These collected essays by Dawkins make a compelling and (literally) wonderful case for science as an awe-inspiring profoundly satisfying way to understand the world.