This is a common misunderstanding of the argument. As Dawkins says some people would say physics is more complex than biology.
Well it probably IS; in the sense its very hard to understand. But that's not the kind of complexity that is being talked about here. Its a confusion between the two different meanings.
Physics are about tiny fundamental particles - the workings of them may be very hard to understand - physics books may be very hard to understand etc - but physical particles are a lot more simple than complex biological objects like, fish, spiders, us humans or whatever!
And God would have to be very complex in this respect.
Not to mention that all these biological objects obviously contain a lot more physical fundamental particles than simply one of them! And they all have to work together! And the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Living things are a lot more complex than their parts put together - but for them to be understood they must be understood through their parts.
As Dawkins explains at the start of The Blind Watchmaker (I paraphrase): Our sun and stars may seem highly complex due to their size and mass, etc! But they are made up of a lot of the same kind of things in comparison with living things. And they don't have complex parts that all work together. Let alone intelligently in order to survive and reproduce etc.
In this sense biological, living things, etc, are much more complex than non-biological physical things. Whether those they are Mountains, Stars of Galaxies or whatever!
Galaxies are more complex in the sense they are harder to understand! Biology is more deeply known than Cosmology for example. There are many mysteries (or puzzles) in the universe that don't have an answer yet. And some may never have an answer.
But in the sense of complexity that needs to explained with simplicity living agents are much more complex than non-biological objects. And once again - we're not talking about simplicity and complexity as in whether its easy or difficult to understand here.
P.S: Leo good point. Us humans are a lot more physically complex than the game of chess. Chess is played with relatively simple non-biological objects and us biological living things are a lot more complex than that.
Chess is complex as in its quite a sophisticated game. These are two completely different kinds of complexity and it seems there's often a confusion between the two!
Complex as in how sophisticated an object and its parts is. And how they work together.
And complex as in hard to understand - even if physically the object(s) may be very simple!!
Two different kinds of complexity that are often confused.
EvF
Well it probably IS; in the sense its very hard to understand. But that's not the kind of complexity that is being talked about here. Its a confusion between the two different meanings.
Physics are about tiny fundamental particles - the workings of them may be very hard to understand - physics books may be very hard to understand etc - but physical particles are a lot more simple than complex biological objects like, fish, spiders, us humans or whatever!
And God would have to be very complex in this respect.
Not to mention that all these biological objects obviously contain a lot more physical fundamental particles than simply one of them! And they all have to work together! And the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Living things are a lot more complex than their parts put together - but for them to be understood they must be understood through their parts.
As Dawkins explains at the start of The Blind Watchmaker (I paraphrase): Our sun and stars may seem highly complex due to their size and mass, etc! But they are made up of a lot of the same kind of things in comparison with living things. And they don't have complex parts that all work together. Let alone intelligently in order to survive and reproduce etc.
In this sense biological, living things, etc, are much more complex than non-biological physical things. Whether those they are Mountains, Stars of Galaxies or whatever!
Galaxies are more complex in the sense they are harder to understand! Biology is more deeply known than Cosmology for example. There are many mysteries (or puzzles) in the universe that don't have an answer yet. And some may never have an answer.
But in the sense of complexity that needs to explained with simplicity living agents are much more complex than non-biological objects. And once again - we're not talking about simplicity and complexity as in whether its easy or difficult to understand here.
P.S: Leo good point. Us humans are a lot more physically complex than the game of chess. Chess is played with relatively simple non-biological objects and us biological living things are a lot more complex than that.
Chess is complex as in its quite a sophisticated game. These are two completely different kinds of complexity and it seems there's often a confusion between the two!
Complex as in how sophisticated an object and its parts is. And how they work together.
And complex as in hard to understand - even if physically the object(s) may be very simple!!
Two different kinds of complexity that are often confused.
EvF
