things to think about

In which Dawkins discusses how behaviour is evolutionary and has its roots in the genes, and how the seemingly stable and predictable actions of individuals in a interacting group (an “evolutionarily stable strategy”, or ESS) are in fact reached by a number of individuals acting selfishly.
p68: It would seem that, as with genetic evolution, […]

In which Dawkins discusses how early replicators acquired themselves “survival machines” to “protect” them from other replicators, and, eventually move them around using legs, wings, fins and similar. He also suggests the origins of imagination, and, possibly, consciousness.
p59: Imagination as a threat-prediction mechanism. This is an interesting, and plausible idea. Once early brains could map […]

In which Dawkins discusses further what happens during replication, how best to define a ‘gene’ or ‘chromosome’ and how inheritance and selection works.
p28: The structure of a cistron, with its beginning and end markers, will be familiar to anyone who’s studied prehistoric computing theory: files were often stored on magnetic tape in this way, one […]

In which the author outlines the theory of the oceans being the starting points of basic chemistry, and the rise of so-called “replicators” (molecules capable of replicating themselves) through natural selection at the chemical level. According to Dawkins, DNA is the most successful of these replicators, and, over time, evolved ever-more elaborate protective shells for […]

Link to Science Weekly, the interview in question is linked in the second paragraph.
A real mind-blower of an interview (conducted by Susan Blackmore), some proper fireworks-off-in-the-head moments in there. Also, the guy has a fantastic voice that I could quite happily listen to all day.
I’m trying to wrap my head around what exactly he means […]