The Blind Watchmaker
E389954
The Blind Watchmaker is a popular science book by Richard Dawkins that explains and defends evolution by natural selection as an unguided, non-teleological process capable of producing complex life.
All labels observed (2)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| The Blind Watchmaker canonical | 4 |
| blind watchmaker metaphor | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T3805878 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Blind Watchmaker Context triple: [Richard Dawkins, notableWork, The Blind Watchmaker]
-
A.
The Selfish Gene
The Selfish Gene is a landmark 1976 book by Richard Dawkins that popularized a gene-centered view of evolution and introduced concepts like memes to a broad audience.
-
B.
Darwin's Dangerous Idea
Darwin's Dangerous Idea is a 1995 philosophical book by Daniel Dennett that explores the far-reaching implications of Darwinian evolution for biology, mind, culture, and religion.
-
C.
Darwin Among the Machines
"Darwin Among the Machines" is a non-fiction book by George Dyson that explores the historical development and philosophical implications of artificial intelligence and digital evolution.
-
D.
What Evolution Is
What Evolution Is is a comprehensive book by evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr that explains the mechanisms, evidence, and implications of biological evolution for a general audience.
-
E.
Undeniable: Evolution and the Science of Creation
Undeniable: Evolution and the Science of Creation is a popular science book by Bill Nye that explains the evidence for evolution and argues against creationist views.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Blind Watchmaker Target entity description: The Blind Watchmaker is a popular science book by Richard Dawkins that explains and defends evolution by natural selection as an unguided, non-teleological process capable of producing complex life.
-
A.
The Selfish Gene
The Selfish Gene is a landmark 1976 book by Richard Dawkins that popularized a gene-centered view of evolution and introduced concepts like memes to a broad audience.
-
B.
Darwin's Dangerous Idea
Darwin's Dangerous Idea is a 1995 philosophical book by Daniel Dennett that explores the far-reaching implications of Darwinian evolution for biology, mind, culture, and religion.
-
C.
Darwin Among the Machines
"Darwin Among the Machines" is a non-fiction book by George Dyson that explores the historical development and philosophical implications of artificial intelligence and digital evolution.
-
D.
What Evolution Is
What Evolution Is is a comprehensive book by evolutionary biologist Ernst Mayr that explains the mechanisms, evidence, and implications of biological evolution for a general audience.
-
E.
Undeniable: Evolution and the Science of Creation
Undeniable: Evolution and the Science of Creation is a popular science book by Bill Nye that explains the evidence for evolution and argues against creationist views.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (48)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
book
ⓘ
popular science book ⓘ |
| arguesAgainst |
William Paley
ⓘ
surface form:
William Paley's watchmaker analogy
the argument from design ⓘ |
| author | Richard Dawkins ⓘ |
| awarded |
Los Angeles Times Book Prize
ⓘ
Royal Society of Literature Award ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin | United Kingdom ⓘ |
| defends | evolution by natural selection ⓘ |
| explains | how natural selection can produce complex adaptations ⓘ |
| field |
evolutionary biology
ⓘ
philosophy of biology ⓘ |
| followedBy | River Out of Eden ⓘ |
| genre |
biology
ⓘ
popular science ⓘ science ⓘ |
| hasChapter |
Accumulating Small Change
ⓘ
Climbing Mount Improbable ⓘ The Watchmaker Unveiled ⓘ |
| hasFormat |
audiobook
ⓘ
hardcover ⓘ paperback ⓘ |
| illustrates |
biomorph computer simulations
ⓘ
cumulative selection ⓘ |
| influenced |
debates on creationism and evolution
ⓘ
public understanding of evolution ⓘ |
| inSeries | Richard Dawkins popular science books ⓘ |
| ISBN | 978-0-393-31570-7 ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| mainSubject |
Darwinism
ⓘ
surface form:
Darwinian evolution
adaptation ⓘ complexity in biology ⓘ creationism ⓘ evolution by natural selection ⓘ intelligent design arguments ⓘ natural selection as an unguided process ⓘ teleology in biology ⓘ |
| mediaType | print ⓘ |
| notableConcept |
The Blind Watchmaker
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
surface form:
blind watchmaker metaphor
|
| positionOnTeleology | non-teleological view of evolution ⓘ |
| precededBy | The Extended Phenotype ⓘ |
| publicationDate | 1986 ⓘ |
| publisher |
Longman
ⓘ
W. W. Norton & Company ⓘ |
| subtitle | Why the Evidence of Evolution Reveals a Universe Without Design ⓘ |
| targetAudience | general readership ⓘ |
| title | The Blind Watchmaker self-link ⓘ |
| usesMetaphor | blind watchmaker ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: The Blind Watchmaker Description of subject: The Blind Watchmaker is a popular science book by Richard Dawkins that explains and defends evolution by natural selection as an unguided, non-teleological process capable of producing complex life.
Referenced by (5)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
this entity surface form:
blind watchmaker metaphor