Quotes About Evolution

The nasty little apes that call themselves human beings can do nothing except run and hide.

Malcolm said, "You know, at times like this one feels, well, perhaps extinct animals should be left extinct. Don't you have that feeling now?

I have more respect for people who change their views after acquiring new information than for those who cling to views they held thirty years ago. The world changes. Ideologues and zealots don't.

Because the history of evolution is that life escapes all barriers. Life breaks free. Life expands to new territories. Painfully, perhaps even dangerously. But life finds a way." Malcolm shook his head.

Too much change is as destructive as too little. Only at the edge of chaos can complex systems flourish.

Other animals fight for territory or food; but, uniquely in the animal kingdom, human beings fight for their 'beliefs.' The reason is that beliefs guide behavior, which has evolutionary importance among human beings. But at a time when our behavior may well lead us to extinction, I see no reason to assume we have any awareness at all. We are stubborn, self-destructive conformists. Any other view of our species is just a self-congratulatory delusion.

When the first giant bones were found in the 1820s and 1830s, scientists felt obliged to explain the bones as belonging to some oversize variant of a modern species. This was because it was believed that no species could ever become extinct, since God would not allow one of His creations to die. Eventually it became clear that this conception of God was mistaken, and the bones belonged to extinct animals.

We are one of only three species on our planet that can claim to be self-aware, yet self-delusion may be a more significant characteristic of our kind.

There are lots of trips out there. It's even possible to become a conference groupie, going from one seminar to another and being a Beautiful Evolved Human Being until you start making the people around you want to throw up.

Because raising children is, in a sense, the reason the society exists in the first place. It's the most important thing that happens, and it's the culmination of all the tools and language and social structure that has evolved.

like a whole life. You start out doing one thing, but end up doing something else, plan to run an errand, but never get there.… And at the end of your life, your whole existence has that same haphazard quality, too. Your whole life has the same shape as a single day.

All major changes are like death," he said. "You can't see to the other side until you are there." And he closed his eyes.

Because the history of evolution is that life escapes all barriers. Life breaks free. Life expands to new territories. Painfully, perhaps even dangerously. But life finds a way." Malcolm

All major changes are like death," he said. "You can't see to the other side until you are there." And

Life will find its way

After all, the trouble with what the scientists said was that they were always saying something different. This year one idea, next year something else. Scientific opinion was ever changing, like the fashions of women's dress, while the firm and fixed date 4004 BC invited the attention of those seeking greater verity.

Broadly speaking, the ability of the park to control the spread of life-forms. Because the history of evolution is that life escapes all barriers. Life breaks free. Life expands to new territories. Painfully, perhaps even dangerously. But life finds a way.

The DNA molecule was so old that its evolution had essentially finished more than two billion years ago.

Classically, the ability to invent and execute plans was believed to be limited to only three species: chimpanzees, gorillas, and human beings. Now

Human beings are so destructive," Malcolm said. "I sometimes think we're a kind of plague, that will scrub the earth clean. We destroy things so well that I sometimes think, maybe that's our function. Maybe every few eons, some animal comes along that kills off the rest of the world, clears the decks, and lets evolution proceed to its next phase.

In the 1980s, a few genetic engineering companies began to ask, "What is the biological equivalent of a Sony Walkman?" These

All major changes are like death," he said. "You can't see to the other side until you are there.

Crocodiles are basically Triassic animals living in the present. Sharks are Triassic. So we know it has happened before.

Classically, the ability to invent and execute plans was believed to be limited to only three species: chimpanzees, gorillas, and human beings.