Home / Authors / Richard Leakey

Richard Leakey

Richard Leakey Quotes

Politician

Richard Leakey (born December 19, 1944) is a renowned Kenyan paleoanthropologist, politician, and environmental activist. As a member of the famous Leakey family, he continued the legacy of his parents, Louis and Mary Leakey, in discovering early human fossils in Africa. He served as director of the National Museums of Kenya and led excavations at Lake Turkana, uncovering significant fossils including the 'Turkana Boy.' He also held the position of director of the Kenya Wildlife Service, where he fought against ivory poaching and promoted conservation. His work has profoundly influenced the understanding of human origins and African wildlife protection.

Filter quotes by topic

All Humans Evolution Species Apes Atheism Culture Language Modern Positive Atheism Today

Famous Richard Leakey Quotes

“The whole story is about change. We are very lucky that the earth's history is recorded in fossilized remains. And we can see the changes. Unfortunately, there will always be gaps in our knowledge, but there is no doubt that we and everything living today has evolved.”

Whole Stories Today Earth Doubt Atheism Lucky Remains Positive Atheism No Doubt Gaps

Author:Richard Leakey

“I have been raised to believe in freedom of thought and speech. If a minority wishes to accept that position it's their right. What I fear is that this minority may seem to be larger than it truly is. What is strange is that there are still people who believe the world is not a globe.”

People Ifs World Believe May Has Beens Stills Seems Wish Accepting Atheism Position Strange Speech Raised Positive Atheism Minorities Globes Freedom Of Thought

Author:Richard Leakey

“I ... believe the study of human history remains important and should not be banned. We should ensure that any archaeological studies are conducted with sensitivity and respect. Reburying relics, in my view, does not help anyone go anywhere.”

Should Believe Humans Doe Important Helping I Believe Views Study Atheism Remains Positive Atheism Sensitivity Human History Banned Relics

Author:Richard Leakey

“The greatest problem we face is the growing number of people living in poverty. The related sense of hopelessness has to be impacting on every part of environmental management.”

People Problem Faces Numbers Poverty Growing Atheism Management Environmental Positive Atheism Related Hopelessness

Author:Richard Leakey

“The problem of the apes is not a shortage of money, it is a shortage of strategy. Let us devote our minds... the one thing we have more of than other apes... and let's secure their future.”

Mind Problem One Thing Strategy Secure Apes Shortage

Author:Richard Leakey

“Primates need good nutrition, to begin with. Not only fruits and plants, but insects as well.”

Needs Wells Plant Fruit Nutrition Insects Primates Good Nutrition

Author:Richard Leakey

“It is virtually impossible to control Northern Kenya, which is populated chiefly by migrant nomads.”

Impossible Kenya Migrants Nomad

Author:Richard Leakey

“To have arrived on this earth as a product of a biological accident, only to depart through human arrogance, would be the ultimate irony.”

Humans Would Be Earth Products Ultimate Intelligence Accidents Irony Arrogance

Author:Richard Leakey

“For three million years we were hunter-gatherers, and it was through the evolutionary pressures of that way of life that a brain so adaptable and so creative eventually emerged. Today we stand with the brains of hunter-gatherers in our heads, looking out on a modern world made comfortable for some by the fruits of human inventiveness, and made miserable for others by the scandal of deprivation in the midst of plenty.”

“To me it's a question of being able to look backward and give the present a root... To give meaning to where we are today, we need to look at where we have come from.”

Needs Giving Looks Today Able Evolution Roots

Author:Richard Leakey

“My father used to say that, through culture, humans effectively domesticated themselves.”

Humans Used Culture Father Evolution

Author:Richard Leakey

“Echoing the criticism made of his father's habilis skulls, he added that Lucy's skull was so incomplete that most of it was 'imagination made of plaster of Paris', thus making it impossible to draw any firm conclusion about what species she belonged to.”

Made Father Imagination Impossible Evolution Draws Criticism Species Conclusion Firm Paris Incomplete Skulls Lucy Plasters

Author:Richard Leakey

“In the area of species protection, we should concern ourselves with what is right as opposed to what might be easier, or popular in the short term.”

Should Might Term Easier Areas Concern Species Protection Short Term Biodiversity

Author:Richard Leakey

“It's the next annihilation of vast numbers of species. It is happening now, and we, the human race, are its cause”

Humans Next Causes Numbers Race Happenings Species Human Race Annihilation Biodiversity

Author:Richard Leakey

“Climate change: We have never faced a more critical time on our planet”

Planets Climate Climate Change Critical Our Planet

Author:Richard Leakey

“It has taken biologists some 230 years to identify and describe three quarters of a million insects; if there are indeed at least thirty million, as Erwin (Terry Erwin, the Smithsonian Institute) estimates, then, working as they have in the past, insect taxonomists have ten thousand years of employment ahead of them. Ghilean Prance, director of the Botanical Gardens in Kew, estimates that a complete list of plants in the Americas would occupy taxonomists for four centuries, again working at historical rates.”

Ifs Years Past Three Millions Taken Four Century Thousand Directors Ten Garden Plant Historical Rate Lists Employment Thirty Quarters Thousand Years Insects Institute Biologist Smithsonian

Author:Richard Leakey

“It occurred to me that if I did not handle the crash correctly, there would be no survivors.”

Ifs Would Be Handle Aviation Survivor Crash Great Aviation

Author:Richard Leakey

“For fossils to thrive, certain favorable circumstances are required. First of all, of course, remnants of life have to be there. These then need to be washed over with water as soon as possible, so that the bones are covered with a layer of sediment.”

Needs Firsts Certain Courses Water Circumstances Bones Thrive Covered Layers Fossils Remnants

Author:Richard Leakey

“Paleoanthropology is not a science that ends with the discovery of a bone. One has to have the original to work with. It is a life-long task.”

Long Ends Discovery Tasks Originals Bones Long Life

Author:Richard Leakey

“The elephants were being slaughtered in masses. Some were even killed in the vicinity of big tourist hotels.”

Bigs Mass Hotel Elephants Tourists Tourism Vicinity

Author:Richard Leakey

“Sadly, I am not able to take part in the fieldwork myself so much anymore, as both of my legs were amputated following an airplane crash twelve years ago.”

Years Able Years Ago Following Legs Airplane Twelve Crash Aeroplanes Fieldwork Airplane Crashes

Author:Richard Leakey

“Whether or not all this came to pass in an East African ditch, I wouldn't like to say. Perhaps it happened in North Africa or further west, but Africa was definitely the place.”

Happened West East North Africa

Author:Richard Leakey

“We hope to find more pieces of the puzzle which will shed light on the connection between this upright, walking ape, our early ancestor, and modern man.”

Men Light Pieces Modern Walking Connections Ancestor Shed Puzzles Apes Modern Man

Author:Richard Leakey

“When out fossil hunting, it is very easy to forget that rather than telling you how the creatures lived, the remains you find indicate only where they became fossilized.”

Easy Forget Creatures Remains Hunting Fossils

Author:Richard Leakey

“The language of art is powerful to those who understand it, and puzzling to those who do not. What we do know is that here was the modern human mind at work, spinning symbolism and abstraction in a way that only Homo sapiens is capable of doing.”

Knows Way Mind Humans Art Language Powerful Modern Capable Art Is Human Mind Abstraction Spinning Homo Sapiens Symbolism Puzzling

Book:The Origin Of Humankind

Source: The Origin Of Humankind

“Ritual disposal of the dead speaks clearly of an awareness of death, and thus an awareness of self.”

Self Speak Awareness Ritual Burial Awareness Of Death

Author:Richard Leakey

“Humans become human through intense learning not just of survival skills but of customs and social mores, kinship and social laws-that is, culture.”

Humans Law Culture Social Skills Survival Intense Customs Kinship Survival Skills

Author:Richard Leakey

“Natural selection operates according to immediate cirumstances and not toward a long-term goal. Homo sapiens did eventually evolve as a descendant of the first humans, but there was nothing inevitable about it.”

Firsts Humans Long Goal Term Natural Evolution Inevitable Evolve Long Term Selection Homo Sapiens Natural Selection Descendants Long Term Goals

Author:Richard Leakey

“As every parent knows, children go through an adolescent growth spurt, during which they put on inches at an alarming rate. Humans are unique in this respect: most mammalian species, including apes, progress almost directly from infancy to adulthood.”

Knows Humans Children Parent Growth Progress Unique Species Rate Including Inches Adulthood Apes Infancy

Author:Richard Leakey

“It seems inconceivable that a species of human could possess fully modern language and not be fully modern in all other ways, too. For this reason, the evolution of language is widely judged to be the culminating event in the emergence of humanity as we know it today.”

Knows Way Humans Reason Seems Today Humanity Language Modern Events Evolution Species Judged Emergence Modern Languages Evolution Of Language

Author:Richard Leakey

“Spoken language clearly differentiates Homo sapiens from all other creatures. None but humankind produces a complex spoken language, a medium for communication and a medium for introspective reflection.”

Language Produce Communication Creatures Reflection Complexes Mediums Humankind Homo Sapiens Introspective Differentiate Spoken Language

Book:The Origin Of Humankind

Source: The Origin Of Humankind

“The world's five thousand extant languages are products of our shared ability, but the five thousand cultures they create are separate from each other.”

World Culture Language Ability Five Mankind Products Thousand

Author:Richard Leakey

“We are bipedal apes, and it should not be surprising to see that fact reflected in the way our ancestors lived.”

Way Should Facts Mankind Ancestor Surprising Apes

Book:The Origin Of Humankind

Source: The Origin Of Humankind

“Culture represents a novelty in the world of nature, and it could have added an effective, unifying edge to the forces of natural selection.”

World Culture Force Nature Natural Edges Selection Novelty Natural Selection Unifying

Author:Richard Leakey

“Scientific innovations continually provide us with new means of analyzing the finds.”

Mean Innovation Analyzing

Author:Richard Leakey

“To investigate the history of man's development, the most important finds are, of course, hominid fossils.”

Men Important Courses Development Fossils Hominids

Author:Richard Leakey

“The problem is that during the 1980s, a decade of heavy poaching, the elephants retreated to safer areas. And now people have moved into the corridors once used by the elephants.”

People Problem Used Areas Moved Heavy Decades Elephants Corridors Poaching

Author:Richard Leakey

“Along the borders to Ethiopia and Somalia, anarchy reigns, the police and military have retreated quite some distance.”

Military Police Distance Borders Anarchy Reign Ethiopia Somalia

Author:Richard Leakey

About the Author

Born: December 19, 1944
Known for: Politician
Quotes: 38

Related Topics

Humans Evolution Species Apes Atheism Culture Language Modern Positive Atheism Today

Popular Topics

People Ifs Thinking Knows Men World Way Want Love Life Inspirational Needs Giving Feels Should Writing Trying Years Mind Firsts

Books & Sources

The Origin Of HumankindRelated source material

Similar Authors

Stephen Jay GouldBrowse related quotes
E. O. WilsonBrowse related quotes
Eugenie ScottBrowse related quotes
George Gaylord SimpsonBrowse related quotes
Richard DawkinsBrowse related quotes
Ernst MayrBrowse related quotes
Richard GoldschmidtBrowse related quotes
Charles DarwinBrowse related quotes
Charles BradlaughBrowse related quotes
Pierre BayleBrowse related quotes