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Stephen Jay Gould

Stephen Jay Gould Quotes

Paleontologist

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Famous Stephen Jay Gould Quotes

“Results rarely specify their causes unambiguously. If we have no direct evidence of fossils or human chronicles, if we are forced to infer a process only from its modern results, then we are usually stymied or reduced to speculation about probabilities. For many roads lead to almost any Rome.”

IfsHumansCausesProcessResultsModernEvidenceDirectRomeProbabilitySpeculationFossilsChronicles
Book:The Panda's Thumb: More Reflections in Natural History
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“Organisms are not billiard balls, propelled by simple and measurable external forces to predictable new positions on life's pool table. Sufficiently complex systems have greater richness. Organisms have a history that constrains their future in myriad, subtle ways.”

WayForceSimpleGreaterPositionBallsTablesComplexesSubtlePoolOrganismsRichnessPredictableConstrainComplex SystemsExternal ForcesNew PositionPool Table
Book:The Panda's Thumb: More Reflections in Natural History
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“We pass through this world but once.”

WorldGivingKindnessThis WorldDeedsHelping OthersFeel GoodNeglectReach OutVolunteerGood DeedsDoing GoodEulogyVolunteerismGiving InPassing ThroughQuakerGoodness And KindnessInspirational KindnessGenerosity And KindnessKindness GenerosityHuman KindnessSelf GivingPhilanthropy GivingVolunteerism And ServiceVolunteer AppreciationGoodness In The World
Book:The Mismeasure of Man (Revised & Expanded)
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“It has become, in my view, a bit too trendy to regard the acceptance of death as something tantamount to intrinsic dignity. Of course I agree with the preacher of Ecclesiastes that there is a time to love and a time to die - and when my skein runs out I hope to face the end calmly and in my own way. For most situations, however, I prefer the more martial view that death is the ultimate enemy - and I find nothing reproachable in those who rage mightily against the dying of the light.”

WayEndsLightRunningFacesScienceDiesCoursesBitsMy OwnViewsSituationEnemyDyingAcceptanceDignityUltimateRegardAgreeRagePreacherBiographiesTrendyEcclesiastesAcceptance Of Death
Book:Bully for Brontosaurus: Reflections in Natural History
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“I am not, personally, a believer or a religious man in any sense of institutional commitment or practice. But I have a great respect for religion, and the subject has always fascinated me, beyond almost all others (with a few exceptions, like evolution and paleontology).”

MenScienceReligionReligiousPracticeSubjectsEvolutionCommitmentBelieverExceptionFascinatedGreat RespectPaleontology
Book:Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms: Essays on Natural History
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“We live in a profoundly nonintellectual culture, made all the worse by a passive hedonism abetted by the spread of wealth and its dissipation into countless electronic devices that impart the latest in entertainment and supposed information - all in short (and loud) doses of "easy listening".”

MadeCultureEasyWealthInformationListeningEntertainmentSpreadLoudDevicesPassiveDoseImpartHedonismDissipationElectronic Devices
Book:Bully for Brontosaurus: Reflections in Natural History
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