Home / Quotes / Quote by Herbert Spencer

Quote by Herbert Spencer

“If a single cell, under appropriate conditions, becomes a man in the space of a few years, there can surely be no difficulty in understanding how, under appropriate conditions, a cell may, in the course of untold millions of years, give origin to the human race.”

Quote by Herbert Spencer

Book:The Principles of Biology

Work

The Principles of Biology

This comprehensive book serves as a foundational resource for understanding the basic principles that govern life sciences, including cell theory, genetics, evolution, and ecology. more

Author

Herbert Spencer

Herbert Spencer was an English philosopher, sociologist, and writer, best known for his theory of social Darwinism. His ideas had a profound impact on social and political theories of the late 19th century. more

You May Also Like

“If the germ plasm wants to swim in the ocean, it makes itself a fish; if the germ plasm wants to fly in the air, it makes itself a bird. If it wants to go to Harvard, it makes itself a man. The strangest thing of all is that the germ plasm that we carry around within us has done all those things. There was a time, hundreds of millions of years ago, when it was making fish. Then ... amphibia ... reptiles ... mammals, and now it's making men.”

Ifs Men Want Years Done Science Millions Air Evolution Ocean Bird Years Ago Fishes Flight Swim Harvard Germs Mammals Reptiles

Author:George Wald

“If they [enlightened men] take any interest in examining, in the infancy of our species, the almost obliterated traces of so many nations that have become extinct, they will doubtless take a similar interest in collecting, amidst the darkness which covers the infancy of the globe, the traces of those revolutions which took place anterior to the existence of all nations.”

Ifs Men Science Nations Interest Existence Darkness Revolution Evolution Species Enlightened Globes Collecting Infancy Examining

Book:Essay on the Theory of the Earth

Source: Essay on the Theory of the Earth

“If we look round the world, there seem to be not above six distinct varieties in the human species, each of which is strongly marked, and speaks the kind seldom to have mixed with any other. But there is nothing in the shape, nothing in the faculties, that shows their coming from different originals; and the varieties of climate, of nourishment, and custom, are sufficient to produce every change.”

Source: A History of the Earth, and Animated Nature

“In the animal world, on the other hand, the process of evolution is characterised by the progressive discrimination of the animal and vegetative functions, and a consequent differentiation of these two great provinces into their separate departments.”

World Two Hands Science Process Animal Evolution Function Discrimination Department Progressive Provinces Animal World Differentiation

Book:Principles of Physiological Psychology

Source: Principles of Physiological Psychology

“In the process of natural selection, then, any device that can insert a higher proportion of certain genes into subsequent generations will come to characterize the species.”

Science Certain Process Natural Generations Evolution Higher Species Proportion Devices Genes Selection Natural Selection Insert

Author:E. O. Wilson

“It is an error to imagine that evolution signifies a constant tendency to increased perfection. That process undoubtedly involves a constant remodeling of the organism in adaptation to new conditions; but it depends on the nature of those conditions whether the direction of the modifications effected shall be upward or downward.”

Science Process Imagine Conditions Depends Evolution Perfection Constant Errors Tendencies Imagine That Organisms Adaptation Modification Remodeling

Book:Evolution and Ethics

Source: Evolution and Ethics

“It is because of his brain that he [modern man] has risen above the animals. Guess which animals he has risen above.”

Men Science Animal Brain Modern Evolution Risen Modern Man He Has Risen

Author:Will Cuppy

“It is certainly true in the United States that there is an uneasiness about certain aspects of science, particularly evolution, because it conflicts, in some people's minds, with their sense of how we all came to be. But you know, if you are a believer in God, it's hard to imagine that God would somehow put this incontrovertible evidence in front of us about our relationship to other living organisms and expect us to disbelieve it. I mean, that doesn't make sense at all.”

“It is natural selection that gives direction to changes, orients chance, and slowly, progressively produces more complex structures, new organs, and new species. Novelties come from previously unseen association of old material. To create is to recombine.”

Giving Science Natural Chance Produce Materials Evolution Structure Species Complexes Association Organs Unseen Selection Novelty Natural Selection

Book:Travaux scientifiques de François Jacob

Source: Travaux scientifiques de François Jacob

“It is, I believe, justifiable to make the generalization that anything an organic chemist can synthesize can be made without him. All he does is increase the probability that given reactions will 'go.' So it is quite reasonable to assume that given sufficient time and proper conditions, nucleotides, amino acids, proteins, and nucleic acids will arise by reactions that, though less probable, are as inevitable as those by which the organic chemist fulfills his predictions. So why not self-duplicating virus-like systems capable of further evolution?”