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Quote by Lewis Thomas

“Our behavior toward each other is the strangest, most unpredictable, and most unaccountable of all the phenomena with which we are obliged to live. In all of nature, there is nothing so threatening to humanity as humanity itself.”

Quote by Lewis Thomas

Book:A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

Work

A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

This book is a compilation of essays that delve into the intricate world of cells, examining their role in biological processes and their importance in the study of life sciences. The essays cover a range of topics, from the fundamental functions of cells to their implications in medical research and evolutionary biology. more

Author

Lewis Thomas was a renowned American physician, writer, and scientist. Born on November 25, 1913, and died on December 3, 1993. He was known for his contributions to medicine and scientific writing, serving as the director of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York. more

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“The cloning of humans is on most of the lists of things to worry about from Science, along with behaviour control, genetic engineering, transplanted heads, computer poetry and the unrestrained growth of plastic flowers.”

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Book:A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

Source: A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

“Music is the effort we make to explain to ourselves how our brains work. We listen to Bach transfixed because this is listening to a human mind.”

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Book:A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

Source: A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

“We leave traces of ourselves wherever we go, on whatever we touch.”

Reality Goes On

Book:A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

Source: A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

“We are, perhaps, uniquely among the earth's creatures, the worrying animal. We worry away our lives, fearing the future, discontent with the present, unable to take in the idea of dying, unable to sit still.”

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Book:A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

Source: A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

“Statistically, the probability of any one of us being here is so small that you'd think the mere fact of existing would keep us all in a contented dazzlement of surprise.”

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Book:A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

Source: A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

“We live in a dancing matrix of viruses; they dart, rather like bees, from organism to organism, from plant to insect to mammal to me and back again, and into the sea, tugging along pieces of this genome, strings of genes from that, transplanting grafts of DNA, passing around heredity as though at a great party.”

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Book:A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

Source: A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

“Sometimes you get a glimpse of a semicolon coming, a few lines farther on, and it is like climbing a steep path through woods and seeing a wooden bench just at a bend in the road ahead, a place where you can expect to sit for a moment, catching your breath.”

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Book:A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

Source: A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays

“A multitude of bees can tell the time of day, calculate the geometry of the sun's position, argue about the best location for the next swarm. Bees do a lot of close observing of other bees; maybe they know what follows stinging and do it anyway.”

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Book:Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony

Source: Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony

“I maintain, despite the moment's evidence against the claim, that we are born and grow up with a fondness for each other, and we have genes for that. We can be talked out of it, for the genetic message is like a distant music, and some of us are hard-of-hearing. Societies are noisy affairs, drowning out the sound of ourselves and our connection.”

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Book:Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony

Source: Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony

“Ants are so much like human beings as to be an embarrassment. They farm fungi, raise aphids as livestock, launch armies into wars, use chemical sprays to alarm and confuse enemies, capture slaves... They do everything but watch television.”

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Author:Lewis Thomas