Quotessence
Home / Topics / Evolution Quotes

Evolution Quotes

Browse 3937 quotes about Evolution.

Related topics

HumansIfsMenScienceThinkingWorldTheoryProcessBelievePeopleSpeciesKnowsYearsNaturalWayFactsHas BeensProgressUniverseCreationMindIdeasMayTheory Of EvolutionConsciousnessFirstsDoeEvolveMeanEarthWellsWholeAnimalFormIndividualNeedsHuman EvolutionWantAtheismSpiritualTwoShouldDifferentSelectionMatterKindLongDesignSocialNatural SelectionReasonImportantStillsEvidenceHigherLawMadeBrainDevelopmentGivingReligionViewsTryingCoursesHuman BeingsLooksPlanetsProductsSeemsStatesI BelieveSurvivalRealStageNextProblemSoulTermUnderstandingUseWould BeExistenceMillionsSelfTodayBiologyForceOrderConsciousCultureLevelsRaceBeliefEndsHumanityLittlesOrganismsResultsFeelsMightmore

Evolution Quotes

“In order to survive, all systems must evolve by providing greater and greater access to the currents that flow through them. This applies to all physical, biological and social systems that survive and thrive.... But let’s take that one step forward... the systems just described are ... constantly evolving. This suggests another design principle: ... design for evolution rather than creating a static design optimizing for the present.”

OrderSocialStepsPrinciplesGreaterDesignEvolutionCreatingFlowCurrentsAccessEvolveThriveProvidingStaticSteps ForwardSocial Systems
Author:John Hagel
Create image

“We tried some experiments in mind reading which were not very successful. Think mind reading contrary to common sense, wise provision of the Bon Dieu that we cannot read each others minds, twould stop civilization and everybody would take to the woods. In fifty or hundred thousand centuries when mankind have become perfect by evolution then perhaps this sense could be developed with safety to the state.”

ThinkingMindStatesReadingPerfectCommonSuccessfulWiseMankindCenturyEvolutionCivilizationThousandHundredSafetyWoodsContraryExperimentsCommon SenseFiftyProvisionMind Reading
Author:Thomas A. Edison
Create image

“I can understand how evolution says, "don't believe in God", but I've never had this problem. I've always loved His creation. Unfortunately, this doesn't mean any_thing to some people, and I just don't get that! After all, if you just read the Bible plainly, it tells you everything. From Creation, to the Flood, to Jesus. I can't see how you can come to the conclusion, there is no God.”

PeopleIfsBelieveMeanI CanProblemJesusCreationEvolutionBibleDon't BelieveConclusionBelieve In GodFloodThere Is No God
Author:Betty Cuthbert
Create image

“Somewhere in the world there is a person who could ask you the precise question you need to hear in order to catalyze the next phase of your evolution. Do what's necessary to run into that person.”

WorldNeedsPersonsRunningOrderNextAsksEvolutionPhasesPrecise
Book:Pronoia Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings
Create image

“I think it is now time for social scientists to step out of the shadow and to establish an advanced social sciences methodology that integrates science (third-person view) social transformation (second-person view) and the evolution of self (first-person view) into a coherent framework of consciousness-based action research”

ThinkingFirstsPersonsSelfActionSocialViewsConsciousnessStepsEvolutionResearchShadowScientistThirdsTransformationFrameworkFirst PersonIntegratingMethodologySocial ScienceThird PersonSocial Transformation
Author:Otto Scharmer
Create image

“We still do not know the mechanics of evolution in spite of the over-confident claims in some quarters, nor are we likely to make further progress in this by the classical methods of paleontology or biology; and we shall certainly not advance matters by jumping up and down shrilling, `Darwin is god and I, So-and-so, am his prophet'”

KnowsStillsMatterProgressEvolutionClaimsMethodProphetSpiteBiologyQuartersMechanicJumpingUp And DownPaleontologyOver Confident
Author:Errol White
Create image

“When it comes to the whole debate today over evolution versus creation, Jesus affirmed the early chapters of Genesis were accurate when He said, "Have you not read, that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female" (Matthew 19:4). Adam and Eve didn't come on the scene after billions of years of mutations and evolution. No. God created them all the way back in the beginning-just like Moses reported in the Book of Genesis.”

WayYearsMadeSaidBookWholeTodayJesusCreationEvolutionSceneBibleFemaleMalesBillionsDebateAdamAccurateChaptersVersusMosesGenesisMatthewAdam And EveMutationBook Of Genesis
Author:Charlie Campbell
Create image

“When we trust the makers of baby formula more than we do our own ability to nourish our babies, we lose a chance to claim an aspect of our power as women. Thinking that baby formula is as good as breast milk is believing that thirty years of technology is superior to three million years of nature's evolution. Countless women have regained trust in their bodies through nursing their children, even if they weren't sure at first that they could do it. It is an act of female power, and I think of it as feminism in its purest form.”

IfsThinkingYearsFirstsBelieveChildrenBodyFormThreeLosesChanceAbilityMillionsTechnologyFeminismBabyEvolutionFemaleAspectClaimsSuperiorsThirtyBreastsMakersFormulasMilkNursingThirty YearsBreastfeedingFemale Power
Author:Christiane Northrup
Create image

“The existing and long-standing use of the word 'evolution' in our state's textbooks has not adversely affected Georgians' belief in the omnipotence of God as creator of the universe, There can be no incompatibility between Christian faith and proven facts concerning geology, biology, and astronomy. There is no need to teach that stars can fall out of the sky and land on a flat Earth in order to defend our religious faith.”

NeedsLongStatesFactsUseEarthChristianOrderFallUniverseBeliefStarsReligiousTeachSkyLandEvolutionStandingCreatorAstronomyBiologyFlatsAffectedProvenReligious FaithTextbooksChristian FaithGeologyOmnipotenceIncompatibilityGeorgians
Author:Jimmy Carter
Create image

“Every civilized human being, whatever his conscious development, is still an archaic man at the deeper levels of his psyche. Just as the human body connects us with the mammals and displays numerous relics of earlier evolutionary stages going back to even the reptilian age, so the human psyche is likewise a product of evolution which, when followed up to its origins, show countless archaic traits.”

MenHumansStillsShowsBodyAgeHuman BeingsLevelsStageProductsDevelopmentEvolutionConsciousDeeperCivilizedDisplayTraitsHuman BodyMemories Dreams ReflectionsRelicsMammalsHuman Psyche
Author:Carl Jung
Create image

“Throughout his last half-dozen books, for example, Arthur Koestler has been conducting a campaign against his own misunderstanding of Darwinism. He hopes to find some ordering force, constraining evolution to certain directions and overriding the influence of natural selection. [...] Darwinism is not the theory of capricious change that Koestler imagines. Random variation may be the raw material of change, but natural selection builds good design by rejecting most variants while accepting and accumulating the few that improve adaptation to local environments.”

MayHas BeensBookLastsCertainForceNaturalHalfAcceptingEnvironmentImagineInfluenceExampleDesignMaterialsTheoryEvolutionCampaignsLocalsDozenSelectionMisunderstandingAdaptationVariationNatural SelectionArthurRejectingRaw MaterialsConductingDarwinismGood DesignCapricious
Author:Stephen Jay Gould
Create image

“[T]ruly grand and powerful theories [...] do not and cannot rest upon single observations. Evolution is an inference from thousands of independent sources, the only conceptual structure that can make unified sense of all this disparate information. The failure of a particular claim usually records a local error, not the bankruptcy of a central theory. [...] If I mistakenly identify your father's brother as your own dad, you don't become genealogically rootless and created de novo. You still have a father; we just haven't located him properly.”

IfsStillsFatherPowerfulRecordsHavensInformationParticularBrotherTheorySourceEvolutionDadClaimsIndependentStructureErrorsLocalsObservationBankruptcyUnifiedInference
Author:Stephen Jay Gould
Create image

“Darwinian evolution may be the most truthful and powerful idea ever generated by Western Science, but if we continue to illustrate our conviction with an indefensible, unsupported, entirely speculative, and basically rather silly story, then we are clothing a thing of beauty in rags - and we should be ashamed, "for the apparel oft proclaims the man.”

IfsMenShouldMayIdeasStoriesPowerfulHe ManEvolutionWesternConvictionSillyAshamedClothingsTruthfulRagsApparel
Book:Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms: Essays on Natural History
Create image

“Each worldview was a cultural product, but evolution is true and separate creation is not. [...] Worldviews are social constructions, and they channel the search for facts. But facts are found and knowledge progresses, however fitfully. Fact and theory are intertwined, and all great scientists understand the interaction.”

FactsFoundSocialProgressCreationProductsTheoryEvolutionScientistConstructionInteractionWorldviewIntertwinedGreat ScientistSocial Construction
Book:Eight little piggies: reflections in natural history
Create image

“Iconography becomes even more revealing when processes or concepts, rather than objects, must be depicted for the constraint of a definite "thing" cedes directly to the imagination. How can we draw "evolution" or "social organization," not to mention the more mundane "digestion" or "self-interest," without portraying more of a mental structure than a physical reality? If we wish to trace the history of ideas, iconography becomes a candid camera trained upon the scholar's mind.”

IfsMindIdeasSelfRealityWishSocialProcessInterestImaginationObjectsEvolutionDrawsConceptsOrganizationCamerasStructureScholarDefiniteRevealingSelf InterestMundaneConstraintsDigestionCandidPortrayingSocial OrganizationIconographyCandid Camera
Book:Eight little piggies: reflections in natural history
Create image

“The vigorous branching of life's tree, and not the accumulating valor of mythical marches to progress, lies behind the persistence and expansion of organic diversity in our tough and constantly stressful world. And if we do not grasp the fundamental nature of branching as the key to life's passage across the geological stage, we will never understand evolution aright.”

IfsWorldLyingBehindsProgressTreeStageKeysEvolutionDiversityToughFundamentalsPersistenceMarchPassagesExpansionStressfulVigorousValor
Book:I Have Landed: Splashes and Reflections in Natural History
Create image

“A complete theory of evolution must acknowledge a balance between "external" forces of environment imposing selection for local adaptation and "internal" forces representing constraints of inheritance and development. Vavilov placed too much emphasis on internal constraints and downgraded the power of selection. But Western Darwinians have erred equally in practically ignoring (while acknowledging in theory) the limits placed on selection by structure and development what Vavilov and the older biologists would have called "laws of form.”

FormLawForceEnvironmentToo MuchTheoryDevelopmentEvolutionBalanceLimitsStructureWesternLocalsAcknowledgeInternalsEmphasisSelectionAdaptationInheritanceConstraintsRepresentingImposingBiologistTheory Of EvolutionExternal Forces
Book:Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes: Further Reflections in Natural History
Create image

“Evolution is an obstacle course not a freeway; the correct analogue for long-term success is a distant punt receiver evading legions of would-be tacklers in an oddly zigzagged path toward a goal, not a horse thundering down the flat.”

LongWould BeCoursesGoalTermPathEvolutionHorseObstaclesLong TermFlatsReceiverLegionFreewaysAnalogueLong Term Success
Book:Eight little piggies: reflections in natural history
Create image

“The general direction of evolution is to produce a serially imprinting, multibrained creature able to decipher its own program, create the technology to leave the planet and live in post-terrestrial mini-worlds, decode the aging sectors of the DNA code--thus assuring immortality, and act in harmony with stages of evolution to come.”

WorldAbleTechnologyStageProducePlanetsEvolutionCreaturesProgramHarmonyAgingPostsCodeImmortalityDnaDecipherImprinting
Author:Timothy Leary
Create image

“After ages during which the earth produced harmless trilobites and butterflies, evolution progressed to the point at which it generated Neros, Genghis Khans, and Hitlers. This, however, is a passing nightmare; in time the earth will become again incapable of supporting life, and peace will return.”

AgeEarthReturnEvolutionPassingPassingsNightmareButterflyIncapableNero
Book:The basic writings of Bertrand Russell, 1903-1959
Create image

“Owing to the identification of religion with virtue, together with the fact that the most religious men are not the most intelligent, a religious education gives courage to the stupid to resist the authority of educated men, as has happened, for example, where the teaching of evolution has been made illegal. So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence; and in this respect ministers of religion follow gospel authority more closely than in some others.”

MenGivingHas BeensMadeI CanFactsTogetherRememberReligiousVirtueHappenedTeachingStupidExampleEvolutionAuthorityIntelligentPraiseEducatedMinistersIllegalOne WordIdentificationOwingEducated ManReligious Education
Book:Education and the Social Order
Create image

“Nothing can better express the feelings of the scientist towards the great unity of the laws of nature than in Immanuel Kant's words: "Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing awe: the stars above me and the moral law within me."... Would he, who did not yet know of the evolution of the world of organisms, be shocked that we consider the moral law within us not as something given, a priori, but as something which has arisen by natural evolution, just like the laws of the heavens?”

KnowsWorldMindTwoFeelingsLawGivenHeavenStarsNaturalMoralEvolutionScientistUnityTwo ThingsAweOrganismsShockedLaws Of NatureMoral Law
Author:Konrad Lorenz
Create image

“Absolutists frighten me. During all the endless discussions on my blog about evolution, intelligent design, God, and the afterworld, numbering altogether thousands of comments, I have never named my beliefs, although readers have freely informed me that I am an atheist, and agnostic, or at the very least a secular humanist - which I am.”

BeliefDesignEvolutionReaderIntelligentAtheistEndlessDiscussionHumanistCommentSecularAgnosticBlogsIntelligent Design
Author:Roger Ebert
Create image

“Our time has been distinguished, more than by anything else, by a mastery, a control, of the external world, and by an almost total forgetfulness of the internal world. If one estimates human evolution from the point of view of knowledge of the external world, then we are in many respects progressing. If our estimate is from the point of view of the internal world, and of oneness of internal and external, then the judgment must be very different.”

IfsWorldHumansHas BeensDifferentViewsProgressEvolutionJudgmentPoint Of ViewOnenessOur TimeInternalsMasteryDistinguishedForgetfulnessHuman Evolution
Author:R. D. Laing
Create image

“In my opinion, neither organisms nor organizations evolve slowly and surely into something better, but drift until some small change occurs which has immediate and overwhelming significance. The special role of the human being is not to wait for these favorable accidents but deliberately to introduce the small change that will have great significance.”

HumansWaitingHuman BeingsOpinionRolesSpecialEvolutionOrganizationAccidentsEvolveSignificanceOverwhelmingIntroducingOrganismsSomething BetterSmall Changes
Author:Edwin Land
Create image

“The evolution of life, and the evolutionary origin of mankind, are scientifically established as firmly and completely as any historical event not witnessed by human observers. Any concession to anti-evolutionists, suggesting that there are scientific reasons to doubt the facticity of evolution, would be propagating a plain untruth.”

HumansReasonWould BeDoubtMankindEventsEvolutionHistoricalObserversSuggestingUntruthConcessionsHistorical EventsEvolution Of Life
Author:Theodosius Dobzhansky
Create image

“We started off with physical evolution and got our form. Then we somehow developed language, which meant cultural evolution could race so we could change our behavior really quickly instead of over hundreds and hundreds of years. And then comes moral evolution, which means we're not frightfully far along with people. And maybe we end up with a spiritual evolution, which is this connectedness with the rest of the life forms on the planet.”

PeopleYearsMeanEndsSpiritualFormLanguageRaceMoralPlanetsEvolutionBehaviorConnectednessSpiritual Evolution
Author:Jane Goodall
Create image