“If we want to postulate a deity capable of engineering all the organized complexity in the world, either instantaneously or by guiding evolution, that deity must have been vastly complex in the first place. The creationist, whether a naive Bible-thumper or an educated bishop, simply postulates an already existing being of prodigious intelligence and complexity. If we are going to allow ourselves the luxury of postulating organized complexity without offering an explanation, we might as well make a job of it and simply postulate the existence of life as we know it!” IfsKnowsWorldWantFirstsWellsHas BeensMightJobsExistenceEvolutionCapableComplexesEducatedLuxuryExplanationComplexityOrganizedOfferingEngineeringNaiveDeitiesBishopsProdigiousCreationistExistence Of LifeBible Thumpers Author:Richard Dawkins
“Bird taxonomy is a difficult field because of the severe anatomical constraints imposed by flight. There are only so many ways to design a bird capable, say, of catching insects in mid-air, with the result that birds of similar habitats tend to have very similar anatomies, whatever their ancestry. For example, American vultures look and behave much like Old World vultures, but biologists have come to realize that the former are related to storks, the latter to hawks, and that their resemblances result from their common lifestyle.” WorldWayLooksDifficultRealizingResultsCommonAirExampleDesignFieldsEvolutionCapableBirdLifestyleFlightFormerBehaveRelatedLatterSevereInsectsCatchingConstraintsAncestryAnatomyResemblanceHawksBiologistHabitatOld WorldVultureTaxonomyStorks Author:Jared Diamond
“I think nobody would claim that random genetic drift is capable of producing adaptation, that is to say the illusion of design. Random genetic drift can't produce wings that are good at flying, or eyes that are good at seeing, or legs that are good at running. But random genetic drift probably is very important in driving evolution at the molecular genetic level.” ThinkingImportantEyeRunningLevelsSeeingDesignProduceEvolutionCapableIllusionClaimsWingsLegsDrivingFlyingAdaptation Author:Richard Dawkins
“Wherever the Net arises, there arises also a rebel to resist human control...A network nurtures small failures in order that large failures don't happen as often. It is...fertile ground for learning, adaptation, and evolution...The only organization capable of unprejudiced growth, or unguided learning, is a network. All other topologies limit what can happen.” HumansHappensOrderGrowthEvolutionInternetLimitsCapableOrganizationAriseRebelFree SpeechNurtureAdaptationFertileFertile GroundTopology Author:Kevin Kelly
“To suppose universal laws of nature capable of being apprehended by the mind and yet having no reason for their special forms, but standing inexplicable and irrational, is hardly a justifiable position. Uniformities are precisely the sort of facts that need to be accounted for. Law is par excellence the thing that wants a reason. Now the only possible way of accounting for the laws of nature, and for uniformity in general, is to suppose them results of evolution.” WayWantNeedsMindReasonFactsFormLawResultsSpecialPositionEvolutionCapableStandingUniversalExcellenceNo ReasonIrrationalLaws Of NatureAccountingInexplicableUniformityUniversal Laws Author:Charles Sanders Peirce
“It is an odd fact of evolution that we are the only species on Earth capable of creating science and philosophy. There easily could have been another species with some scientific talent, say that of the average human ten-year-old, but not as much as adult humans have; or one that is better than us at physics but worse at biology; or one that is better than us at everything. If there were such creatures all around us, I think we would be more willing to concede that human scientific intelligence might be limited in certain respects.” IfsThinkingYearsHumansHas BeensPhilosophyFactsMightWould BeEarthCertainTalentWillingEvolutionTenCreaturesCreatingCapableAdultsSpeciesAveragePhysicsOddBiologyCould Have BeenScience And Philosophy Author:Colin McGinn
“How I hate the man who talks about the 'brute creation', with an ugly emphasis on Brute. Only Christians are capable of it. As for me, I am proud of my close kinship with other animals. I take a jealous pride in my Simian ancestry. I like to think that I was once a magnificent hairy fellow living in the trees and that my frame has come down through geological time via sea jelly and worms and Amphioxus, Fish, Dinosaurs, and Apes. Who would exchange these for the pallid couple in the Garden of Eden?” ThinkingMenChristianScienceHateAnimalTreeSeaCreationHe ManPrideEvolutionProudCoupleCapableGardenI HateFellowsFishesUglyJealousMagnificentEmphasisWormsBrutesApesEdenDinosaursAncestryKinshipJellyGarden Of EdenGeological Time Book:The Journal of a Disappointed Man Source: The Journal of a Disappointed Man
“I believe the artist is capable of contributing to the broader evolution of culture in all of its dimensions.” BelieveArtistCultureI BelieveEvolutionCapableDimensionsContributing Author:Kehinde Wiley
“There is no evolutionary pressure to create minds capable of forming sciences; it just happened. Evolutionary pressure has not led to higher rates of reproduction for people capable of solving scientific problems or creating new scientific ideas. So if, in fact, the science-forming capacities evolved for other reasons, it would not be too surprising if those particular structures that have developed proved to be rather special in their nature, reflecting the contingencies of their evolution or the working of physical law.” PeopleIfsMindIdeasReasonFactsProblemLawHappenedSpecialParticularEvolutionHigherCreatingCapableCapacityPressureStructureRateSurprisingReflectingReproductionContingency Author:Noam Chomsky
“As many critics of religion have pointed out, the notion of a creator poses an immediate problem of an infinite regress. If God created the universe, what created God? To say that God, by definition, is uncreated simply begs the question. Any being capable of creating a complex world promises to be very complex himself. As the biologist Richard Dawkins has observed repeatedly, the only natural process we know of that could produce a being capable of designing things is evolution.” IfsKnowsWorldProblemUniverseProcessNaturalDesignProduceEvolutionPromiseCreatingCapableInfiniteComplexesCriticsNotionDefinitionsCreatorBiologist Author:Sam Harris
“A species consists of a group of populations which replace each other geographically or ecologically and of which the neighboring ones integrate or hybridise wherever they are in contact or which are potentially capable of doing so (with one or more of the populations) in those cases where contact is prevented by geographical or ecological barriers.” ScienceCasesGroupsEvolutionCapableSpeciesPopulationContactBarriersEcologicalIntegrating Author:Ernst Mayr
“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?” BelieveDoeMadeSelfScienceGivenI BelieveConditionsEvolutionCapableIncreaseAssumingReactionsAriseInevitableSufficientReasonableWhy NotPredictionsProbabilityAcidVirusesProteinChemistGeneralizationAmino Acids Author:George Wells Beadle
“Workers must root out the idea that by keeping the results of their labors to themselves a fortune will be assured to them. Patent fees are so much wasted money. The flying machine of the future will not be born fully fledged and capable of a flight for 1,000 miles or so. Like everything else it must be evolved gradually. The first difficulty is to get a thing that will fly at all. When this is made, a full description should be published as an aid to others. Excellence of design and workmanship will always defy competition.” ShouldFirstsMadeIdeasScienceBornResultsDesignEvolutionFutureCapableLaborRootsMachinesDifficultyCompetitionFortuneExcellenceWorkersAidsMilesFlyingFlightDescriptionAssuredFeesPatentsWorkmanshipFlying Machines Author:Lawrence Hargrave
“From the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of higher animals, directly follows.” WarNatureAnimalEnvironmentObjectsEvolutionHigherCapableSpeciesProductionsFamineExaltedNatural SelectionOrigin Of SpeciesConceiving Author:Charles Darwin
“Existence loves laughter. You may have observed, or not, that man is the only animal in the whole of existence who is capable of laughing. Laughter is the only distinguishing mark that you are not a buffalo, you are not a donkey; you are a human being. Laughter defines your humanity and your evolution. And the greatest laugh is at your own ridiculous things.” MenHumansMayWholeHumanityHuman BeingsAnimalExistenceLaughingEvolutionCapableLaughterMarkRidiculousDonkeyBuffaloRidiculous ThingsLove Laughter Author:Rajneesh
“I want my people to understand that because only man is capable to laugh, that means laughter is the highest point of consciousness, the highest point of understanding, the highest point of evolution. That's why I have started calling laughter "the prayer time."” PeopleMenWantMeanUnderstandingPrayerConsciousnessLaughingEvolutionCallingHighestCapableLaughterPrayer Time Author:Rajneesh
“Some physicists solve that problem of the necessity of finely tuned physical constants ... by invoking the anthropic principle, saying, well, here we are, we exist, we have to be in the kind of universe capable of giving rise to us. That in itself is, I think, unsatisfying, and as John Lennox rightly says, some physicists solve that by the multiverse idea-the idea that our universe is just one of many universes.” ThinkingGivingWellsKindIdeasProblemUniversePrinciplesEvolutionCapableSolveJust OnePhysicistMultiverseAnthropic Principle Author:Richard Dawkins
“The fact of evolution is the backbone of biology, and biology is thus in the peculiar position of being a science founded on an unproved theory -is it then a science or a faith? Belief in the theory of evolution is thus exactly parallel to belief in special creation - both are concepts which believers know to be true but neither, up to the present, has been capable of proof.” KnowsHas BeensFactsBeliefSpecialCreationPositionTheoryEvolutionCapableConceptsProofBelieverBeing TrueBiologyPeculiarParallelsBackboneTheory Of Evolution Author:L. Harrison Matthews