Best evolution & complexity Quotes | Short & Famous Sayings

“One of the great breakthroughs of evolution theory is that you start with simple things and they will grow into complexity.”

Grows Simple Theory Evolution Complexity Breakthrough Simple Things

Author:Brian Eno

“It's the old idea that the process of evolution is some push in the direction of greater complexity--in particular greater intellectual complexity. In one twig of the tree of life, namely ours, having a big brain happened to have advantages. But that's just what worked for a particular species of primate 5 to 7 million years ago.”

Years Ideas Bigs Process Brain Millions Greater Happened Tree Particular Evolution Intellectual Advantage Years Ago Species Complexity Tree Of Life Primates Twigs Old Ideas

Author:Steven Pinker

“The evolution of knowledge is toward simplicity, not complexity.”

Evolution Simplicity Complexity

Book:Handbook for Preclears

Source: Handbook for Preclears

“If you search the scientific literature on evolution, and if you focus your search on the question of how molecular machines - the basis of life - developed, you find an eerie and complete silence. The complexity of life's foundation has paralyzed science's attempt to account for it; molecular machines raise an as-yet-impenetrable barrier to Darwinism's universal reach.”

Ifs Literature Silence Focus Evolution Machines Universal Accounts Bases Raises Foundation Complexity Barriers Darwinism Paralyzed Eerie

Author:Michael Behe

“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!”

“There might have been a hundred or a thousand life-bearing planets, had the course of evolution of the universe been a little different, or there might have been none at all. They would probably add, that, as life and man have been produced, that shows that their production was possible; and therefore, if not now then at some other time, if not here then in some other planet of some other sun, we should be sure to have come into existence; or if not precisely the same as we are, then something a little better or a little worse.”

“The daily grinding of evolution, as accelerated by technology, churns out more and more complex organisms, with higher rates of energy use, and with increasing specialization. Minds are the ideal way to express complexity, energy density, increasing specialization, expanding diversity -- all in one system. Mindedness is what evolution produces. Mindedness is what technology wants, too.”

Way Want Mind Use Energy Technology Produce Evolution Higher Diversity Ideals Complexes Rate Complexity Organisms Expanding Density Specialization Energy Use

Author:Kevin Kelly

“Optimization hinders evolution. Everything should be built top-down, except the first time. Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it.”

Should Firsts Doe Evolution First Time Built Simplicity Complexity Hinder Top Down Optimization

Author:Alan Perlis

“The beauty of evolution is that it does provide an explanation of how you can get complexity out of simplicity. It does it by slow, gradual degree. At no point are you postulating the sudden coming into existence of a complicated being.”

Doe Existence Evolution Degrees Simplicity Complicated Explanation Complexity No Point

Author:Richard Dawkins

“Irreducible complexity is a problem for Darwinian evolution. Whenever we see these complex functional systems we realise that they have to be designed.”

Problem Evolution Complexity Realising

Author:Michael Behe

“The intellectual evolution of the race consists in an increase in the number, delicacy, complexity, permanence and speed of formation of such associations.”

Numbers Race Evolution Intellectual Increase Speed Complexity Association Formation Permanence Delicacy

Book:The Evolution of the Human Intellect

Source: The Evolution of the Human Intellect

“He always reminded us that every atom in our bodies was once part of a distant star that had exploded. He talked about how evolution moves from simplicity toward complexity, and how human intelligence is the highest known expression of evolution. I remember him telling me that a frog's brain is much more complex than a star. He saw human consciousness as the first neuron of the universe coming to life and awareness. A spark in the darkness, waiting to spread to fire.”

Source: The Footprints of God

“People have a hard time accepting free-market economics for the same reason they have a hard time accepting evolution: it is counterintuitive. Life looks intelligently designed, so our natural inclination is to infer that there must be an intelligent designer--a God. Similarly, the economy looks designed, so our natural inclination is to infer that we need a designer--a government. In fact, emergence and complexity theory explains how the principles of self-organization and emergence cause complex systems to arise from simple systems without a top-down designer.”

“In the abstract, it might be tempting to imagine that irreducible complexity simply requires multiple simultaneous mutations - that evolution might be far chancier than we thought, but still possible. Such an appeal to brute luck can never be refuted... Luck is metaphysical speculation; scientific explanations invoke causes.”

Stills Might Causes Imagine Evolution Luck Appeals Explanation Abstract Complexity Imagine That Multiple Metaphysical Speculation Brutes Serendipity Tempting Invoke Mutation Simultaneous

Author:Michael Behe

“Life shows no trend to complexity in the usual sense-only an asymmetrical expansion of diversity around a starting point constrained to be simple.”

Life Shows Simple Evolution Diversity Starting Complexity Trends Usual Expansion Starting Point

Book:Eight little piggies: reflections in natural history

Source: Eight little piggies: reflections in natural history

“Creationists have also changed their name ... to intelligent design theorists who study 'irreducible complexity' and the 'abrupt appearance' of life-yet more jargon for 'God did it.' ... Notice that they have no interest in replacing evolution with native American creation myths or including the Code of Hammarabi alongside the posting of the Ten Commandments in public schools.”

“Primates stand at a turning point in the course of evolution. Primates are to the biologist what viruses are to the biochemist. They can be analysed and partly understood according to the rules of a simpler discipline, but they also present another level of complexity: viruses are living chemicals, and primates are animals who love and hate and think.”

Thinking Science Hate Courses Animal Levels Evolution Discipline Understood Complexity Chemicals Viruses Turning Points Love And Hate Biologist Primates

Author:Alison Jolly

“After having produced aquatic animals of all ranks and having caused extensive variations in them by the different environments provided by the waters, nature led them little by little to the habit of living in the air, first by the water's edge and afterwards on all the dry parts of the globe. These animals have in course of time been profoundly altered by such novel conditions; which so greatly influenced their habits and organs that the regular gradation which they should have exhibited in complexity of organisation is often scarcely recognisable.”

Evolution Quotes

Related topics

Evolution Quotes