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Evolution Quotes

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Evolution Quotes

“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.”

“I have devoted my whole life to the study of Nature, and yet a single sentence may express all that I have done. I have shown that there is a correspondence between the succession of Fishes in geological times and the different stages of their growth in the egg,-this is all. It chanced to be a result that was found to apply to other groups and has led to other conclusions of a like nature.”

Source: Agassiz on Evolution: Methods of study in natural history

“The chemical differences among various species and genera of animals and plants are certainly as significant for the history of their origins as the differences in form. If we could define clearly the differences in molecular constitution and functions of different kinds of organisms, there would be possible a more illuminating and deeper understanding of question of the evolutionary reactions of organisms than could ever be expected from morphological considerations.”

“We have long been seeking a different kind of evolutionary process and have now found one; namely, the change within the pattern of the chromosomes. ... The neo-Darwinian theory of the geneticists is no longer tenable.”

Kind Long Different Science Found Process Theory Evolution Patterns Seeking Different Kinds Chromosomes

Author:Richard Goldschmidt

“Aging is not 'lost youth,' but a new stage of opportunity and strength. It's a different stage of life, and if you are going to pretend it's youth, you are going to miss it. You are going to miss the surprises, the possibilities, and the evolution that we are just beginning to know about because there are no role models, no guideposts, and no signs.”

Ifs Knows Different Opportunity Lost Roles Stage Missing Possibility Youth Evolution Models Aging Surprise Ass Role Models Bad Ass Stages Of Life Lost Youth

Author:Betty Friedan

“For millions of years, on average, one species became extinct every century.... We are now heaving more than a thousand different species of animals and plants off the planet every year.”

Years Different Animal Millions Century Planets Evolution Thousand Plant Species Environmental Average Animal Rights

Book:Last Chance To See

Source: Last Chance To See

“The formation of different languages and of distinct species and the proofs that both have been developed through a gradual process, are curiously parallel.”

Has Beens Different Language Process Evolution Species Proof Parallels Formation Different Languages

Book:The Descent of Man: the Evolution

Source: The Descent of Man: the Evolution

“Paleontologists had long been aware of a seeming contradiction between Darwin's postulate of gradualism, confirmed by the work of population genetics, and the actual findings of paleontology. Following phyletic lines through time seemed to reveal only minimal gradual changes but no clear evidence for any change of a species into a different genus or for the gradual origin of an evolutionary novelty. Anything truly novel always seemed to appear quite abruptly in the fossil record.”

Source: One Long Argument: Charles Darwin and the Genesis of Modern Evolutionary Thought

“It is quite true that many scientists, many physicists, maintain that the physical constants, the half dozen or so numbers that physicists have to simply assume in order to derive the rest of their understanding ... have to be assumed. You can't provide a rationale for why those numbers are there. Physicists have calculated that if any of these numbers was a little bit different, the universe as we know it wouldn't exist.”

Ifs Knows Littles Different Order Universe Bits Understanding Numbers Half Evolution Little Bit Scientist Assuming Dozen Physicist Rationale

Author:Richard Dawkins

“The universe and the Laws of Physics seem to have been specifically designed for us. If any one of about 40 physical qualities had more than slightly different values, life as we know it could not exist: Either atoms would not be stable, or they wouldn't combine into molecules, or the stars wouldn't form heavier elements, or the universe would collapse before life could develop, and so on...”

Ifs Knows Has Beens Different Seems Form Law Values Universe Stars Quality Evolution Elements Physics Atoms Stable Collapse Molecules Laws Of Physics Different Values

Author:Stephen Hawking

“For the production of man a different apprenticeship [from forests] was needed to sharpen the wits and quicken the higher manifestations of intellect - a more open veldt country where competition was keener between swiftness and stealth, and where adroitness of thinking played a preponderating role in the preservation of the species.”

Thinking Men Different Country Roles Evolution Needed Higher Competition Species Productions Intellect Wit Forests Manifestation Preservation Apprenticeship Stealth Swiftness

Author:Raymond Dart

“In the world which we know, among the different and primitive geniuses that preside over the evolution of the several species, there exists not one, excepting that of the dog, that ever gave a thought to the presence of man.”

Knows Men World Different Friendship Dog Evolution Genius Species Primitive Canine Dog Lover Great Dog Poodle Dogs Man And Dog

Book:The Double Garden: Works of Maeterlinck

Source: The Double Garden: Works of Maeterlinck