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Evolution Quotes

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Evolution Quotes

“Christ did not come to civilize. He came to save. Civilization is not the solution; it does not destroy the works of the devil. All civilization aims at world improvement, at the gradual elimination of the curse; it is a process of evolution. It is like a man who is suffering from a terrible disease, and the physician who comes to help him gives him a salve to apply. He treats the skin symptoms but the source of the disease he never considers and never touches. Such is a boasted and progressive civilization. It is a delusion.”

“[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.”

Ifs Stills Father Powerful Records Havens Information Particular Brother Theory Source Evolution Dad Claims Independent Structure Errors Locals Observation Bankruptcy Unified Inference

Author:Stephen Jay Gould

“Pouter, tumbler, and fantail are from the same source; The racer and hack may be traced to one Horse; So men were developed from monkeys of course, Which nobody can deny.”

Men May Courses Source Evolution Horse Deny Monkeys Hacks Racers

Author:Bill Vaughan

“Cultures are not the source of all morals, only a limited set of morals. Cultures can be graded and judged morally according to their contribution to the evolution of life.”

Culture Moral Source Evolution Contribution Judged Evolution Of Life

Book:LILA An Inquriry into Morals

Source: LILA An Inquriry into Morals

“As for the presence of large NGF [nerve growth factor] sources in snake venom and male genital organs, they may be conceived as instances of bizarre evolutionary gene expression.”

May Science Growth Expression Source Evolution Males Factors Instance Nerves Genes Organs Bizarre Snakes Venom

Author:Rita Levi-Montalcini

“Evolution is an inference from thousands of independent sources, the only conceptual structure that can make unified sense of all this disparate information.”

Science Information Source Evolution Independent Structure Unified Inference

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

Source: Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms: Essays on Natural History

“Morphological information has provided the greatest single source of data in the formulation and development of the theory of evolution and that even now, when the preponderance of work is experimental, the basis for interpretation in many areas of study remains the form and relationships of structures.”

Form Science Study Information Theory Source Development Evolution Areas Bases Remains Structure Data Interpretation Theory Of Evolution

Author:Everett C. Olson

“The History of Evolution is the real source of light in the investigation of organic bodies. It is applicable at every step, and all our ideas of the correlation of organic bodies will be swayed by our knowledge of the history of evolution. To carry the proof of it into all branches of research would be an almost endless task. (1828)”

Ideas Real Body Light Would Be Science Steps Source Evolution Research Tasks Proof Endless Branches Investigation Every Step Correlation

Author:Karl Ernst von Baer

“Catastrophes come when some dominant institution, swollen like a soap-bubble and still standing without foundations, suddenly crumbles at the touch of what may seem a word or idea, but is really some stronger material source.”

May Stills Ideas Seems Progress Materials Source Evolution Standing Stronger Institutions Foundation Bubbles Dominant Catastrophe Soap Swollen Soap Bubbles

Author:George Santayana

“Part of what makes a language 'alive' is its constant evolution. I would hate to think Britain would ever emulate France, where they actually have a learned faculty whose job it is to attempt to prevent the incursion of foreign words into the language. I love editing Harry with Arthur Levine, my American editor-the differences between 'British English' (of which there must be at least 200 versions) and 'American English' (ditto!) are a source of constant interest and amusement to me.”

Thinking Jobs Hate Language Interest Differences Wise Alive Source Evolution Constant Witty British Versions France Britain Faculty Editors Editing Amusement Arthur Emulate American English

Author:J. K. Rowling

“Only a tiny fraction of corpses fossilize, and we are lucky to have as many intermediate fossils as we do. We could easily have had no fossils at all, and still the evidence for evolution from other sources, such as molecular genetics and geographical distribution, would be overwhelmingly strong. On the other hand, evolution makes the strong prediction that if a single fossil turned up in the wrong geological stratum, the theory would be blown out of the water.”

Ifs Stills Hands Would Be Religion Strong Water Theory Source Evolution Lucky Evidence Tiny Predictions Distribution Fossils Corpses Genetics Fractions

Book:The God Delusion

Source: The God Delusion

“There is the theory that all the living forms in the world have arisen from a single source which itself came from an inorganic form. This theory can be called the 'general theory of evolution,' and the evidence which supports this is not sufficiently strong to allow us to consider it as anything more than a working hypothesis.”

World Form Strong Support Theory Source Evolution Evidence Hypothesis Theory Of Evolution

Author:Gerald A. Kerkut

“It is the process of evolution which identifies innovative benefits from any source and selects them on merit without prejudice”

Process Source Evolution Benefits Economics Prejudice Merit Innovative

Author:David Landes