quotations about evolution
A curious aspect of the theory of evolution is that everybody thinks he understands it.
JACQUES MONOD
On the Molecular Theory of Evolution
And then there are fossils. Whenever anybody tries to tell me that they believe the Earth was created in seven days, I reach for a fossil and go "Fossil!" And if they keep talking, I throw it just over their head.
LEWIS BLACK
Red, White, and Screwed
It is curious how there seems to be an instinctive digust in Man for his nearest ancestors and relations. If only Darwin could conscientiously have traced man back to the Elephant or the Lion or the Antelope, how much ridicule and prejudice would have been spared to the doctrine of Evolution.
HAVELOCK ELLIS
Impressions and Comments
As you evolve, you will make a lot of people uncomfortable. Evolve anyway.
ANONYMOUS
Man has lost the basic skill of the ape, the ability to scratch its back. Which gave it extraordinary independence, and the liberty to associate for reasons other than the need for mutual back-scratching.
JEAN BAUDRILLARD
Cool Memories
Now, science cannot completely exclude the possibility of supernatural explanation. It is possible - though very unlikely - that our whole world is controlled by elves.
JERRY A. COYNE
Why Evolution Is True
One touch of Darwin makes the whole world kin.
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW
Back to Methuselah
The evolutionary vision is agnostic in regard to systems in the universe of greater complexity than those of which human beings have clear knowledge. It recognizes aesthetic, moral, and religious ideas and experiences as a species, in this case of mental structures or of images, which clearly interacts with other species in the world's great ecosystem.
KENNETH BOULDING
Ecodynamics: A New Theory of Societal Evolution
Human beings are so destructive. I sometimes think we're a kind of plague, that will scrub the earth clean. We destroy things so well that I sometimes think, maybe that's our function. Maybe every few eons, some animal comes along that kills off the rest of the world, clears the decks, and lets evolution proceed to its next phase.
MICHAEL CRICHTON
The Lost World
It is singular that the theory which--of all those advanced since Newton established the law of gravitation--has given to thoughtful minds the grandest conceptions of Nature and the laws of Nature, should have been, of all theories perhaps ever suggested by man, the most thoroughly misunderstood. There can be no doubt that many who recognize the real significance of the theory of natural development, who know that its influence is by no means limited to biological evolution, but has been felt in the far wider--the infinitely wide--field of cosmical evolution, have been pained by the thought that with the widening of the domain of development, the belief in a power working in and through all things seems to be set on one side in the name of universal evolution.
RICHARD ANTHONY PROCTOR
Mysteries of Time and Space
Natural selection, as it has operated in human history, favors not only the clever but the murderous.
BARBARA EHRENREICH
The Worst Years of Our Lives
One general law, leading to the advancement of all organic beings, namely, multiply, vary, let the strongest live and the weakest die.
CHARLES DARWIN
On the Origin of the Species
Out of the dusk a shadow,
Then a spark;
Out of the cloud a silence,
Then a lark;
Out of the heart a rapture,
Then a pain;
Out of the dead, cold ashes,
Life again.
JOHN BANISTER TABB
Evolution
Evolution is like walking on a rolling barrel. The walker isn't so much interested in where the barrel is going as he is in keeping on top of it.
ROBERT FROST
The Letters of Robert Frost to Louis Untermeyer
Of course, like every other man of intelligence and education I do believe in organic evolution. It surprises me that at this late date such questions should be raised.
WOODROW WILSON
letter to Winterton C. Curtis, Aug. 29, 1922
As a historical science, evolution is confirmed by the fact that so many independent lines of evidence converge to its single conclusion. Independent sets of data from geology, paleontology, botany, zoology, herpetology, entomology, biogeography, comparative anatomy and physiology, genetics and population genetics, and many other sciences each point to the conclusion that life evolved. This is a convergence of evidence. Creationists can demand "just one fossil transitional form" that shows evolution. But evolution is not proved through a single fossil. It is proved through a convergence of fossils, along with a convergence of genetic comparisons between species, and a convergence of anatomical and physiological comparisons between species, and many other lines of inquiry. For creationists to disprove evolution, they need to unravel all these independent lines of evidence, as well as construct a rival theory that can explain them better than the theory of evolution. They have yet to do so.
MICHAEL SHERMER
Why Darwin Matters
Evolution is a tinkerer.
FRANCOIS JACOB
"Evolution and Tinkering"
I see nothing in the theory of evolution inconsistent with an Almighty Creator and Protector.
JOHN HENRY NEWMAN
letter to David Brown, Apr. 4, 1874
Evolution is a change from an indefinite, incoherent, homogeneity to a definite, coherent, heterogeneity, through continuous differentiations and integrations.
HERBERT SPENCER
First Principles
Even if not a single fossil has ever been found, the evidence from surviving animals would still overwhelmingly force the conclusion that Darwin was right.
RICHARD DAWKINS
The Greatest Show on Earth