Stephen Jay Gould Quotes About Values

Quotes about: Values

• Theory-free science makes about as much sense as value-free politics.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Statistics, Theory, Values

  "Dinosaur in a Haystack: Reflections in Natural History". Book by Stephen Jay Gould, "The First Unmasking of Nature", 1995.

• We build our personalities laboriously and through many years, and we cannot order fundamental changes just because we might value their utility; no button reading "positive attitude" protrudes from our hearts, and no finger can coerce positivity into immediate action by a single and painless pressing.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Attitude, Reading, Heart

  Stephen Jay Gould (2011). “Full House”, p.47, Harvard University Press

• I would rather label the whole enterprise of setting a biological value upon groups for what it is: irrelevant, intellectually unsound, and highly injurious.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Labels, Groups, Enterprise

  Stephen Jay Gould (2006). “The Mismeasure of Man (Revised & Expanded)”, p.91, W. W. Norton & Company

• Among people I have met, the few whom I would term “great” all share a kind of unquestioned, fierce dedication; an utter lack of doubt about the value of their activities (or at least an internal impulse that drives through any such angst); and above all, a capacity to work (or at least to be mentally alert for unexpected insights) at every available moment of every day of their lives.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Life, Work, Dedication

• I am glad that the life of pandas is so dull by human standards, for our efforts at conservation have little moral value if we preserve creatures only as human ornaments; I shall be impressed when we show solicitude for warty toads and slithering worms.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Effort, Ornaments, Pandas

  Stephen Jay Gould (2010). “An Urchin in the Storm: Essays about Books and Ideas”, p.21, W. W. Norton & Company

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