Species Quotes - Page 5

• The major novelty of my theory was its claim that the most rapid evolutionary change does not occur in widespread, populous species, as claimed by Most geneticists, but in small founder populations.

  Ernst Mayr

  Population, Doe, Novelty

  Ernst Mayr (1988). “Toward a New Philosophy of Biology: Observations of an Evolutionist”, Harvard University Press

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• As a species, we're addicted to the facile discrimination involved in saying that something or phenomenon is either 'this' or 'that' - how much more uncomfortable that it may well be 'the other'.

  Will Self

  May, Discrimination, Uncomfortable

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• The human species is often amazingly inventive and industrious but at the same time profoundly lazy. It's very clear that we humans don't like to work. This aversion to work is so extreme - and our ingenuity so acute - that we're eager to devote countless hours designing and building devices that might shave a few minutes off our workday

  Charles Petzold

  Design, Lazy, Aversion

  Charles Petzold (2000). “Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software”, p.299, Microsoft Press

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• We're the only species that listens to Michael Bublé when we have sex. That's gotta be wrong.

  Chris D'Elia

  Sex

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• We know the product is going to stink. We know that because we live in the world, and we know that everything stinks. We all believe, Hey, maybe this one wont stink. We are a hopeful species. Stupid but hopeful. But were happy in that moment between the commercial and the purchase. And I think spending your life trying to dupe innocent people out of hard-won earnings to buy useless, low-quality, misrepresented items and services is an excellent use of your energy.

  Jerry Seinfeld

  Stupid, Believe, Thinking

  "Jerry Seinfeld Gets Brutally Honest About Advertising in This Hilarious Speech at the Clios". www.adweek.com. October 02, 2014.

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• I would say that for the sake of human progress, the best thing we could possibly do would be to diminish, to the point of eliminating, religious faiths. But certainly not eliminating the natural yearnings of our species or the asking of these great questions.

  E. O. Wilson

  Religious, Progress, Would Be

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• We should not knowingly allow any species or race to go extinct. And let us go beyond mere salvage to begin the restoration of natural environments, in order to enlarge wild populations and stanch the hemorrhaging of biological wealth. There can be no purpose more enspiriting than to begin the age of restoration, reweaving the wondrous diversity of life that still surrounds us.

  E. O. Wilson

  Race, Order, Diversity

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• Evolution doesn't care whether you believe in it or not, no more than gravity does. I want to rekindle excitement over what we've achieved as a species with the space program. We can't afford to regress back to the days of superstition.

  Seth MacFarlane

  Believe, Space, Doe

  "Seth MacFarlane on hosting the Oscars, being hated by 'South Park'". Interview with Jonah Weiner, www.cnn.com. December 11, 2012.

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• As species are exterminated by shifting climate zones, ecosystems can collapse, destroying more species.

  James Hansen

  Ecosystems, Shifting, Climate

  "Coal-fired power stations are death factories. Close them". Article by James Hansen, www.theguardian.com. February 15, 2009.

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• I certainly look at the modern guys and think they are a different species to when we played. They are fitter and their conditioning is extraordinary.

  Will Carling

  Thinking, Guy, Different

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• There has always been a tendency to classify children almost as a distinct species.

  Hugh Lofting

  Children, Tendencies

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• A race is what zoologists term a variety or subdivision of a species.

  J. Philippe Rushton

  Race, Zoologist, Term

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• Deconstructing the concept of race not only conflicts with people's tendency to classify and build family histories according to common descent but also ignores the work of biologists studying non-human species.

  J. Philippe Rushton

  Race, People, Common

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• At issue is not only knowledge of the world but our survival as individuals and as a species. All the basic technologies ever invented by humans to feed and protect themselves depend on a relentless commitment to hard-nosed empiricism: you cannot assume that your arrowheads will pierce the hide of a bison or that your raft will float just because the omens are propitious and you have been given supernatural reassurance that they will. You have to be sure.

  Barbara Ehrenreich

  Commitment, Technology, Issues

  Barbara Ehrenreich (2009). “Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America”, p.148, Macmillan

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• Darwin's book, On the Origin of Species, was published in 1859. It is perhaps the most influential book that has ever been published, because it was read by scientist and non- scientist alike, and it aroused violent controversy. Religious people disliked it because it appeared to dispense with God; scientists liked it because it seemed to solve the most important problem in the universe-the existence of living matter. In fact, evolution became in a sense a scientific religion; almost all scientists have accepted it and many are prepared to 'bend' their observations to fit in with it.

  Henry Lipson

  Religious, Book, People

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• Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, believes that in 25 years, somewhere between 75 and 80 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct.

  Gaylord Nelson

  Believe, Animal, Years

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• In every species of fish I've angled for, it is the ones that have got away that thrill me the most, the ones that keep fresh in my memory. So I say it is good to lose fish. If we didn't, much of the thrill of angling would be gone.

  Ray Bergman

  Memories, Fishing, Would Be

  Ray Bergman (1938). “Trout: Fly Plates in Full Color Painted by Edgar Burke; Photographs of Fly Tying by Charles S. Krug; Also Many Diagrams in Line by Ivin Sickles”

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• I think we must ask ourselves if this is really what we want to do to God's creation, to drive it to extinction? Because extinction really is irreversible; species that go extinct are lost forever. This is not like Jurassic Park. We can't bring them back.

  Stuart L. Pimm

  Animal, Thinking, Jurassic Park

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• Spiritually, trees play a unique role in the Jewish and Christian scriptures, from the Garden of Eden to the Cross of Christ. Biologically, in great forest communities, they help sustain life on our planet, giving off oxygen, anchoring soil, keeping stream and rivers clear, and providing habitation for thousands of species. How can religious persons not care about the widespread destruction of these creatures of God? We need to love them as our very selves, as neighbors in earth's community of life.

  Elizabeth A. Johnson

  Christian, Religious, Unique

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• Cheetah genes cooperate with cheetah genes but not with camel genes, and vice versa. This is not because cheetah genes, even in the most poetic sense, see any virtue in the preservation of the cheetah species. They are not working to save the cheetah from extinction like some molecular World Wildlife Fund.

  Richard Dawkins

  Science, Wildlife, Vices

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• ADDER, n. A species of snake. So called from its habit of adding funeral outlays to the other expenses of living.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Science, Snakes, Funeral

  Ambrose Bierce (2001). “The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary”, p.12, University of Georgia Press

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• The brain writes the autobiography of our species at the conscious level.

  David Brooks

  Writing, Brain, Levels

  "David Brooks: From Spouses to Sofas, ‘Emotions Tell Us What to Value". Interview with Jeffrey Brown, www.pbs.org. March 8, 2011.

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• Humans call animals 'dumb'... after they robbed their entire own precious world. They are intelligent beings in their own right, and thoroughly self-sufficient... if not molested by humans. Yet, after millennia of slavery by selfish/callous humans they're made to look dumb! The 'superior species' in their situations would, too, appear 'dumb'.

  Adela Popescu

  Selfish, Animal, Intelligent

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• 'Extinction' issue. Save the species for whom??? Humans' convenience, of course! Individuals of the species are snatched from their homes/family/habitat/held in captivity/forced to mate at great physical/ spiritual pain. When the right numbers are reached, their holocaust starts all over again! Another merry-go-round/ bu$ine$$ a$ u$ual!!! Protectionists/welfarists find it a profitable issue: no controversy/ easy donations! I'd rather see an entire species extinct than in the hands of the humans!

  Adela Popescu

  Spiritual, Pain, Home

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• It is a species of coquetry to make a parade of never practising it.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Coquette, Coquetry, Parades

  "Maxims". No. 110, 1665 - 1678.

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