Quotes from Francois Jacob

Nature is a tinkerer, not an inventor.

The Place of No Shadows, in Isaac Asimovs Science Fiction Magazine (1990) In our Universe, matter is arranged in a hierarchy of structures by successive integrations.

It is hope that gives life meaning. And hope is based on the prospect of being able one day to turn the actual world into a possible one that looks better.

For me, this world of questions and the provisional, this chase after an answer that was always put off to the next day, all that was euphoric. I lived in the future.

Evolution is a tinkerer, not an engineer. It works with what is already there and takes the path of least resistance. It is not always the most efficient solution, but it is the dumbest solution that works

What man seeks, to the point of anguish, in his gods, in his art, in his science, is meaning. He cannot bear the void. He pours meaning on events like salt on his food.

Evolution is a tinkerer, not an engineer.

I had turned my anxiety into my profession.

Evolution is a tinkerer.

One of the deepest functions of a living organisms is to look ahead... to produce future.