Quotes About Species

He belonged to that special class of men the species produces every so often, in whom a craving for limitless power is so extreme that any suffering to achieve it seems natural, and he had become the omnipotent ruler of a warrior nation.

No amphibian succeeded in adapting to salt water.

Therefore, it came as a terrible shock to the Victorian age when Darwin, following his theory of common descent, incorporated the human species into the animal kingdom as a descendant of primate ancestors.

Furthermore, it is observed in general that the smaller the population size of a species is, the more vulnerable it will be to extinction.

Man has two necessary fundamental characteristics, the instinct of his own preservation, without which no being could exist, and the instinct of the preservation of his species, without which no species could have been formed or have continued to exist.

In order to be suitable material for the work of natural selection, mutations must be rare events, as they actually are. If they were so frequent that there was a considerable chance of, say, a dozen of different mutations occurring in the same individual, the injurious ones would, as a rule, predominate over the advantageous ones and the species, instead of being improved by selection, would remain unimproved, or would perish.

The expansion of the Universe and the evolution of all species is dependent on contrast. How could you ever decide what you do want, without living some of what you don't want? And so, be easy on yourself! Do not try to hold yourself to the impossible standard of only being in a place where everything is exactly as you want it to be. If you could do that you would cease to exist.

The Natural History Museum is open to the public on Tuesdays and Fridays. Elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus; extraordinary animals! Rubens rendered them marvelously. I had a feeling of happiness as soon as I entered the place and the further I went the stronger it grew. I felt my whole being rise above commonplaces and trivialities and the petty worries of my daily life. What an immense variety of animals and species of different shapes and functions!

Whenever it occurs, however it occurs, pessimism has but one effect: it introduces humility into thought. It undermines the innumerable, self-aggrandizing postures that constitute the human being. Pessimism is the humility of the species that has named itself, thought furtively stumbling upon its own limitations on black wings of futility.

A disgust and revulsion towards the species which has, as a further qualification, the disgust towards ourselves.

Men and women belong to different species and communications between them is still in its infancy.

they avoid the exploration of evolution, because it reminds us all that humankind may not be that special in nature's scheme. What happens to other species also happens to us.

As I learned more about evolution, I realized that from nature's point of view, you and I ain't such a big deal. Humans are just another species on this planet trying to make a go of it, trying to pass our genes into the future, just like chrysanthemums, muskrats, sea jellies, poison ivy … and bumblebees.

From time to time, I meet someone who will say something like, "I am not afraid of dying." I don't buy it. Everyone is afraid of dying. It's part of the instinct that helps us survive as a species. It's a crucial feature of human evolution. It's also, I strongly suspect, a crucial reason why so many people have trouble believing evolution is true. Life can be ironic like that.

Altruism is not a moral or religious ideal, no matter what some people might tell you, it is an essential biological part of who or what we are as a species.

Altruism is not a moral or religious ideal, no matter what some people might tell you. It is essential, biological part of who or what we are as a species.

Nature, too, supports our personal blossoming (if we have any quiet exposure to her) through her spontaneities, through her beauty, power, and mirroring, through her dazzling variety of species and habitats, and by way of the wind, Moon, Sun, stars, and galaxies.

The conversation progressed, bumper-car style, to a very heated discussion about death and the survival of the soul. It amazes me that we, as a species, can argue so fervently over something that is, when all is said and done, unknowable and unprovable. Nonetheless, we all arrive at conclusions and cleave to our certainties: that there is nothing but the Void; or that we will find ourselves writing an admissions exam at the Pearly Gates.

Darwin. Celui qui dit que nous descendons du singe.

Life is a hideous thing, and from the background behind what we know of it peer daemoniacal hints of truth which make it sometimes a thousandfold more hideous. Science, already oppressive with its shocking revelations, will perhaps be the ultimate exterminator of our human species—if separate species we be—for its reserve of unguessed horrors could never be borne by mortal brains if loosed upon the world.

Science, already oppressive with its shocking revelations, will perhaps be the ultimate exterminator of our human species - if separate species we be - for its reserve of unguessed horrors could never be borne by mortal brains if loossed upon the world.

Science, already oppressive with its shocking revelations, will perhaps be the ultimate exterminator of our human species—if separate species we be—for its reserve of unguessed horrors could never be borne by mortal brains if loosed upon the world. If we knew what we are, we should do as Sir Arthur Jermyn did; and Arthur Jermyn soaked himself in oil and set fire to his clothing one night.

genetic drift, and

There are currently four species of sirenian: three manatee species in the Atlantic and Caribbean and one species of dugong in the Indian and Pacific oceans.