Quotes About Adaptation

Podemos creer que la selección natural llegue a producir, por una parte, un órgano de insignificante importancia, como la cola de la jirafa, que sirve de espantamoscas, y por otra parte, un órgano tan maravilloso como el ojo?

since all organisms vary, and all reproduce themselves in greater numbers than can survive, there must always be competition between variants; in other words, the principle of natural selection, too, is universally applicable.

species of the same genus would occasionally exhibit reversions to lost ancestral characters.

I believe in Natural Selection, not because I can prove in any single case that it has changed one species into another, but because it groups and explains well (as it seems to me) a host of facts in classification, embryology, morphology, rudimentary organs, geological succession and distribution.

Though nature grants vast periods of time for the work of natural selection, she does not grant an indefinite period; for as all organic beings are striving, it may be said, to seize on each place in the economy of nature, if any one species does not become modified and improved in a corresponding degree with its competitors, it will soon be exterminated.

Did man, after his first inroad into South America, destroy, as has been suggested, the unwieldy Megatherium and the other Edentata?

Man, like every other animal, has no doubt advanced to his present high condition through a struggle for existence consequent on his multiplication; and if he is to advance still higher, it is to be feared that he must remain subject to a severe struggle.

evolution is written on the wings of butterflies

By a monstrosity I presume is meant some considerable deviation of structure, generally injurious, or not useful to the species.

Man selects only for his own good; Nature only for that of the being which she tends.

Great as the differences are between the breeds of pigeons, I am fully convinced that the common opinion of naturalists is correct, namely, that all have descended from the rock-pigeon (Columba livia), including under this term several geographical races or sub-species, which differ from each other in the most trifling respects.

How have all those exquisite adaptations of one part of the organisation to another part, and to the conditions of life, and of one organic being to another being, been perfected?

belirtilen çeÅŸitli engeller ve belki daha bilinmeyen baÅŸkalar?, toplumun tasas?z, bozuk ve baÅŸka bak?mlardan aÅŸa?? üyelerinin iyi insanlardan daha h?zl? çoÄŸalmas?n? önlemezse, dünya tarihinde pek s?k görüldüÄŸü gibi, ulus geriler.

Parece no haber más propósito en la variabilidad de los seres vivientes y en la acción de la selección natural que en la dirección en la sopla el viento.

I believe man . . . in the same predicament with other animals.

The natural history of this archipelago is very remarkable; it seems to be a little world within itself.

A un mono americano, un ateles, que se embriagó con coñac , nunca más se le pudo hacer que lo volviese a probar, en lo que obraba con mayor cordura que muchos hombres El Origen del Hombre

Celui qui n'évolue pas disparaît.

It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.

Species that struggle to adapt to survive will become extinct

When we descend to details we can prove that no one species has changed; nor can we prove that the supposed changes are beneficial, which is the groundwork of the theory.

No looking back. Life goes one way only, and whatever opinions you hold about the past having nothing to do with anything but your own damn weakness. Nothing changes what already happened. It will always have happened. You either let it break you down or you don't.

My opinion was that if hogs are biting you so often that you have to stop and make up a specific word for it, maybe lack of vocabulary is not your most pressing problem.

That's the way it is at some point in life. An inevitable consequence of living. A lot of things begin falling away.