Quotes about evolution

"Man has lost the basic skill of the ape, the ability to scratch its back. Which gave it extraordinary independence, and the liberty to associate for reasons other than the need for mutual back-scratching."

Baudrillard, Jean on evolution   

"Evolution is gaining the psychic zones of the world... life, being and ascent of consciousness, could not continue to advance indefinitely along its line without transforming itself in depth. The being who is the object of his own reflection, in consequence, of that very doubling back upon himself becomes in a flash able to raise himself to a new sphere."

Chardin, Pierre Teilhard De on evolution   

"The probability of life originating from accident is comparable to the probability of the unabridged dictionary resulting from an explosion in a printing shop."

Conklin, Edward on evolution   

"The question is this -- Is man an ape or an angel? My Lord, I am on the side of the angels. I repudiate with indignation and abhorrence these new fanged theories."

Disraeli, Benjamin on evolution   

"Natural selection, as it has operated in human history, favors not only the clever but the murderous."

Ehrenreich, Barbara on evolution   

"It is curious how there seems to be an instinctive disgust in Man for his nearest ancestors and relations. If only Darwin could conscientiously have traced man back to the Elephant or the Lion or the Antelope, how much ridicule and prejudice would have been spared to the doctrine of Evolution."

Ellis, Havelock on evolution   

"Darwinian man, though well-behaved, at best is only a monkey shaved."

Gilbert, W. S. on evolution   

"God created a number of possibilities in case some of his prototypes failed -- that is the meaning of evolution."

Greene, Graham on evolution   

"The pre-human creature from which man evolved was unlike any other living thing in its malicious viciousness toward its own kind. Humanization was not a leap forward but a groping toward survival."

Hoffer, Eric on evolution   

"Historians will have to face the fact that natural selection determined the evolution of cultures in the same manner as it did that of species."

Lorenz, Konrad on evolution   

"It is hard for the ape to believe he descended from man."

Mencken, H. L. on evolution
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"Evolution is not a force but a process. Not a cause but a law."

Morley, John on evolution   

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"One of the stupidest theories of Western life."

Muggeridge, Malcolm on evolution   

"All the evolution we know of proceeds from the vague to the definite."

Peirce, Charles Sanders on evolution   

"We live between two worlds; we soar in the atmosphere; we creep upon the soil; we have the aspirations of creators and the propensities of quadrupeds. There can be but one explanation of this fact. We are passing from the animal into a higher form, and the drama of this planet is in its second act."

Reade, W. Winwood on evolution   

"Organic life, we are told, has developed gradually from the protozoon to the philosopher, and this development, we are assured, is indubitably an advance. Unfortunately it is the philosopher, not the protozoon, who gives us this assurance."

Russell, Bertrand on evolution   

"An extra-terrestrial philosopher, who had watched a single youth up to the age of twenty-one and had never come across any other human being, might conclude that it is the nature of human beings to grow continually taller and wiser in an indefinite progress towards perfection; and this generalization would be just as well founded as the generalization which evolutionists base upon the previous history of this planet."

Russell, Bertrand on evolution   

"It is disturbing to discover in oneself these curious revelations of the validity of the Darwinian theory. If it is true that we have sprung from the ape, there are occasions when my own spring appears not to have been very far."

Skinner, Cornelia Otis on evolution   

"The more specific idea of Evolution now reached is -- a change from an indefinite, incoherent homogeneity to a definite, coherent heterogeneity, accompanying the dissipation of motion and integration of matter."

Spencer, Herbert on evolution   

"The historic ascent of humanity, taken as a whole, may be summarized as a succession of victories of consciousness over blind forces -- in nature, in society, in man himself."

Trotsky, Leon on evolution   

"Evolution is the law of policies: Darwin said it, Socrates endorsed it, Cuvier proved it and established it for all time in his paper on The Survival of the Fittest. These are illustrious names, this is a mighty doctrine: nothing can ever remove it from its firm base, nothing dissolve it, but evolution."

Twain, Mark on evolution
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"I believe that our Heavenly Father invented man because he was disappointed in the monkey."

Twain, Mark on evolution
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"After listening to a lecture on evolution by a science professor, a student wrote a poem and titled it The Amazing Professor. The poem read: Once I was a tadpole when I began to begin. Then I was a frog with my tail tucked in. Next I was a monkey on a coconut tree. Now I am a doctor with a Ph.D."

Unknown, Source on evolution   

"Evolution has developed man to such a high degree that he builds zoos to keep his ancestors in cages."

Unknown, Source on evolution
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"Two million years from now the scientists can start a row by claming that the creatures of that period descended from us."

Unknown, Source on evolution   

"We are the products of editing, rather than of authorship."

Wald, George on evolution   

"Biologically the species is the accumulation of the experiments of all its successful individuals since the beginning."

Wells, H.G. on evolution   

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"The Revolution was effected before the War commenced. The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people; a change in their religious sentiments of their duties and obligations. This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people, was the real American Revolution."

Adams, John on evolution   

"I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy."

Adams, John on evolution
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"The most radical revolutionary will become a conservative the day after the revolution."

Arendt, Hannah on evolution   

"In revolutions the occasions may be trifling but great interest are at stake."

Aristotle on evolution   

"Inferiors revolt in order that they may be equal, and equals that they may be superior. Such is the state of mind which creates revolutions."

Aristotle on evolution
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"Thinkers prepare the revolution and bandits carry it out."

Azuela, Mariano on evolution
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"Revolution begins with the self, in the self."

Bambara, Toni Cade on evolution   

"Revolution is an abrupt change in the form of misgovernment."

Bierce, Ambrose on evolution   

"So they united, and the Communist revolution took the chain from their legs and wound it around their necks."

Bonom, Samuel on evolution   

"I, John Brown, am now quite certain that the crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with Blood."

Brown, John Mason on evolution   

"Men are made uneasy; they flinch; they cannot bear the sudden light; a general restlessness supervenes; the face of society is disturbed, or perhaps convulsed; old interests and old beliefs have been destroyed before new ones have been created. These symptoms are the precursors of revolution; they have preceded all the great changes through which the world has passed."

Buckle, Henry Thomas on evolution   

"I had such a wonderful feeling last night, walking beneath the dark sky while cannon boomed on my right and guns on my left the feeling that I could change the world only by being there."

Butnariu, Viorica on evolution   

"The dead have been awakened -- shall I sleep? The world's at war with tyrants -- shall I crouch? the harvest's ripe -- and shall I pause to reap? I slumber not; the thorn is in my couch; Each day a trumpet soundeth in mine ear, its echo in my heart."

Byron, Lord on evolution