Daniel Dennett

“Natural selection is not gene centrist and nor is biology all about genes; our comprehending minds are a result of our fast evolving culture.”

“We should get used to the idea that we'll probably never be able to find - and confirm - a good explanation of the ultimate origin of the universe, though I see no reason to believe that we can't press much further on this question than we have managed to date.”

“The juvenile sea squirt wanders through the sea searching for a suitable rock or hunk of coral to cling to and make its home for life. For this task, it has a rudimentary nervous system. When it finds its spot and takes root, it doesn't need its brain anymore so it eats it!”

“I think many people are terribly afraid of being demoted by the Darwinian scheme from the role of authors and creators in their own right into being just places where things happen in the universe.”

“If the history of resistance to Darwinian thinking is a good measure, we can expect that long into the future, long after every triumph of human thought has been matched or surpassed by 'mere machines,' there will still be thinkers who insist that the human mind works in mysterious ways that no scie...”

“The mind is the effect, not the cause.”