“Even if not a single fossil has ever been found, the evidence from surviving animals would still overwhelmingly force the conclusion that Darwin was right.”
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Author detail
Clinton Richard Dawkins, FRS, FRSL is a British ethologist, evolutionary biologist and popular science author. He was formerly Professor for Public Understanding of Science at Oxford and was a fellow of New College, Oxford. Dawkins came to prominence with his 1976 book *The Selfish Gene*, which popularised the gene-centred view of evolution and introduced the term meme. In 1982, he made a widely cited contribution to evolutionary biology with the concept, presented in his book *The Extended Phenotype*, that the phenotypic effects of a gene are not necessarily limited to an organism's body, but can stretch far into the environment, including the bodies of other organisms. Dawkins is well known for his candid criticism of creationism and intelligent design. In his 1986 book *The Blind Watchmaker*, he argued against the watchmaker analogy, an argument for the existence of a supernatural creator based upon the complexity of living organisms. Instead, he described evolutionary processes as analogous to a blind watchmaker. He has since written several popular science books, and makes regular television and radio appearances, predominantly discussing these topics. ([Source][1]) [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Dawkins
Quotes
Showing 61-80 of 349
“Even if not a single fossil has ever been found, the evidence from surviving animals would still overwhelmingly force the conclusion that Darwin was right.”
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“Presumably there is indeed no purpose in the ultimate fate of the cosmos, but do any of us really tie our life's hopes to the ultimate fate of the cosmos anyway? Of course we don't; not if w...”
“We think we know that chimpanzees are higher animals and earthworms are lower, we think we've always known what that means, and we think evolution makes it even clearer. But it doesn't. It i...”
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“Despite the Great Chain of Being's traditional ranking of humans between animals and angels, there is no evolutionary justification for the common assumption that evolution is somehow 'aimed...”
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“It is interesting to wonder whether taxonomists of the future may regret the way our generation messed around with genomes.”
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“I know that not all my readers like my digressions, but the research that has been done on Caenorhabditis elegans is such a ringing triumph of science that you aren't going to stop me.”
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“Different sorts of survival machine appear very varied on the outside and in their internal organs. An octopus is nothing like a mouse, and both are quite different from an oak tree. Yet in...”
“Prediction in a complex world is a chancy business. Every decision that a survival machine takes is a gamble, and it is the business of genes to program brains in advance so that on average...”
“Os livros de física podem ser complicados, mas eles, assim como os carros e os computadores, são produtos de objetos biológicos - cérebros humanos. Os objetos e os fenômenos que um livro de...”
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“O darwinismo é uma teoria de processos cumulativos tão lentos que se desenrolam ao longo de milhares e milhões de anos. Todos os nossos juízos intuitivos sobre o que é provável mostram-se er...”
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“Некоторые критики ошибочно считают, что «Эгоистичный ген» проповедует эгоизм как нравственный принцип, которого мы должны придерживаться в жизни! Другие (возможно, потому, что они прочитали...”
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“To describe the forests of the world as its 'lungs' does no harm, and it might do some good if it encourages people to preserve them. But the rhetoric of holistic harmony can degenerate into...”
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“If more doctors understood Darwinism, humanity would not now be facing a crisis of antibiotic resistance.”
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“When we die there are two things we can leave behind us: genes and memes.”
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“To succumb to the God Temptation in either of those guises, biological or cosmological, is an act of intellectual capitulation.”
“The mystic is content to bask in the wonder and revel in a mystery that we were not 'meant' to understand. The scientist feels the same wonder but is restless, not content; recognizes the my...”
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“We don't usually see this happening but, like detectives arriving on the scene after a crime, we can piece together what must have happened from the evidence that remains.”
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“Parsimony is always in the forefront of a scientist's mind when choosing between theories, but it isn't always obvious how to judge it.”
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“The genetic code is universal. I regard this as near-conclusive proof that all organisms are descended from a single common ancestor.”
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“There is mystery but never magic, and mysteries are all the more beautiful for being eventually explained. Things are explicable and it is our privilege to explain them.”
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