Authors:

Stephen Jay Gould Quotes - Page 3

All Quotes Adaptation Age Atheism Baseball Biology Children Commitment Creation Culture Design Diversity Doubt Earth Ecology Environment Evolution Genius Giving Humanity Imagination Integrity Kindness Life Lying Nature Observation Past Perspective Philosophy Progress Reality Religion Science Simplicity Soul Struggle Students Stupidity Tragedy Understanding Values Vision Writing
Antiessentialist thinking forces us to view the world differently. We must accept shadings and continua as fundamental. We lose criteria for judgment by comparison to some ideal: short people, retarded people, people of

Antiessentialist thinking forces us to view the world differently. We must accept shadings and continua as fundamental. We lose criteria for judgment by comparison to some ideal: short people, retarded people, people of other beliefs, colors, and religions are people of full status.

Stephen Jay Gould
Thinking, Views, Color
Stephen Jay Gould (2010). “The Flamingo's Smile: Reflections in Natural History”, p.161, W. W. Norton & Company

If genius has any common denominator, I would propose breadth of interest and the ability to construct fruitful analogies between fields.

Stephen Jay Gould
Genius, Analogies, Fields
Stephen Jay Gould (2010). “The Panda's Thumb: More Reflections in Natural History”, p.66, W. W. Norton & Company

Few tragedies can be more extensive than the stunting of life, few injustices deeper than the denial of an opportunity to strive or even to hope, by a limit imposed from without, but falsely identified as lying within.

Stephen Jay Gould
Hope, Fear, Lying
Stephen Jay Gould (2006). “The Mismeasure of Man (Revised & Expanded)”, p.36, W. W. Norton & Company

We who revel in nature's diversity and feel instructed by every animal tend to brand Homo sapiens as the greatest catastrophe since the Cretaceous extinction.

Stephen Jay Gould
Nature, Animal, Diversity

Nothing is more dangerous than a dogmatic worldview - nothing more constraining, more blinding to innovation, more destructive of openness to novelty.

Stephen Jay Gould
Innovation, Religion, Novelty
Stephen Jay Gould (1995). “Dinosaur in a haystack: reflections in natural history”, Harmony

Orchids manufacture their intricate devices from the common components of ordinary flowers, parts usually fitted for very different functions. If God had designed a beautiful machine to reflect his wisdom and power, surely he would not have used a collection of parts generally fashioned for other purposes. Orchids were not made by an ideal engineer; they are jury-rigged from a limited set of available components. Thus, they must have evolved from ordinary flowers.

Stephen Jay Gould
Beautiful, Flower, Orchids
Stephen Jay Gould (2010). “The Panda's Thumb: More Reflections in Natural History”, p.20, W. W. Norton & Company

Among people I have met, the few whom I would term “great” all share a kind of unquestioned, fierce dedication; an utter lack of doubt about the value of their activities (or at least an internal impulse that drives through any such angst); and above all, a capacity to work (or at least to be mentally alert for unexpected insights) at every available moment of every day of their lives.

Stephen Jay Gould
Life, Work, Dedication

Misunderstanding of probability may be the greatest of all impediments to scientific literacy.

Stephen Jay Gould
May, Literacy, Probability
Stephen Jay Gould (1995). “Dinosaur in a haystack: reflections in natural history”, Harmony

We live in a profoundly nonintellectual culture, made all the worse by a passive hedonism abetted by the spread of wealth and its dissipation into countless electronic devices that impart the latest in entertainment and supposed information - all in short (and loud) doses of "easy listening".

Stephen Jay Gould
Listening, Culture, Information
Stephen Jay Gould (1991). “Bully for Brontosaurus: Reflections in Natural History”, W W Norton & Company Incorporated

Organisms [...] are directed and limited by their past. They must remain imperfect in their form and function, and to that exte