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Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes: Further Reflections in Natural History QUOTES

Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes: Further Reflections in Natural History QUOTES

1 " If we use the past only to creature heroes for present purposes, we will never understand the richness of human thought or the plurality of ways of knowing. "

― Stephen Jay Gould , Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes: Further Reflections in Natural History

2 " In science, "fact" can only mean "confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent." I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms. "

― Stephen Jay Gould , Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes: Further Reflections in Natural History

3 " We do not inhabit a perfected world where natural selection ruthlessly scrutinizes all organic structures and then molds them for optimal utility. Organisms inherit a body form and a style of embryonic development; these impose constraints upon future change and adaptation. In many cases, evolutionary pathways reflect inherited patterns more than current environmental demands. These inheritances constrain, but they also provide opportunity. A potentially minor genetic change […] entails a host of complex, nonadaptive consequences. The primary flexibility of evolution may arise from nonadaptive by-products that occasionally permit organisms to strike out in new and unpredictable directions. What “play” would evolution have if each structure were built for a restricted purpose and could be used for nothing else? How could humans learn to write if our brain had not evolved for hunting, social cohesion, or whatever, and could not transcend the adaptive boundaries of its original purpose? "

― Stephen Jay Gould , Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes: Further Reflections in Natural History

4 " This is a changing world. It changes from day to day, year to year, and from age to age. Rivers deepen their gorges as they carry more land to the sea. Mountains rise, only to be leveled gradually by winds and rain. Continents rise and sink into the sea. Such are the gradual changes of the physical earth as days add into years and years combine to become ages. "

― Stephen Jay Gould , Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes: Further Reflections in Natural History