Brief Candle in the Dark Quotes

“If you need a geography lesson in order to know where Africa is – if, by age seventeen, you have somehow failed to imbibe such knowledge by osmosis or simple curiosity – you surely don’t have the sort of mind that would benefit from a university education.”
― Richard Dawkins, Brief Candle in the Dark: My Life in Science

“I will not utter falsehoods but I have no objection to making meaningless statements.”
― Richard Dawkins, Brief Candle in the Dark: My Life in Science

“Elitism has become a dirty word, and it is a pity. Elitism is reprehensible only when it is snobbish and exclusive. The best sort of elitism tries to expand the élite by encouraging more and more people to join it . . . Science is inherently interesting, and the interest will shine through without the need for soundbites, gimmicks or dumbing down.”
― Richard Dawkins, Brief Candle in the Dark: My Life in Science

“A branch of one of the cranial nerves, the recurrent laryngeal runs from the brain to the larynx. It doesn’t go straight there, however. Instead, it dives down into the chest, loops around one of the main arteries leaving the heart, and proceeds back up the neck to the larynx. In a giraffe the detour is significant (British understatement) and it is presumably costly. The explanation lies in history, in the nerve’s emergence in our fish ancestors before a discernible neck evolved.”
― Richard Dawkins, Brief Candle in the Dark: My Life in Science

“My reverie jumps me into the middle of the period and I conjure the giant, unforgettable figure of Douglas Adams, sadly absent from the feast.”
― Richard Dawkins, Brief Candle in the Dark: My Life in Science