What Evolution Is Quotes

“The searching human mind is not satisfied merely to discover facts. We also want to know how things happen and why.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“Actually, the entire ascent of life can be presented as an adaptive radiation in the time dimension. From the beginning of replicating molecules to the formation of membrane-bounded cells, the formation of chromosomes, the origin of nucleated eukaryotes, the formation of multicellular organisms, the rise of endothermy, and the evolution of a large and highly complex central nervous system, each of these steps permitted the utilization of a different set of environmental resources, that is, the occupation of a different adaptive zone.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“A plant on the edge of a desert is said to struggle for life against the drought, though more properly it should be said to be dependent on the moisture”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“No one could have predicted that a defenseless, slow-moving biped should become the pinnacle of Creation.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“And it is this randomness of variation that is responsible for the enormous, often quite bizarre diversity of the living world.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“No amphibian succeeded in adapting to salt water.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“Furthermore, it is observed in general that the smaller the population size of a species is, the more vulnerable it will be to extinction.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“Therefore, it came as a terrible shock to the Victorian age when Darwin, following his theory of common descent, incorporated the human species into the animal kingdom as a descendant of primate ancestors.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“The principle of adaptationism has been adopted so widely by Darwinians because it is such a heuristic methodology.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“This uneven rate of evolution of different properties of an organism is called mosaic evolution , and it may create difficulties for classification.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“Some insignificant and probably nocturnal mammals also survived and experienced in the Paleocene and Eocene a spectacular radiation, producing all the orders and many of the families of the now living mammals.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is

“To use the molecular clock in such a way requires the calibration of its “ticking rate.”
― Ernst W. Mayr, What Evolution Is