"Great is the power of steady misrepresentation; but the history of science shows that fortunately this power does not long endure."
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Charles Darwin quotes (page 3 of 20)
395 quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"As man advances in civilization, and small tribes are united into larger communities, the simplest reason would tell each individual that he ought to extend his social instincts and sympathies to all members of the same nation, though personally unknown to him. This point being once reached, there is only an artificial barrier to prevent his sympathies extending to the men of all nations and races."
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"Man in his arrogance thinks himself a great work, worthy the interposition of a great deity. More humble and I believe true to consider him created from animals."
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"A fair result can be obtained only by fully stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question." Charles Darwin"
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"The fact of evolution is the backbone of biology, and biology is thus in the peculiar position of being a science founded on an improved theory, is it then a science or faith?"
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"To kill an error is as good a service as, and sometimes even better than, the establishing of a new truth or fact."
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"The chief distinction in the intellectual powers of the two sexes is shown by mans attaining to a higher eminence, in whatever he takes up, than the woman. Whether deep thought, reason, or imagination or merely the use of the senses and hands.....We may also infer.....The average mental power in man must be above that of woman."
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"Man is descended from a hairy, tailed quadruped, probably arboreal in its habits."
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"I am sorry to have to inform you that I do not believe in the Bible as a divine revelation, & therefore not in Jesus Christ as the Son of God."
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"Great is the power of steady misrepresentation"
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"Even people who aren’t geniuses can outthink the rest of mankind if they develop certain thinking habits."
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"It is always advisable to perceive clearly our ignorance."
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"False facts are highly injurious to the progress of science, for they often endure long; but false views, if supported by some evidence, do little harm, for every one takes a salutary pleasure in proving their falseness."
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"Owing to this struggle for life, any variation, however slight and from whatever cause proceeding, if it be in any degree profitable to an individual of any species, in its infinitely complex relationship to other organic beings and to external nature, will tend to the preservation of that individual, and will generally be inherited by its offspring."
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"We must, however, acknowledge, as it seems to me, that man with all his noble qualities... still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin."
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"There is a grandeur in this view of life, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful are being evolved"
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"The most powerful natural species are those that adapt to environmental change without losing their fundamental identity which gives them their competitive advantage."
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"we are always slow in admitting any great change of which we do not see the intermediate steps"
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"We cannot fathom the marvelous complexity of an organic being; but on the hypothesis here advanced this complexity is much increased. Each living creature must be looked at as a microcosm--a little universe, formed of a host of self-propagating organisms, inconceivably minute and as numerous as the stars in heaven."
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"The expression often used by Mr. Herbert Spencer of the Survival of the Fittest is more accurate, and is sometimes equally convenient."
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