Scientist

We have decommissioned natural selection and must now look deep within ourselves and decide what we wish to become.

In many environments, take away the ants and there would be partial collapses in many of the land ecosystems.

It's like having astronomy without knowing where the stars are.

The two major challenges for the 21st century are to improve the economic situation of the majority and save as much of the planet as we can.

The education of women is the best way to save the environment.

It's always been a great survival value for people to believe they belong to a superior tribe. That's just in human relationships.

Ants make up two-thirds of the biomass of all the insects. There are millions of species of organisms and we know almost nothing about them.

Blind faith, no matter how passionately expressed, will not suffice. Science for its part will test relentlessly every assumption about the human condition.

Even as empiricism is winning the mind, transcendentalism continues to win the heart.

Science and religion are the two most powerful forces in the world. Having them at odds... is not productive.

What we need is an electronic encyclopedia of life, with one page for each species. On each page is given everything known about that species.

If those committed to the quest fail, they will be forgiven. When lost, they will find another way. The moral imperative of humanism is the endeavor alone, whether successful or not, provided the effort is honorable and failure memorable.

You are capable of more than you know. Choose a goal that seems right for you and strive to be the best, however hard the path. Aim high. Behave honorably. Prepare to be alone at times, and to endure failure. Persist! The world needs all you can give.

For me, the peculiar qualities of faith are a logical outcome of this level of biological organization.

I had in mind a message, although I hope it doesn't intrude too badly, persuading Americans, and especially Southerners, of the critical importance of land and our vanishing natural environment and wildlife.

I doubt that most people with short-term thinking love the natural world enough to save it.

It's the technique, I think, of writing a novel that is difficult for a nonfiction writer.

Every kid has a bug period... I never grew out of mine.

We ought to recognize that religious strife is not the consequence of differences among people. It's about conflicts between creation stories.

One thing I did was grow up as an ardent naturalist. I never grew out of my bug period.