I would rather label the whole enterprise of setting a biological value upon groups for what it is: irrelevant, intellectually unsound, and… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share Image
Transitional forms are generally lacking at the species level, but they are abundant between larger groups. — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share Image
If evolution almost always occurs by rapid speciation in small, peripheral isolates, then what should the fossil record look like? We are… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share Image
In their recently aborted struggle to inject Genesis literalism into science classrooms, fundamentalist groups followed their usual opportunistic strategy of arguing two… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share Image
Since we proposed punctuated equilibria to explain trends, it is infuriating to be quoted again and again by creationists-whether through design or… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share Image
I have often been amused by our vulgar tendency to take complex issues, with solutions at neither extreme of a continuum of… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share Image
We are here because one odd group of fishes had a peculiar fin anatomy that could transform into legs for terrestrial creatures;… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share Image
Our current drug crisis is a tragedy born of a phony system of classification. For reasons that are little more than accidents… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share Image
Biological determinism is, in its essence, a theory of limits. It takes the current status of groups as a measure of where… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share Image
I strongly reject any conceptual scheme that places our options on a line, and holds that the only alternative to a pair of extreme… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
In his anti-Darwinian book... (and eponymously named The Neck of the Giraffe ), Francis Hitching tells the story... "The need to survive by reaching… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
... many folks take them seriously because they just 'know' that evolution can never be seen in the immediate here and now. In fact,… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
Charles Darwin viewed the fossil record more as an embarrassment than as an aid to his theory ... — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
Zoocentrism is the primary fallacy of human sociobiology, for this view of human behavior rests on the argument that if the actions of "lower"… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
The world, unfortunately, rarely matches our hopes and consistently refuses to behave in a reasonable manner. — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
The true beauty of nature is her amplitude; she exists neither for nor because of us, and possesses a staying power that all our… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
With copious evidence ranging from Plato's haughtiness to Beethoven's tirades, we may conclude that the most brilliant people of history tend to be a… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
When scientists need to explain difficult points of theory, illustration by hypothetical example - rather than by total abstraction - works well (perhaps indispensably)… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
The truly awesome intellectuals in our history have not merely made discoveries; they have woven variegated, but firm, tapestries of comprehensive coverage. The tapestries… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
I believe that we can still have a genre of scientific books suitable for and accessible alike to professionals and interested laypeople. The concepts… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
Science simply cannot adjudicate the issue of God's possible superintendence of nature. — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
But if we laugh with derision, we will never understand. Human intellectual capacity has not altered for thousands of years so far as we… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
We debase the richness of both nature and our own minds if we view the great pageant of our intellectual history as a compendium… — Stephen Jay Gould Copy Share
