The greatest impact of the Darwinian revolution…was that it completed the liberation from superstition and fear that began in the physical sciences a few centuries before. Man, too, is a natural phenomenon. [in “The evolutionary...

Man is a glorious and unique species of animal. The species originated by evolution…. Future evolution could raise man to superb heights as yet hardly glimpsed, but it will not automatically do so. As far...

If a sect does officially insist that its structure of belief demands that evolution be false, then no compromise is possible. An honest and competent biology teacher can only conclude that the sect’s beliefs are...

It is inherent in any definition of science that statements that cannot be checked by observation are not really saying anything or at least they are not science.

Man is the result of a purposeless and natural process that did not have him in mind.

What is man?” is probably the most profound that can be asked by man. It has always been central to any system of philosophy or theology…. The point I want to make now is that...

Species evolve exactly as if they were adapting as best they could to a changing world, and not at all as if they were moving toward a set goal.

To put it crudely but graphically, the monkey who did not have a realistic perception of the tree branch he jumped for was soon a dead monkey—and therefore did not become one of our ancestors.

Man has risen, not fallen. He can choose to develop his capacities as the highest animal and to try to rise still farther, or he can choose otherwise. The choice is his responsibility, and his...

I don’t think that evolution is supremely important because it is my specialty; it is my specialty because I think it is supremely important. [In: Edward J. Larson (2004) Evolution, Modern Library. p. 250]

Among the things most characteristic of organisms–most distinctive of living as opposed to inorganic systems–is a sort of directedness. Their structures and activities have an adaptedness, an evident and vital usefulness to the organism. Darwin’s...

The conflict between science and religion has a single and simple cause. It is the designation as religiously canonical of any conception of the material world open to scientific investigation….As a matter of fact, most...

Over and over again in the study of the history of life it appears that what can happen does happen. There is little suggestion that what occurs must occur, that it was fated or that...

If I didn’t fear I’d do you harm…I’d try to make you an atheist. I really do think that you are a deluded follower of mistaken and superstitious and cowardly theories. That’s as far as...

[Darwin] gave an answer to the tremendous question that so deeply concerns…What is Man? [He] answered this question to the effect that man is a natural product of the universe;…man is an animal, a vertebrate,...