Darwin Day 2006

[greygirlbeast]

The secrets of evolution are death and time — the deaths of enormous numbers of lifeforms that were imperfectly adapted to the enviroment; and time for a long succession of small mutations that were by accident adaptive, time for the slow accumulation of patterns of favorable mutations. Part of the resistance to Darwin and Wallace derives from our difficulty in imagining the passage of the millennia, much less the aeons. What does seventy million years mean to beings who live only one-millionth as long? We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it forever. — Carl Sagan


Charles Darwin (1809-1882)

Comments

[sovay]

This is my favorite photograph of Darwin, I think:



Thank you for your post, especially the quotation.

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

Thank you for your post, especially the quotation.

You're welcome. I like that Darwin photo, too. The child looks so very suspicious of the camera...

[tactileson.livejournal.com]

A wonderful quote. It lifts me out of the nonsense I hear so often from those creationists, and makes me want to go dig out my copy of Dragons of Eden by Sagan that is buried somewhere in one of my many boxes of books.

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

and makes me want to go dig out my copy of Dragons of Eden by Sagan that is buried somewhere in one of my many boxes of books.

There's a book I haven't read in ages. I love it, thought.