#bio

There is an element of autobiography in all fiction in that pain or distress, or pleasure, is based on the author's own. But in my case that is as far as it goes. ↗

— William Trevor

#author #autobiography #based #case #distress

Of all the species of literary composition, perhaps biography is the most delightful. The attention concentrated on one individual gives a unity to the materials of which it is composed, which is wanting in general history. ↗

— Robert Hall

#biography #composed #composition #concentrated #delightful

In the 21st century our tastes buds, our brain chemistry, our biochemistry, our hormones and our kitchens have been hijacked by the food industry. ↗

— Mark Hyman

#been #biochemistry #brain #buds #century

The monopoly of science in the realm of knowledge explains why evolutionary biologists do not find it meaningful to address the question whether the Darwinian theory is true. ↗

— Phillip E. Johnson

#biologists #darwinian #darwinian theory #evolutionary #explains

In some ways it's taken me decades to come clean and make honest work - and still to this day, sometimes I find myself wanting to hide behind my work and deny the more biographical aspects. ↗

— David Knopfler

#behind #biographical #clean #come #day

You've had an extremely weak euro on the foreign exchange markets, you've had a very dubious policy being followed. ↗

— John Major

#dubious #euro #exchange #extremely #followed

In science's pecking order, evolutionary biology lurks somewhere near the bottom, far closer to phrenology than to physics. For evolutionary biology is a historical science, laden with history's inevitable imponderables. We evolutionary biologists cannot generate a Cretaceous Park to observe exactly what killed the dinosaurs; and, unlike "harder" scientists, we usually cannot resolve issues with a simple experiment, such as adding tube A to tube B and noting the color of the mixture. ↗

— Jerry A. Coyne

#confessions-of-the-darwinists #conjecture #darwin #darwinism #darwinist-confessions

A wonderful area for speculative academic work is the unknowable. These days religious subjects are in disfavor, but there are still plenty of good topics. The nature of consciousness, the workings of the brain, the origin of aggression, the origin of language, the origin of life on earth, SETI and life on other worlds...this is all great stuff. Wonderful stuff. You can argue it interminably. But it can't be contradicted, because nobody knows the answer to any of these topics. ↗

— Michael Crichton

#brain #conjecture #consciousness #darwinism #evolution

The phrase 'the fossil record' sounds impressive and authoritative. As used by some persons it becomes, as intended, intimidating, taking on the aura of esoteric truth as expounded by an elite class of specialists. But what is it, really, this fossil record? Only data in search of interpretation. All claims to the contrary that I know, and I know of several, are so much superstition. ↗

— Gareth J. Nelson

#darwin #darwinism #evolution #fossil-record #fossils

Birth after birth the line unchanging runs, And fathers live transmitted in their sons; Each passing year beholds the unvarying kinds, The same their manners, and the same their minds:Till, as erelong successive buds decay, And insect-shoals successive pass away, Increasing wants the pregnant parent vex With the fond wish to form a softer sex. .. ↗

— Erasmus Darwin

#brilliant #life #nature-s-grandeur #science #life