#biology

We are biology. We are reminded of this at the beginning and the end, at birth and at death. In between we do what we can to forget. ↗

— Mary Roach

#death #life #mary-roach #science #death

Fleshers used to spin fantasies about aliens arriving to ‘conquer’ Earth, to steal their ‘precious’ physical resources, to wipe them out for fear of ‘competition’…as if a species capable of making the journey wouldn’t have had the power, or the wit, or the imagination, to rid itself of obsolete biological imperatives. Conquering the Galaxy is what bacteria with spaceships would do – knowing no better, having no choice. ↗

— Greg Egan

#sci-fi #science #science-fiction #space-exploration #imagination

Consciousness is the chronic pain of life, and all higher organisms suffer it every waking moment. ↗

— David Marusek

#biology #consciousness #sentience #life

We all know interspecies romance is weird. ↗

— Tim Burton

#animals #biology #genetics #interspecies #love

Even when Darwin's teaching first made its appearance, it became clear at once that its scientific, materialist core, its teaching concerning the evolution of living nature, was antagonistic to the idealism that reigned in biology. ↗

— Trofim Lysenko

#appearance #became #biology #clear #concerning

After an extensive interview he arranged for my weaknesses in foreign languages to be over-looked and so I started a Biology degree at Birmingham in 1967. ↗

— Paul Nurse

#arranged #biology #birmingham #degree #extensive

A key issue in developmental biology at that time was the problem of how cells underwent differentiation, with most workers concentrating on explanations in terms of changes in enzyme and gene regulation. ↗

— Paul Nurse

#cells #changes #concentrating #developmental #differentiation

I decided that the University of Sussex in Brighton was a good place for this work because it had a strong tradition in bacterial molecular genetics and an excellent reputation in biology. ↗

— Paul Nurse

#biology #brighton #decided #excellent #genetics

Quick dinner with ... Ang [Lee] and his wife Jane who's visiting with the children for a while. We talked about her work as a microbiologist and the behaviour of the epithingalingie under the influence of cholesterol. She's fascinated by cholesterol. Says it's very beautiful: bright yellow. She says Ang is wholly uninterested. He has no idea what she does. I check this out for myself. 'What does Jane do?' I ask. 'Science,' he says vaguely. ↗

— Emma Thompson

#cholesterol #disparate-interests #husbands #lack-of-interest #married-couples

That natural selection can produce changes within a type is disputed by no one, not even the staunchest creationist. But that it can transform one species into another — that, in fact, has never been observed. ↗

— Robert J. Sawyer

#darwin #darwinism #evolution #natural-selection #neo-darwinism