It's easier to change what you do than people think it is. If you don't change, your field changes around you.

Why do we do basic research? To learn about ourselves.

Biology will relate every human gene to the genes of other animals and bacteria, to this great chain of being.

The virtues of science are skepticism and independence of thought.

The interaction of the variation in our genes is what's responsible for lots of our attributes and vigor.

We haven't been able yet to determine in terms of genes what makes a human being a human and not another mammal.

Three billion bases of DNA sequence can be put on a single compact disc and one will be able to pull a CD out of one's pocket and say, 'Here is a human being; it's me!'

The community as a whole doesn't listen patiently to critics who adopt alternative viewpoints. Although the great lesson of history is that knowledge develops through the conflict of viewpoints.

Early on, it's good to develop the ability to write. Learning to write is a useful exercise, even if what you're writing about is not that relevant.

The human's place in the universe will be set in the scheme of evolution, the product of our biological inheritance.

We are embedded in a biological world and related to the organisms around us.

The Bible is the greatest love story ever told.

If conquest constitutes a natural right on the part of the few, the many have only to gather sufficient strength in order to acquire the natural right of reconquering what has been taken from them

If you read quickly to get through a poem to what it means, you have missed the body of the poem.

New York waiters, probably the surliest in the Western world . . . are better images of their city than that journalistic favorite the taxi driver.

I don't particularly like to go see 3D movies, but when I'm doing it I kind of do enjoy it. I enjoy seeing the image in 3D, there's a childhood fun about being able to see those dimensions.

I have long discovered that geologists never read each other's works, and that the only object in writing a book is a proof of earnestness.

In so complex a thing as human nature, we must consider it is hard to find rules without exception.

To be rational is so glorious a thing, that two-legged creatures generally content themselves with the title.

Why did adults have to be so thick? They always say “tell the truth,” and when you do, they don’t believe you. What’s the point?

Among the things that you, and you alone, are the absolute and final judge of is whether or not you are a success.