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From the freedom to explore comes the joy of learning. From knowledge acquired by personal initiative arises the desire for more knowledge. And from mastery of the novel and beautiful world awaiting every child comes self-confidence.

E. O. Wilson

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E. O. Wilson
Age: 95
Born: 1929
Born: June 10
Autobiographer
Biologist
Ecologist
Entomologist
Ethologist
Evolutionary Biologist
Myrmecologist
Naturalist
Novelist
Science Writer
Birmingham
Alabama
E. O. Wilson
Edward Osborne
EO Wilson
E O Wilson
Edward Osborne Wilson
Wilson
Edward Wilson
Junior
World
Freedom
Arise
Desire
Confidence
Comes
Novel
Awaiting
Science
Personal
Acquired
Beautiful
Joy
Arises
Self
Learning
Initiative
Children
Child
Mastery
Every
Knowledge
Explore

More quotes by E. O. Wilson

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Darwin's dice have rolled badly for Earth. The human species is, in a word, an environmental abnormality. Perhaps a law of evolution is that intelligence usually extinguishes itself.
E. O. Wilson
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Human nature is deeper and broader than the artificial contrivance of any existing culture.
E. O. Wilson
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Ants make up two-thirds of the biomass of all the insects. There are millions of species of organisms and we know almost nothing about them.
E. O. Wilson
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It may be argued that to know one kind of beetle is to know them all. But a species is not like a molecule in a cloud of molecules-it is a unique population.
E. O. Wilson
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These slender little people (Homo Habilis), the size of modern 12 year olds, were devoid of fangs and claws and almost certainly slower on foot than the four legged animals around them. They could have succeeded in their new way of life only by relying on tools and sophisticated cooperative behavior
E. O. Wilson
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The historical circumstance of interest is that the tropical rain forests have persisted over broad parts of the continents since their origins as stronghold of the flowering plants 150 million years ago.
E. O. Wilson
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Each of these [bacterial] species are masterpieces of evolution. Each has persisted for thousands to millions of years. Each is exquisitely adapted to the environment in which it lives, interlocked with other species to form ecosystems upon which our own lives depend in ways we have not begun even to imagine.
E. O. Wilson
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[T]he true natural sciences lock together in theory and evidence to form the ineradicable technical base of modern civilization. The pseudosciences satisfy personal psychological needs... but lack the ideas or the means to contribute to the technical base.
E. O. Wilson
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In science, obsessiveness under psychological control can be a virtue.
E. O. Wilson
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The one process now going on that will take millions of years to correct is the loss of genetic and species diversity by the destruction of natural habitats. This is the folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us.
E. O. Wilson
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Humanity is part of nature, a species that evolved among other species. The more closely we identify ourselves with the rest of life, the more quickly we will be able to discover the sources of human sensibility and acquire the knowledge on which an enduring ethic, a sense of preferred direction, can be built.
E. O. Wilson
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The two major challenges for the 21st century are to improve the economic situation of the majority and save as much of the planet as we can.
E. O. Wilson
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A society that condemns homosexuality harms itself. (254)
E. O. Wilson
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Companies that are willing to share, to withhold in order to further the growth of the company, willing to try to get a better atmosphere through a demonstration of democratic principles, fairness and cooperation, a better product, those will win in the end.
E. O. Wilson
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We don't need to clear the 4 to 6 percent of the Earth's surface remaining in tropical rain forests, with most of the animal and plant species living there.
E. O. Wilson
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[Bacteria are the] dark matter of the biological world [with 4 million mostly unknown species in a ton of soil].
E. O. Wilson
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The living environment is the biosphere, the thin layer around the world of living organisms. We're part of that. Our existence is dependent on it in ways that people haven't even begun to appreciate. Our existence depends not just on its existence, but its stability and its richness.
E. O. Wilson
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I was a senior in high school when I decided I wanted to work on ants as a career. I just fell in love with them, and have never regretted it.
E. O. Wilson
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I see no way out of the problems that organized religion and tribalism create other than humans just becoming more honest and fully aware of themselves.
E. O. Wilson
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The search for knowledge is in our genes. It was put there by our distant ancestors who spread across the world, and it's never going to be quenched.
E. O. Wilson