Quote

If one could conclude as to the nature of the Creator from a study of creation it would appear that God has an inordinate fondness for stars and beetles.

John B. S. Haldane

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

John B. S. Haldane
Age: 72 †
Born: 1892
Born: November 5
Died: 1964
Died: December 1
Biochemist
Biologist
Geneticist
Physiologist
Scientist
University Teacher
Hartford
Connecticut
J. B. S. Haldane
John Burdon Sanderson Haldane
Stars
Inordinate
Nature
Beetles
Would
Fondness
Conclude
Appear
Creator
Creation
Study

More quotes by John B. S. Haldane

Image
Shelley and Keats were the last English poets who were at all up to date in their chemical knowledge.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
The conclusion forced upon me in the course of a life devoted to natural science is that the universe as it is assumed to be in physical science is only an idealized world, while the real universe is the spiritual universe in which spiritual values count for everything.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
It was a reaction from the old idea of protoplasm, a name which was a mere repository of ignorance.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
In fact, words are well adapted for description and the arousing of emotion, but for many kinds of precise thought other symbols are much better.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
Science affects the average man and woman in two ways already. He or she benefits by its application driving a motor-car or omnibus instead of a horse-drawn vehicle, being treated for disease by a doctor or surgeon rather than a witch, and being killed with an automatic pistol or shell in place of a dagger or a battle-axe.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
I will give up my belief in evolution if someone finds a fossil rabbit in the Precambrian.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
I suppose the process of acceptance will pass through the usual four stages: (i) this is worthless nonsense (ii) this is an interesting, but perverse, point of view (iii) this is true, but quite unimportant (iv) I always said so.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
You can drop a mouse down a thousand-yard mine shaft and, on arriving at the bottom, it gets a slight shock and walks away. A rat would probably be killed, though it can fall safely from the eleventh story of a building, a man is broken, a horse splashes.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
Haldane was engaged in discussion with an eminent theologian. What inference, asked the latter, might one draw about the nature of God from a study of his works? Haldane replied: An inordinate fondness for beetles.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
A time will however come (as I believe) when physiology will invade and destroy mathematical physics, as the latter has destroyed geometry.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
This is my prediction for the future: Whatever hasn't happened will happen, and no one will be safe from it.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
I am quite sure that our views on evolution would be very different had biologists studied genetics and natural selection before and not after most of them were convinced that evolution had occurred.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
We do not know, in most cases, how far social failure and success are due to heredity, and how far to environment. But environment is the easier of the two to improve.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
There is no great invention, from fire to flying, which has not been hailed as an insult to some god.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
I think, however, that so long as our present economic and national systems continue, scientific research has little to fear.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
I do not believe in the commercial possibility of induced radioactivity.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
I have no doubt that in reality the future will be vastly more surprising than anything I can imagine. Now my own suspicion is that the Universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
Blake expressed some doubt as to whether God had made the tiger. But the tiger is in many ways an admirable animal. We have now to ask whether God made the tapeworm. And it is questionable whether an affirmative answer fits in either with what we know about the process of evolution or what many of us believe about the moral perfection of God.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
I have come to the conclusion that my subjective account of my motivation is largely mythical on almost all occasions. I don't know why I do things.
John B. S. Haldane
Image
The wise man regulates his conduct by the theories both of religion and science. But he regards these theories not as statements of ultimate fact but as art-forms.
John B. S. Haldane