Simon Conway Morris Quotes

The way Conway Morris goes about biting the hand that once fed him would make a shoal of piranha seem decorous.

Ethics are pre-determined and a matter of discovery, not a evolved concept.

['Intelligent Design'] is a theology for control freaks.

If there were a clear prospect that such evils were part of a barbarian past, then at least we might find a small crumb of comfort. No such prospect exists: no scientific analysis can even remotely answer or account for past and present horrors of human behaviour.

I would argue that in any habitable zone that doesn't boil or freeze, intelligent life is going to emerge because intelligence is convergent.

The fact that some things are mysterious or that they touch on mystery isn't in some way a capitulation, and one should realize that there are some things that we may never understand and, to that extent, should be humbled by that.

Life's Solution builds a forceful case for the predictability of evolutionary outcomes, not in terms of genetic details but rather their broad phenotypic manifestations. The case rests on a remarkable compilation of examples of convergent evolution, in which two or more lineages have independently evolved similar structures and functions.

I think the intellectual consistency of Christianity in historical evidence is frankly overwhelming, but my materialist colleagues regard me as a slightly sad case.

It is difficult to imagine evolution in alien planets operating in any manner other than Darwinian.

Most of the tree of life is effectively arranged.

I am driven to observe of the ultra-Darwinists the following features as symptomatic. First, to my eyes, is their almost unbelievable self-assurance, their breezy self-confidence.

Pikaia is a missing link because, of all chordates, it's probably the most primitive.

As a number of people have stressed over the years, I think it would be premature to assume science itself will explain everything.

On a perfect planet such as might be acceptable to a physicist, one might predict that from its origin the diversity of life would grow exponentially until the carrying capacity, however defined, was reached. The fossil record on Earth, however, tells a very different story.

If one compares the sequence of amino acids that go to form the protein haemoglobin, it becomes apparent that humans and chimps are identical and do not differ in a single site ...

It seldom seems to strike the ultra-Darwinists that theology might have its own richness and subtleties, and might strange thought actually tell us things about the world that are not only to our real advantage, but will never be revealed by science.

I don't think an alien will be a blob. If aliens are out there they should have evolved just like us. They should have eyes and be walking on two legs. In short if there is any life out there then it is likely to be very similar to us.

The underlying reason for convergence seems to be that all organisms are under constant scrutiny of natural selection and are also subject to the constraints of the physical and chemical factors that severely limit the action of all inhabitants of the biosphere. Put simply, convergence shows that in a real world not all things are possible.

The Burgess Shale is not unique, but for those who study evolution and fossils it has become something of an icon. It provides a reference point and a benchmark, a point of common discussion and an issue of universal scientific interest.

By obtaining a sense of its place in the unfolding drama of life, set in an ecological theatre, so we can understand why it has become one of the leading players.

One can say with reasonable confidence that the likelihood of something analogous to a human evolving is really pretty high.

Scientists don't believe anything.Scientists test things.

Richard Dawkins is arguably England's most pious atheist.