Everything in nature is the result of fixed laws.
Charles DarwinRead
The very essence of instinct is that it's followed independently of reason.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Instinct drives behavior without the influence of rational thought.
In this quote, Charles Darwin emphasizes that instinct operates on a fundamental level, guiding actions and decisions, often in ways that are not governed by logical reasoning. This observation highlights the primal nature of instinct as a crucial component of human and animal behavior, suggesting that our instincts can compel us to act in certain ways without deliberation or conscious reasoning.
Themes
InstinctReasonBehaviorNatureDecision
In practice
Example use cases
During a discussion about the nature of decision-making, one might quote Darwin to emphasize the role of instinct.
More from Charles Darwin
All quotes βThe highest possible stage in moral culture is when we recognize that we ought to control our thoughts.
Charles DarwinRead
I am quite conscious that my speculations run beyond the bounds of true science....It is a mere rag of an hypothesis with as many flaw[s] & holes as sound parts.
Charles DarwinRead
We cannot fathom the marvelous complexity of an organic being; but on the hypothesis here advanced this complexity is much increased. Each living creature must be looked at as a microcosm--a little universe, formed of a host of self-propagating organisms, inconceivably minute and as numerous as the stars in heaven.
Charles DarwinRead
I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of Natural Selection.
Charles DarwinRead
we are always slow in admitting any great change of which we do not see the intermediate steps
Charles DarwinRead
Similar quotes
While we rejoice in the new possibilities open to humanity, we also see the dangers arising from these possibilities, and we must ask ourselves how we can overcome them.
Pope Benedict XviRead
As a real person, he wouldn't last a minute, would he? But drama is about imperfection. And we've moved away from the aspirational hero. We got tired of it, it was dull. If I was House's friend, I would hate it. How he so resolutely refuses to be happy or take the kind-hearted road. But we don't always like morally good people, do we?
Hugh LaurieRead
War don't ennoble men, it turns 'em into dogs. It poisons the soul.
James JonesRead
For a moment of night we have a glimpse of ourselves and of our world islanded in a stream of stars - pilgrims of mortality, voyaging between horizons across the eternal seas of space and time.
Henry BestonRead
The poor is the center of the Gospel. If we take out the poor, we cannot understand the message of Christ
Pope FrancisRead
Money is what fueled the industrial society. But in the informational society, the fuel, the power, is knowledge. One has now come to see a new class structure divided by those who have information and those who must function out of ignorance. This new class has its power not from money, not from land, but from knowledge.
John Kenneth GalbraithRead