John Maynard Smith Quotes

The evolution of sex is the hardest problem in evolutionary biology.

John Maynard Smith

• Sex

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Quotes to Explore

• I found out that there was this project called the 'Great Green Wall' where they wanted to plant trees across the Sahara desert, and the idea was born that I wanted to create a support structure for that initiative.

  

  Magnus Larsson
  • Great
  • Support
  • Wall

• I have no special talent, you know. I never took a writing course before I began to write.

  

  Patricia Reilly Giff
  • Writing
  • Know
  • Talent

• But you have to understand that I consider myself a very modest artist, or whatever, and not of importance really at all - it is quite embarrassing to me to be asked my opinion about things. I am only a wee Scottish poet on the outside of everything.

  

  Ian Hamilton Finlay
  • Artist
  • Poet
  • Embarrassing

• Honor sinks where commerce long prevails.

  

  Walter Bagehot
  • Long
  • Honor
  • Where

• I'd rather be strongly wrong than weakly right.

  

  Tallulah Bankhead
  • Right
  • Wrong
  • Rather

• I had a wonderful mother who wanted my sister and me to have everything, even though money was a very prominent thing we didn't have. But we had a very happy childhood - pretty much ideal, in fact.

  

  Natalie Babbitt
  • Money
  • Happy
  • Mother

• I have a tendency to think that when you portray baddies in movies, they come out more human than good guys.

  

  Vincent Cassel
  • Good
  • Think
  • Movies

• When we're back home, I feel pretty domesticated.

  

  Washed Out
  • Home
  • Pretty
  • Feel

• I found a certain kind of music congenial to me; it never occurred to me to write music that was academically acceptable.

  

  Carlisle Floyd
  • Music
  • Me
  • Kind

• I am not the kind of director who sits in a chair smoking a cigar talking with a microphone to 10 assistants. I need to move. To touch. To put a painting on a wall. To arrange a set.

  

  Federico Fellini
  • Painting
  • Director
  • Move

• There is no job description for the first lady and she's only there because her husband got elected president.

  

  Nancy Reagan
  • She
  • Job
  • Husband

• I was set free because my greatest fear had been realized, and I still had a daughter who I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became a solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.

  

  Joanne Rowling
  • Life
  • Free
  • Fear

• If this is the end of the world, give me a fork and a knife.

  

  Dana Goodyear
  • World
  • Me
  • End

• Small businesses have told us that having cash in their pocket is one of the primary things that they need.

  

  Karen Mills
  • Small
  • Need
  • Cash

• A good president needs a big comfort zone. He should be able to treat enemies as opportunities, appear authentic in joy and grief, stay cool under the hot lights.

  

  Nancy Gibbs
  • Good
  • Joy
  • Cool

• I'm all in favour of grand important speeches, but the president then has to link his sermons to a strategy.

  

  Zbigniew Brzezinski
  • Important
  • Strategy
  • Link

• Going to a restaurant is one of my keenest pleasures. Meeting someplace with old and new friends, ordering wine, eating food, surrounded by strangers, I think is the core of what it means to live a civilised life.

  

  Adam Gopnik
  • Life
  • Live
  • Friends

• I don't want to just add another DVD to the pile. So I think, 'Is this going to have an impact and some lasting value? Is it worth it for me to spend two years of my middle-aged life on this?' They're my criteria, and I think that's led me to more urgent projects.

  

  Larry Charles
  • Life
  • Value
  • Impact

• This is the sin against the Holy Ghost: - To speak of bloody power as right divine, And call on God to guard each vile chief's house, And for such chiefs, turn men to wolves and swine.

  

  Vachel Lindsay
  • God
  • Men
  • Power

• Love is a four-letter word, but you don't hear in nearly as often as you hear some other four-letter words. It may be a sign of our times that everyone talks openly about sex, but we seem to be embarrassed to talk about love.

  

  Thomas Sowell
  • Love
  • Sex
  • Word

• And yet to every bad there is a worse.

  

  Thomas Hardy
  • Bad

• The Four Reliances. First, rely on the spirit and meaning of the teachings, not on the words; Second, rely on the teachings, not on the personality of the teacher; Third, rely on real wisdom, not superficial interpretation; And fourth, rely on the essence of your pure Wisdom Mind, not on judgmental perceptions.

  

  Gautama Buddha
  • Spirit
  • Judge
  • Teaching

• I admire the work of brilliant actresses such as Judi Dench, Maggie Smith and Helen Mirren, who have had such varied careers. They have never stopped working, and they are as great today as they ever were.

  

  Cate Blanchett
  • Careers
  • Admire
  • Judi Dench

• The evolution of sex is the hardest problem in evolutionary biology.

  

  John Maynard Smith
  • Sex