People respect nonfiction but they read novels.

The ant world is a tumult, a noisy world of pheromones being passed back and forth.

And pigs may fly. And we may be able to terraform and send surface populations to Mars. And Jesus may come next week anyway, so it doesn't matter one way or the other. All these crazy things run through people's minds.

Destroying rainforest for economic gain is like burning a Renaissance painting to cook a meal.

Hands-on experience at the critical time, not systematic knowledge, is what counts in the making of a naturalist. Better to be an untutored savage for a while, not to know the names or anatomical detail. Better to spend stretches of time just searching and dreaming.

I thought perhaps it should be recognized that religious people, including fundamentalists, are quite intelligent, many of them are highly educated, and they should be treated with complete respect.

The closer the genetic relationship of the family members, as for example father-to-son, as opposed to uncle-to-nephew, the higher the degree of cooperation.