Today Charles Darwin is best known for establishing the fact of evolution and for recognizing the major role of natural selection in driving it.

The past was still a Golden Age, of ignorance, while the present is an Iron Age of willful bliss.

The main thing that gives me hope is the media. We have radio, TV, magazines, and books, so we have the possibility of learning from societies that are remote from us, like Somalia. We turn on the TV and see what blew up in Iraq or we see conditions in Afghanistan.

Measles and TB evolved from diseases of our cattle, influenza from a disease of pigs, and smallpox possibly from a disease of camels. The Americas had very few native domesticated animal species from which humans could acquire such diseases.

The Anasazi did manage to construct in stone the largest and tallest buildings erected in North America until the Chicago steel girder skyscrapers of the 1880s.

Take air quality in the United States today: It's about 30 percent better than it was 25 years ago, even though there are now more people driving more cars.

All recognized famous inventors had capable predecessors and successors and made their improvements at a time when society was capable of using their product.