People From Philadelphia

"Everything changes when we look at the evidence; what looks impossible actually happened."

"The order of fossils in the world’s rocks is powerful evidence of our connections to the rest of life."

"Our fish ancestors had internal and external nostrils, too, and to nobody’s surprise these are the same fish that have armbones and other features in common with us."

"For thousands of years, mankind considered itself the pinnacle of life’s creation on a planet sitting in the center of the universe. Science changed that perception. Leavitt, Hubble, and others helped us see that we live near the margin of a vast galaxy, in a universe of galaxies, with our planet one of many worlds. Darwin and the biologists had their say too. Our entire species is but one little twig on an enormous tree of life filled with all life on earth. But each discovery that moves us from the center of creation to some obscure corner brings an entirely new relation between us, other species, and the entire universe."

"What do billions of years of history mean for our lives today? Answers to fundamental questions we face—about the inner workings of our organs and our place in nature—will come from understanding how our bodies and minds have emerged from parts common to other living creatures. I can imagine few things more beautiful or intellectually profound than finding the basis for our humanity, and remedies for many of the ills we suffer, nestled inside some of the most humble creatures that have ever lived on our planet."

"Humans are a timekeeping species, and much of our history can be traced to the ways we parse the moments of our lives."

"The thrill of the scientific hunt is to have an idea whose truth is hitched to predictions that take us to new places to explore, objects to discover, and data to analyze."

"[The Powels were] difficult to separate from each other, who lived together not as man and wife… but as two friends, happily matched in point of understanding, taste, and information."

"Powel: Well, Doctor, what have we got? Benjamin Franklin: A republic, Madam, if you can keep it. Powel: And why not keep it? Franklin: Because the people, on tasting the dish, are always disposed to eat more of it than does them good."

"When in society she will animate and give a brilliancy to the whole Conversation; you know the uncommons command she has of Language and her ideas flow with rapidity."

"Contrary to American custom, [Mrs. Powel] plays the leading role in the family. What chiefly distinguishes her is her taste for conversation [and] her wit and knowledge."

"Your resignation wou'd elate the Enemies of good Government...They would say that you were actuated by Principles of self-Love alone—that you saw the Post was not tenable with any Prospect of adding to your Fame. The antifederalists would use it as an argument for dissolving the Union, and would urge that you, from Experience, had found the present System a bad one, and had, artfully, withdrawn from it that you might not be crushed under its Ruins."

"[You] have frequently demonstrated that you possess an Empire over yourself. For Gods sake do not yield that Empire to a Love of Ease, Retirement, rural Pursuits, or a false Diffidence of Abilities which those that best know you so justly appreciate. Convince the World then that you are a practical Philosopher, and that your native Philanthropy has inducted you to relinquish an Object so Essiential to your Happiness...That you are not indifferent to the Plaudits of the World I must conclude when I believe that the love of honest Fame has and ever will be predominate in the best the noblest and most capable Natures. Nor is the Approbation of Mankind to be disregarded with Impunity even by you."

"I presume your Grand Children are with you, and doubt not that they will afford you every consolation that existing Circumstances will admit. Present me affectionately and sympathetically to them they also have lost a protecting affectionate Connection, and I have lost a much valued Friend."

"I have certainly experienced severe trials, and some hard dispensations of Providence … To travel with some dignity, innocence, and usefulness, down the Road which leads from the Morning of Youth to the Night of the Grave, is perhaps as much as we can flatter ourselves with accomplishing."

"Dined at Mr. Powells -- A most sinfull Feast again! Every Thing which could delight the Eye, or allure the Taste."

"Like Mira, Virtue’s Self possess Let her adorn your Mind For Virtue in a pleasing dress Has Charms for all Mankind Her spotless Mantle shall be shown When its blest Owner flies The Flaming Chariot make it known When Soaring to the Skies."

"[A]n order of magnitude quantitative change in technology can make a qualitative change in the lifestyle we enjoy."

"We’re just getting out of domestic situation plays in which we were examining our lifestyle. We’ve been portrayed as a unique, complex kind of people…and there’s a lot more that we can bring to the public. The truth is we do everything."

"What happens is this: when we come to believe that the only way to make change is to murder one another, the idea of “the other” makes less valuable the human life it possesses. As a consequence, we can kill the “other” and not feel guilty. Unfortunately, human beings spend too much time rationalizing that war is right under certain circumstances; that it’s okay to threaten and kill other human beings."

"We speak [in traditional portrayal] one abominable language—hip; we have one interest—women. Our lives have no beginning, no ending. We’re highly emotional in terms of reactive violence, and we do not use our minds in any way."

"I didn’t start writing to tell happy, little stories. I started writing to make some impact on the world in which I live. If you don’t want to say anything about sexual assault, that’s your business, but I want to say something about it. I think it is absolutely and unequivocally wrong. We have no right because we are in the military to rape fellow soldiers who just happen to be females. A lot of victims are male as well. In the Army I was in, the life of the person next to you was as valuable as your own. You would never do anything to hurt your comrade. Your life depended on him, and in the case of Iraq, those gentlemen’s lives depended on the women they were raping. It’s horrifying."

"Age-related sensory changes can be traced to degeneration in some of the cells and cell products that compose the sense organ itself."

"Natural selection favors animals that are most likely to become reproductively successful by developing better survival strategies and greater reserve capacity in vital systems to better escape predation, disease, accidents, and environmental extremes. Natural selection diminishes after reproductive success because the species will not benefit from members favored for greater longevity. The level of physiological reserve remaining after reproductive maturity determines longevity and evolves incidental to the selection process that acts on earlier developmental events. Physiological reserve does not renew at the same rate that it incurs losses because molecular disorder increases at a rate greater than the capacity for repair. These are age changes, and they increase vulnerability to predation, accidents, or disease."

"Geron's board was a Who's Who of telomere research, with a little biological stardust thrown in. It included Carol Greider (who ran a lab at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory now), Woody Wright and Jerry Shay, Michael West's former mentors at the University of Texas; James Watson, the famed codiscoverer of the double helix; and, for historical, scientific, and even sentimental reasons, Leonard Hayflick."

"Since the first cell culture was set at the beginning of the twentieth century it was believed that all cultured cells, if provided with the proper conditions, would replicate indefinitely. Sixty years later we overthrew this dogma by finding that normal cells have a finite capacity to replicate and that only abnormal or cancer cell populations can replicate indefinitely. We interpreted these findings to bear on our understanding of the aging process. If, as had been previously thought, normal cells can replicate indefinitely, then age changes could not have an intracellular origin. Our findings demonstrated that, on the contrary, age changes do have an intracellular origin. The hundreds of changes that were subsequently found to precede the loss of replicative capacity have been interpreted to be age changes and the finitude of replication to be an expression of longevity determination. Subsequent findings by others have determined the molecular mechanism that governs the finitude of normal cell replicative capacity and how immortal cancer cells escape this inevitability."

"“Having trouble with the help?” I asked. “Trying to weed out those who kiss other asses to cover their own,” she said. “There are people who get things done, and people who just get in the way.”"

"“All I’m hearing is ‘I can’t’ when I needed that data yesterday. Go bore someone else with your excuses.”"

"Humans are driven by emotion. Much of our so-called logic is merely the rationalization of choices that make us feel good."

"Its purpose is the same as every other organism. To survive."

"“If not, we’ll go to plan B.” “Which is?” “I don’t know. I’ll make it up if we need it.”"

"The whole earth is solar powered. The movement of clouds and air and water, the growth of plants and animals, it’s all just a big heat engine driven by the sun. Humanity has spent so long binging on fossil fuels that we’ve forgotten where it all comes from."

"“When history looks back on this century,” Paul said, “they will see it as an aberration. A bizarre spike on the energy graph when we suddenly realized the Earth had millions of years of the sun’s energy stored underground and used it all up in a brief blaze of glory. The worst thing that ever happened to the human race was the invention of the steam engine.” “You’re kidding me,” I said. “All of modern human advancement and invention, enabling billions of people to survive, that’s all nothing? Medicine? Global communication? Modern agriculture?” “It’s a glitch. It’s like blowing your whole trust fund in a weekend. When the fund runs out, you’ve got to live on your income.”"

"Nobody knows: they just believe, and then because everyone else believes it, too, it feels like it couldn’t possibly be wrong. But consensus doesn’t mean truth. In fact, it means a lack of critical thinking, a blind following of the status quo. Humans are really good at doing that, too."

"Beneath their costumery of progressive benevolence, liberal Hollywood “helpers” and global do-gooders exhibit a cold indifference toward the actual wants and needs of their supposed beneficiaries in the Third World. They’re raising hundreds of millions for abortions, not for food, water and education."

"We live in a self-defeating culture that pays lip service to heroic action in times of crisis, yet brutally punishes the very kind of snap judgments and instant security profiling that make such heroism possible in the first place."

"The “new” war on conservatives on the internet is the same old attempt by desperate liberals to shut down their competitors in the marketplace of ideas. If you can’t beat ’em, deplatform ’em. That’s the progressive way. The right-wing solution is not to lie down, but to win over more converts, find new ways to disseminate our news and views, and turn up the heat. I’ve been doing it for 25-plus years and have no intention on cooling off, giving in or shutting up. Speak for those who have no voice. Support those speaking for you."

"I had the opportunity to fish as a kid, I just follow through with it. I'm not the best fisherman in the world, but I have a lot more fun than a lot of my other fishing friends in this world, who think they're supposedly experts. Sometimes the fish cooperate, sometimes they don't."

"We are either all equally free, or we are not free."

"Due process of law is an evolved way of living in a civilized fashion that protects the freedom of all."

"What gives me grounds for optimism is that this is the only country on the face of the Earth where if you tell a 10-year-old kid, "You can't do" something and it strikes him as absurd, a 10-year-old kid looks up and says "It's a free country." This is the only nation on Earth whose children say "It's a free country." It's going to take a whole lot to root that out of the American spirit."

"The problem of free speech in, both in society in general and on campus in particular, is everyone will say "I believe in free speech, but." The problem is everyone has a different "But!" exemption that they would put on free speech. So the issue really becomes, who has the power to enforce their exemptions to free speech while keeping absolute free speech for themselves?"

"What a terrible price students are paying now for the idea of comfort."

"The correct answer to speech you abhor is bearing witness to what you believe."

"Government programs once established never end, they just never end. The logic is evermore decision made by government and ever fewer decisions made by individuals. Democracy is an extraordinary thing, but Hitler could've been elected democratically. Democracy is not the same as liberty. It is not the same as individual rights."

"The logic of governmental power is to exercise it such that Republicans can talk "Terrific free market!" language until they actually have power. Where upon, its program after program and crony after crony. The extraordinary bailout occurred under the Bush administration. I think that raises extraordinary dangers of the fact that as power accumulates, it never gives anything back. Its always expanding."

"There are in the final analysis, two kinds of decisions. One, decisions you make for yourself and two decisions other people make for you, whether it's one tyrant or 51% of your fellow citizens."

"A government, a regime that is not willing to slaughter large numbers of its own citizens to stay in tyrannical power will lose power."

"I think it's almost impossible to impose a free and liberal society from the outside."

"The crucial moment of the end of the Cold War for me was the meeting between Gorbachev and Honecker, tyrant of East Germany, and Honecker said to him, and I'm sure Gorbachev is accurately conveying it, Honecker said to him if you don't send the tanks, "If you don't let us send out the tanks, it will be the fall of communism", and Gorbachev said "I wont send out the tanks, you may not send out the tanks." and I believe in China they will send out the tanks."