Coevolution Quotes

Through the evolutionary process, those who are able to engage in social cooperation of various sorts do better in survival and reproduction.

We did not domesticate wheat; wheat domesticated us.

Widely dispersed knowledge concerning the important role of basic cooperative processes among living beings may lead to the acceptance of cooperation as a guiding principle both in social theory and as a basis for human behavior. Such a development when it occurs will alter the course of human history.

A tree is alive, and thus it is always more than you can see. Roots to leaves, yes-those you can, in part, see. But it is more-it is the lichens and moss and ferns that grow on its bark, the life too small to see that lives among its roots, a community we know of, but do not think on. It is every fly and bee and beetle that uses it for shelter or food, every bird that nests in its branches. Every one an individual, and yet every one part of the tree, and the tree part of every one.

In the course of evolution, it constantly happens that, independently of each other, two different forms of life take similar, parallel paths in adapting themselves to the same external circumstances.

The way to understand how different species evolved is to think about the niches that they fill in an ecosystem - basically, how they make a living.

I think competition is the best thing for everyone. Competition is what makes us evolve, from when we were itty bitty little tadpoles in prehistoric times to what we've turned into now. Competition makes us evolve and makes us push ourselves better.

In the present epoch of struggle between two worlds the two opposing and antagonistic trends penetrating the foundations of nearly all branches of biology are particularly sharply defined.

It has become evident that the primary lesson of the study of evolution is that all evolution is coevolution: every organism is evolving in tandem with the organisms around it.

It gives evolutionary biologists great status if they champion competition and the economists have to consult them. The economists have to consult the evolutionary biologists, because they are the ones who invented the idea of competition. It comes from the field of evolution.

We observe closely related species in sympatry and infer how they evolved from a common ancestor.

But of course, what the eagle does not realize is that it is participating in a very crude form of natural selection.One day a tortoise will learn how to fly.

You could think of an ecosystem as a bunch of antagonistic arms races, almost: Everything that an animal depends upon for food is the body part of some other animal or plant who would just as soon keep that body part for itself.

In the animal world, there are all kinds of behaviors that are binary: for example, to flee or to fight. In any evolutionary environment, knowing your opponent's decision would not be advantageous for long because your opponent would evolve the same recognition mechanism to also know you.

...think of agriculture as something the grasses did to people to conquer the trees.

I am decidedly of the opinion that in very many instances we can trace such a necessary connexion, especially among birds, and often with more complete success than in the case which I have here attempted to explain.

I have been interested in phenomena involving complexity, diversity and evolution since I was a young boy.

People wouldn’t have become who we are today if we hadn’t coevolved with dogs.

I should premise that I use the term “Struggle for Existence” in a large and Metaphorical Sense, including dependence of one being on another, and including (which is more important) success in leaving progeny.

If you really want to study evolution, you've got go outside sometime, because you'll see symbiosis everywhere!

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

If plants could be credited with reasoning powers, we would marvel at the imaginative ways they bribe or ensnare other creatures to carry out their wishes.