Quotes from book
An Urchin in the Storm

Stephen Jay Gould

An Urchin in the Storm is a 1987 essay collection from paleontologist and science writer Stephen Jay Gould.

“No serious student of human behavior denies the potent influence of evolved biology upon our cultural lives. Our struggle is to figure out how biology affects us, not whether it does.”

Stephen Jay Gould book An Urchin in the Storm

Source: An Urchin in the Storm (1987) "Nurturing Nature", p. 152

“An overtly expressed political commitment does not debar a scientist from viewing nature accurately—if only because no honest scientist or effective political activist would be foolish enough to advance a program in evident discord with the world as we find it.”

Stephen Jay Gould book An Urchin in the Storm

Source: An Urchin in the Storm (1987) "Nurturing Nature", p. 150

“No one doubts that biological universals exist. We must sleep, eat, and grow older, and we are not about to give up procreation; almost all our social institutions are influenced by these imperatives.”

Stephen Jay Gould book An Urchin in the Storm

Source: An Urchin in the Storm (1987) "Genes on the Brain", p. 113

“The study of social setting does not imply either the irrelevance or nonexistence of a factual world out there.”

Stephen Jay Gould book An Urchin in the Storm

Source: An Urchin in the Storm (1987) "The Power of Narrative", p. 84