Our planet, the Earth, is, as far as we know, unique in the universe. It contains life. Even in its most barren stretches, there are animals. Around the equator, where those two essentials for life, sunshine and moisture, are most abundant, great forests grow. And here plants and animals proliferate in such numbers that we still have not even named all the different species. Here, animals and plants, insects and birds, mammals and man live together in intimate and complex communities, each dependent on one another. Two thirds of the surface of this unique planet are covered by water, and it was here indeed that life began. From the oceans, it has spread even to the summits of the highest mountains as animals and plants have responded to the changing face of the Earth.
David AttenboroughRelated topics
begin changing complex different earth equator face far great live man moisture spread sunshine surface unique waterRelated quotes
Man derives two capital advantages from the superiority of his intellectual powers. The first is, that, as an individual, he possesses a certain comprehension of mind, whereby he contemplates and enjoys the past and the future, as well as the present. This comprehension is enlarged with the experience of every day; and by this means the happiness of man, as he advances in intellect, is continually less dependent on temporary circumstances and sensations.The next advantage resulting from the same principle, and which is, in many respects, both the cause and effect of the former, is, that the human species itself is capable of a similar and unbounded improvement; whereby mankind in a later age are greatly superior to mankind in a former age, the individuals being taken at the same time of life.
Joseph Priestley
I'm aware of the made up declarations about me that have recently begun to appear on the Internet and in emails as "Chuck Norris facts." I've seen some of them. Some are funny. Some are pretty far out. Being more a student of the Wild West than the wild world of the Internet, I'm not quite sure what to make of it. It's quite surprising. I do know that boys will be boys, and I neither take offense nor take these things too seriously. Who knows, maybe these made up one-liners will prompt young people to seek out the real facts as found in my recent autobiographical book, "Against All Odds?" They may even be interested enough to check out my novels set in the Old West, "The Justice Riders," released this month. I'm very proud of these literary efforts.
Chuck Norris
The systems view of nature and man is clearly non- anthropocentric, but it is not non-humanistic for all that. It allows us to understand that man is one species of system in a complex and embracing hierarchy of nature, and at the same time it tells us that all systems have value and intrinsic worth. They are goal-oriented, self-maintaining, and self-creating expressions of nature's penchant for order and adjustment. The status of man is not lessened by admitting the amoeba as his kin, nor by recognizing that sociocultural systems are his supersystems. Seeing himself as a connecting link in a complex natural hierarchy cancels man's anthropocentrism, but seeing the hierarchy itself as an expression of self-ordering and self-creating nature bolsters his self-esteem and encourages his humanism.
Ervin László
It is one of the most beautiful characteristics of Theosophy that it gives back to people in a more rational form everything which was really useful and helpful to them in the religions which they have outgrown... in this teaching as to the immortality of the soul and the life after death, Theosophy...does not put forward these great truths merely on the authority of some sacred book of long ago; in speaking of these subjects it is not dealing with pious opinions, or metaphysical speculations, but with solid, definite facts, as real and as close to us as the air we breathe or the houses we live in - facts of which many among us have constant experience - facts among which lies the daily work of some of our students, as will presently be seen.
Charles Webster Leadbeater
Did you know that when God made the universe, he didn't lift one finger? He didn't turn one screw or pound one nail. He just spoke and every molecule lined up. That's incredible to think about. When He speaks, the waves lay down; the wind quits blowing. When He speaks, the dead come to life. When He speaks, the universe is created! Everything obeys the voice of God, except us. He's having some trouble out of us right now. But He's going to fix that one of these days when "every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father," coming to a city near you. But the scoffers are willingly ignorant of how God made the heavens by His Word, and they're ignorant of how the earth was standing out of the water and in the water.
Kent Hovind