Richard E. Blackwelder famous quotes

The study of taxonomy in its broadest sense is probably the oldest branch of biology or natural history as well as the basis for all the other branches, since the first step in obtaining any knowledge of things about us is to discriminate between them and to learn to recognize them.
-- Richard E. Blackwelder

#Taxonomy #Branches #Firsts

Zoological taxonomists in general are inclined to be practical workers rather than philosophers, if only because they face such an unending task that they are not encouraged to sit back and philosophize.
-- Richard E. Blackwelder

#Faces #Tasks #Philosopher

[About a conference on Systematic Biology] Many interesting statements were made that apply directly to the work of taxonomists. In some cases the interest lay in the value of the suggestion and sometimes in the obvious need for rebuttal.
-- Richard E. Blackwelder

#Interesting #Needs #Taxonomy

Gifford Pinchot points out that in colonial and pioneer days the forest was a foe and an obstacle to the settler. It had to be cleared away... But [now] as a nation we have not yet come to have a proper respect for the forest and to regard it as an indispensable part of our resources-one which is easily destroyed but difficult to replace; one which confers great benefits while it endures, but whose disappearance is accompanied by a train of evil consequences not readily foreseen and positively irreparable.
-- Richard E. Blackwelder

#Evil #Forests #Pioneers

I have worked really hard to defy categorization, to break down a taxonomy whenever it comes my way.

The music had to be rooted, and yet had to branch out,like the wild imagination of a child.

. . . [The Judicial Branch] may truly be said to have neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment; and must ultimately depend upon the aid of the executive arm even for the efficacy of its judgments.

The superiority...enjoyed by nations that have...perfected a branch of industry, constitutes a...formidable obstacle.

On the ostensible exactitude of certain branches of human knowledge, including mathematics. The exactness is a fake.

If the first requisite for writing well about food is a good appetite, the second is to put in your apprenticeship as a feeder when you have enough money to pay the check but not enough to produce indifference of the total.

I take the walk to be the externalization of an interior seeking so that the analogy is first of all between the external and the internal.

Lawyers are the first refuge of the incompetent.

Sometimes to heal, you must first get hurt.

When I first started, I just wanted to work. I wouldn't necessarily do anything, but I'd pretty much almost do anything at the very beginning.