>The passion for naming things is an odd human trait. It is strange that men always feel so much more at ease when they have put appellations on the things around them and that a wild, new region almost seems familiar and subdued once enough names have been used on it, even though in fact it is not changed in the slightest. Or, on second thought, it is perhaps not really strange. The urge to name must be as old as the human race, as old as speech which is one of the really fundamental characteristics by which we rise above the brutes, and thus a basic and essential part of the human spirit or soul. The naming fallacy is common enough even in science. Many a scientist claims to have explained some phenomenon when in truth all he has done is to give it a name. > Man is the result of a purposeless and natural process that did not have him in mind. George Gaylord Simpson Tags: [[Evolution]] (https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/evolution "[[Evolution]] quotes"), [nature](https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/nature "Nature quotes"), [purpose](https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/purpose "Purpose quotes"),[science](https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/science "Science quotes") > The question “What is man?” is probably the most profound that can be asked by man. It has always been central to any system of philosophy or theology…. The point I want to make now is that all attempts to answer that question before 1859 are worthless and that we will be better off if we ignore them completely. George Gaylord Simpson, [Tempo and Mode in Evolution](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1471360.Tempo_and_Mode_in_Evolution) George Gaylord Simpson >Species evolve exactly as if they were adapting as best they could to a changing world, and not at all as if they were moving toward a set goal. ### Revisiting George Gaylord Simpson’s “The Role of the Individual in Evolution” (1941) https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13752-021-00386-7 `Concepts:`[[Science]] `Knowledge Base:` [[Evolution]]