And enough for me that when my hand touched your shoulder, you leaned on me; and when you felt me slip away, you called my name.
Orson Scott CardRead
Nature can't evolve a species that hasn't the will to survive. Individuals might be bred to sacrifice themselves, but the race as a whole can never cease to exist.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Survival is rooted in the collective will of a species, not just individual sacrifices.
This quote emphasizes that the survival of a species depends on the collective determination and will of its members. While individuals may be willing to make sacrifices, true continuity and survival depend on the whole group's desire and effort to endure and thrive, highlighting the importance of unity and shared purpose in the face of challenges.
Themes
SurvivalSpeciesWillExistenceSacrifice
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a motivational speech about teamwork and survival in adverse conditions.
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All quotes →The world is always a democracy in times of flux, and the man with the best voice will win.
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Never mind that the story had turned out to be lies and foolishness—there was always folks stupid enough to say, Where there's smoke there's fire, when the saying should have been, Where there's scandalous lies there's always malicious believers and spreaders-around, regardless of evidence.
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The lives of all people flow through time, and, regardless of how brutal one moment may be, how filled with grief or pain or fear, time flows through all lives equally.
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You take a step, then another. That's the journey. But to take a step with your eyes open is not a journey at all, it's a remaking of your own mind.
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I've had your tears with mine, and you've had mine with yours. I think that's more intimate even than a kiss.
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Nature never deceives us; it is we who deceive ourselves.
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Loss of genetic diversity in agriculture is leading us to a rendezvous with extinction--to the doorstep of hunger on a scale we refuse to imagine. To simplify the environment as we have done with agriculture is to destroy the complex interrelationships that hold the natural world together. Reducing the diversity of life, we narrow our options for the future and render our own survival more precarious.
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What a thing it is to sit absolutely alone, in the forest, at night, cherished by this wonderful, unintelligible, perfectly innocent speech, the most comforting speech in the world, the talk that rain makes by itself all over the ridges, and the talk of the watercourses everywhere in the hollows! Nobody started it, nobody is going to stop it. It will talk as long as it wants this rain. As long as it talks I am going to listen.
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The greatest delight the fields and woods minister is the suggestion of an occult relation between man and the vegetable. I am not alone and unacknowledged. They nod to me and I to them.
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It is estimated that one-third of all reef-building corals, a third of all fresh-water mollusks, a third of sharks and rays, a quarter of all mammals, a fifth of all reptiles, and a sixth of all birds are headed toward oblivion. The losses are occurring all over: in the South Pacific and in the North Atlantic, in the Arctic and the Sahel, in lakes and on islands, on mountaintops and in valleys.
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Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.
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