Athlete Quotes (2 quotes)
The growth of a naturalist is like the growth of a musician or athlete: excellence for the talented, lifelong enjoyment for the rest, benefit for humanity.
In The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth (2010), 147.
There is, in fact, no reason whatever for believing that such a game as, say, football improves the health of those who play it. On the contrary, there is every reason for believing that it is deleterious. The football player is not only exposed constantly to a risk of grave injury, often of an irremediable kind; he is also damaged in his normal physiological processes by the excessive strains of the game, and the exposure that goes with playing it. … The truth is that athletes, as a class, are not above the normal in health, but below it. … Some are crippled on the field, but more succumb to the mere wear and tear.
From American Mercury (Jun 1931). Collected in A Mencken Chrestomathy (1949, 1956), 370-371.
In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
(1987) -- 
