Famous quotes
Quotes by famous people, credited to who said them. Your own quotes must not match any of these. More are added all the time. 1,158,269 quotes Who coined it · How we decide
EnglishItalianoPolskiעבריתFrançaisPortuguêsفارسیEspañol中文РусскийDeutschالعربيةहिन्दी日本語ΕλληνικάLatina
David Attenborough
91 quotes
“If we [humans] disappeared overnight, the world would probably be better off [making the point that the reverse is not true].”
David Attenborough (born 1926) first seen 2005 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Daily Telegraph (12 November 2005)
“People who accuse us of putting in too much violence, [should see] what we leave on the cutting-room floor. My conscience troubles me more about reducing the pain and savagery that there is in the natural world than the reverse.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) first seen 2011 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: David Attenborough: 'I'm an essential evil.'", The Guardian (21 October 2011)
“In moments of great grief, that's where you look and immerse yourself. You realise you are not immortal, you are not a god, you are part of the natural world and you come to accept that.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) first seen 2016 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: David Attenborough at 90: 'I think about my mortality every day'", interview with Joe Shute, The Telegraph (29 October 2016)
“We must change our diet. The planet can’t support billions of meat-eaters.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) first seen 2020 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Go vegetarian to save wildlife and the planet, Sir David Attenborough urges". The Independent (26 August 2020)
“We are going to have to live more economically than we do. And we can do that and, I believe we will do it more happily, not less happily. And that the excesses the capitalist system has brought us, have got to be curbed somehow.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) first seen 2020 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Attenborough: 'Curb excess capitalism' to save nature". BBC (7 October 2020)
“This City in Ukraine was once Home to almost 50 thousand people. It had everything a community would need for a comfortable life. But on the 26th of April 1986, it suddenly became uninhabitable. The nearby Nuclear Power Station of Chernobyl exploded. And less than in 48 hours the city was evacuated. No one has lived here since”
David Attenborough (born 1926) first seen 2020 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: DAVID ATTENBOROUGH: CHERNOBYL AND A LIFE ON OUR PLANET (15.10.2020)
“I had rather thought that I would celebrate my 100th birthday quietly, but it seems that many of you have had other ideas. I have been completely overwhelmed by birthday greetings, from pre-school groups to care home residents, and countless individuals and families of all ages. I simply can't reply to each of you separately, but I'd like to thank you all most sincerely for your kind messages, and wish those of you who have planned your own local events: Have a very happy day.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) first seen 2026 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 7 May 2026. Remarks on the eve of his 100th birthday.
“Trade is a proper and decent relationship, with dignity and respect on both sides.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Roman public's thirst for blood and pleasure in witnessing pain seems to have been unquenchable and without limit. The caged animals were kept in dungeons below the main arena. The terrified animals in their cages were hoisted up from this pit. And not only animals, human beings too, criminals, slaves and prisoners of war. And here in this arena they were set one upon the other to provide the crowd with spectacles of the most appalling carnage. It still continues to this day in Spain.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“And yet, today the harbour is silted up, most of the city lies buried beneath sand dunes and the land has become a desert. As the population had grown and more people wanted more fields, so more of the forest that once stood around the city was cut down, until eventually it was all gone. With no roots to hold the soil, and no attempt to conserve it, it was carried away by the wind and the rain.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It used to be said, that in places like this, nature eventually failed to support man, the truth is exactly the reverse, here man failed to support nature. Ten thousand years ago man regarded the natural world as divine, but as he domesticated animals and plants so nature lost some of its mystery and appeared to be little more than a larder that could be raided with impunity.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There are some four million different kinds of animals and plants in the world. Four million different solutions to the problems of staying alive. This is the story of how a few of them came to be as they are.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Immensely powerful though we are today, it's equally clear that we're going to be even more powerful tomorrow. And what's more there will be greater compulsion upon us to use our power as the number of human beings on Earth increases still further. Clearly we could devastate the world. […] As far as we know, the Earth is the only place in the universe where there is life. Its continued survival now rests in our hands.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The savage, rocky shores of Christmas Island, 200 miles south of Java, in the Indian Ocean. It's November, the moon is in its third quarter, and the sun is just setting. And in a few hours from now, on this very shore, a thousand million lives will be launched.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I am at the very centre of the great white continent, Antarctica. The South Pole is about half a mile away. For a thousand miles in all directions, there is nothing but ice. And, in the whole of this continent, which is about one-and-a-half times the size of the United States and larger than Europe, there is a year-round population of no more than 800 people. This is the loneliest and coldest place on Earth, the place that is most hostile to life. And yet, in one or two places, it is astonishingly rich.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“At a time when it's possible for thirty people to stand on the top of Everest in one day, Antarctica still remains a remote, lonely and desolate continent. A place where it's possible to see the splendours and immensities of the natural world at its most dramatic and, what's more, witness them almost exactly as they were, long, long before human beings ever arrived on the surface of this planet. Long may it remain so.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Midwinter, and the countryside is so still, it seems almost lifeless. But these trees and bushes and grasses around me are living organisms just like animals. And they have to face very much the same sort of problems as animals face throughout their lives if they're to survive. They have to fight one another, they have to compete for mates, they have to invade new territories. But the reason that we're seldom aware of these dramas is that plants of course live on a different time-scale.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Ever since we arrived on this planet as a species, we've cut them down, dug them up, burnt them and poisoned them. Today we're doing so on a greater scale than ever […] We destroy plants at our peril. Neither we nor any other animal can survive without them. The time has now come for us to cherish our green inheritance, not to pillage it – for without it, we will surely perish.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Birds are the most accomplished aeronauts the world has ever seen. They fly high and low, at great speed, and very slowly. And always with extraordinary precision and control.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The island is immense. It's 1,000 miles long, if you discount a narrow arm of sea that crosses it in the middle, and it contains mountains over 12,000 feet high. It's New Zealand. The first land-living mammals to get here were human beings and they didn't arrive until a mere 1,500 years ago. So here you can glimpse what the world would have been like if the birds had won that battle with the early mammals and now ruled the Earth, for here they once did.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Many of New Zealand's birds flew here from Australia fifteen hundred miles away across the sea to the west. They started to do so millions of years ago, and they are still doing so today... So, if you know Australian birds, you will recognise quite a lot, particularly those that are relatively recent arrivals.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[The Kiwi.] It's the bird equivalent of a badger.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Its heart that in flight contracted a thousand times a minute, slows until its beat is virtually undetectable. Its body temperature falls dramatically, and its breathing seems to cease altogether. [...] It's hibernating; but for a hummingbird, winter comes 365 times a year.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“As the last thermals of summer start to rise, the birds [hawks and vultures] circle up to great heights, 10,000 feet or more, to give themselves a good start for the long journey ahead. As they glide southwards, slowly losing height, they will look for another thermal and make for its base so that, once again, they will be lifted high enough to reach the next.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Without thermals, [raptors] can't travel far. But the snow geese fly on... They navigate by the stars.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I'll bet when our prehistoric ancestors first dug for tubers and planted seeds in Europe, one of these little robins appeared within a couple of days. Other animals must have done the same job for them before human beings did. Once, not so long ago, wild pig were common all over Europe, and they're great diggers and rootlers. So maybe the robin's boldness and friendliness with other kinds of animals started in prehistory, even before human beings arrived in Europe.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Living on the bodies of mammals, oxpeckers manage to get quite a varied diet. A maggot here, a tick there, a little sip of blood, perhaps a little tasty earwax.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A spider. Quite big enough and succulent enough to provide a snack for a Scops.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It's equally astonishing that the birds are able to measure its relative strength with such accuracy that they can trace it back to its source simply by sensing in which direction it becomes marginally stronger. But a turkey vulture is exceptionally well-equipped among birds, with wide-open nostrils and extremely well-developed sense organs within them.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Those that live in the air have to fight in the air.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Even though hunters have a formidable armoury and great skill, most of their hunting trips... end in failure.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The food-chain that sustains a meat-eater could scarcely be shorter than it is here. [...] Algae that can uniquely tolerate these salty waters proliferate in the sunshine by the ton. Flamingos filter the algae from the water with their beaks, and vegetable is turned into flesh. And that flesh is food for eagles.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Mallards must be one of the most familiar birds in the world. Because of that, perhaps we tend to take ducks for granted. But in fact, they are a very varied family.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Members of the auk family, such as these guillemots and puffins... propel themselves, not with their feet like ducks, but with their wings, and they have paid a considerable price to be able to do so... Auks have had to evolve shorter, stubbier wings. That gives them a rather clumsy, whirring flight in the air, but it does enable them to "fly" underwater so well that they can outpace small fish.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Penguins underwater look somewhat like dolphins, and indeed the two families have similar evolutionary histories. Dolphins are descended from air-breathing land animals, just as penguins are descended from air-breathing flying animals. Both subsequently took to swimming for their food. They became beautifully adapted and streamlined. And now, both are superlative swimmers and highly accomplished fishermen.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To many of us, however, this is the most delectable of natural sounds. It's an hour before dawn, it's spring, this is an English woodland. All around, the dawn chorus. It's so familiar that perhaps we take it for granted.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You might think that a hornbill would have the most powerful excavation tool of all, but in fact its huge beak is a relatively delicate structure and no use at all as a chisel.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The battle between cuckoos and other birds is a continuing one. The cuckoos developing new stratagems and perhaps finding new victims, and the victims finding new defences.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Each [pelican] has already survived many perils in its young life. As a chick, it fought battles with its brothers and sisters and won.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“No sooner has one been pushed out of the nest then a second will follow, until there is only one left. And that's what happens nearly always in a pelican's nest. That being the case, it seems rather inefficient, not to say heartless, that the pelican should always lay three eggs. But the reason is that it's partly an insurance policy, in case something terrible happens to one or two of the chicks, there's always a third left to carry on. And partly because, very rarely, when the fishing is very good, it is possible to raise more than one chick.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[African Rift Valley soda lakes]. Steaming-hot water comes from volcanic springs and is so loaded with soda that around the margins of the lake it solidifies into white curds. Yet flamingos come here in thousands. [...] The fact that so few creatures can tolerate these conditions means that any animal that can, has the place to itself and so can proliferate in vast numbers.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All over the world, birds [...] manage to survive in the most hostile of places. A century ago, a completely new kind of environment appeared on Earth. Nothing like it had faced birds before in their entire 200 million year history. Yet some species began to adapt to it almost immediately... The modern city.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Birds were flying from continent to continent long before we were. They reached the coldest place on Earth, Antarctica, long before we did. They can survive in the hottest of deserts. Some can remain on the wing for years at a time. They can girdle the globe. Now, we have taken over the Earth, and the sea, and the sky. But with skill and care and knowledge, we can ensure that there is still a place on Earth for birds in all their beauty and variety, if we want to, and surely, we should.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Sensing the approaching danger, the snail flees. But in a world of snail paces, the conch is something of a Ferrari. It calls for desperate measures. Exhausted by the effort of its last-ditch attempt, the tulip snail is slowly... gunned... down.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Warm-bloodedness is one of the key factors that have enabled mammals to conquer the Earth, and to develop the most complex bodies in the animal kingdom. In this series, we will travel the world to discover just how varied and how astonishing mammals are.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“An eye from another world; a smell-detector, investigating the path ahead. We don't often see a snail that way, and that's because we've only recently had the tiny lenses and electronic cameras that we need to explore this miniature world. But when we meet its inhabitants face to face, we suddenly realise that their behaviour can be just as meaningful to us as the behaviour of many animals more our own size.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If we and the rest of the backboned animals were to disappear overnight, the rest of the world would get on pretty well. But if they were to disappear, the land's ecosystems would collapse. The soil would lose its fertility. Many of the plants would no longer be pollinated. Lots of animals, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals would have nothing to eat. And our fields and pastures would be covered with dung and carrion. These small creatures are within a few inches of our feet, wherever we go on land – but often, they're disregarded. We would do very well to remember them.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Reptiles and amphibians are sometimes thought of as primitive, dull and dimwitted. In fact, of course, they can be lethally fast, spectacularly beautiful, surprisingly affectionate and very sophisticated.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Reptiles and amphibians are sometimes seen as simple, primitive creatures. That's a long way from the truth. The fact that they are solar-powered means that their bodies require only 10% of the energy that mammals of a similar size require. At a time when we ourselves are becoming increasingly concerned about the way in which we get our energy from the environment and the wasteful way in which we use it, maybe there are things that we can learn from "life in cold blood.”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“This is the Earth - our planet, home to millions of different species, but only one species dominates everything - human beings. There are nearly seven billion of us living on the Earth, and the human population is increasing by more than two people every second; two hundred thousand people every day; nearly eighty million people every year. Each additional life needs food, energy, water, shelter, and hopefully a whole lot more. m0s0-m0s43”
David Attenborough (born 1926) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source