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Who said: “I believe that this Nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to earth.”
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Thumbnail of Jacques Monod (source)
Jacques Monod
(9 Feb 1910 - 31 May 1976)

French biochemist who shared with his fellow researchers the 1965 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine. They revealed how messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) is involved in protein synthesis within a cell. He headed the Pasteur Institute from 1971.


Jacques Monod - “In science, self-satisfaction is death.”

Illustrated Quote - Large (800 x 600 px)

“In science, self-satisfaction is death. Personal self-satisfaction is the death of the scientist. Collective self-satisfaction is the death of the research. It is restlessness, anxiety, dissatisfaction, agony of mind that nourish science.”
— Jacques Monod
New Scientist (17 Jun 1976)

More Jacques Monod quotes on science >>

Context of Jacques Monod’s quote, “In science, self-satisfaction is death.”

Although several books of quote collections simply give a citation for this quote to New Scientist,1 in fact the article therein itself references another source: “Le Nouvel Observateur, honouring his memory, revives quotations from an earlier interview which preserve the flavour of the man.” The first of these is that shown above.

The second is given as, “Everything that exists in the Universe is the result of chance and necessity.” Interstingly, the article continues with an editorial remark: “When I found that quotation in Democritus I almost had tears in my eyes; to think that it had been written 2500 years ago!”

Text by Webmaster, who would like to hear from any reader with a more specific lead to the primary source interview. Quotes from 'Ariadne', New Scientist (17 Jun 1976), 680. (source)


See also:
  • Science Quotes by Jacques Monod.
  • 9 Feb - short biography, births, deaths and events on date of Monod's birth.
  • Jacques Monod - context of quote “Every living being is also a fossil.” - Medium image (500 x 350 px)
  • Jacques Monod - context of quote “Every living being is also a fossil.” - Large image (800 x 600 px)
  • Jacques Monod - context of quote “There are living systems; there is no living “matter.”” - Medium image (500 x 350 px)
  • Jacques Monod - context of quote “There are living systems; there is no living “matter.”” - Large image (800 x 600 px)
  • Jacques Monod - context of quote “There is no intention in the universe” - Medium image (500 x 350 px)
  • Jacques Monod - context of quote “There is no intention in the universe” - Large image (800 x 600 px)
  • Jacques Monod - context of quote “In science, self-satisfaction is death.” - Medium image (500 x 350 px)
  • Origins of Molecular Biology: A Tribute to Jacques Monod, by Agnes Ullmann (ed.). - book suggestion.

Nature bears long with those who wrong her. She is patient under abuse. But when abuse has gone too far, when the time of reckoning finally comes, she is equally slow to be appeased and to turn away her wrath. (1882) -- Nathaniel Egleston, who was writing then about deforestation, but speaks equally well about the danger of climate change today.
Carl Sagan Thumbnail Carl Sagan: 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) ...(more by Sagan)

Albert Einstein: I used to wonder how it comes about that the electron is negative. Negative-positive—these are perfectly symmetric in physics. There is no reason whatever to prefer one to the other. Then why is the electron negative? I thought about this for a long time and at last all I could think was “It won the fight!” ...(more by Einstein)

Richard Feynman: It is the facts that matter, not the proofs. Physics can progress without the proofs, but we can't go on without the facts ... if the facts are right, then the proofs are a matter of playing around with the algebra correctly. ...(more by Feynman)
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