TODAY IN SCIENCE HISTORY ®  •  TODAYINSCI ®
Celebrating 24 Years on the Web
Find science on or your birthday

Today in Science History - Quickie Quiz
Who said: “God does not care about our mathematical difficulties. He integrates empirically.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index A > Category: Assert

Assert Quotes (69 quotes)

…tis a dangerous thing to ingage the authority of Scripture in disputes about the Natural World, in opposition to Reason; lest Time, which brings all things to light, should discover that to be evidently false which we had made Scripture to assert.
The Sacred Theory of the Earth (1681)
Science quotes on:  |  Authority (99)  |  Bring (95)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Discover (571)  |  Dispute (36)  |  Engage (41)  |  Evidently (26)  |  False (105)  |  Lest (3)  |  Light (635)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural World (33)  |  Opposition (49)  |  Reason (766)  |  Scripture (14)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  World (1850)

[Coleridge] selected an instance of what was called the sublime, in DARWIN, who imagined the creation of the universe to have taken place in a moment, by the explosion of a mass of matter in the womb, or centre of space. In one and the same instant of time, suns and planets shot into systems in every direction, and filled and spangled the illimitable void! He asserted this to be an intolerable degradation—referring, as it were, all the beauty and harmony of nature to something like the bursting of a barrel of gunpowder! that spit its combustible materials into a pock-freckled creation!
In Seamus Perry (eds.), Coleridge’s Responses: Vol. 1: Coleridge on Writers and Writing (2007), 338-339.
Science quotes on:  |  Beauty (313)  |  Big Bang (45)  |  Call (781)  |  Creation (350)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Degradation (18)  |  Direction (185)  |  Explosion (51)  |  Gunpowder (18)  |  Harmony (105)  |  Instant (46)  |  Mass (160)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Moment (260)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Planet (402)  |  Select (45)  |  Something (718)  |  Space (523)  |  Sublime (50)  |  Sun (407)  |  System (545)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Void (31)  |  Womb (25)

[Having already asserted his opposition to communism in every respect by signing the regents' oath, his answer to a question why a non-Communist professor should refuse to take a non-Communist oath as a condition of University employment was that to do so would imply it was] up to an accused person to clear himself. ... That sort of thing is going on in Washington today and is a cause of alarm to thoughtful citizens. It is the method used in totalitarian countries. It sounds un-American to people who don’t like to be pushed around. If someone says I ought to do a certain thing the burden should be on him to show I why I should, not on me to show why I should not.
As quoted in 'Educator Scores Oath For Faculty', New York Times (16 Apr 1950), 31.
Science quotes on:  |  Accusation (6)  |  Alarm (19)  |  Already (226)  |  Answer (389)  |  Burden (30)  |  Cause (561)  |  Certain (557)  |  Citizen (52)  |  Communism (11)  |  Communist (9)  |  Condition (362)  |  Country (269)  |  Do (1905)  |  Employment (34)  |  Himself (461)  |  Method (531)  |  Oath (10)  |  Opposition (49)  |  People (1031)  |  Person (366)  |  Professor (133)  |  Push (66)  |  Question (649)  |  Refusal (23)  |  Refuse (45)  |  Respect (212)  |  Say (989)  |  Show (353)  |  Sound (187)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thoughtful (16)  |  Today (321)  |  Totalitarian (6)  |  Un-American (3)  |  Unamerican (2)  |  University (130)  |  Washington (7)  |  Why (491)

[Professor W.L. Bragg asserts that] In sodium chloride there appear to be no molecules represented by NaCl. The equality in number of sodium and chlorine atoms is arrived at by a chess-board pattern of these atoms; it is a result of geometry and not of a pairing-off of the atoms.
In Henry E. Armstrong, 'Poor Common Salt!', Nature (1927), 120, 478.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Sir William Bragg (9)  |  Chess (27)  |  Chlorine (15)  |  Equality (34)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Number (710)  |  Pattern (116)  |  Professor (133)  |  Represent (157)  |  Result (700)  |  Salt (48)  |  Sodium (15)  |  Sodium Chloride (2)

δος μοι που στω και κινω την γην — Dos moi pou sto kai kino taen gaen (in epigram form, as given by Pappus, classical Greek).
δος μοι πα στω και τα γαν κινάσω — Dos moi pa sto kai tan gan kinaso (Doric Greek).
Give me a place to stand on and I can move the Earth.
About four centuries before Pappas, but about three centuries after Archimedes lived, Plutarch had written of Archimedes' understanding of the lever:
Archimedes, a kinsman and friend of King Hiero, wrote to him that with a given force, it was possible to move any given weight; and emboldened, as it is said, by the strength of the proof, he asserted that, if there were another world and he could go to it, he would move this one.
A commonly-seen expanded variation of the aphorism is:
Give me a lever long enough and a place to stand, and I can move the earth.
As attributed to Pappus (4th century A.D.) and Plutarch (c. 46-120 A.D.), in Sherman K. Stein, Archimedes: What Did He Do Besides Cry Eureka? (1999), 5, where it is also stated that Archimedes knew that ropes and pulley exploit “the principle of the lever, where distance is traded for force.” Eduard Jan Dijksterhuis, in his book, Archimedes (1956), Vol. 12., 15. writes that Hiero invited Archimedes to demonstrate his claim on a ship from the royal fleet, drawn up onto land and there loaded with a large crew and freight, and Archimedes easily succeeded. Thomas Little Heath in The Works of Archimedes (1897), xix-xx, states according to Athenaeus, the mechanical contrivance used was not pulleys as given by Plutarch, but a helix., Heath provides cites for Pappus Synagoge, Book VIII, 1060; Plutarch, Marcellus, 14; and Athenaeus v. 207 a-b. What all this boils down to, in the opinion of the Webmaster, is the last-stated aphorism would seem to be not the actual words of Archimedes (c. 287 – 212 B.C.), but restatements of the principle attributed to him, formed by other writers centuries after his lifetime.
Science quotes on:  |  Aphorism (22)  |  Archimedes Lever (3)  |  Classical (49)  |  Do (1905)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enough (341)  |  Expand (56)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Friend (180)  |  Fulcrum (3)  |  Greek (109)  |  Lever (13)  |  Long (778)  |  Move (223)  |  Possible (560)  |  Proof (304)  |  Stand (284)  |  Strength (139)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Variation (93)  |  Weight (140)  |  World (1850)

Copernicus, who rightly did condemn
This eldest systeme, form’d a wiser scheme;
In which he leaves the Sun at Rest, and rolls
The Orb Terrestial on its proper Poles;
Which makes the Night and Day by this Career,
And by its slow and crooked Course the Year.
The famous Dane, who oft the Modern guides,
To Earth and Sun their Provinces divides:
The Earth’s Rotation makes the Night and Day,
The Sun revolving through th’ Eccliptic Way
Effects the various seasons of the Year,
Which in their Turn for happy Ends appear.
This Scheme or that, which pleases best, embrace,
Still we the Fountain of their Motion trace.
Kepler asserts these Wonders may be done
By the Magnetic Vertue of the Sun,
Which he, to gain his End, thinks fit to place
Full in the Center of that mighty Space,
Which does the Spheres, where Planets roll, include,
And leaves him with Attractive Force endu’d.
The Sun, thus seated, by Mechanic Laws,
The Earth, and every distant Planet draws;
By which Attraction all the Planets found
Within his reach, are turn'd in Ether round.
In Creation: A Philosophical Poem in Seven Books (1712), book 2, l. 430-53, p.78-9.
Science quotes on:  |  Attraction (61)  |  Attractive (25)  |  Best (467)  |  Career (86)  |  Condemn (44)  |  Nicolaus Copernicus (54)  |  Course (413)  |  Divide (77)  |  Draw (140)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effect (414)  |  Embrace (47)  |  End (603)  |  Ether (37)  |  Fit (139)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Gain (146)  |  Guide (107)  |  Happy (108)  |  Include (93)  |  Johannes Kepler (95)  |  Law (913)  |  Magnetic (44)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Modern (402)  |  Motion (320)  |  Orb (20)  |  Planet (402)  |  Please (68)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Pole (49)  |  Proper (150)  |  Province (37)  |  Reach (286)  |  Rest (287)  |  Roll (41)  |  Rotation (13)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Season (47)  |  Slow (108)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Space (523)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Still (614)  |  Sun (407)  |  Think (1122)  |  Through (846)  |  Trace (109)  |  Turn (454)  |  Various (205)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Year (963)

A work of genius is something like the pie in the nursery song, in which the four and twenty blackbirds are baked. When the pie is opened, the birds begin to sing. Hereupon three fourths of the company run away in a fright; and then after a time, feeling ashamed, they would fain excuse themselves by declaring, the pie stank so, they could not sit near it. Those who stay behind, the men of taste and epicures, say one to another, We came here to eat. What business have birds, after they have been baked, to be alive and singing? This will never do. We must put a stop to so dangerous an innovation: for who will send a pie to an oven, if the birds come to life there? We must stand up to defend the rights of all the ovens in England. Let us have dead birds..dead birds for our money. So each sticks his fork into a bird, and hacks and mangles it a while, and then holds it up and cries, Who will dare assert that there is any music in this bird’s song?
Co-author with his brother Augustus William Hare Guesses At Truth, By Two Brothers: Second Edition: With Large Additions (1848), Second Series, 86. (The volume is introduced as “more than three fourths new.” This quote is identified as by Julius; Augustus had died in 1833.)
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (97)  |  Ashamed (3)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Baking (2)  |  Begin (275)  |  Behind (139)  |  Bird (163)  |  Blackbird (4)  |  Business (156)  |  Company (63)  |  Cry (30)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Dare (55)  |  Death (406)  |  Defend (32)  |  Do (1905)  |  Eat (108)  |  Eating (46)  |  England (43)  |  Excuse (27)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Fork (2)  |  Fright (11)  |  Genius (301)  |  Hacking (2)  |  Holding (3)  |  Innovation (49)  |  Life (1870)  |  Money (178)  |  Music (133)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nursery (4)  |  Open (277)  |  Opening (15)  |  Oven (5)  |  Pie (4)  |  Right (473)  |  Run (158)  |  Say (989)  |  French Saying (67)  |  Sing (29)  |  Singing (19)  |  Something (718)  |  Song (41)  |  Stand (284)  |  Standing (11)  |  Stink (8)  |  Stop (89)  |  Taste (93)  |  Themself (4)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

Among all the occurrences possible in the universe the a priori probability of any particular one of them verges upon zero. Yet the universe exists; particular events must take place in it, the probability of which (before the event) was infinitesimal. At the present time we have no legitimate grounds for either asserting or denying that life got off to but a single start on earth, and that, as a consequence, before it appeared its chances of occurring were next to nil. ... Destiny is written concurrently with the event, not prior to it.
In Jacques Monod and Austryn Wainhouse (trans.), Chance and Necessity: An Essay on the Natural Philosophy of Modern Biology (1971), 145.
Science quotes on:  |  A Priori (26)  |  Appear (122)  |  Chance (244)  |  Concurrent (2)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Deny (71)  |  Destiny (54)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Event (222)  |  Exist (458)  |  Ground (222)  |  Infinitesimal (30)  |  Legitimate (26)  |  Life (1870)  |  Must (1525)  |  Next (238)  |  Occur (151)  |  Occurrence (53)  |  Particular (80)  |  Possible (560)  |  Present (630)  |  Prior (6)  |  Probability (135)  |  Single (365)  |  Start (237)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Verge (10)  |  Write (250)  |  Zero (38)

And I believe there are many Species in Nature, which were never yet taken notice of by Man, and consequently of no use to him, which yet we are not to think were created in vain; but it’s likely … to partake of the overflowing Goodness of the Creator, and enjoy their own Beings. But though in this sense it be not true, that all things were made for Man; yet thus far it is, that all the Creatures in the World may be some way or other useful to us, at least to exercise our Wits and Understandings, in considering and contemplating of them, and so afford us Subject of Admiring and Glorifying their and our Maker. Seeing them, we do believe and assert that all things were in some sense made for us, we are thereby obliged to make use of them for those purposes for which they serve us, else we frustrate this End of their Creation.
John Ray
The Wisdom of God Manifested in the Works of the Creation (1691), 169-70.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Belief (615)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Contemplating (11)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Creation (350)  |  Creator (97)  |  Creature (242)  |  Do (1905)  |  End (603)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Frustration (14)  |  Glorification (2)  |  Goodness (26)  |  Maker (34)  |  Man (2252)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Notice (81)  |  Other (2233)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Sense (785)  |  Species (435)  |  Subject (543)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Use (771)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)  |  Vain (86)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wit (61)  |  World (1850)

Be daring, be different, be impractical; be anything that will assert integrity of purpose and imagination vision against the play-it-safers, the creatures of the commonplace, the slave of the ordinary.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Commonplace (24)  |  Creature (242)  |  Dare (55)  |  Daring (17)  |  Different (595)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Impractical (3)  |  Integrity (21)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Slave (40)  |  Vision (127)  |  Will (2350)

But medicine has long had all its means to hand, and has discovered both a principle and a method, through which the discoveries made during a long period are many and excellent, while full discovery will be made, if the inquirer be competent, conduct his researches with knowledge of the discoveries already made, and make them his starting-point. But anyone who, casting aside and rejecting all these means, attempts to conduct research in any other way or after another fashion, and asserts that he has found out anything, is and has been victim of deception.
Ancient Medicine, in Hippocrates, trans. W. H. S. Jones (1923), Vol. I, 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Both (496)  |  Casting (10)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Deception (9)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Inquirer (9)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Long (778)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Method (531)  |  Other (2233)  |  Period (200)  |  Point (584)  |  Principle (530)  |  Research (753)  |  Through (846)  |  Victim (37)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries we can see the emergence of a tension that has yet to be resolved, concerning the attitude of scientists towards the usefulness of science. During this time, scientists were careful not to stress too much their relationships with industry or the military. They were seeking autonomy for their activities. On the other hand, to get social support there had to be some perception that the fruits of scientific activity could have useful results. One resolution of this dilemma was to assert that science only contributed at the discovery stage; others, industrialists for example, could apply the results. ... Few noted the ... obvious paradox of this position; that, if scientists were to be distanced from the 'evil' effects of the applications of scientific ideas, so too should they receive no credit for the 'good' or socially beneficial, effects of their activities.
Co-author with Philip Gummett (1947- ), -British social scientist
Science, Technology and Society Today (1984), Introduction, 4.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Application (257)  |  Apply (170)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Author (175)  |  Autonomy (6)  |  British (42)  |  Dilemma (11)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Effect (414)  |  Emergence (35)  |  Evil (122)  |  Fruit (108)  |  Good (906)  |  Idea (881)  |  Industry (159)  |  Military (45)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paradox (54)  |  Perception (97)  |  Receive (117)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Relationship (114)  |  Resolution (24)  |  Result (700)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  See (1094)  |  Social (261)  |  Stage (152)  |  Stress (22)  |  Support (151)  |  Tension (24)  |  Time (1911)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)

Every definition implies an axiom, since it asserts the existence of the object defined. The definition then will not be justified, from the purely logical point of view, until we have ‘proved’ that it involves no contradiction either in its terms or with the truths previously admitted.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Admit (49)  |  Axiom (65)  |  Contradiction (69)  |  Define (53)  |  Definition (238)  |  Existence (481)  |  Imply (20)  |  Involve (93)  |  Justify (26)  |  Logical (57)  |  Object (438)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Previously (12)  |  Prove (261)  |  Purely (111)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Truth (1109)  |  View (496)  |  Will (2350)

Everyone admits that the male is the primary efficient cause in generation, as being that in whom the species or form resides, and they further assert that his genitures emitted in coitus causes the egg both to exist and to be fertile. But how the semen of the cock produces the chick from the egg, neither the philosophers nor the physicians of yesterday or today have satisfactorily explained, or solved the problem formulated by Aristotle.
Disputations Touching the Generation of Animals (1651), trans. Gweneth Whitteridge (1981), Chapter 47, 214.
Science quotes on:  |  Aristotle (179)  |  Being (1276)  |  Both (496)  |  Cause (561)  |  Cock (6)  |  Egg (71)  |  Exist (458)  |  Explain (334)  |  Fertile (30)  |  Fertilization (15)  |  Form (976)  |  Generation (256)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Physician (284)  |  Primary (82)  |  Problem (731)  |  Reproduction (74)  |  Reside (25)  |  Semen (5)  |  Species (435)  |  Today (321)  |  Yesterday (37)

For myself, I found that I was fitted for nothing so well as for the study of Truth; as having a mind nimble and versatile enough to catch the resemblances of things (which is the chief point) , and at the same time steady enough to fix and distinguish their subtler differences; as being gifted by nature with desire to seek, patience to doubt, fondness to meditate, slowness to assert, readiness to reconsider, carefulness to dispose and set in order; and as being a man that neither affects what is new nor admires what is old, and that hates every kind of imposture. So I thought my nature had a kind of familiarity and relationship with Truth.
From 'Progress of philosophical speculations. Preface to intended treatise De Interpretatione Naturæ (1603), in Francis Bacon and James Spedding (ed.), Works of Francis Bacon (1868), Vol. 3, 85.
Science quotes on:  |  Admiration (61)  |  Affectation (4)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Being (1276)  |  Catch (34)  |  Chief (99)  |  Desire (212)  |  Difference (355)  |  Disposition (44)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguishing (14)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Enough (341)  |  Familiarity (21)  |  Fix (34)  |  Fondness (7)  |  Gift (105)  |  Gifted (25)  |  Hate (68)  |  Imposture (6)  |  Kind (564)  |  Man (2252)  |  Meditation (19)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Myself (211)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Nimble (2)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Old (499)  |  Order (638)  |  Patience (58)  |  Point (584)  |  Readiness (9)  |  Reconsideration (3)  |  Relationship (114)  |  Resemblance (39)  |  Seek (218)  |  Seeking (31)  |  Set (400)  |  Setting (44)  |  Slowness (6)  |  Steady (45)  |  Study (701)  |  Subtlety (19)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Versatile (6)

Galileo … asserts that in all these phenomena we must measure all that is measurable, and try to make measurable all that is not directly measurable.
From the original French, “Galilée … déclare que dans tous ces phénomènes il faut mesurer tout ce qui est mesurable, et tâcher de rendre mesurable tout ce qui ne l’est pas directement,” in Galilée: Les Droits de la Science et la Méthode des Sciences Physiques (1868), 289. Notice the statement is not enclosed in quotation marks; they are the author’s words, not Galileo’s. Translation by Webmaster using Internet resources. Martin’s words are often repeated as an assumed quote by Galileo: Measure what is measurable, and make measurable what is not so. These words do not come verbatim from any known work by Galileo, and should only be used without quotation marks as Martin’s description of Galileo’s method. Nevertheless, quotation marks have been - erroneously - added in many books, for example, in the transcript of a radio talk by Hermann Weyl, 'Mathematics and the Laws of Nature', collected in Warren Weaver (ed.), The Scientists Speak (1947). Reprinted in Isabel S. Gordon and Sophie Sorkin (eds.), The Armchair Science Reader (1959), 301.
Science quotes on:  |  Direct (228)  |  Galileo Galilei (134)  |  Measure (241)  |  Must (1525)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Try (296)

Gardner writes about various kinds of cranks with the conscious superiority of the scientist…. He asserts that the scientist, unlike the crank, does his best to remain open-minded, so how can he be so sure that no sane person has ever seen a flying saucer…? … A.J. Ayer once remarked wryly “I wish I was as certain of anything as he seems to be about everything”.
In The Quest For Wilhelm Reich (1981), 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Best (467)  |  Certain (557)  |  Conscious (46)  |  Crank (18)  |  Everything (489)  |  Flying (74)  |  Flying Saucer (3)  |  Martin Gardner (50)  |  Kind (564)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Open (277)  |  Open-Minded (2)  |  Person (366)  |  Remain (355)  |  Sane (5)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Superiority (19)  |  Various (205)  |  Wish (216)  |  Write (250)

Has Matter innate Motion? Then each Atom,
Asserting its indisputable Right
To dance, would form an Universe of Dust.
The Complaint: or, Night-Thoughts on Life, Death, and Immortality (1742, 1750), Night 9, 278.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Dance (35)  |  Dust (68)  |  Form (976)  |  Indisputable (8)  |  Innate (14)  |  Matter (821)  |  Motion (320)  |  Right (473)  |  Universe (900)

I am not ... asserting that humans are either genial or aggressive by inborn biological necessity. Obviously, both kindness and violence lie with in the bounds of our nature because we perpetrate both, in spades. I only advance a structural claim that social stability rules nearly all the time and must be based on an overwhelmingly predominant (but tragically ignored) frequency of genial acts, and that geniality is therefore our usual and preferred response nearly all the time ... The center of human nature is rooted in ten thousand ordinary acts of kindness that define our days.
In Eight Little Piggies: Reflections in Natural History (1993), 282.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Advance (298)  |  Aggressive (4)  |  Base (120)  |  Biological (137)  |  Both (496)  |  Bound (120)  |  Bounds (8)  |  Center (35)  |  Claim (154)  |  Define (53)  |  Frequency (25)  |  Genial (3)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Nature (71)  |  Ignore (52)  |  Inborn (4)  |  Kindness (14)  |  Lie (370)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Obviously (11)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Overwhelmingly (3)  |  Perpetrate (3)  |  Predominant (4)  |  Prefer (27)  |  Response (56)  |  Root (121)  |  Rule (307)  |  Social (261)  |  Spade (3)  |  Stability (28)  |  Structural (29)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Time (1911)  |  Violence (37)

I assert that the cosmic religious experience is the strongest and the noblest driving force behind scientific research.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Behind (139)  |  Cosmic (74)  |  Drive (61)  |  Driving (28)  |  Experience (494)  |  Force (497)  |  Nobl (4)  |  Religious (134)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Strong (182)  |  Strongest (38)

I venture to assert that the feelings one has when the beautiful symbolism of the infinitesimal calculus first gets a meaning, or when the delicate analysis of Fourier has been mastered, or while one follows Clerk Maxwell or Thomson into the strange world of electricity, now growing so rapidly in form and being, or can almost feel with Stokes the pulsations of light that gives nature to our eyes, or track with Clausius the courses of molecules we can measure, even if we know with certainty that we can never see them I venture to assert that these feelings are altogether comparable to those aroused in us by an exquisite poem or a lofty thought.
In paper (May 1891) read before Bath Branch of the Teachers’ Guild, published in The Practical Teacher (July 1891), reprinted as 'Geometry', in Frederic Spencer, Chapters on the Aims and Practice of Teaching (1897), 194.
Science quotes on:  |  Analysis (244)  |  Arouse (13)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Being (1276)  |  Calculus (65)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Rudolf Clausius (9)  |  Clerk (13)  |  Comparable (7)  |  Course (413)  |  Delicate (45)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Exquisite (27)  |  Eye (440)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Feelings (52)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Form (976)  |  Growing (99)  |  Infinitesimal (30)  |  Infinitesimal Calculus (2)  |  Know (1538)  |  Light (635)  |  Lofty (16)  |  Master (182)  |  Mathematics As A Fine Art (23)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  James Clerk Maxwell (91)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Measure (241)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Poem (104)  |  Pulsation (4)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  See (1094)  |  Sir George Gabriel Stokes (3)  |  Strange (160)  |  Symbolism (5)  |  Sir J.J. Thomson (18)  |  Thought (995)  |  Track (42)  |  World (1850)

I, Galileo Galilei, son of the late Vincenzo Galilei, of Florence, aged seventy years, being brought personally to judgment, and kneeling before your Most Eminent and Most Reverend Lords Cardinals, General Inquisitors of the universal Christian republic against heretical depravity, having before my eyes the Holy Gospels, which I touch with my own hands, swear that I have always believed, and now believe, and with the help of God will in future believe, every article which the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church of Rome holds, teaches, and preaches. But because I have been enjoined by this Holy Office altogether to abandon the false opinion which maintains that the sun is the centre and immovable, and forbidden to hold, defend, or teach the said false doctrine in any manner, and after it hath been signified to me that the said doctrine is repugnant with the Holy Scripture, I have written and printed a book, in which I treat of the same doctrine now condemned, and adduce reasons with great force in support of the same, without giving any solution, and therefore have been judged grievously suspected of heresy; that is to say, that I held and believed that the sun is the centre of the universe and is immovable, and that the earth is not the centre and is movable; willing, therefore, to remove from the minds of your Eminences, and of every Catholic Christian, this vehement suspicion rightfully entertained toward me, with a sincere heart and unfeigned faith, I abjure, curse, and detest the said errors and heresies, and generally every other error and sect contrary to Holy Church; and I swear that I will never more in future say or assert anything verbally, or in writing, which may give rise to a similar suspicion of me; but if I shall know any heretic, or anyone suspected of heresy, that I will denounce him to this Holy Office, or to the Inquisitor or Ordinary of the place where I may be; I swear, moreover, and promise, that I will fulfil and observe fully, all the penances which have been or shall be laid on me by this Holy Office. But if it shall happen that I violate any of my said promises, oaths, and protestations (which God avert!), I subject myself to all the pains and punishments which have been decreed and promulgated by the sacred canons, and other general and particular constitutions, against delinquents of this description. So may God help me, and his Holy Gospels which I touch with my own hands. I, the above-named Galileo Galilei, have abjured, sworn, promised, and bound myself as above, and in witness thereof with my own hand have subscribed this present writing of my abjuration, which I have recited word for word. At Rome, in the Convent of Minerva, June 22, 1633. I, Galileo Galilei, have abjured as above with my own hand.
Abjuration, 22 Jun 1633. In J.J. Fahie, Galileo, His Life and Work (1903), 319-321.
Science quotes on:  |  Abandon (73)  |  Abjuration (3)  |  Against (332)  |  Being (1276)  |  Book (413)  |  Bound (120)  |  Cardinal (9)  |  Catholic (18)  |  Christian (44)  |  Church (64)  |  Condemn (44)  |  Constitution (78)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Curse (20)  |  Denounce (6)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Eminence (25)  |  Entertain (27)  |  Error (339)  |  Eye (440)  |  Faith (209)  |  Forbidden (18)  |  Force (497)  |  Future (467)  |  General (521)  |  God (776)  |  Great (1610)  |  Happen (282)  |  Heart (243)  |  Heliocentric Model (7)  |  Heretic (8)  |  Holy (35)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Know (1538)  |  Late (119)  |  Lord (97)  |  Maintain (105)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Myself (211)  |  Never (1089)  |  Oath (10)  |  Observe (179)  |  Office (71)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pain (144)  |  Present (630)  |  Promise (72)  |  Punishment (14)  |  Reason (766)  |  Religion (369)  |  Remove (50)  |  Republic (16)  |  Repugnant (8)  |  Rise (169)  |  Rome (19)  |  Sacred (48)  |  Say (989)  |  Solution (282)  |  Subject (543)  |  Sun (407)  |  Support (151)  |  Suspicion (36)  |  Swear (7)  |  Teach (299)  |  Touch (146)  |  Universal (198)  |  Universe (900)  |  Will (2350)  |  Willing (44)  |  Witness (57)  |  Word (650)  |  Writing (192)  |  Year (963)

If “Number rules the universe” as Pythagoras asserted, Number is merely our delegate to the throne, for we rule Number.
In Men of Mathematics (1937), 16.
Science quotes on:  |  Delegate (3)  |  Merely (315)  |  Number (710)  |  Pythagoras (38)  |  Rule (307)  |  Throne (8)  |  Universe (900)

If I have put the case of science at all correctly, the reader will have recognised that modern science does much more than demand that it shall be left in undisturbed possession of what the theologian and metaphysician please to term its “legitimate field.” It claims that the whole range of phenomena, mental as well as physical—the entire universe—is its field. It asserts that the scientific method is the sole gateway to the whole region of knowledge.
From The Grammar of Science (1892), 29-30.
Science quotes on:  |  Assertion (35)  |  Case (102)  |  Claim (154)  |  Correction (42)  |  Demand (131)  |  Field (378)  |  Gateway (6)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Left (15)  |  Legitimate (26)  |  Mental (179)  |  Metaphysician (7)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Science (55)  |  More (2558)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Physical (518)  |  Please (68)  |  Possession (68)  |  Range (104)  |  Reader (42)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Region (40)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Sole (50)  |  Term (357)  |  Theologian (23)  |  Undisturbed (4)  |  Universe (900)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)

If it were possible for us to have so deep an insight into a man's character as shown both in inner and in outer actions, that every, even the least, incentive to these actions and all external occasions which affect them were so known to us that his future conduct could be predicted with as great a certainty as the occurrence of a solar or lunar eclipse, we could nevertheless still assert that the man is free.
Critique of Practical Reason (1788). In L. W. Beck (ed. & trans.), Critique of Practical Reason and Other Writings in Moral Philosophy (1949), 204-5.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Both (496)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Character (259)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Deep (241)  |  Eclipse (25)  |  Free (239)  |  Future (467)  |  Great (1610)  |  Incentive (10)  |  Inner (72)  |  Insight (107)  |  Known (453)  |  Man (2252)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Occurrence (53)  |  Possible (560)  |  Predict (86)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Still (614)

Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.
The Descent of Man (1871), Vol. 1, 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Confidence (75)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Little (717)  |  More (2558)  |  Never (1089)  |  Problem (731)  |  Will (2350)

In logic, A asserts and B denies. Assertions being proverbially untrue, the presumption would be in favor of B’s innocence were it not that denials are notoriously false.
The Unabridged Devil’s Dictionary (2000), 5.
Science quotes on:  |  Assertion (35)  |  Being (1276)  |  Denial (20)  |  False (105)  |  Favor (69)  |  Innocence (13)  |  Logic (311)  |  Notorious (8)  |  Presumption (15)  |  Proverb (29)  |  Untrue (12)

In our day grand generalizations have been reached. The theory of the origin of species is but one of them. Another, of still wider grasp and more radical significance, is the doctrine of the Conservation of Energy, the ultimate philosophical issues of which are as yet but dimly seem-that doctrine which “binds nature fast in fate” to an extent not hitherto recognized, exacting from every antecedent its equivalent consequent, and bringing vital as well as physical phenomena under the dominion of that law of causal connexion which, so far as the human understanding has yet pierced, asserts itself everywhere in nature.
'Address Delivered Before The British Association Assembled at Belfast', (19 Aug 1874). Fragments of Science for Unscientific People: A Series of Detached Essays, Lectures, and Reviews (1892), Vol. 2, 1801.
Science quotes on:  |  Antecedent (5)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Binding (9)  |  Bringing (10)  |  Cause (561)  |  Connection (171)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Consequent (19)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Conservation Of Energy (30)  |  Doctrine (81)  |  Dominion (11)  |  Energy (373)  |  Equivalent (46)  |  Everywhere (98)  |  Exacting (4)  |  Extent (142)  |  Fate (76)  |  Generalization (61)  |  Grandness (2)  |  Grasp (65)  |  Human (1512)  |  Issue (46)  |  Law (913)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Origin (250)  |  Origin Of Species (42)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physics (564)  |  Radical (28)  |  Reach (286)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Significance (114)  |  Species (435)  |  Still (614)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Vital (89)  |  Vitality (24)

In point of fact, no conclusive disproof of a theory can ever be produced; for it is always possible to say that the experimental results are not reliable or that the discrepancies which are asserted to exist between the experimental results and the theory are only apparent and that they will disappear with the advance of our understanding. If you insist on strict proof (or strict disproof) in the empirical sciences, you will never benefit from experience, and never learn from it how wrong you are.
The Logic of Scientific Discovery: Logik Der Forschung (1959, 2002), 28.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Apparent (85)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Conclusive (11)  |  Disappear (84)  |  Empirical (58)  |  Empirical Science (9)  |  Exist (458)  |  Experience (494)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Learn (672)  |  Never (1089)  |  Point (584)  |  Possible (560)  |  Produced (187)  |  Proof (304)  |  Result (700)  |  Say (989)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wrong (246)

Individual thinkers since the days of Ezekiel and Isaiah have asserted that the despoliation of land is not only inexpedient but wrong. Society, however, has not yet affirmed their belief. I regard the present conservation movement as the embryo of such an affirmation.
In 'The Ethical Sequence', A Sand County Almanac, and Sketches Here and There (1949, 1987), 203.
Science quotes on:  |  Affirmation (8)  |  Belief (615)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Embryo (30)  |  Ezekiel (2)  |  Individual (420)  |  Isaiah (2)  |  Land (131)  |  Movement (162)  |  Present (630)  |  Regard (312)  |  Society (350)  |  Thinker (41)  |  Wrong (246)

Is man a peculiar organism? Does he originate in a wholly different way from a dog, bird, frog, or fish? and does he thereby justify those who assert that he has no place in nature, and no real relationship with the lower world of animal life? Or does he develop from a similar embryo, and undergo the same slow and gradual progressive modifications? The answer is not for an instant doubtful, and has not been doubtful for the last thirty years. The mode of man’s origin and the earlier stages of his development are undoubtedly identical with those of the animals standing directly below him in the scale; without the slightest doubt, he stands in this respect nearer the ape than the ape does to the dog. (1863)
As quoted in Ernst Haeckel and E. Ray Lankester (trans.) as epigraph for Chap. 12, The History of Creation (1886), Vol. 1, 364.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Animal Life (21)  |  Answer (389)  |  Ape (54)  |  Bird (163)  |  Develop (278)  |  Development (441)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Dog (70)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Doubtful (30)  |  Embryo (30)  |  Fish (130)  |  Frog (44)  |  Gradual (30)  |  Identical (55)  |  Instant (46)  |  Justify (26)  |  Last (425)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lower (11)  |  Man (2252)  |  Modification (57)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nearer (45)  |  Organism (231)  |  Origin (250)  |  Origin Of Man (9)  |  Originate (39)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Place (192)  |  Progressive (21)  |  Relationship (114)  |  Respect (212)  |  Scale (122)  |  Similar (36)  |  Slow (108)  |  Stage (152)  |  Stand (284)  |  Undergo (18)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wholly (88)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

It has been asserted … that the power of observation is not developed by mathematical studies; while the truth is, that; from the most elementary mathematical notion that arises in the mind of a child to the farthest verge to which mathematical investigation has been pushed and applied, this power is in constant exercise. By observation, as here used, can only be meant the fixing of the attention upon objects (physical or mental) so as to note distinctive peculiarities—to recognize resemblances, differences, and other relations. Now the first mental act of the child recognizing the distinction between one and more than one, between one and two, two and three, etc., is exactly this. So, again, the first geometrical notions are as pure an exercise of this power as can be given. To know a straight line, to distinguish it from a curve; to recognize a triangle and distinguish the several forms—what are these, and all perception of form, but a series of observations? Nor is it alone in securing these fundamental conceptions of number and form that observation plays so important a part. The very genius of the common geometry as a method of reasoning—a system of investigation—is, that it is but a series of observations. The figure being before the eye in actual representation, or before the mind in conception, is so closely scrutinized, that all its distinctive features are perceived; auxiliary lines are drawn (the imagination leading in this), and a new series of inspections is made; and thus, by means of direct, simple observations, the investigation proceeds. So characteristic of common geometry is this method of investigation, that Comte, perhaps the ablest of all writers upon the philosophy of mathematics, is disposed to class geometry, as to its method, with the natural sciences, being based upon observation. Moreover, when we consider applied mathematics, we need only to notice that the exercise of this faculty is so essential, that the basis of all such reasoning, the very material with which we build, have received the name observations. Thus we might proceed to consider the whole range of the human faculties, and find for the most of them ample scope for exercise in mathematical studies. Certainly, the memory will not be found to be neglected. The very first steps in number—counting, the multiplication table, etc., make heavy demands on this power; while the higher branches require the memorizing of formulas which are simply appalling to the uninitiated. So the imagination, the creative faculty of the mind, has constant exercise in all original mathematical investigations, from the solution of the simplest problems to the discovery of the most recondite principle; for it is not by sure, consecutive steps, as many suppose, that we advance from the known to the unknown. The imagination, not the logical faculty, leads in this advance. In fact, practical observation is often in advance of logical exposition. Thus, in the discovery of truth, the imagination habitually presents hypotheses, and observation supplies facts, which it may require ages for the tardy reason to connect logically with the known. Of this truth, mathematics, as well as all other sciences, affords abundant illustrations. So remarkably true is this, that today it is seriously questioned by the majority of thinkers, whether the sublimest branch of mathematics,—the infinitesimal calculus—has anything more than an empirical foundation, mathematicians themselves not being agreed as to its logical basis. That the imagination, and not the logical faculty, leads in all original investigation, no one who has ever succeeded in producing an original demonstration of one of the simpler propositions of geometry, can have any doubt. Nor are induction, analogy, the scrutinization of premises or the search for them, or the balancing of probabilities, spheres of mental operations foreign to mathematics. No one, indeed, can claim preeminence for mathematical studies in all these departments of intellectual culture, but it may, perhaps, be claimed that scarcely any department of science affords discipline to so great a number of faculties, and that none presents so complete a gradation in the exercise of these faculties, from the first principles of the science to the farthest extent of its applications, as mathematics.
In 'Mathematics', in Henry Kiddle and Alexander J. Schem, The Cyclopedia of Education, (1877.) As quoted and cited in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-book (1914), 27-29.
Science quotes on:  |  Abundant (23)  |  Act (278)  |  Actual (118)  |  Advance (298)  |  Age (509)  |  Alone (324)  |  Analogy (76)  |  Appalling (10)  |  Application (257)  |  Applied (176)  |  Applied Mathematics (15)  |  Arise (162)  |  Attention (196)  |  Auxiliary (11)  |  Basis (180)  |  Being (1276)  |  Branch (155)  |  Build (211)  |  Calculus (65)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Child (333)  |  Claim (154)  |  Class (168)  |  Common (447)  |  Complete (209)  |  Auguste Comte (24)  |  Conception (160)  |  Connect (126)  |  Consider (428)  |  Constant (148)  |  Count (107)  |  Counting (26)  |  Creative (144)  |  Culture (157)  |  Curve (49)  |  Demand (131)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Department (93)  |  Develop (278)  |  Difference (355)  |  Direct (228)  |  Discipline (85)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Distinction (72)  |  Distinctive (25)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Empirical (58)  |  Essential (210)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Extent (142)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Figure (162)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Foreign (45)  |  Form (976)  |  Formula (102)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Genius (301)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Gradation (17)  |  Great (1610)  |  Human (1512)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Illustration (51)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Induction (81)  |  Infinitesimal (30)  |  Infinitesimal Calculus (2)  |  Inspection (7)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Lead (391)  |  Logic (311)  |  Majority (68)  |  Material (366)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Memorize (4)  |  Memory (144)  |  Mental (179)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Multiplication (46)  |  Multiplication Table (16)  |  Name (359)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Nature Of Mathematics (80)  |  Neglect (63)  |  Neglected (23)  |  New (1273)  |  Notice (81)  |  Notion (120)  |  Number (710)  |  Object (438)  |  Observation (593)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perception (97)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Physical (518)  |  Power (771)  |  Practical (225)  |  Preeminence (3)  |  Premise (40)  |  Present (630)  |  Principle (530)  |  Problem (731)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Pure (299)  |  Push (66)  |  Question (649)  |  Range (104)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Recondite (8)  |  Representation (55)  |  Require (229)  |  Resemblance (39)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Scope (44)  |  Scrutinize (7)  |  Search (175)  |  Series (153)  |  Simple (426)  |  Solution (282)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Step (234)  |  Straight (75)  |  Straight Line (34)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Suppose (158)  |  System (545)  |  Table (105)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thinker (41)  |  Today (321)  |  Triangle (20)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Two (936)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Verge (10)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Writer (90)

It has been said by a distinguished philosopher that England is “usually the last to enter into the general movement of the European mind.” The author of the remark probably meant to assert that a man or a system may have become famous on the continent, while we are almost ignorant of the name of the man and the claims of his system. Perhaps, however, a wider range might be given to the assertion. An exploded theory or a disadvantageous practice, like a rebel or a patriot in distress, seeks refuge on our shores to spend its last days in comfort if not in splendour.
Opening from essay, 'Elementary Geometry', included in The Conflict of Studies and Other Essays (1873), 136.
Science quotes on:  |  Assertion (35)  |  Author (175)  |  Become (821)  |  Claim (154)  |  Comfort (64)  |  Continent (79)  |  Disadvantageous (2)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Distress (9)  |  England (43)  |  Enter (145)  |  European (5)  |  Exploded (11)  |  Famous (12)  |  General (521)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Last (425)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Movement (162)  |  Name (359)  |  Patriot (5)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Practice (212)  |  Range (104)  |  Rebel (7)  |  Refuge (15)  |  Remark (28)  |  Seek (218)  |  Spend (97)  |  Splendour (8)  |  System (545)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Usually (176)

It is a good thing Heaven has not given us the power to change as much of our body as we would like to or as our theory would assert is necessary.
Aphorism 34 in Notebook D (1773-1775), as translated by R.J. Hollingdale in Aphorisms (1990). Reprinted as The Waste Books (2000), 48.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Change (639)  |  Good (906)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Liking (4)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Power (771)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)

It is sometimes asserted that a surgical operation is or should be a work of art … fit to rank with those of the painter or sculptor. … That proposition does not admit of discussion. It is a product of the intellectual innocence which I think we surgeons may fairly claim to possess, and which is happily not inconsistent with a quite adequate worldly wisdom.
Address, opening of 1932-3 session of U.C.H. Medical School (4 Oct 1932), 'Art and Science in Medicine', The Collected Papers of Wilfred Trotter, FRS (1941), 93.
Science quotes on:  |  Adequacy (10)  |  Adequate (50)  |  Admission (17)  |  Art (680)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Claim (154)  |  Discussion (78)  |  Fit (139)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Inconsistency (5)  |  Innocence (13)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Operation (221)  |  Painter (30)  |  Possess (157)  |  Possession (68)  |  Product (166)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Rank (69)  |  Sculptor (10)  |  Surgeon (64)  |  Surgery (54)  |  Think (1122)  |  Wisdom (235)  |  Work (1402)

It may be asserted without exaggeration that the domain of mathematical knowledge is the only one of which our otherwise omniscient journalism has not yet possessed itself.
In Ueber Wert und angeblichen Unwert der Mathematik'’ Jahresbericht der Deulschen Mathematiker Vereinigung (1904), 367.
Science quotes on:  |  Domain (72)  |  Exaggeration (16)  |  Journalism (4)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Modern Mathematics (50)  |  Omniscient (6)  |  Possess (157)

It often happens that men, even of the best understandings and greatest circumspection, are guilty of that fault in reasoning which the writers on logick call the insufficient, or imperfect enumeration of parts, or cases: insomuch that I will venture to assert, that this is the chief, and almost the only, source of the vast number of erroneous opinions, and those too very often in matters of great importance, which we are apt to form on all the subjects we reflect upon, whether they relate to the knowledge of nature, or the merits and motives of human actions. It must therefore be acknowledged, that the art which affords a cure to this weakness, or defect, of our understandings, and teaches us to enumerate all the possible ways in which a given number of things may be mixed and combined together, that we may be certain that we have not omitted anyone arrangement of them that can lead to the object of our inquiry, deserves to be considered as most eminently useful and worthy of our highest esteem and attention. And this is the business of the art, or doctrine of combinations ... It proceeds indeed upon mathematical principles in calculating the number of the combinations of the things proposed: but by the conclusions that are obtained by it, the sagacity of the natural philosopher, the exactness of the historian, the skill and judgement of the physician, and the prudence and foresight of the politician, may be assisted; because the business of all these important professions is but to form reasonable conjectures concerning the several objects which engage their attention, and all wise conjectures are the results of a just and careful examination of the several different effects that may possibly arise from the causes that are capable of producing them.
Ars conjectandi (1713). In F. Maseres, The Doctrine of Permutations and Combinations (1795), 36.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Arise (162)  |  Arrangement (93)  |  Art (680)  |  Attention (196)  |  Best (467)  |  Business (156)  |  Call (781)  |  Capable (174)  |  Cause (561)  |  Certain (557)  |  Chief (99)  |  Circumspection (5)  |  Combination (150)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Conjecture (51)  |  Consider (428)  |  Cure (124)  |  Defect (31)  |  Deserve (65)  |  Different (595)  |  Effect (414)  |  Engage (41)  |  Erroneous (31)  |  Error (339)  |  Exactness (29)  |  Examination (102)  |  Fault (58)  |  Form (976)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Happen (282)  |  Historian (59)  |  Human (1512)  |  Imperfect (46)  |  Importance (299)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lead (391)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Matter (821)  |  Merit (51)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motive (62)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Number (710)  |  Object (438)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Physician (284)  |  Politician (40)  |  Possible (560)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Principle (530)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Profession (108)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Result (700)  |  Sagacity (11)  |  Skill (116)  |  Subject (543)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Together (392)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Useful (260)  |  Vast (188)  |  Way (1214)  |  Weakness (50)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wise (143)  |  Writer (90)

It would be rash to say that nothing remains for discovery or improvement even in elementary mathematics, but it may be safely asserted that the ground has been so long and so thoroughly explored as to hold out little hope of profitable return for a casual adventurer.
In 'Private Study of Mathematics', Conflict of Studies and other Essays (1873), 73.
Science quotes on:  |  Adventurer (3)  |  Casual (9)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Ground (222)  |  Hold (96)  |  Hope (321)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Little (717)  |  Long (778)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Profitable (29)  |  Rash (15)  |  Remain (355)  |  Return (133)  |  Safely (7)  |  Say (989)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)  |  Thoroughly (67)

It would be rash to say that nothing remains for discovery or improvement even in elementary mathematics, but it may be safely asserted that the ground has been so long and so thoroughly explored as to hold out little hope of profitable return for a casual adventurer.
In 'Private Study of Mathematics', Conflict of Studies and other Essays (1873), 73.
Science quotes on:  |  Discovery (837)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Ground (222)  |  Hope (321)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Little (717)  |  Long (778)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Profitable (29)  |  Rash (15)  |  Remain (355)  |  Return (133)  |  Say (989)  |  Thoroughly (67)

Leaders who assert they will not concede one square meter of national territory to an invader should think of the hundreds of square kilometers of topsoil eroded from their countries each year.
Quoted, without source, in Epigraph in P. G. Dhar Chakrabarti (ed.), People, Planet, and Progress Beyond 2015 (2017), 33. [Please contact Webmaster if you know the primary source.]
Science quotes on:  |  Area (33)  |  Concede (2)  |  Country (269)  |  Erosion (20)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Invader (2)  |  Leader (51)  |  Nation (208)  |  Soil Erosion (5)  |  Territory (25)  |  Topsoil (2)

Let people who have to observe sickness and death look back and try to register in their observation the appearances which have preceded relapse, attack or death, and not assert that there were none, or that there were not the right ones. A want of the habit of observing conditions and an inveterate habit of taking averages are each of them often equally misleading.
Notes on Nursing: What it is, and What it is Not (1860), 67.
Science quotes on:  |  Appearance (145)  |  Attack (86)  |  Average (89)  |  Back (395)  |  Condition (362)  |  Death (406)  |  Equally (129)  |  Habit (174)  |  Look (584)  |  Misleading (21)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observe (179)  |  People (1031)  |  Register (22)  |  Relapse (5)  |  Right (473)  |  Sickness (26)  |  Try (296)  |  Want (504)

Newton supposed that the case of the planet was similar to that of [a ball spun around on the end of an elastic string]; that it was always pulled in the direction of the sun, and that this attraction or pulling of the sun produced the revolution of the planet, in the same way that the traction or pulling of the elastic string produces the revolution of the ball. What there is between the sun and the planet that makes each of them pull the other, Newton did not know; nobody knows to this day; and all we are now able to assert positively is that the known motion of the planet is precisely what would be produced if it were fastened to the sun by an elastic string, having a certain law of elasticity. Now observe the nature of this discovery, the greatest in its consequences that has ever yet been made in physical science:—
I. It begins with an hypothesis, by supposing that there is an analogy between the motion of a planet and the motion of a ball at the end of a string.
II. Science becomes independent of the hypothesis, for we merely use it to investigate the properties of the motion, and do not trouble ourselves further about the cause of it.
'On Some of the Conditions of Mental Development,' a discourse delivered at the Royal Institution, 6 Mar 1868, in Leslie Stephen and Frederick Pollock (eds.), Lectures and Essays, by the Late William Kingdon Clifford (1886), 56.
Science quotes on:  |  Analogy (76)  |  Attraction (61)  |  Ball (64)  |  Become (821)  |  Begin (275)  |  Cause (561)  |  Certain (557)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Direction (185)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Elasticity (8)  |  End (603)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Gravitation (23)  |  Merely (315)  |  Motion (320)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Nobody (103)  |  Observe (179)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Planet (402)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Produced (187)  |  Pull (43)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Sun (407)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Use (771)  |  Way (1214)

Ordinary language is totally unsuited for expressing what physics really asserts, since the words of everyday life are not sufficiently abstract. Only mathematics and mathematical logic can say as little as the physicist means to say.
In The Scientific Outlook (1931, 2001), 61.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Everyday Life (15)  |  Express (192)  |  Language (308)  |  Little (717)  |  Logic (311)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Means (587)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physics (564)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Unsuitable (2)  |  Word (650)

Our first endeavors are purely instinctive prompting of an imagination vivid and undisciplined. As we grow older reason asserts itself and we become more and more systematic and designing. But those early impulses, though not immediately productive, are of the greatest moment and may shape our very destinies. Indeed, I feel now that had I understood and cultivated instead of suppressing them, I would have added substantial value to my bequest to the world. But not until I had attained manhood did I realize that I was an inventor.
In 'My Early Life', My Inventions: And Other Writings (2016), 1. Originally published in serial form in Part 1, 'My Inventions', Electrical Experimenter magazine (1919).
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Design (203)  |  Early (196)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  First (1302)  |  Grow (247)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Impulse (52)  |  Instinctive (5)  |  More (2558)  |  Old (499)  |  Productive (37)  |  Prompt (14)  |  Purely (111)  |  Reason (766)  |  Systematic (58)  |  Undisciplined (2)  |  Vivid (25)

Physicists speak of the particle representation or the wave representation. Bohr's principle of complementarity asserts that there exist complementary properties of the same object of knowledge, one of which if known will exclude knowledge of the other. We may therefore describe an object like an electron in ways which are mutually exclusive—e.g., as wave or particle—without logical contradiction provided we also realize that the experimental arrangements that determine these descriptions are similarly mutually exclusive. Which experiment—and hence which description one chooses—is purely a matter of human choice.
The Cosmic Code: Quantum Physics as the Language of Nature (1982), 94.
Science quotes on:  |  Arrangement (93)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Niels Bohr (55)  |  Choice (114)  |  Choose (116)  |  Complementarity (6)  |  Complementary (15)  |  Contradiction (69)  |  Describe (132)  |  Description (89)  |  Determination (80)  |  Determine (152)  |  Electron (96)  |  Exclusion (16)  |  Exclusive (29)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Human (1512)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mutual (54)  |  Object (438)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Principle (530)  |  Property (177)  |  Purely (111)  |  Realization (44)  |  Realize (157)  |  Representation (55)  |  Speak (240)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Wave (112)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

Psychologists must cease to be content with the sterile and narrow conception of their science as the science of consciousness, and must boldly assert its claim to be the positive science of mind in all its aspects and modes of functining, or, as I would prefer to say, the positive science of conduct or behavior.
An Introduction to Social Psychology (1928), 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Aspect (129)  |  Behavior (95)  |  Behaviour (42)  |  Cease (81)  |  Claim (154)  |  Conception (160)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Must (1525)  |  Narrow (85)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Positive (98)  |  Say (989)  |  Sterile (24)

Religion closes off the central questions of existence by attempting to dissuade us from further enquiry by asserting that we cannot ever hope to comprehend. We are, religion asserts, simply too puny.
Essay collected in John Cornwell (ed.), 'The Limitless Power of Science', Nature's Imagination: The Frontiers of Scientific Vision (1995), 125.
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (266)  |  Central (81)  |  Close (77)  |  Comprehend (44)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Existence (481)  |  Hope (321)  |  Puny (8)  |  Question (649)  |  Religion (369)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Simply (53)

Science is an allegory that asserts that the relations between the parts of reality are similar to the relations between terms of discourse.
Poetry and Mathematics (1929), 96-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Allegory (8)  |  Reality (274)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)

So highly did the ancients esteem the power of figures and numbers, that Democritus ascribed to the figures of atoms the first principles of the variety of things; and Pythagoras asserted that the nature of things consisted of numbers.
In De Augmentis, Bk. 3; Advancement of Learning, Bk. 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Ascribe (18)  |  Atom (381)  |  Consist (223)  |  Democritus of Abdera (17)  |  Esteem (18)  |  Estimates of Mathematics (30)  |  Figure (162)  |  First (1302)  |  Highly (16)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nature Of Things (30)  |  Number (710)  |  Power (771)  |  Principle (530)  |  Pythagoras (38)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Variety (138)

The [first] argument asserts the non-existence of notion on the ground that that which is in locomotion must arrive at the half-way stage before it arrives at the goal.
Dichotomy paradox
Zeno
Aristotle, Physics, 239b10 11. In Reginald E. Allen, Greek Philosophy: Thales to Aristotle? (1991), 46.
Science quotes on:  |  Argument (145)  |  Existence (481)  |  First (1302)  |  Goal (155)  |  Ground (222)  |  Half (63)  |  Infinite Series (8)  |  Motion (320)  |  Must (1525)  |  Notion (120)  |  Paradox (54)  |  Stage (152)  |  Way (1214)

The aim of scientific work is truth. While we internally recognise something as true, we judge, and while we utter judgements, we assert.
In Manuscripts 2 (after 1879). As cited and translated by Ivor Grattan-Guinness in The Search for Mathematical Roots, 1870-1940 (2011), 177.
Science quotes on:  |  Aim (175)  |  Judge (114)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Something (718)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Work (1402)

The elementary parts of all tissues are formed of cells in an analogous, though very diversified manner, so that it may be asserted, that there is one universal principle of development for the elementary parts of organisms, however different, and that this principle is the formation of cells.
Mikroskopische Untersuchungen über die Uebereinstimmung in der Struktur und dem Wachsthum der Thiere und Pflanzen (1839). Microscopic Researches into the Accordance in the Structure and Growth of Animals and Plants, trans. Henry Smith (1847), 165.
Science quotes on:  |  Analogy (76)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Cell (146)  |  Development (441)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Diversity (75)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Form (976)  |  Formation (100)  |  Manner (62)  |  Organism (231)  |  Principle (530)  |  Tissue (51)  |  Universal (198)  |  Universality (22)

The existence of life must be considered as an elementary fact that can not be explained, but must be taken as a starting point in biology, in a similar way as the quantum of action, which appears as an irrational element from the point of view of classical mechanical physics, taken together with the existence of elementary particles, forms the foundation of atomic physics. The asserted impossibility of a physical or chemical explanation of the function peculiar to life would in this sense be analogous to the insufficiency of the mechanical analysis for the understanding of the stability of atoms.
'Light and Life', Nature, 1933, 131, 458.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Atom (381)  |  Atomic Physics (7)  |  Biology (232)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Classical (49)  |  Classical Physics (6)  |  Consider (428)  |  Element (322)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Existence (481)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Form (976)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Function (235)  |  Impossibility (60)  |  Insufficiency (3)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Must (1525)  |  Particle (200)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physics (564)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Sense (785)  |  Stability (28)  |  Together (392)  |  Understanding (527)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)

The Gaia Hypothesis asserts that Earth’s atmosphere is continually interacting with geology (the lithosphere). Earth’s cycling waters (the hydrosphere), and everything that lives (the biosphere). … The image is that the atmosphere is a circulatory system for life’s bio-chemical interplay. If the atmosphere is pan of a larger whole that has some of the qualities of an organism, one of those qualities we must now pray for is resilience.
In Praise of Nature
Science quotes on:  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Biosphere (14)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Circulatory (2)  |  Continually (17)  |  Cycle (42)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Everything (489)  |  Gaia (15)  |  Geology (240)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Image (97)  |  Interact (8)  |  Interplay (9)  |  Large (398)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lithosphere (2)  |  Live (650)  |  Must (1525)  |  Organism (231)  |  Pray (19)  |  Quality (139)  |  Resilience (2)  |  System (545)  |  Water (503)  |  Whole (756)

The great basic thought that the world is not to be comprehended as a complex of ready-made things, but as a complex of processes, in which the things apparently stable no less than their mind-images in our heads, the concepts, go through an uninterrupted change of coming into being and passing away, in which, in spite of all seeming accidents and of all temporary retrogression, a progressive development asserts itself in the end—this great fundamental thought has, especially since the time of Hegel, so thoroughly permeated ordinary consciousness that in this generality it is scarcely ever contradicted.
Ludwig Feuerbach and the Outcome of Classical German Philosophy (1886). C. P. Dutt (ed.) (1934), 54.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Basic (144)  |  Being (1276)  |  Change (639)  |  Coming (114)  |  Complex (202)  |  Concept (242)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Contradict (42)  |  Development (441)  |  End (603)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Generality (45)  |  Great (1610)  |  Image (97)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Passing (76)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Retrogression (6)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Spite (55)  |  Stable (32)  |  Temporary (24)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thoroughly (67)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Uninterrupted (7)  |  World (1850)

The mathematical intellectualism is henceforth a positive doctrine, but one that inverts the usual doctrines of positivism: in place of originating progress in order, dynamics in statics, its goal is to make logical order the product of intellectual progress. The science of the future is not enwombed, as Comte would have had it, as Kant had wished it, in the forms of the science already existing; the structure of these forms reveals an original dynamism whose onward sweep is prolonged by the synthetic generation of more and more complicated forms. No speculation on number considered as a category a priori enables one to account for the questions set by modern mathematics … space affirms only the possibility of applying to a multiplicity of any elements whatever, relations whose type the intellect does not undertake to determine in advance, but, on the contrary, it asserts their existence and nourishes their unlimited development.
As translated in James Byrnie Shaw, Lectures on the Philosophy of Mathematics (1918), 193. From Léon Brunschvicg, Les Étapes de La Philosophie Mathématique (1912), 567-568, “L’intellectualisme mathématique est désormais une doctrine positive, mais qui intervertira les formules habituelles du positivisme: au lieu de faire sortir le progrès de l’ordre, ou le dynamique du statique, il tend à faire de l'ordre logique le produit du progrès intellectuel. La science à venir n'est pas enfermée, comme l’aurait voulu Comte, comme le voulait déjà Kant, dans les formes de la science déjà faite; la constitution de ces formes révèle un dynamisme originel dont l’élan se prolonge par la génération synthétique de notions de plus en plus compliquées. Aucune spéculation sur le nombre, considéré comme catégorie a priori, ne permet de rendre compte des questions qui se sont posées pour la mathématique moderne … … l’espace ne fait qu'affirmer la possibilité d'appliquer sur une multiplicité d’éléments quelconques des relations dont l’intelligence ne cherche pas à déterminer d’avance le type, dont elle constate, au contraire, dont elle suscite le développement illimité.”
Science quotes on:  |  A Priori (26)  |  Account (195)  |  Advance (298)  |  Already (226)  |  Category (19)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Auguste Comte (24)  |  Consider (428)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Determine (152)  |  Development (441)  |  Doctrine (81)  |  Dynamics (11)  |  Element (322)  |  Enable (122)  |  Existence (481)  |  Form (976)  |  Future (467)  |  Generation (256)  |  Goal (155)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Immanuel Kant (50)  |  Logic (311)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Mathematics (50)  |  More (2558)  |  Multiplicity (14)  |  Number (710)  |  Order (638)  |  Original (61)  |  Positive (98)  |  Positivism (3)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Product (166)  |  Progress (492)  |  Prolong (29)  |  Question (649)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Set (400)  |  Space (523)  |  Speculation (137)  |  Statics (6)  |  Structure (365)  |  Sweep (22)  |  Synthetic (27)  |  Type (171)  |  Undertake (35)  |  Unlimited (24)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Wish (216)

The metaphysical doctrine of determinism simply asserts that all events in this world are fixed, or unalterable, or predetermined. It does not assert that they are known to anybody, or predictable by scientific means. But it asserts that the future is as little changeable as is the past. Everybody knows what we mean when we say that the past cannot be changed. It is in precisely the same sense that the future cannot be changed, according to metaphysical determinism.
Karl Raimund Popper and William Warren Bartley (ed.), The Open Universe: an Argument for Indeterminism (1991), 8.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Anybody (42)  |  Determinism (12)  |  Event (222)  |  Everybody (72)  |  Future (467)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Little (717)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Metaphysical (38)  |  Metaphysics (53)  |  Past (355)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Predetermine (2)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Sense (785)  |  World (1850)

The mythology of science asserts that with many different scientists all asking their own questions and evaluating the answers independently, whatever personal bias creeps into their individual answers is cancelled out when the large picture is put together. This might conceivably be so if scientists were women and men from all sorts of different cultural and social backgrounds who came to science with very different ideologies and interests. But since, in fact, they have been predominantly university-trained white males from privileged social backgrounds, the bias has been narrow and the product often reveals more about the investigator than about the subject being researched.
'Have Only Men Evolved?' Women Look at Biology Looking At Women, eds. Ruth Hubbard, Mary Sue Henifin, and Barbara Fried (1979).
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Ask (420)  |  Asking (74)  |  Background (44)  |  Being (1276)  |  Bias (22)  |  Cancel (5)  |  Creep (15)  |  Cultural (26)  |  Different (595)  |  Evaluate (7)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Ideology (15)  |  Independently (24)  |  Individual (420)  |  Interest (416)  |  Investigator (71)  |  Large (398)  |  Male (26)  |  More (2558)  |  Mythology (19)  |  Narrow (85)  |  Often (109)  |  Personal (75)  |  Picture (148)  |  Predominantly (4)  |  Privilege (41)  |  Product (166)  |  Question (649)  |  Research (753)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Social (261)  |  Sort (50)  |  Subject (543)  |  Together (392)  |  Train (118)  |  University (130)  |  Whatever (234)  |  White (132)  |  Woman (160)

The question of relevance comes before that of truth, because to ask whether a statement is true or false presupposes that it is relevant (so that to try to assert the truth or falsity of an irrelevant statement is a form of confusion)...
From Wholeness and the Implicate Order (1980, 2002), 42.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Confusion (61)  |  Falsity (16)  |  Form (976)  |  Irrelevance (4)  |  Presuppose (15)  |  Question (649)  |  Relevance (18)  |  Statement (148)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Try (296)

The skeptic does not mean him who doubts, but him who investigates or researches, as opposed to him who asserts and thinks that he has found. The one is the man who studies the problem and the other is the man who gives us a formula, correct or incorrect, as the solution of it.
'My Religion', Essays and Soliloquies, translated by John Ernest Crawford Flitch (1925), 56. In Robert Andrews, The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations (1993), 844:9.
Science quotes on:  |  Doubt (314)  |  Formula (102)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (810)  |  Other (2233)  |  Problem (731)  |  Research (753)  |  Solution (282)  |  Think (1122)

There have been many authorities who have asserted that the basis of science lies in counting or measuring, i.e. in the use of mathematics. Neither counting nor measuring can however be the most fundamental processes in our study of the material universe—before you can do either to any purpose you must first select what you propose to count or measure, which presupposes a classification.
Classification and Biology (1970), 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Basis (180)  |  Classification (102)  |  Count (107)  |  Counting (26)  |  Do (1905)  |  First (1302)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Lie (370)  |  Material (366)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Measure (241)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Presuppose (15)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Select (45)  |  Study (701)  |  Universe (900)  |  Use (771)

Those who assert that the mathematical sciences make no affirmation about what is fair or good make a false assertion; for they do speak of these and frame demonstrations of them in the most eminent sense of the word. For if they do not actually employ these names, they do not exhibit even the results and the reasons of these, and therefore can be hardly said to make any assertion about them. Of what is fair, however, the most important species are order and symmetry, and that which is definite, which the mathematical sciences make manifest in a most eminent degree. And since, at least, these appear to be the causes of many things—now, I mean, for example, order, and that which is a definite thing, it is evident that they would assert, also, the existence of a cause of this description, and its subsistence after the same manner as that which is fair subsists in.
Aristotle
In Metaphysics [MacMahon] Bk. 12, chap. 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Actually (27)  |  Affirmation (8)  |  Appear (122)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Cause (561)  |  Definite (114)  |  Degree (277)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Description (89)  |  Do (1905)  |  Eminent (20)  |  Employ (115)  |  Estimates of Mathematics (30)  |  Evident (92)  |  Example (98)  |  Exhibit (21)  |  Existence (481)  |  Fair (16)  |  False (105)  |  Frame (26)  |  Good (906)  |  Hardly (19)  |  Important (229)  |  It Is Evident (6)  |  Least (75)  |  Manifest (21)  |  Manner (62)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Most (1728)  |  Name (359)  |  Order (638)  |  Reason (766)  |  Result (700)  |  Same (166)  |  Say (989)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sense Of The Word (6)  |  Speak (240)  |  Species (435)  |  Subsist (5)  |  Subsistence (9)  |  Symmetry (44)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Word (650)

Those who have taken upon them to lay down the law of nature as a thing already searched out and understood, whether they have spoken in simple assurance or professional affectation, have therein done philosophy and the sciences great injury. For as they have been successful in inducing belief, so they have been effective in quenching and stopping inquiry; and have done more harm by spoiling and putting an end to other men's efforts than good by their own. Those on the other hand who have taken a contrary course, and asserted that absolutely nothing can be known — whether it were from hatred of the ancient sophists, or from uncertainty and fluctuation of mind, or even from a kind of fullness of learning, that they fell upon this opinion — have certainly advanced reasons for it that are not to be despised; but yet they have neither started from true principles nor rested in the just conclusion, zeal and affectation having carried them much too far...
Now my method, though hard to practice, is easy to explain; and it is this. I propose to establish progressive stages of certainty. The evidence of the sense, helped and guarded by a certain process of correction, I retain. But the mental operation which follows the act of sense I for the most part reject; and instead of it I open and lay out a new and certain path for the mind to proceed in, starting directly from the simple sensuous perception.
Novum Organum (1620)
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Already (226)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Assurance (17)  |  Belief (615)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Correction (42)  |  Course (413)  |  Down (455)  |  Easy (213)  |  Effective (68)  |  Effort (243)  |  End (603)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Explain (334)  |  Fluctuation (15)  |  Follow (389)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hard (246)  |  Hatred (21)  |  Injury (36)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Kind (564)  |  Known (453)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Nature (80)  |  Learning (291)  |  Mental (179)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Open (277)  |  Operation (221)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Other (2233)  |  Path (159)  |  Perception (97)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Practice (212)  |  Principle (530)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Process (439)  |  Professional (77)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reject (67)  |  Rest (287)  |  Retain (57)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Search (175)  |  Sense (785)  |  Simple (426)  |  Stage (152)  |  Start (237)  |  Successful (134)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Understood (155)

Those who knew that the judgements of many centuries had reinforced the opinion that the Earth is placed motionless in the middle of heaven, as though at its centre, if I on the contrary asserted that the Earth moves, I hesitated for a long time whether to bring my treatise, written to demonstrate its motion, into the light of day, or whether it would not be better to follow the example of the Pythagoreans and certain others, who used to pass on the mysteries of their philosophy merely to their relatives and friends, not in writing but by personal contact, as the letter of Lysis to Hipparchus bears witness. And indeed they seem to me to have done so, not as some think from a certain jealousy of communicating their doctrines, but so that their greatest splendours, discovered by the devoted research of great men, should not be exposed to the contempt of those who either find it irksome to waste effort on anything learned, unless it is profitable, or if they are stirred by the exhortations and examples of others to a high-minded enthusiasm for philosophy, are nevertheless so dull-witted that among philosophers they are like drones among bees.
'To His Holiness Pope Paul III', in Copernicus: On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres (1543), trans. A. M. Duncan (1976), 24.
Science quotes on:  |  Bear (162)  |  Bee (44)  |  Better (493)  |  Certain (557)  |  Contact (66)  |  Contempt (20)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Demonstrate (79)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Discover (571)  |  Drone (4)  |  Dull (58)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effort (243)  |  Enthusiasm (59)  |  Exposed (33)  |  Find (1014)  |  Follow (389)  |  Friend (180)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Heaven (266)  |  High (370)  |  Hipparchus (5)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Jealousy (9)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Letter (117)  |  Light (635)  |  Long (778)  |  Lysis (4)  |  Merely (315)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Motion (320)  |  Move (223)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pass (241)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Profitable (29)  |  Pythagoras (38)  |  Research (753)  |  Splendour (8)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Waste (109)  |  Witness (57)  |  Writing (192)

Two lights for guidance. The first, our little glowing atom of community, with all that it signifies. The second, the cold light of the stars, symbol of the hypercosmical reality, with its crystal ecstasy. Strange that in this light, in which even the dearest love is frostily asserted, and even the possible defeat of our half-waking world is contemplated without remission of praise, the human crisis does not lose but gains significance. Strange, that it seems more, not less, urgent to play some part in this struggle, this brief effort of animalcules striving to win for their race some increase of lucidity before the ultimate darkness.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Animalcule (12)  |  Atom (381)  |  Brief (37)  |  Cold (115)  |  Community (111)  |  Contemplate (21)  |  Crisis (25)  |  Crystal (71)  |  Darkness (72)  |  Defeat (31)  |  Ecstasy (9)  |  Effort (243)  |  First (1302)  |  Gain (146)  |  Glow (15)  |  Guidance (30)  |  Human (1512)  |  Increase (225)  |  Less (105)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Lose (165)  |  Love (328)  |  Lucidity (7)  |  More (2558)  |  Part (235)  |  Play (116)  |  Possible (560)  |  Praise (28)  |  Race (278)  |  Reality (274)  |  Remission (3)  |  Second (66)  |  Seem (150)  |  Significance (114)  |  Signify (17)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Strange (160)  |  Strive (53)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Two (936)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Urgent (15)  |  Waking (17)  |  Win (53)  |  World (1850)

Unconscious, perhaps, of the remote tendency of his own labours, he [Joseph Black] undermined that doctrine of material heat, which he seemed to support. For, by his advocacy of latent heat, he taught that its movements constantly battle, not only some of our senses, but all of them; and that, while our feelings make us believe that heat is lost, our intellect makes us believe that it is not lost. Here, we have apparent destructability, and real indestructibility. To assert that a body received heat without its temperature rising, was to make the understanding correct the touch, and defy its dictates. It was a bold and beautiful paradox, which required courage as well as insight to broach, and the reception of which marks an epoch in the human mind, because it was an immense step towards idealizing matter into force.
History of Civilization in England (1861), Vol. 2, 494.
Science quotes on:  |  Apparent (85)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Joseph Black (14)  |  Body (557)  |  Bold (22)  |  Courage (82)  |  Defy (11)  |  Epoch (46)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Feelings (52)  |  Force (497)  |  Heat (180)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Immense (89)  |  Insight (107)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Labor (200)  |  Latent Heat (7)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Movement (162)  |  Paradox (54)  |  Reception (16)  |  Remote (86)  |  Required (108)  |  Rising (44)  |  Sense (785)  |  Step (234)  |  Support (151)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Tendency (110)  |  Touch (146)  |  Understanding (527)

We do not doubt to assert, that air does not serve for the motion of the lungs, but rather to communicate something to the blood ... It is very likely that it is the fine nitrous particles, with which the air abounds, that are communicated to the blood through the lungs.
Tractatus duo. Quorum prior agit de respiratione: alter de rachitude (1668), 43. Quoted in Robert G. Frank Jr., Harvey and the Oxford Physiologists (1980), 228.
Science quotes on:  |  Abound (17)  |  Air (366)  |  Blood (144)  |  Communicate (39)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Lung (37)  |  Motion (320)  |  Particle (200)  |  Something (718)  |  Through (846)

What is possible can never be demonstrated to be false; and 'tis possible the course of nature may change, since we can conceive such a change. Nay, I will go farther, and assert, that he could not so much as prove by any probable arguments, that the future must be conformable to the past. All probable arguments are built on the supposition, that there is this conformity betwixt the future and the past, and therefore can never prove it. This conformity is a matter of fact, and if it must be proved, will admit of no proof but from experience. But our experience in the past can be a proof of nothing for the future, but upon a supposition, that there is a resemblance betwixt them. This therefore is a point, which can admit of no proof at all, and which we take for granted without any proof.
An Abstract of A Treatise on Human Nature (1740), ed. John Maynard Keynes and Piero Sraffa (1938), 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Argument (145)  |  Change (639)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Conformity (15)  |  Course (413)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fact (1257)  |  False (105)  |  Farther (51)  |  Future (467)  |  Grant (76)  |  Matter (821)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Past (355)  |  Point (584)  |  Possible (560)  |  Proof (304)  |  Prove (261)  |  Resemblance (39)  |  Supposition (50)  |  Will (2350)

You may take it as an instance of male injustice if I assert that envy and jealousy play an even greater part in the mental life of women than of men. It is not that I think these characteristics are absent in men or that I think they have no other roots in women than envy for the penis; but I am inclined to attribute their greater amount in women to this latter influence.
New Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis (1933), in James Strachey (ed.), The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud (1964), Vol. 22, 125.
Science quotes on:  |  Amount (153)  |  Attribute (65)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Envy (15)  |  Greater (288)  |  Inclined (41)  |  Influence (231)  |  Jealousy (9)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mental (179)  |  Other (2233)  |  Psychoanalysis (37)  |  Root (121)  |  Sexuality (11)  |  Think (1122)


Carl Sagan Thumbnail 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) -- Carl Sagan
Quotations by:Albert EinsteinIsaac NewtonLord KelvinCharles DarwinSrinivasa RamanujanCarl SaganFlorence NightingaleThomas EdisonAristotleMarie CurieBenjamin FranklinWinston ChurchillGalileo GalileiSigmund FreudRobert BunsenLouis PasteurTheodore RooseveltAbraham LincolnRonald ReaganLeonardo DaVinciMichio KakuKarl PopperJohann GoetheRobert OppenheimerCharles Kettering  ... (more people)

Quotations about:Atomic  BombBiologyChemistryDeforestationEngineeringAnatomyAstronomyBacteriaBiochemistryBotanyConservationDinosaurEnvironmentFractalGeneticsGeologyHistory of ScienceInventionJupiterKnowledgeLoveMathematicsMeasurementMedicineNatural ResourceOrganic ChemistryPhysicsPhysicianQuantum TheoryResearchScience and ArtTeacherTechnologyUniverseVolcanoVirusWind PowerWomen ScientistsX-RaysYouthZoology  ... (more topics)
Sitewide search within all Today In Science History pages:
Visit our Science and Scientist Quotations index for more Science Quotes from archaeologists, biologists, chemists, geologists, inventors and inventions, mathematicians, physicists, pioneers in medicine, science events and technology.

Names index: | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z |

Categories index: | 1 | 2 | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z |
Thank you for sharing.
- 100 -
Sophie Germain
Gertrude Elion
Ernest Rutherford
James Chadwick
Marcel Proust
William Harvey
Johann Goethe
John Keynes
Carl Gauss
Paul Feyerabend
- 90 -
Antoine Lavoisier
Lise Meitner
Charles Babbage
Ibn Khaldun
Euclid
Ralph Emerson
Robert Bunsen
Frederick Banting
Andre Ampere
Winston Churchill
- 80 -
John Locke
Bronislaw Malinowski
Bible
Thomas Huxley
Alessandro Volta
Erwin Schrodinger
Wilhelm Roentgen
Louis Pasteur
Bertrand Russell
Jean Lamarck
- 70 -
Samuel Morse
John Wheeler
Nicolaus Copernicus
Robert Fulton
Pierre Laplace
Humphry Davy
Thomas Edison
Lord Kelvin
Theodore Roosevelt
Carolus Linnaeus
- 60 -
Francis Galton
Linus Pauling
Immanuel Kant
Martin Fischer
Robert Boyle
Karl Popper
Paul Dirac
Avicenna
James Watson
William Shakespeare
- 50 -
Stephen Hawking
Niels Bohr
Nikola Tesla
Rachel Carson
Max Planck
Henry Adams
Richard Dawkins
Werner Heisenberg
Alfred Wegener
John Dalton
- 40 -
Pierre Fermat
Edward Wilson
Johannes Kepler
Gustave Eiffel
Giordano Bruno
JJ Thomson
Thomas Kuhn
Leonardo DaVinci
Archimedes
David Hume
- 30 -
Andreas Vesalius
Rudolf Virchow
Richard Feynman
James Hutton
Alexander Fleming
Emile Durkheim
Benjamin Franklin
Robert Oppenheimer
Robert Hooke
Charles Kettering
- 20 -
Carl Sagan
James Maxwell
Marie Curie
Rene Descartes
Francis Crick
Hippocrates
Michael Faraday
Srinivasa Ramanujan
Francis Bacon
Galileo Galilei
- 10 -
Aristotle
John Watson
Rosalind Franklin
Michio Kaku
Isaac Asimov
Charles Darwin
Sigmund Freud
Albert Einstein
Florence Nightingale
Isaac Newton


by Ian Ellis
who invites your feedback
Thank you for sharing.
Today in Science History
Sign up for Newsletter
with quiz, quotes and more.