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 C > Category: Chaos

Chaos Quotes (99 quotes)


… it may happen that small differences in the initial conditions produce very great ones in the final phenomena.
Science and Method (1908) translated by Francis Maitland (2003), 68.
Science quotes on:  |  Condition (362)  |  Difference (355)  |  Final (121)  |  Great (1610)  |  Happen (282)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Small (489)

[My advice] will one day be found
With other relics of 'a former world,'
When this world shall be former, underground,
Thrown topsy-turvy, twisted, crisped, and curled,
Baked, fried or burnt, turned inside-out, or drowned,
Like all the worlds before, which have been hurled
First out of, and then back again to Chaos,
The Superstratum which will overlay us.
Don Juan (1821), Canto 9, Verse 37. In Jerome J. McGann (ed.), Lord Byron: The Complete Poetical Works (1986), Vol. 5, 420.
Science quotes on:  |  Advice (57)  |  Back (395)  |  Change (639)  |  First (1302)  |  Former (138)  |  Other (2233)  |  Turn (454)  |  Twist (10)  |  Underground (12)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

[Student describing Niels Bohr's main gift, the ability to synthesize:] Like Socrates, he wages a fight to bring harmony out of chaos and diversity.
Anonymous
Quoted in Bill Becker, 'Pioneer of the Atom', New York Times Sunday Magazine (20 Oct 1957), 52.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Niels Bohr (55)  |  Diversity (75)  |  Fight (49)  |  Gift (105)  |  Harmony (105)  |   Socrates, (17)  |  Student (317)  |  Synthesis (58)

Ante mare, et terras, et quod tegit omnia caelum, unus erat toto naturae vultus in orbe, quem dixere chaos: rudis indigestaque moles; nec quicquam, nisi pondus iners; congestaque eodem non bene iunctarum discordia, semina rerum.
Before there was the sea, the earth and the sky canopy, Nature presented the same aspect throughout the world, which men called Chaos: a raw, disorganized bulk; nothing but an inert mass; a jumbled heap of primordial things.
The original Latin text of Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Book 1, lines 5-9, in which he described the Creation of the universe. It is freely translated by Webmaster blending several sources. See, for example, Locke (trans.), The First Book of Ovid's Metamorphoses, with a Literal Interlinear Translation (1828), 2, or Mary Innes (trans.), The Metamorphoses of Ovid (1955), 29.
Science quotes on:  |  Creation (350)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Inert (14)  |  Mass (160)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sky (174)  |  Universe (900)  |  World (1850)

Chaos umpire sits
And by decision more embroils the fray
By which he reigns: next him high arbiter
Chance governs all.
In Richard Bentlet (ed.), Milton's Paradise Lost (1732), book 2, lines 907-910, 70.
Science quotes on:  |  Arbiter (5)  |  Chance (244)  |  Decision (98)  |  Govern (66)  |  High (370)  |  More (2558)  |  Next (238)  |  Reign (24)  |  Sit (51)

After innumerable dynasties of giant creatures, after endless generations of fish and families of molluscs, man finally arrives, the degenerate product of a grandiose type, his mould perhaps broken by his Creator. Fired by his retrospection, these timid humans, born but yesterday, can now leap across chaos, sing an endless hymn, and configure the history of the universe in a sort of retrograde Apocalypse.
From 'La Peau de Chagrin' (1831). As translated as by Helen Constantine The Wild Ass’s Skin (2012), 19.
Science quotes on:  |  Apocalypse (2)  |  Arrive (40)  |  Broken (56)  |  Creator (97)  |  Creature (242)  |  Degenerate (14)  |  Dynasty (8)  |  Endless (60)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fish (130)  |  Generation (256)  |  Giant (73)  |  Grandiose (4)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Hymn (6)  |  Innumerable (56)  |  Leap (57)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mold (37)  |  Product (166)  |  Retrograde (8)  |  Timid (6)  |  Type (171)  |  Universe (900)  |  Yesterday (37)

All material Things seem to have been composed of the hard and solid Particles … variously associated with the first Creation by the Counsel of an intelligent Agent. For it became him who created them to set them in order: and if he did so, it is unphilosophical to seek for any other Origin of the World, or to pretend that it might arise out of a Chaos by the mere Laws of Nature.
From Opticks (1704, 2nd ed., 1718), 377-378.
Science quotes on:  |  Agent (73)  |  Arise (162)  |  Associated (2)  |  Big Bang (45)  |  Composed (3)  |  Counsel (11)  |  Creation (350)  |  First (1302)  |  Hard (246)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Law (913)  |  Material (366)  |  Mere (86)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Order (638)  |  Origin (250)  |  Origin Of The Earth (13)  |  Origin Of The Universe (20)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  Pretend (18)  |  Seek (218)  |  Set (400)  |  Solid (119)  |  Thing (1914)  |  World (1850)

All power, all subordination rests on the executioner: he is the horror and the bond of human association. Remove this incomprehensible agent from the world, and the very moment order gives way to chaos, thrones topple, and society disappears
In Joseph de Maistre and Richard A. Lebrun (trans.), The St. Petersburg Dialogues (1993), 20.
Science quotes on:  |  Agent (73)  |  Association (49)  |  Bond (46)  |  Disappear (84)  |  Give (208)  |  Horror (15)  |  Human (1512)  |  Incomprehensible (31)  |  Moment (260)  |  Order (638)  |  Power (771)  |  Remove (50)  |  Rest (287)  |  Society (350)  |  Subordination (5)  |  Throne (8)  |  Topple (2)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)

Amid the turmoil and tumult of battle, there may be seeming disorder and yet no real disorder at all.
The Art of War translated by Lionel Giles, (1910, 1963), 14.
Science quotes on:  |  Battle (36)  |  Disorder (45)  |  Turmoil (8)

As I am writing, another illustration of ye generation of hills proposed above comes into my mind. Milk is as uniform a liquor as ye chaos was. If beer be poured into it & ye mixture let stand till it be dry, the surface of ye curdled substance will appear as rugged & mountanous as the Earth in any place.
Letter to Thomas Burnet (Jan 1680/1. In H. W. Turnbull (ed.), The Correspondence of Isaac Newton, 1676-1687 (1960), Vol. 2, 334.
Science quotes on:  |  Beer (10)  |  Dry (65)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Generation (256)  |  Hill (23)  |  Illustration (51)  |  Milk (23)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mixture (44)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Rugged (7)  |  Stand (284)  |  Substance (253)  |  Surface (223)  |  Will (2350)  |  Writing (192)

At first men try with magic charms
To fertilize the earth,
To keep their flocks and herds from harm
And bring new young to birth.

Then to capricious gods they turn
To save from fire or flood;
Their smoking sacrifices burn
On altars red with blood.

Next bold philosopher and sage
A settled plan decree
And prove by thought or sacred page
What Nature ought to be.

But Nature smiles—a Sphinx-like smile
Watching their little day
She waits in patience for a while—
Their plans dissolve away.

Then come those humbler men of heart
With no completed scheme,
Content to play a modest part,
To test, observe, and dream.

Till out of chaos come in sight
Clear fragments of a Whole;
Man, learning Nature’s ways aright
Obeying, can control.
Epigraph in A History of Science and Its Relation with Philosophy & Religion (1968), vi.
Science quotes on:  |  Altar (11)  |  Birth (154)  |  Blood (144)  |  Burn (99)  |  Capricious (9)  |  Clear (111)  |  Complete (209)  |  Content (75)  |  Control (182)  |  Decree (9)  |  Dissolve (22)  |  Dream (222)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Fertilize (4)  |  Fire (203)  |  Flock (4)  |  Flood (52)  |  Fragment (58)  |  God (776)  |  Harm (43)  |  Heart (243)  |  Humble (54)  |  Learn (672)  |  Magic (92)  |  Modest (19)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Obey (46)  |  Observe (179)  |  Page (35)  |  Patience (58)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Plan (122)  |  Poem (104)  |  Prove (261)  |  Red (38)  |  Sacred (48)  |  Sacrifice (58)  |  Sage (25)  |  Save (126)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Settle (23)  |  Sight (135)  |  Smile (34)  |  Smoke (32)  |  Sphinx (2)  |  Test (221)  |  Thought (995)  |  Turn (454)  |  Wait (66)  |  Watch (118)  |  Whole (756)  |  Young (253)

At first, the sea, the earth, and the heaven, which covers all things, were the only face of nature throughout the whole universe, which men have named Chaos; a rude and undigested mass, and nothing more than an inert weight, and the discordant atoms of things not harmonizing, heaped together in the same spot.
Describing the creation of the universe from chaos, at the beginning of Book I of Metamorphoses, lines 5-9. As translated by Henry T. Riley, The Metamorphoses of Ovid, Vol I: Books I-VII (1858), 1-2. Riley footnoted: “A rude and undigested mass.—Ver. 7. This is very similar to the words of the Scriptures, ‘And the earth was without form and void,’ Genesis, ch. i. ver. 2.”
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Creation (350)  |  Discord (10)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Face (214)  |  First (1302)  |  Harmonize (4)  |  Heap (15)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Inert (14)  |  Mass (160)  |  More (2558)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Rude (6)  |  Sea (326)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Together (392)  |  Undigested (2)  |  Universe (900)  |  Weight (140)  |  Whole (756)

At the beginning of its existence as a science, biology was forced to take cognizance of the seemingly boundless variety of living things, for no exact study of life phenomena was possible until the apparent chaos of the distinct kinds of organisms had been reduced to a rational system. Systematics and morphology, two predominantly descriptive and observational disciplines, took precedence among biological sciences during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. More recently physiology has come to the foreground, accompanied by the introduction of quantitative methods and by a shift from the observationalism of the past to a predominance of experimentation.
In Genetics and the Origin of Species (1937, 1982), 6.
Science quotes on:  |  18th Century (21)  |  19th Century (41)  |  Apparent (85)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Biological (137)  |  Biology (232)  |  Boundless (28)  |  Description (89)  |  Descriptive (18)  |  Discipline (85)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Existence (481)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Foreground (3)  |  Introduction (37)  |  Kind (564)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Method (531)  |  More (2558)  |  Morphology (22)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observational (15)  |  Organism (231)  |  Past (355)  |  Physiology (101)  |  Possible (560)  |  Precedence (4)  |  Predominance (3)  |  Quantitative (31)  |  Rational (95)  |  Seemingly (28)  |  Shift (45)  |  Study (701)  |  System (545)  |  Systematic (58)  |  Systematics (4)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Two (936)  |  Variety (138)

Before the seas and lands had been created, before the sky that covers everything, Nature displayed a single aspect only throughout the cosmos; Chaos was its name, a shapeless, unwrought mass of inert bulk and nothing more, with the discordant seeds of disconnected elements all heaped together in anarchic disarray.
Describing the creation of the universe from chaos, at the beginning of Book I of Metamorphoses, lines 5-9. As translated in Charles Martin (trans.), Metamorphoses (2004), 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Aspect (129)  |  Bulk (24)  |  Cosmos (64)  |  Cover (40)  |  Creation (350)  |  Disconnected (3)  |  Discord (10)  |  Display (59)  |  Element (322)  |  Everything (489)  |  Heap (15)  |  Inert (14)  |  Land (131)  |  Mass (160)  |  More (2558)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Sea (326)  |  Seed (97)  |  Single (365)  |  Sky (174)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Together (392)  |  Wrought (2)

Before the seas, and this terrestrial ball,
And Heav’n’s high canopy, that covers all,
One was the face of Nature; if a face:
Rather a rude and indigested mass:
A lifeless lump, unfashion’d, and unfram’d,
Of jarring seeds; and justly Chaos nam’d.
As translated by John Dryden, et al. and Sir Samuel Garth (ed.), Metamorphoses (1998), 3. Ovid started writing the 14 books of Metamorphoses in about 1 a.d.. Dryden died in 1700. He had translated about one-third of the full Metamorphoses. His work was finished by others, and the translation was published in 1717.
Science quotes on:  |  Ball (64)  |  Canopy (8)  |  Cover (40)  |  Digested (2)  |  Face (214)  |  Frame (26)  |  Heaven (266)  |  High (370)  |  Jar (9)  |  Justly (7)  |  Lifeless (15)  |  Lump (5)  |  Mass (160)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Rude (6)  |  Sea (326)  |  Seed (97)  |  Terrestrial (62)

Both the man of science and the man of art live always at the edge of mystery, surrounded by it; both always, as to the measure of their creation, have had to do with the harmonization of what is new with what is familiar, with the balance between novelty and synthesis, with the struggle to make partial order in total chaos.
Address at the close of the year-long Bicentennial Celebration of Columbia University (26 Dec 54). Printed in 'Prospects in the Arts and Sciences', Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (Feb 1955), 52.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Art (680)  |  Balance (82)  |  Both (496)  |  Creation (350)  |  Do (1905)  |  Edge (51)  |  Harmony (105)  |  Live (650)  |  Man (2252)  |  Measure (241)  |  Men Of Science (147)  |  Mystery (188)  |  New (1273)  |  Novelty (31)  |  Order (638)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Synthesis (58)  |  Total (95)

Building goes on briskly at the therapeutic Tower of Babel; what one recommends another condemns; what one gives in large doses another scarce dares to prescribe in small doses; and what one vaunts as a novelty another thinks not worth rescuing from merited oblivion. All is confusion, contradiction, inconceivable chaos. Every country, every place, almost every doctor, have their own pet remedies, without which they imagine their patients can not be cured; and all this changes every year, aye every mouth.
Weekly Medical Gazette, of Vienna
Science quotes on:  |  Babel (3)  |  Briskly (2)  |  Build (211)  |  Building (158)  |  Change (639)  |  Condemn (44)  |  Confusion (61)  |  Contradiction (69)  |  Country (269)  |  Cure (124)  |  Dare (55)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Dose (17)  |  Give (208)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Inconceivable (13)  |  Large (398)  |  Merit (51)  |  Mouth (54)  |  Novelty (31)  |  Oblivion (10)  |  Patient (209)  |  Pet (10)  |  Place (192)  |  Prescribe (11)  |  Recommend (27)  |  Remedy (63)  |  Rescue (14)  |  Scarce (11)  |  Small (489)  |  Therapeutic (6)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tower (45)  |  Worth (172)  |  Year (963)

But it seems to me equally obvious that the orderliness is not all-pervasive. There are streaks of order to be found among the chaos, and the nature of scientific method is to seek these out and to stick to them when found and to reject or neglect the chaos. It is obvious that we have succeeded in finding some order in nature, but this fact in itself does not prove anything farther.
Scientific Method: An Inquiry into the Character and Validy of Natural Law (1923), 200.
Science quotes on:  |  Equally (129)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Farther (51)  |  Method (531)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Neglect (63)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Order (638)  |  Orderliness (9)  |  Prove (261)  |  Prove Anything (7)  |  Reject (67)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Seek (218)  |  Succeed (114)

By the 18th century science had been so successful in laying bare the laws of nature that many thought there was nothing left to discover. Immutable laws prescribed the motion of every particle in the universe, exactly and forever: the task of the scientist was to elucidate the implications of those laws for any particular phenomenon of interest. Chaos gave way to a clockwork world. But the world moved on ...Today even our clocks are not made of clockwork. ... With the advent of quantum mechanics, the clockwork world has become a lottery. Fundamental events, such as the decay of a radioactive atom, are held to be determined by chance, not law.
Does God Play Dice?: The New Mathematics of Chaos (2002). xi.
Science quotes on:  |  18th Century (21)  |  Atom (381)  |  Bare (33)  |  Become (821)  |  Century (319)  |  Chance (244)  |  Clock (51)  |  Decay (59)  |  Discover (571)  |  Event (222)  |  Forever (111)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Immutable (26)  |  Interest (416)  |  Law (913)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Motion (320)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Particle (200)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Predictability (7)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Mechanics (47)  |  Radioactive (24)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Successful (134)  |  Task (152)  |  Thought (995)  |  Today (321)  |  Universe (900)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)

Chaos is the beginning, simplicity is the end.
Letter (1950) to Ocy Tjeng Sit, as quoted in Maurits Cornelis Escher and ‎J.W. Vermeulen (ed.), Escher on Escher: Exploring the Infinite (1989), which is requoted in Michele Emmer and ‎Doris Schattschneider, M.C. Escher’s Legacy: A Centennial Celebration (2007), 71.
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  End (603)  |  Simplicity (175)

Chaos is the score upon which reality is written.
Tropic of Cancer (1980), 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Reality (274)  |  Score (8)

Chaos often breeds life when order breeds habit.
The Education of Henry Adams (1907, 1918), 249.
Science quotes on:  |  Breed (26)  |  Habit (174)  |  Life (1870)  |  Order (638)

Chaos theory is a new theory invented by scientists panicked by the thought that the public were beginning to understand the old ones.
John Mitchinson and John Lloyd, If Ignorance Is Bliss, Why Aren't There More Happy People?: Smart Quotes for Dumb Times (2009), 273.
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Chaos Theory (4)  |  Invent (57)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)  |  Panic (4)  |  Public (100)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thought (995)  |  Understand (648)

Chaos was the law of nature; order was the dream of man.
From his autobiography, The Education of Henry Adams (1907, 1918), 451.
Science quotes on:  |  Dream (222)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Nature (80)  |  Man (2252)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Order (638)

Confucius once said that a bear could not fart at the North Pole without causing a big wind in Chicago.
By this he meant that all events, therefore, all men, are interconnected in an unbreakable web. What man does, no matter how seemingly insignificant, vibrates through the strands and affects every man.
Riders of the Purple Wage (1967). In Gary Westfahl, Science Fiction Quotations: From the Inner Mind to the Outer Limits (2006), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Bear (162)  |  Butterfly Effect (6)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Event (222)  |  Insignificant (33)  |  Man (2252)  |  Matter (821)  |  North Pole (5)  |  Pole (49)  |  Seemingly (28)  |  Strand (9)  |  Unbreakable (3)  |  Vibrate (7)  |  Wind (141)

Connected by innumerable ties with abstract science, Physiology is yet in the most intimate relation with humanity; and by teaching us that law and order, and a definite scheme of development, regulate even the strangest and wildest manifestations of individual life, she prepares the student to look for a goal even amidst the erratic wanderings of mankind, and to believe that history offers something more than an entertaining chaos—a journal of a toilsome, tragi-comic march nowither.
In 'Educational Value of Natural History Sciences', Lay Sermons, Addresses, and Reviews (1870), 97.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Belief (615)  |  Comic (5)  |  Connect (126)  |  Definite (114)  |  Development (441)  |  Entertaining (9)  |  Erratic (4)  |  Goal (155)  |  History (716)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Individual (420)  |  Innumerable (56)  |  Intimate (21)  |  Journal (31)  |  Law (913)  |  Law And Order (5)  |  Life (1870)  |  Look (584)  |  Manifestation (61)  |  Mankind (356)  |  March (48)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Offer (142)  |  Order (638)  |  Physiology (101)  |  Prepare (44)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Something (718)  |  Strange (160)  |  Student (317)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Tie (42)  |  Toil (29)  |  Tragic (19)  |  Wild (96)

Creation came out of chaos, is surrounded by chaos, and will end in chaos.
Anonymous
Given in Kathleen McAuliffe, 'Get Smart: Controlling Chaos,' Omni (1990), 12, No. 5, 43. As quoted and cited in Information Technology, It’s for everyone!: Proceedings of the LITA Third National Conference, Library and Information Technology Association, Denver, September 13-16, 1992 (1992), 202.
Science quotes on:  |  Creation (350)  |  End (603)  |  Surrounded (2)  |  Will (2350)

Einstein’s space is no closer to reality than Van Gogh’s sky. The glory of science is not in a truth more absolute than the truth of Bach or Tolstoy, but in the act of creation itself. The scientist’s discoveries impose his own order on chaos, as the composer or painter imposes his; an order that always refers to limited aspects of reality, and is based on the observer's frame of reference, which differs from period to period as a Rembrandt nude differs from a nude by Manet.
In The Act of Creation (1964), 252.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Act (278)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Bach (7)  |  Bach_Johann (2)  |  Base (120)  |  Closer (43)  |  Composer (7)  |  Creation (350)  |  Differ (88)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  Frame of Reference (5)  |  Glory (66)  |  Impose (22)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  More (2558)  |  Nude (3)  |  Observer (48)  |  Order (638)  |  Painter (30)  |  Period (200)  |  Reality (274)  |  Refer (14)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Sky (174)  |  Space (523)  |  Count Leo Tolstoy (18)  |  Truth (1109)

Either an ordered Universe or a medley heaped together mechanically but still an order; or can order subsist in you and disorder in the Whole! And that, too, when all things are so distinguished and yet intermingled and sympathetic.
A. S. L. Farquharson (ed.), The Meditations of the Emperor Marcus Antoninus Aurelius (1944), Vol. I, Book IV, 63.
Science quotes on:  |  Disorder (45)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Order (638)  |  Still (614)  |  Sympathetic (10)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Together (392)  |  Universe (900)  |  Whole (756)

Ere land and sea and the all-covering sky
Were made, in the whole world the countenance
Of nature was the same, all one, well named
Chaos, a raw and undivided mass,
Naught but a lifeless bulk, with warring seeds
Of ill-joined elements compressed together.
Ovid’s description of the Creation of the universe at the beginning of Metamorphoses, Book I, lines 5-9, as translated in A.D. Melville (trans.), Ovid: Metamorphoses (1987), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Bulk (24)  |  Countenance (9)  |  Covering (14)  |  Element (322)  |  Land (131)  |  Lifeless (15)  |  Mass (160)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Naught (10)  |  Origin Of The Earth (13)  |  Raw (28)  |  Sea (326)  |  Seed (97)  |  Sky (174)  |  Together (392)  |  Undivided (3)  |  Whole (756)  |  Whole World (29)  |  World (1850)

Everybody’s a mad scientist, and life is their lab. We’re all trying to experiment to find a way to live, to solve problems, to fend off madness and chaos.
In David Chronenberg and Chris Rodley (ed.), Chronenberg on Chronenberg (1992), 7. As cited in Carl Royer, B Lee Cooper, The Spectacle of Isolation in Horror Films: Dark Parades (2013), 55.
Science quotes on:  |  Everybody (72)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Find (1014)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Mad (54)  |  Madness (33)  |  Problem (731)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Solution (282)  |  Solve (145)  |  Trying (144)  |  Way (1214)

Evolution is chaos with feedback.
As quoted in James Gleick, Chaos: Making a New Science (1988), 314.
Science quotes on:  |  Evolution (635)  |  Feedback (10)

Gentlemen, there is such a chaos in our therapeutics that we ought to be thankful for any good advice, whether it comes from an old woman, a shepherd, a blacksmith, or even a Homeopath.
As quoted in George E. Shipman, 'Allopathic Science', American Homœpathist (Jan 1878), 2, No.1, 39
Science quotes on:  |  Advice (57)  |  Blacksmith (5)  |  Gentleman (26)  |  Good (906)  |  Old (499)  |  Shepherd (6)  |  Thankful (4)  |  Therapeutics (3)  |  Woman (160)

God put a secret art into the forces of Nature so as to enable it to fashion itself out of chaos into a perfect world system.
Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens (1755), editted and translated by William Hastie in Kant's Cosmogony (1900), 27.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Enable (122)  |  Force (497)  |  God (776)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Secret (216)  |  System (545)  |  World (1850)

Groves hated the weather, and the weathermen; they represented chaos and the messengers of chaos. Weather violated boundaries, ignored walls and gates, failed to adhere to deadlines, disobeyed orders. Weather caused delays. The weather forecasters had opposed the [atomic bomb] test date for months—it was set within a window of unfavorable conditions: thunderstorms, rain, high winds, inversion layers. Groves had overridden them. … Groves saw it as a matter of insubordination when the weather forecasters refused to forecast good weather for the test.
In Atomic Spaces: Living on the Manhattan Project (1999), 312. For the attitude of Groves toward the weather see his, 'Some Recollections of July 16, 1945', Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (Jun 1970), 26, No. 6, 27.
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Condition (362)  |  Delay (21)  |  Disobedience (4)  |  Fail (191)  |  Forecast (15)  |  Gate (33)  |  Good (906)  |  Leslie Richard Groves (13)  |  High (370)  |  Layer (41)  |  Matter (821)  |  Month (91)  |  Order (638)  |  Rain (70)  |  Represent (157)  |  Saw (160)  |  Schedule (5)  |  Set (400)  |  Test (221)  |  Thunderstorm (7)  |  Trinity (9)  |  Wall (71)  |  Weather (49)  |  Wind (141)  |  Window (59)

Hear how the ripples make a sound of chaos!
From 'Sound of Breaking', collected in Selected Poems (1918, 2003), 59.
Science quotes on:  |  Hear (144)  |  Ripple (12)  |  Sound (187)

I can conceive few human states more enviable than that of the man to whom, panting in the foul laboratory, or watching for his life under the tropic forest, Isis shall for a moment lift her sacred veil, and show him, once and for ever, the thing he dreamed not of; some law, or even mere hint of a law, explaining one fact; but explaining with it a thousand more, connecting them all with each other and with the mighty whole, till order and meaning shoots through some old Chaos of scattered observations.
Health and Education (1874), 289.
Science quotes on:  |  Conceive (100)  |  Deer (11)  |  Dream (222)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Forest (161)  |  Foul (15)  |  Hint (21)  |  Human (1512)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Law (913)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lift (57)  |  Man (2252)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Microscope (85)  |  Moment (260)  |  More (2558)  |  Mouse (33)  |  Observation (593)  |  Old (499)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paramecium (2)  |  Rat (37)  |  Sacred (48)  |  Show (353)  |  State (505)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Through (846)  |  Veil (27)  |  Whole (756)

I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery, but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing.
As quoted in John Noble Wilford, 'Sizing up the Cosmos: An Astronomers Quest', New York Times (12 Mar 1991), C10.
Science quotes on:  |  Existence (481)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Find (1014)  |  God (776)  |  Improbable (15)  |  Instead (23)  |  Miracle (85)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Order (638)  |  Organize (33)  |  Principle (530)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Something (718)  |  Why (491)

I know of scarcely anything so apt to impress the imagination as the wonderful form of cosmic order expressed by the “Law of Frequency of Error.” The law would have been personified by the Greeks and deified, if they had known of it. It reigns with serenity and in complete self-effacement, amidst the wildest confusion. The huger the mob, and the greater the apparent anarchy, the more perfect is its sway. It is the supreme law of Unreason. Whenever a large sample of chaotic elements are taken in hand and marshaled in the order of their magnitude, an unsuspected and most beautiful form of regularity proves to have been latent all along.
In Natural Inheritance (1894), 66.
Science quotes on:  |  Anarchy (8)  |  Apparent (85)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Complete (209)  |  Confusion (61)  |  Cosmic (74)  |  Element (322)  |  Error (339)  |  Express (192)  |  Form (976)  |  Frequency (25)  |  Greater (288)  |  Greek (109)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Impress (66)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Large (398)  |  Latent (13)  |  Law (913)  |  Magnitude (88)  |  Mob (10)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Order (638)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Prove (261)  |  Regularity (40)  |  Reign (24)  |  Sample (19)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Self (268)  |  Serenity (11)  |  Supreme (73)  |  Unsuspected (7)  |  Whenever (81)  |  Wonderful (155)

I trust ... I have succeeded in convincing you that modern chemistry is not, as it has so long appeared, an ever-growing accumulation of isolated facts, as impossible for a single intellect to co-ordinate as for a single memory to grasp.
The intricate formulae that hang upon these walls, and the boundless variety of phenomena they illustrate, are beginning to be for us as a labyrinth once impassable, but to which we have at length discovered the clue. A sense of mastery and power succeeds in our minds to the sort of weary despair with which we at first contemplated their formidable array. For now, by the aid of a few general principles, we find ourselves able to unravel the complexities of these formulae, to marshal the compounds which they represent in orderly series; nay, even to multiply their numbers at our will, and in a great measure to forecast their nature ere we have called them into existence. It is the great movement of modern chemistry that we have thus, for an hour, seen passing before us. It is a movement as of light spreading itself over a waste of obscurity, as of law diffusing order throughout a wilderness of confusion, and there is surely in its contemplation something of the pleasure which attends the spectacle of a beautiful daybreak, something of the grandeur belonging to the conception of a world created out of chaos.
Concluding remark for paper presented at the Friday Discourse of the the Royal Institution (7 Apr 1865). 'On the Combining Power of Atoms', Proceedings of the Royal Institution (1865), 4, No. 42, 416.
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulation (51)  |  Aid (101)  |  Attend (67)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Belonging (36)  |  Boundless (28)  |  Call (781)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Clue (20)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Compound (117)  |  Conception (160)  |  Confusion (61)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Despair (40)  |  Discover (571)  |  Existence (481)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Forecast (15)  |  Formula (102)  |  General (521)  |  Grandeur (35)  |  Great (1610)  |  Growing (99)  |  Hang (46)  |  Hour (192)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intricate (29)  |  Isolated (15)  |  Labyrinth (12)  |  Law (913)  |  Light (635)  |  Long (778)  |  Mastery (36)  |  Measure (241)  |  Memory (144)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Modern (402)  |  Movement (162)  |  Multiply (40)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Number (710)  |  Obscurity (28)  |  Order (638)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Passing (76)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Power (771)  |  Principle (530)  |  Represent (157)  |  Sense (785)  |  Series (153)  |  Single (365)  |  Something (718)  |  Spectacle (35)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Surely (101)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Trust (72)  |  Unravel (16)  |  Variety (138)  |  Wall (71)  |  Waste (109)  |  Weary (11)  |  Wilderness (57)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

I try in my prints to testify that we live in a beautiful and orderly world, and not in a formless chaos, as it sometimes appears.
(1965). As quoted in Michele Emmer and ‎Doris Schattschneider, M.C. Escher’s Legacy: A Centennial Celebration (2007), 71.
Science quotes on:  |  Appear (122)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Formless (4)  |  Live (650)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Print (20)  |  Sometimes (46)  |  Testify (7)  |  Try (296)  |  World (1850)

I will frankly tell you that my experience in prolonged scientific investigations convinces me that a belief in God—a God who is behind and within the chaos of vanishing points of human knowledge—adds a wonderful stimulus to the man who attempts to penetrate into the regions of the unknown.
As quoted in E.P. Whipple, 'Recollections of Agassiz', in Henry Mills Alden (ed.), Harper's New Monthly Magazine (June 1879), 59, 103.
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (266)  |  Behind (139)  |  Belief (615)  |  Biography (254)  |  Convince (43)  |  Experience (494)  |  God (776)  |  Human (1512)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Man (2252)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  Point (584)  |  Prolong (29)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Stimulus (30)  |  Tell (344)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Vanishing (11)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wonderful (155)

If all mankind were to disappear, the world would regenerate back to the rich state of equilibrium that existed ten thousand years ago. If insects were to vanish, the environment would collapse into chaos.
In Rosemarie Jarski, Words From The Wise (2007), 269. [Contact webmaster if you know the primary print source.]
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Collapse (19)  |  Disappear (84)  |  Environment (239)  |  Equilibrium (34)  |  Exist (458)  |  Insect (89)  |  Mankind (356)  |  State (505)  |  Thousand (340)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

If matter is not eternal, its first emergence into being is a miracle beside which all others dwindle into absolute insignificance. But, as has often been pointed out, the process is unthinkable; the sudden apocalypse of a material world out of blank nonentity cannot be imagined; its emergence into order out of chaos when “without form and void” of life, is merely a poetic rendering of the doctrine of its slow evolution.
In Nineteenth Century (Sep c.1879?). Quoted in John Tyndall, 'Professor Virchow and Evolution', Fragments of Science (1879), Vol. 2, 377.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Apocalypse (2)  |  Being (1276)  |  Big Bang (45)  |  Black (46)  |  Doctrine (81)  |  Dwindle (6)  |  Dwindling (3)  |  Emergence (35)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Evolution (635)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Insignificance (12)  |  Life (1870)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Merely (315)  |  Miracle (85)  |  Nonentity (2)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Point (584)  |  Pointing (4)  |  Process (439)  |  Rendering (6)  |  Slow (108)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Unthinkable (8)  |  Void (31)  |  World (1850)

If the flap of a butterfly’s wings can be instrumental in generating a tornado, it can equally well be instrumental in preventing a tornado.
In talk presented at the 139th Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (29 Dec 1972). The text of the talk, in its original form, as then prepared for press release but unpublished, is in Edward Lorenz, Essence of Chaos (1995), Appendix 1, 181.
Science quotes on:  |  Butterfly (26)  |  Butterfly Effect (6)  |  Equally (129)  |  Flap (2)  |  Instrumental (5)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Tornado (4)  |  Wing (79)

If we wish to make a new world we have the material ready. The first one, too, was made out of chaos.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  First (1302)  |  Material (366)  |  New (1273)  |  New World (6)  |  Ready (43)  |  Wish (216)  |  World (1850)

Imagine the chaos that would arise if time machines were as common as automobiles, with tens of millions of them commercially available. Havoc would soon break loose, tearing at the fabric of our universe. Millions of people would go back in time to meddle with their own past and the past of others, rewriting history in the process. … It would thus be impossible to take a simple census to see how many people there were at any given time.
In Hyperspace: A Scientific Odyssey Through Parallel Universes, Time Warps, and The Tenth Dimension (1994, 1995), 234.
Science quotes on:  |  Arise (162)  |  Automobile (23)  |  Available (80)  |  Back (395)  |  Break (109)  |  Census (4)  |  Common (447)  |  Fabric (27)  |  Havoc (7)  |  History (716)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Machine (271)  |  Meddle (3)  |  Millions (17)  |  Other (2233)  |  Past (355)  |  People (1031)  |  Process (439)  |  Rewriting (2)  |  See (1094)  |  Simple (426)  |  Soon (187)  |  Tear (48)  |  Time (1911)  |  Time Machine (4)  |  Universe (900)

In the field one has to face a chaos of facts, some of which are so small that they seem insignificant; others loom so large that they are hard to encompass with one synthetic glance. But in this crude form they are not scientific facts at all; they are absolutely elusive, and can be fixed only by interpretation, by seeing them sub specie aeternitatis, by grasping what is essential in them and fixing this. Only laws and gerneralizations are scientific facts, and field work consists only and exclusively in the interpretation of the chaotic social reality, in subordinating it to general rules.
Baloma (1954), 238.
Science quotes on:  |  Anthropology (61)  |  Consist (223)  |  Crude (32)  |  Essential (210)  |  Face (214)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Field (378)  |  Field Work (2)  |  Form (976)  |  General (521)  |  Glance (36)  |  Hard (246)  |  Insignificant (33)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Large (398)  |  Law (913)  |  Loom (20)  |  Other (2233)  |  Reality (274)  |  Rule (307)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Small (489)  |  Social (261)  |  Synthetic (27)  |  Work (1402)

In this physical world there is no real chaos; all is in fact orderly; all is ordered by the physical principles. Chaos is but unperceived order- it is a word indicating the limitations of the human mind and the paucity of observational facts. The words “chaos,” “accidental,” “chance,” “unpredictable," are conveniences behind which we hide our ignorance.
From Of Stars and Men: The Human Response to an Expanding Universe (1958 Rev. Ed. 1964), Foreword.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Accidental (31)  |  Behind (139)  |  Chance (244)  |  Convenience (54)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Hide (70)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Indicate (62)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limitation (52)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observational (15)  |  Order (638)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Paucity (3)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical World (30)  |  Principle (530)  |  Real (159)  |  Unpredictable (18)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)

It can happen to but few philosophers, and but at distant intervals, to snatch a science, like Dalton, from the chaos of indefinite combination, and binding it in the chains of number, to exalt it to rank amongst the exact. Triumphs like these are necessarily 'few and far between.'
Reflections on the Decline of Science in England (1830), 22.
Science quotes on:  |  Combination (150)  |  John Dalton (25)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Exalt (29)  |  Happen (282)  |  Indefinite (21)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Number (710)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Rank (69)  |  Research (753)  |  Snatch (14)  |  Triumph (76)

It is some systematised exhibition of the whale in his broad genera, that I would now fain put before you. Yet is it no easy task. The classification of the constituents of a chaos, nothing less is here essayed. Listen to what the best and latest authorities have laid down.
“No branch of Zoology is so much involved as that which is entitled Cetology,” says Captain Scoresby, A.D. 1820.
“It is not my intention, were it in my power, to enter into the inquiry as to the true method of dividing the cetacea into groups and families. * * * Utter confusion exists among the historians of this animal” (sperm whale), says Surgeon Beale. A. D. 1839.
“Unfitness to pursue our research in the unfathomable waters.” “Impenetrable veil covering our knowledge of the cetacea.” “A field strewn with thorns.” “All these incomplete indications but serve to torture us naturalists.”
Thus speak of the whale, the great Cuvier, and John Hunter, and Lesson, those lights of zoology and anatomy. Nevertheless, though of real knowledges there be little, yet of books there are plenty; and so in some small degree, with cetology, or the science of whales. Many are the men, small and great, old and new, landsmen and seamen, who have at large or in little, written of the whale. Run over a few:— The Authors of the Bible; Aristotle; Pliny; Aldrovandi; Sir Thomas Browne; Gesner; Ray; Linnæus; Rondeletius; Willoughby; Green; Artedi; Sibbald; Brisson; Marten; Lacépède; Bonneterre; Desmarest; Baron Cuvier; Frederick Cuvier; John Hunter; Owen; Scoresby; Beale; Bennett; J. Ross Browne; the Author of Miriam Coffin; Olmstead; and the Rev. T. Cheever. But to what ultimate generalising purpose all these have written, the above cited extracts will show.
Of the names in this list of whale authors, only those following Owen ever saw living whales; and but one of them was a real professional harpooner and whaleman. I mean Captain Scoresby.
Opening of Chap. 32, 'Cetology', in Moby Dick (1851, 1892), 126-127.
Science quotes on:  |  Aristotle (179)  |  Authority (99)  |  Bible (105)  |  Sir Thomas Browne (23)  |  Captain (16)  |  Cetacean (3)  |  Cetology (2)  |  Classification (102)  |  Confusion (61)  |  Baron Georges Cuvier (34)  |  Family (101)  |  Genus (27)  |  Group (83)  |  Harpoon (3)  |  Historian (59)  |  John Hunter (8)  |  Carolus Linnaeus (36)  |  Sir Richard Owen (17)  |  Pliny the Elder (18)  |  Professional (77)  |  Surgeon (64)  |  Task (152)  |  Whale (45)  |  Whaleman (2)  |  Zoology (38)

It turns out that an eerie type of chaos can lurk just behind a façade of order—and yet, deep inside the chaos lurks an even eerier type of order.
Metamagical Themas: Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern (1985, 1996), 299.
Science quotes on:  |  Behind (139)  |  Deep (241)  |  Facade (2)  |  Order (638)  |  Turn (454)  |  Type (171)

Know then thyself, presume not God to scan;
The proper study of Mankind is Man.
Plac'd on this isthmus of a middle state,
A being darkly wise, and rudely great:
With too much knowledge for the Sceptic side,
With too much weakness for the Stoic's pride,
He hangs between; in doubt to act, or rest;
In doubt to deem himself a God, or Beast;
In doubt his Mind or Body to prefer,
Born but to die, and reas'ning but to err;
Alike in ignorance, his reason such,
Whether he thinks too little, or too much:
Chaos of Thought and Passion, all confus'd;
Still by himself abus'd, or disabus'd;
Created half to rise, and half to fall;
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;
Sole judge of Truth, in endless Error hurl'd:
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!
... Superior beings, when of late they saw
A mortal Man unfold all Nature's law,
Admir'd such wisdom in an earthly shape,
And shew'd a NEWTON as we shew an Ape.
'An Essay on Man' (1733-4), Epistle II. In John Butt (ed.), The Poems of Alexander Pope (1965), 516-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Abuse (25)  |  Act (278)  |  Admiration (61)  |  Alike (60)  |  Ape (54)  |  Beast (58)  |  Being (1276)  |  Birth (154)  |  Body (557)  |  Confusion (61)  |  Creation (350)  |  Death (406)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Endless (60)  |  Error (339)  |  Fall (243)  |  Glory (66)  |  God (776)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hang (46)  |  Himself (461)  |  Hurling (2)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Isthmus (2)  |  Jest (5)  |  Judge (114)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Late (119)  |  Law (913)  |  Little (717)  |  Lord (97)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mortal (55)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Passion (121)  |  Preference (28)  |  Prey (13)  |  Pride (84)  |  Proper (150)  |  Reason (766)  |  Rest (287)  |  Riddle (28)  |  Rise (169)  |  Saw (160)  |  Sceptic (5)  |  Shape (77)  |  Show (353)  |  Side (236)  |  Sole (50)  |  State (505)  |  Still (614)  |  Stoic (3)  |  Study (701)  |  Superior (88)  |  Superiority (19)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Weakness (50)  |  Wisdom (235)  |  Wise (143)  |  World (1850)

Life is order, death is disorder. A fundamental law of Nature states that spontaneous chemical changes in the universe tend toward chaos. But life has, during milliards of years of evolution, seemingly contradicted this law. With the aid of energy derived from the sun it has built up the most complicated systems to be found in the universe—living organisms. Living matter is characterized by a high degree of chemical organisation on all levels, from the organs of large organisms to the smallest constituents of the cell. The beauty we experience when we enjoy the exquisite form of a flower or a bird is a reflection of a microscopic beauty in the architecture of molecules.
The Nobel Prize for Chemistry: Introductory Address'. Nobel Lectures: Chemistry 1981-1990 (1992), 69.
Science quotes on:  |  Aid (101)  |  Architecture (50)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Bird (163)  |  Build (211)  |  Cell (146)  |  Change (639)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemical Change (8)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Constituent (47)  |  Contradict (42)  |  Contradiction (69)  |  Death (406)  |  Degree (277)  |  Disorder (45)  |  Energy (373)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Experience (494)  |  Exquisite (27)  |  Flower (112)  |  Form (976)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  High (370)  |  Large (398)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Nature (80)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Matter (821)  |  Microscopic (27)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Order (638)  |  Organ (118)  |  Organism (231)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Seemingly (28)  |  Spontaneous (29)  |  State (505)  |  Sun (407)  |  System (545)  |  Tend (124)  |  Universe (900)  |  Year (963)

Life, this anti-entropy, ceaselessly reloaded with energy, is a climbing force, toward order amidst chaos, toward light, among the darkness of the indefinite, toward the mystic dream of Love, between the fire which devours itself and the silence of the Cold.
Nobel Lecture, The Coming Age of the Cell, 12 Dec 1974
Science quotes on:  |  Cold (115)  |  Darkness (72)  |  Devour (29)  |  Dream (222)  |  Energy (373)  |  Entropy (46)  |  Fire (203)  |  Force (497)  |  Indefinite (21)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Love (328)  |  Mystic (23)  |  Order (638)  |  Silence (62)

Man is the Reasoning Animal. Such is the claim. I think it is open to dispute. Indeed, my experiments have proven to me that he is the Unreasoning Animal. … It seems plain to me that whatever he is he is not a reasoning animal. His record is the fantastic record of a maniac. I consider that the strongest count against his intelligence is the fact that with that record back of him he blandly sets himself up as the head animal of the lot: whereas by his own standards he is the bottom one.
In truth, man is incurably foolish. Simple things which the other animals easily learn, he is incapable of learning. Among my experiments was this. In an hour I taught a cat and a dog to be friends. I put them in a cage. In another hour I taught them to be friends with a rabbit. In the course of two days I was able to add a fox, a goose, a squirrel and some doves. Finally a monkey. They lived together in peace; even affectionately.
Next, in another cage I confined an Irish Catholic from Tipperary, and as soon as he seemed tame I added a Scotch Presbyterian from Aberdeen. Next a Turk from Constantinople; a Greek Christian from Crete; an Armenian; a Methodist from the wilds of Arkansas; a Buddhist from China; a Brahman from Benares. Finally, a Salvation Army Colonel from Wapping. Then I stayed away two whole days. When I came back to note results, the cage of Higher Animals was all right, but in the other there was but a chaos of gory odds and ends of turbans and fezzes and plaids and bones and flesh—not a specimen left alive. These Reasoning Animals had disagreed on a theological detail and carried the matter to a Higher Court.
In Mark Twain and Bernard DeVoto (ed.), Letters from the Earth: Uncensored Writings (1962), 180-181. [Note: As a humorous, irreverent consideration of Man and Christianity, these essays (written c.1909) remained unpublished for over 50 years after Twain’s death (1910), because his daughter and literary executor (Clara Clemens Samossoud) felt that some of the pieces did not accurately represent her father’s beliefs, but eventually, she consented to their publication.]
Science quotes on:  |  Aberdeen (2)  |  Against (332)  |  Alive (97)  |  Animal (651)  |  Arkansas (2)  |  Army (35)  |  Back (395)  |  Bone (101)  |  Bottom (36)  |  Brahman (2)  |  Buddhist (5)  |  Cage (12)  |  Cat (52)  |  Catholic (18)  |  China (27)  |  Christian (44)  |  Claim (154)  |  Consider (428)  |  Count (107)  |  Course (413)  |  Court (35)  |  Detail (150)  |  Disagreed (4)  |  Disagreement (14)  |  Dispute (36)  |  Dog (70)  |  Dove (3)  |  End (603)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Fantastic (21)  |  Flesh (28)  |  Fool (121)  |  Foolish (41)  |  Fox (9)  |  Friend (180)  |  Goose (13)  |  Greek (109)  |  Himself (461)  |  History (716)  |  Hour (192)  |  Incapable (41)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Ireland (8)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Lot (151)  |  Man (2252)  |  Matter (821)  |  Methodist (2)  |  Monkey (57)  |  Next (238)  |  Open (277)  |  Other (2233)  |  Peace (116)  |  Proof (304)  |  Rabbit (10)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Record (161)  |  Result (700)  |  Right (473)  |  Salvation (13)  |  Scotland (6)  |  Set (400)  |  Simple (426)  |  Soon (187)  |  Specimen (32)  |  Squirrel (11)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Tame (4)  |  Theology (54)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Together (392)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Turban (2)  |  Two (936)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wild (96)

Mankind have been slow to believe that order reigns in the universe—that the world is a cosmos and a chaos.
… The divinities of heathen superstition still linger in one form or another in the faith of the ignorant, and even intelligent men shrink from the contemplation of one supreme will acting regularly, not fortuitously, through laws beautiful and simple rather than through a fitful and capricious system of intervention.
... The scientific spirit has cast out the demons, and presented us with nature clothed in her right mind and living under the reign of law. It has given us, for the sorceries of the alchemist, the beautiful laws of chemistry; for the dreams of the astrologer, the sublime truths of astronomy; for the wild visions of cosmogony, the monumental records of geology; for the anarchy of diabolism, the laws of God.
Speech (16 Dec 1867) given while a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, introducing resolution for the appointment of a committee to examine the necessities for legislation upon the subject of the ninth census to be taken the following year. Quoted in John Clark Ridpath, The Life and Work of James A. Garfield (1881), 216.
Science quotes on:  |  Alchemist (23)  |  Alchemy (31)  |  Astrology (46)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Capricious (9)  |  Cast (69)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Cosmogony (3)  |  Cosmos (64)  |  Dream (222)  |  Faith (209)  |  Form (976)  |  Geology (240)  |  God (776)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Intervention (18)  |  Law (913)  |  Linger (14)  |  Living (492)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Order (638)  |  Present (630)  |  Record (161)  |  Reign (24)  |  Right (473)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Shrink (23)  |  Simple (426)  |  Slow (108)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Still (614)  |  Sublime (50)  |  Superstition (70)  |  Supreme (73)  |  System (545)  |  Through (846)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vision (127)  |  Wild (96)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

Mathematicians … believed that prediction was just a function of keeping track of things. If you knew enough, you could predict anything. … Chaos theory throws it right out the window because … in fact there are great categories of phenomena that are inherently unpredictable.
In novel, Jurassic Park (1990, 1991), 158.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (615)  |  Chaos Theory (4)  |  Enough (341)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Function (235)  |  Great (1610)  |  Inherently (5)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Predict (86)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Right (473)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Track (42)  |  Unpredictable (18)  |  Window (59)

Most persons seem not to want to face complexity and not to want to admit that much of nature is so complex as to be uncontrollable by mankind and describable as “chaos” in the short term.
From Paper by Charles A. Fink, 'Opportunities for Broadening Brain Functioning While Modeling Cyberbetic Dynamics', collected in International Association for Cybernetics, Gautier-Villars (ed.), Proceedings of the 12th International Congress of Cybernetics, Namur, Belgium, Aug 1989, 485. [This is widely seen on the web—attributed to Benoit Mandelbrot—with a spurious ellipsis thus: “The most complex object in mathematics, the Mandelbrot Set … is so complex as to be uncontrollable by mankind and describable as “chaos.” Paragraphs earlier on the page, is the unrelated line, “This videoclip shows what has been called the most complex object in mathematics, the Mandelbrot Set.” It is clearly a non-sequitur to link the two excerpted phrases with an ellipsis, when considered with more context of each phrase. The two phrases are now separate quotes on this website, and not attributed as a direct quote by Mandelbrot. —Webmaster (1 Nov 2021)]
Science quotes on:  |  Admit (49)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Uncontrollable (5)

Nature even in chaos cannot proceed otherwise than regularly and according to order.
Universal Natural History and Theory of the Heavens (1755), editted and translated by William Hastie in Kant's Cosmogony (1900), 26.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Order (638)  |  Proceed (134)

Nature is disordered, powerful and chaotic, and through fear of the chaos we impose system on it. We abhor complexity, and seek to simplify things whenever we can by whatever means we have at hand. We need to have an overall explanation of what the universe is and how it functions. In order to achieve this overall view we develop explanatory theories which will give structure to natural phenomena: we classify nature into a coherent system which appears to do what we say it does.
In Day the Universe Changed (1985), 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Abhorrence (8)  |  Achievement (187)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Classification (102)  |  Coherence (13)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Develop (278)  |  Development (441)  |  Disorder (45)  |  Do (1905)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Fear (212)  |  Function (235)  |  Imposition (5)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Need (320)  |  Order (638)  |  Overall (10)  |  Phenomena (8)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Research (753)  |  Say (989)  |  Seek (218)  |  Seeking (31)  |  Simplification (20)  |  Simplify (14)  |  Structure (365)  |  System (545)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  Universe (900)  |  View (496)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Whenever (81)  |  Will (2350)

Nature, when left to universal laws, tends to produce regularity out of chaos.
'Seventh Reflection: Cosmogony' in 'The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God', (1763), editted and translated by David Walford in Theoretical Philosophy, 1755-1770 (2003), 191
Science quotes on:  |  Law (913)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Order (638)  |  Regularity (40)  |  Tend (124)  |  Universal (198)

Nothing in Nature is random. … A thing appears random only through the incompleteness of our knowledge.
Ethics I. Quoted in Robert M. Gray and Lee D. Davisson, introduction to statistical signal processing (2004), x.
Science quotes on:  |  Incomplete (31)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Random (42)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)

Order is not sufficient. What is required, is something much more complex. It is order entering upon novelty; so that the massiveness of order does not degenerate into mere repetition; and so that the novelty is always reflected upon a background of system.
Alfred North Whitehead, David Ray Griffin (ed.), Donald W. Sherburne (ed.), Process and Reality: an Essay in Cosmology (2nd Ed.,1979), 339.
Science quotes on:  |  Background (44)  |  Complex (202)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Degenerate (14)  |  More (2558)  |  Novelty (31)  |  Order (638)  |  Repetition (29)  |  Required (108)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Something (718)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  System (545)

Over very long time scales, when the perturbing influences of both Jupiter and Saturn are taken into account, the seemingly regular orbits of asteroids that stray into the Kirkwood gaps turn chaotic. For millions of years … such an orbit seems predictable. Then the path grows increasingly eccentric until it begins to cross the orbit of Mars and then the Earth. Collisions or close encounters with those planets are inevitable.
In article 'Tales of Chaos: Tumbling Moons and Unstable Asteroids", New York Times (20 Jan 1987), C3.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Asteroid (19)  |  Begin (275)  |  Both (496)  |  Collision (16)  |  Cross (20)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Eccentric (11)  |  Gap (36)  |  Grow (247)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Influence (231)  |  Jupiter (28)  |  Long (778)  |  Mars (47)  |  Million (124)  |  Orbit (85)  |  Path (159)  |  Perturb (2)  |  Planet (402)  |  Predictable (10)  |  Regular (48)  |  Saturn (15)  |  Scale (122)  |  Seemingly (28)  |  Stray (7)  |  Time (1911)  |  Turn (454)  |  Year (963)

Edward Lorenz quote: Predictability: Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?
Predictability: Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?
Title of paper presented at the 139th Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (29 Dec 1972). The text of the talk, in its original form, as then prepared for press release but unpublished, is in Edward Lorenz, Essence of Chaos (1995), Appendix 1, 181. Note: Webmaster has been unable to find a verbatim source for a widely circulated variant, namely: The fluttering of a butterfly’s wing in Rio de Janeiro, amplified by atmospheric currents, could cause a tornado in Texas two weeks later. That form is given in Laura Nader, Naked Science: Anthropological Inquiry Into Boundaries (1996), 209. However, it appears in a sentence as narrative, without quotation marks, and has no citation. Webmaster believes it may be the concept restated by Nader in her own words. Webmaster has not yet found any earlier printed, cited or verbatim example in the wording of the variant. If you know a primary source for this variant, please contact Webmaster.
Science quotes on:  |  Butterfly (26)  |  Butterfly Effect (6)  |  Chaos Theory (4)  |  Meteorology (36)  |  Predictability (7)  |  Set (400)  |  Tornado (4)  |  Wing (79)

Psychiatrist David Shainberg argued that mental illness, which appears chaotic, is actually the reverse. Mental illness occurs when images of the self become rigid and closed, restricting an open creative response to the world.[Co-author with David Peat]
In John F. Briggs and David Peat, Seven Life Lessons of Chaos: Spiritual Wisdom from the Science of Change (1999, 2000), 29. A footnote gives the source of this idea as from David Shainberg, The Transforming Self: New Dimensions in Psychoanalytic Process (1973).
Science quotes on:  |  Appearance (145)  |  Author (175)  |  Become (821)  |  Closed (38)  |  Creative (144)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Illness (35)  |  Image (97)  |  Mental (179)  |  Mental Illness (4)  |  Occur (151)  |  Open (277)  |  Psychiatrist (16)  |  Response (56)  |  Reverse (33)  |  Rigid (24)  |  Self (268)  |  World (1850)

Science is the attempt to discern the order that underlies the chaos of nature; art is the attempt to discern the order that underlies the chaos of man.
In The Strength To Dream: Literature and the Imagination (1961), 197.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Discern (35)  |  Man (2252)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Order (638)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Underlie (19)

Scientific theory is a contrived foothold in the chaos of living phenomena.
In Function of the Orgasm: Discovery of the Orgone (1927, 1973), 39-40.
Science quotes on:  |  Contrive (10)  |  Foothold (2)  |  Live (650)  |  Living (492)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Theory (24)  |  Theory (1015)

So says the most ancient book of the Earth; thus it is written on its leaves of marble, lime, sand, slate, and clay: ... that our Earth has fashioned itself, from its chaos of substances and powers, through the animating warmth of the creative spirit, to a peculiar and original whole, by a series of preparatory revolutions, till at last the crown of its creation, the exquisite and tender creature man, was enabled to appear.
Outlines of a Philosophy of the History of Man (1803). Translated from 1784 Original, Vol. I, Book 10, 465-6.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Book (413)  |  Creation (350)  |  Creative (144)  |  Creature (242)  |  Crown (39)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Exquisite (27)  |  Geology (240)  |  Last (425)  |  Man (2252)  |  Marble (21)  |  Most (1728)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Power (771)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Sand (63)  |  Say (989)  |  Series (153)  |  Slate (6)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Substance (253)  |  Through (846)  |  Warmth (21)  |  Whole (756)

Taxonomy (the science of classification) is often undervalued as a glorified form of filing—with each species in its folder, like a stamp in its prescribed place in an album; but taxonomy is a fundamental and dynamic science, dedicated to exploring the causes of relationships and similarities among organisms. Classifications are theories about the basis of natural order, not dull catalogues compiled only to avoid chaos.
Wonderful Life (1989), 98.
Science quotes on:  |  Avoid (123)  |  Basis (180)  |  Cause (561)  |  Classification (102)  |  Dedicated (19)  |  Dull (58)  |  Form (976)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Natural (810)  |  Order (638)  |  Organism (231)  |  Relationship (114)  |  Species (435)  |  Stamp (36)  |  Taxonomy (19)

Tell me these things, Olympian Muses, tell
From the beginning, which first came to be?
Chaos was first of all, but next appeared
Broad-bosomed Earth, Sure standing-place for all
The gods who live on snowy Olympus' peak,
And misty Tartarus, in a recess
Of broad-pathed earth, and Love, most beautiful
Of all the deathless gods. He makes men weak,
He overpowers the clever mind, and tames
The spirit in the breasts of men and gods.
From Chaos came black Night and Erebos.
And Night in turn gave birth to Day and Space
Whom she conceived in love to Erebos.
And Earth bore starry Heaven, first, to be
An equal to herself, to cover her
All over, and to be a resting-place,
Always secure, for all the blessed gods.Theogony, I. 114-28.
Heslod
In Hesiod and Theognis, trans. Dorothea Wender (1973), 26-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Birth (154)  |  Bless (25)  |  Blessed (20)  |  Bosom (14)  |  Clever (41)  |  Day (43)  |  Earth (1076)  |  First (1302)  |  God (776)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Live (650)  |  Love (328)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Muse (10)  |  Next (238)  |  Night (133)  |  Path (159)  |  Recess (8)  |  Space (523)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Star (460)  |  Tell (344)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Turn (454)  |  Weak (73)

The Atoms or Particles, which now constitute Heaven and Earth, being once separate and diffused in the Mundane Space, like the supposed Chaos, could never without a God by their Mechanical affections have convened into this present Frame of Things or any other like it.
A Confutation of Atheism from the Origin and Frame of the World. (1693), Part II, 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Affection (44)  |  Atom (381)  |  Being (1276)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Earth (1076)  |  God (776)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Never (1089)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  Present (630)  |  Separate (151)  |  Space (523)  |  Thing (1914)

The fundamental concepts of physical science, it is now understood, are abstractions, framed by our mind, so as to bring order to an apparent chaos of phenomena.
From Preface, A History of Science and its Relations with Philosophy & Religion (1931), vii.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstraction (48)  |  Apparent (85)  |  Concept (242)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Order (638)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Understood (155)

The lightning fell and the storm raged, and strata were deposited and uptorn and bent back, and Chaos moved from beneath, to create and flavor the fruit on your table to-day.
In 'Perpetual Forces', North American Review (1877), No. 125. Collected in Ralph Waldo Emerson and James Elliot Cabot (ed.), Lectures and Biographical Sketches (1883), 60.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Beneath (68)  |  Create (245)  |  Creation (350)  |  Deposit (12)  |  Flavor (8)  |  Fruit (108)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Storm (56)  |  Strata (37)  |  Table (105)

The major producer of the social chaos, the indeterminacy of thought and values that rational knowledge is supposed to eliminate, is none other than science itself.
In Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (1974).
Science quotes on:  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Major (88)  |  Other (2233)  |  Rational (95)  |  Social (261)  |  Thought (995)  |  Value (393)

The manuscript looks chaotic, even by mathematics standards.
[About newly-found late work of Srinivasa Ramanujan.]
Quoted in John Noble Wilford, 'Mathematician's Final Equations Praised', New York Times (9 Jun 1981), C1.
Science quotes on:  |  Late (119)  |  Look (584)  |  Manuscript (10)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Srinivasa Ramanujan (17)  |  Standard (64)  |  Work (1402)

The mind, in short, works on the data it receives very much as a sculptor works on his block of stone. In a sense the statue stood there from eternity. But there were a thousand different ones beside it, and the sculptor alone is to thank for having extricated this one from the rest. Just so with the world of each of us, howsoever different our several views of it may be, all lay embedded in the primordial chaos of sensations, which gave the mere matter to the thought of all of us indifferently.
In 'The Stream of Thought', The Principles of Psychology (1890), Vol. 1, 288.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Data (162)  |  Different (595)  |  Eternity (64)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Primordial (14)  |  Receive (117)  |  Rest (287)  |  Sculptor (10)  |  Sensation (60)  |  Sense (785)  |  Short (200)  |  Statue (17)  |  Stone (168)  |  Thank (48)  |  Thought (995)  |  Thousand (340)  |  View (496)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

The rudest numerical scales, such as that by which the mineralogists distinguish different degrees of hardness, are found useful. The mere counting of pistils and stamens sufficed to bring botany out of total chaos into some kind of form. It is not, however, so much from counting as from measuring, not so much from the conception of number as from that of continuous quantity, that the advantage of mathematical treatment comes. Number, after all, only serves to pin us down to a precision in our thoughts which, however beneficial, can seldom lead to lofty conceptions, and frequently descend to pettiness.
On the Doctrine of Chances, with Later Reflections (1878), 61-2.
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (144)  |  Beneficial (16)  |  Botany (63)  |  Conception (160)  |  Continuity (39)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Count (107)  |  Counting (26)  |  Degree (277)  |  Descend (49)  |  Descent (30)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguishing (14)  |  Down (455)  |  Form (976)  |  Hardness (4)  |  Kind (564)  |  Lead (391)  |  Lofty (16)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Measure (241)  |  Mineralogist (3)  |  Number (710)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Pettiness (3)  |  Pin (20)  |  Precision (72)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Rudeness (5)  |  Scale (122)  |  Seldom (68)  |  Stamen (4)  |  Sufficiency (16)  |  Thought (995)  |  Total (95)  |  Treatment (135)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)

The sea from its extreme luminousness presented a wonderful and most beautiful appearance. Every part of the water which by day is seen as foam, glowed with a pale light. The vessel drove before her bows two billows of liquid phosphorus, and in her wake was a milky train. As far as the eye reached the crest of every wave was bright; and from the reflected light, the sky just above the horizon was not so utterly dark as the rest of the Heavens. It was impossible to behold this plane of matter, as if it were melted and consumed by heat, without being reminded of Milton’s description of the regions of Chaos and Anarchy.
Science quotes on:  |  Anarchy (8)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Being (1276)  |  Billow (3)  |  Bow (15)  |  Bright (81)  |  Dark (145)  |  Description (89)  |  Extreme (78)  |  Eye (440)  |  Heat (180)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Horizon (47)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Light (635)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Luminous (19)  |  Matter (821)  |  John Milton (31)  |  Most (1728)  |  Phosphorus (18)  |  Present (630)  |  Reach (286)  |  Rest (287)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sky (174)  |  Train (118)  |  Two (936)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Water (503)  |  Wave (112)  |  Wonderful (155)

The so-called science of psychology is now in chaos, with no sign that order is soon to be restored. It is hard to find two of its professors who agree, and when the phenomenon is encountered it usually turns out that one of them is not a psychologist at all, but simply a teacher of psychology. … Not even anthropology offers a larger assortment of conflicting theories, or a more gaudy band of steaming and blood-sweating professors.
From book review (of Psychology: A Simplification) in American Mercury (Jul 1927), 582-583. Collected in A Mencken Chrestomathy (1949, 1956), 317.
Science quotes on:  |  Agree (31)  |  Anthropology (61)  |  Assortment (5)  |  Band (9)  |  Blood (144)  |  Call (781)  |  Called Science (14)  |  Conflict (77)  |  Conflicting (13)  |  Find (1014)  |  Gaudy (2)  |  Hard (246)  |  Larger (14)  |  More (2558)  |  Offer (142)  |  Order (638)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Professor (133)  |  Psychologist (26)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Restore (12)  |  Sign (63)  |  Simply (53)  |  So-Called (71)  |  Soon (187)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Turn (454)  |  Turn Out (9)  |  Two (936)  |  Usually (176)

The theory of probability is the only mathematical tool available to help map the unknown and the uncontrollable. It is fortunate that this tool, while tricky, is extraordinarily powerful and convenient.
The Fractal Geometry of Nature (1977, 1983), 201.
Science quotes on:  |  Available (80)  |  Fortunate (31)  |  Map (50)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Probability (135)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Tool (129)  |  Tricky (3)  |  Unknown (195)

Then followed months of intense thought in order to find out what the bewildering chaos of scattered observations meant until one day all of a sudden the whole became as clear and comprehensible as if it were illuminated with a flash of light … There are not many joys in human life equal to the joy of the sudden birth of a generalisation illuminating the mind after a long period of patient research.”
In Memoirs of a Revolutionist, 226-227. Concerning his geographical “meticulous research which resulted in his discovery of the configuration of the mountains of Asia—a discovery which he regarded as his most significant contribution to science.” As quoted, commented and cited in Caroline Cahm, Kropotkin: And the Rise of Revolutionary Anarchism, 1872-1886 (2002), 24.
Science quotes on:  |  Bewildering (5)  |  Generalization (61)  |  Human Life (32)  |  Intense (22)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Joy (117)  |  Observation (593)  |  Patient (209)  |  Research (753)  |  Revelation (51)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Thinking (425)

Theory always tends to become abstract as it emerges successfully from the chaos of facts by the processes of differentiation and elimination, whereby the essentials and their connections become recognised, whilst minor effects are seen to be secondary or unessential, and are ignored temporarily, to be explained by additional means.
In Electromagnetic Theory (1892), Vol. 2, 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Become (821)  |  Connection (171)  |  Differentiate (19)  |  Differentiation (28)  |  Effect (414)  |  Eliminate (25)  |  Elimination (26)  |  Emerge (24)  |  Essential (210)  |  Explain (334)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Recognise (14)  |  Tend (124)  |  Theory (1015)

Therapeutics and materia medica are in this day in the chaos of a transition.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Therapeutics (3)  |  Transition (28)

We adore chaos because we love to produce order.
Notation made on his pocket calendar (4 Dec 1958) as quoted in Michele Emmer and ‎Doris Schattschneider, M.C. Escher’s Legacy: A Centennial Celebration (2007), 71.
Science quotes on:  |  Adore (3)  |  Love (328)  |  Order (638)  |  Produce (117)

We are not to think that Jupiter has four satellites given him by nature, in order, by revolving round him, to immortalize the name of the Medici, who first had notice of the observation. These are the dreams of idle men, who love ludicrous ideas better than our laborious and industrious correction of the heavens.—Nature abhors so horrible a chaos, and to the truly wise, such vanity is detestable.
From Nodus Gordius, Appendix, as cited in John Elliot Drinkwater Bethune, Life of Galileo Galilei: With Illustrations of the Advancement of Experimental Philosophy (1832), 93.
Science quotes on:  |  Abhor (8)  |  Better (493)  |  Correction (42)  |  Dream (222)  |  First (1302)  |  Gift (105)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Horrible (10)  |  Idea (881)  |  Idle (34)  |  Idleness (15)  |  Immortalize (2)  |  Industrious (12)  |  Jupiter (28)  |  Laborious (17)  |  Love (328)  |  Ludicrous (7)  |  Moon (252)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Notice (81)  |  Observation (593)  |  Order (638)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Satellite (30)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Truly (118)  |  Vanity (20)  |  Wise (143)

We are the children of chaos, and the deep structure of change is decay. At root, there is only corruption, and the unstemmable tide of chaos. Gone is purpose; all that is left is direction. This is the bleakness we have to accept as we peer deeply and dispassionately into the heart of the Universe.
In The Second Law (1984), 216.
Science quotes on:  |  Bleakness (2)  |  Change (639)  |  Child (333)  |  Corruption (17)  |  Decay (59)  |  Direction (185)  |  Dispassionate (9)  |  Heart (243)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Structure (365)  |  Tide (37)  |  Universe (900)

We see that each surface is really a pair of surfaces, so that, where they appear to merge, there are really four surfaces. Continuing this process for another circuit, we see that there are really eight surfaces etc and we finally conclude that there is an infinite complex of surfaces, each extremely close to one or the other of two merging surfaces.
An intermediate thought about some surface in state space, while evolving his Prototype Model of Chaos. In 'Deterministic Nonperiodic Flow', Journal of Atmospheric Science (1963), 20, 130–141. As quoted and cited in: T.N. Palmer, 'Edward Norton Lorenz: 23 May 1917—16 April 2008', Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society (2009) 55, 144.
Science quotes on:  |  Circuit (29)  |  Complex (202)  |  Conclude (66)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Other (2233)  |  Process (439)  |  See (1094)  |  Surface (223)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Two (936)

What a chimera ... is man ! What a novelty, what a monster, what a chaos, what a subject of contradiction, what a prodigy! A judge of all things, feeble worm of the earth, depository of the truth, cloacae of uncertainty and error, the glory and the shame of the universe!
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Chimera (10)  |  Contradiction (69)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Error (339)  |  Feeble (28)  |  Glory (66)  |  Judge (114)  |  Man (2252)  |  Monster (33)  |  Novelty (31)  |  Prodigy (5)  |  Shame (15)  |  Subject (543)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Universe (900)  |  Worm (47)

What else, when chaos draws all forces inward
To shape a single leaf.
From poem, 'The Room'. Collected in Louis Untermeyer (ed.), Modern American Poetry: A Critical Anthology (1930), 600.
Science quotes on:  |  Leaf (73)  |  Shape (77)

What is the Chaos? It is the Order destroyed during Creation.
Unkempt Thoughts (1962), 53.
Science quotes on:  |  Creation (350)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Order (638)

When we try to imagine a chaos we fail. ... In its very fiber the mind is an order and refuses to build a chaos.
From chapter 'Jottings from a Note-Book', in Canadian Stories (1918), 170.
Science quotes on:  |  Build (211)  |  Fail (191)  |  Fiber (16)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Order (638)  |  Refuse (45)  |  Try (296)

Where chaos begins, classical science stops.
In Chaos: Making a New Science (1985, 1987), 3
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Classical (49)  |  Stop (89)

Wherever groups disclosed themselves, or could be introduced, simplicity crystallized out of comparative chaos.
In 'Groups and Matrices, an Excursion in the Practical, The Queen of the Sciences (1938), Chap. 6, 73.
Science quotes on:  |  Crystallize (12)  |  Group Theory (5)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Wherever (51)

Who … is not familiar with Maxwell’s memoirs on his dynamical theory of gases? … from one side enter the equations of state; from the other side, the equations of motion in a central field. Ever higher soars the chaos of formulae. Suddenly we hear, as from kettle drums, the four beats “put n=5.” The evil spirit v vanishes; and … that which had seemed insuperable has been overcome as if by a stroke of magic … One result after another follows in quick succession till at last … we arrive at the conditions for thermal equilibrium together with expressions for the transport coefficients.
In Ceremonial Speech (15 Nov 1887) celebrating the 301st anniversary of the Karl-Franzens-University Graz. Published as Gustav Robert Kirchhoff: Festrede zur Feier des 301. Gründungstages der Karl-Franzens-Universität zu Graz (1888), 29, as translated in Michael Dudley Sturge, Statistical and Thermal Physics (2003), 343. A more complete alternate translation also appears on the Ludwig Boltzmann Quotes page of this website.
Science quotes on:  |  Beat (42)  |  Central (81)  |  Coefficient (6)  |  Condition (362)  |  Drum (8)  |  Dynamical (15)  |  Enter (145)  |  Equation (138)  |  Equilibrium (34)  |  Evil (122)  |  Expression (181)  |  Field (378)  |  Follow (389)  |  Formula (102)  |  Hear (144)  |  Kettle (3)  |  Last (425)  |  Magic (92)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  Motion (320)  |  Other (2233)  |  Overcome (40)  |  Result (700)  |  Side (236)  |  Soar (23)  |  Spirit (278)  |  State (505)  |  Stroke (19)  |  Succession (80)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thermal (15)  |  Together (392)  |  Transport (31)

Who does not know Maxwell’s dynamic theory of gases? At first there is the majestic development of the variations of velocities, then enter from one side the equations of condition and from the other the equations of central motions, higher and higher surges the chaos of formulas, suddenly four words burst forth: “Put n = 5.” The evil demon V disappears like the sudden ceasing of the basso parts in music, which hitherto wildly permeated the piece; what before seemed beyond control is now ordered as by magic. There is no time to state why this or that substitution was made, he who cannot feel the reason may as well lay the book aside; Maxwell is no program-musician who explains the notes of his composition. Forthwith the formulas yield obediently result after result, until the temperature-equilibrium of a heavy gas is reached as a surprising final climax and the curtain drops.
In Ceremonial Speech (15 Nov 1887) celebrating the 301st anniversary of the Karl-Franzens-University Graz. Published as Gustav Robert Kirchhoff: Festrede zur Feier des 301. Gründungstages der Karl-Franzens-Universität zu Graz (1888), 29-30, as translated in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-book (1914), 187. From the original German, “Wer kennt nicht seine dynamische Gastheorie? – Zuerst entwickeln sich majestätisch die Variationen der Geschwindigkeiten, dann setzen von der einen Seite die Zustands-Gleichungen, von der anderen die Gleichungen der Centralbewegung ein, immer höher wogt das Chaos der Formeln; plötzlich ertönen die vier Worte: „Put n=5.“Der böse Dämon V verschwindet, wie in der Musik eine wilde, bisher alles unterwühlende Figur der Bässe plötzlich verstummt; wie mit einem Zauberschlage ordnet sich, was früher unbezwingbar schien. Da ist keine Zeit zu sagen, warum diese oder jene Substitution gemacht wird; wer das nicht fühlt, lege das Buch weg; Maxwell ist kein Programmmusiker, der über die Noten deren Erklärung setzen muss. Gefügig speien nun die Formeln Resultat auf Resultat aus, bis überraschend als Schlusseffect noch das Wärme-Gleichgewicht eines schweren Gases gewonnen wird und der Vorhang sinkt.” A condensed alternate translation also appears on the Ludwig Boltzmann Quotes page of this website.
Science quotes on:  |  Bass (2)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Book (413)  |  Burst (41)  |  Cease (81)  |  Central (81)  |  Composition (86)  |  Condition (362)  |  Control (182)  |  Curtain (4)  |  Demon (8)  |  Development (441)  |  Disappear (84)  |  Drop (77)  |  Dynamic (16)  |  Enter (145)  |  Equation (138)  |  Equilibrium (34)  |  Evil (122)  |  Explain (334)  |  Feel (371)  |  Final (121)  |  First (1302)  |  Formula (102)  |  Gas (89)  |  Heavy (24)  |  Higher (37)  |  Know (1538)  |  Magic (92)  |  Majestic (17)  |  Mathematics As A Fine Art (23)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  James Clerk Maxwell (91)  |  Motion (320)  |  Music (133)  |  Musician (23)  |  Note (39)  |  Obedient (9)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Permeate (3)  |  Program (57)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reason (766)  |  Result (700)  |  Side (236)  |  State (505)  |  Substitution (16)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Surge (2)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)  |  Variation (93)  |  Velocity (51)  |  Why (491)  |  Wild (96)  |  Word (650)  |  Yield (86)

Who shall declare the time allotted to the human race, when the generations of the most insignificant insect also existed for unnumbered ages? Yet man is also to vanish in the ever-changing course of events. The earth is to be burnt up, and the elements are to melt with fervent heat—to be again reduced to chaos—possibly to be renovated and adorned for other races of beings. These stupendous changes may be but cycles in those great laws of the universe, where all is variable but the laws themselves and He who has ordained them.
Physical Geography (1848), Vol. 1, 2-3.
Science quotes on:  |  Adornment (4)  |  Age (509)  |  Being (1276)  |  Burnt (2)  |  Change (639)  |  Course (413)  |  Cycle (42)  |  Declaration (10)  |  Declare (48)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Element (322)  |  Event (222)  |  Ever-Changing (2)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Fervent (6)  |  Generation (256)  |  Great (1610)  |  Heat (180)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Insect (89)  |  Insignificant (33)  |  Law (913)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Melt (16)  |  Most (1728)  |  Ordained (2)  |  Other (2233)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Race (278)  |  Reduced (3)  |  Renovation (2)  |  Stupendous (13)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vanish (19)  |  Variability (5)  |  Variable (37)

Who then can calculate the path of the molecule? how do we know that the creations of worlds are not determined by the fall of grains of sand?
Victor Hugo and Charles E. Wilbour (trans.), Les Misérables (1862), 41.
Science quotes on:  |  Butterfly Effect (6)  |  Calculate (58)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Chance (244)  |  Creation (350)  |  Determination (80)  |  Fall (243)  |  Grain (50)  |  Know (1538)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Path (159)  |  Sand (63)  |  World (1850)


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.