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: “I have no satisfaction in formulas unless I feel their arithmetical magnitude.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index L > Category: Long

Long Quotes (778 quotes)

… scientific thought does not mean thought about scientific subjects with long names. There are no scientific subjects. The subject of science is the human universe; that is to say, everything that is, or has been, or may be related to man.
'On the Aims and Instruments of Scientific Thought,' a Lecture delivered before the members of the British Association, at Brighton, on 19 Aug 1872, in Leslie Stephen and Frederick Pollock (eds.), Lectures and Essays, by the Late William Kingdon Clifford (1886), 86.
Science quotes on:  |  Everything (489)  |  Human (1512)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (810)  |  Name (359)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Thought (17)  |  Subject (543)  |  Thought (995)  |  Universe (900)

...the life of the planet began the long, slow process of modulating and regulating the physical conditions of the planet. The oxygen in today's atmosphere is almost entirely the result of photosynthetic living, which had its start with the appearance of blue-green algae among the microorganisms.
In Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony(1984), 74.
Science quotes on:  |  Algae (7)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Blue (63)  |  Condition (362)  |  Green (65)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Microorganism (29)  |  Modulation (3)  |  Oxygen (77)  |  Photosynthesis (21)  |  Physical (518)  |  Planet (402)  |  Process (439)  |  Regulation (25)  |  Result (700)  |  Slow (108)  |  Slowness (6)  |  Start (237)  |  Today (321)

’Tis evident, that as common Air when reduc’d to half Its wonted extent, obtained near about twice as forcible a Spring as it had before; so this thus- comprest Air being further thrust into half this narrow room, obtained thereby a Spring about as strong again as that It last had, and consequently four times as strong as that of the common Air. And there is no cause to doubt, that If we had been here furnisht with a greater quantity of Quicksilver and a very long Tube, we might by a further compression of the included Air have made It counter-balance “the pressure” of a far taller and heavier Cylinder of Mercury. For no man perhaps yet knows how near to an infinite compression the Air may be capable of, If the compressing force be competently increast.
A Defense of the Doctrine Touching the Spring and Weight of the Air (1662), 62.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Balance (82)  |  Being (1276)  |  Boyle�s Law (2)  |  Capable (174)  |  Cause (561)  |  Common (447)  |  Compression (7)  |  Cylinder (11)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Evident (92)  |  Extent (142)  |  Force (497)  |  Greater (288)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mercury (54)  |  Narrow (85)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Pressure (69)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Quicksilver (8)  |  Spring (140)  |  Strong (182)  |  Thrust (13)  |  Time (1911)

“Daddy,” she says, “which came first, the chicken or the egg?”
Steadfastly, even desperately, we have been refusing to commit ourselves. But our questioner is insistent. The truth alone will satisfy her. Nothing less. At long last we gather up courage and issue our solemn pronouncement on the subject: “Yes!”
So it is here.
“Daddy, is it a wave or a particle?”
“Yes.”
“Daddy, is the electron here or is it there?”
“Yes.”
“Daddy, do scientists really know what they are talking about?”
“Yes!”
The Strange Story of the Quantum (1947), 156-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Commit (43)  |  Courage (82)  |  Do (1905)  |  Egg (71)  |  Electron (96)  |  First (1302)  |  Gather (76)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Particle (200)  |  Quantum Mechanics (47)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Solemn (20)  |  Subject (543)  |  Talking (76)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Wave (112)  |  Will (2350)

“I should have more faith,” he said; “I ought to know by this time that when a fact appears opposed to a long train of deductions it invariably proves to be capable of bearing some other interpretation.”
Spoken by character, Sherlock Holmes, in A Study in Scarlet (1887), in Works of Arthur Conan Doyle (1902), Vol. 11, 106.
Science quotes on:  |  Appearance (145)  |  Bearing (10)  |  Capability (44)  |  Capable (174)  |  Deduction (90)  |  Face (214)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Faith (209)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Invariably (35)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  More (2558)  |  Opposition (49)  |  Other (2233)  |  Proof (304)  |  Prove (261)  |  Time (1911)  |  Train (118)

“Talent is a long patience.” We must look on what we wish to express long enough and with enough attention to discover an aspect that has not been seen and portrayed by another. There is, in everything, something unexplored, because we always use our eyes only with the recollection of what has been thought before on the subject we are contemplating.
From Pierre et Jean (1888), as translated by Alexina Loranger in 'Introduction', Pierre et Jean (Peter and John) (1890), 38-39. The opening words are quoted from Gustave Flaubert. From the original French, “Le talent est une longue patience. — Il s’agit de regarder tout ce qu’on veut exprimer assez longtemps et avec assez d’attention pour en découvrir un aspect qui n’ait été vu et dit par personne. Il y a, dans tout, de l’inexploré, parce que nous sommes habitués à ne nous servir de nos yeux qu’avec le souvenir de ce qu’on a pensé avant nous sur ce que nous contemplons.”
Science quotes on:  |  Aspect (129)  |  Attention (196)  |  Contemplate (29)  |  Discover (571)  |  Enough (341)  |  Everything (489)  |  Express (192)  |  Eye (440)  |  Look (584)  |  Must (1525)  |  Patience (58)  |  Portray (6)  |  Recollection (12)  |  See (1094)  |  Something (718)  |  Subject (543)  |  Talent (99)  |  Thought (995)  |  Unexplored (15)  |  Use (771)  |  Wish (216)

“Would you tell me please, which way I ought to go from here?”
“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat.
“I don’t much care where … ,” said Alice.
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat.
“So long as I get somewhere,” Alice added as an explanation. “Oh, you’re sure to do that,” said the Cat, “if only you walk long enough.”
In Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865, 1869), 89.
Science quotes on:  |  Care (203)  |  Cat (52)  |  Deal (192)  |  Depend (238)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enough (341)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Good (906)  |  Matter (821)  |  Please (68)  |  Tell (344)  |  Walk (138)  |  Want (504)  |  Way (1214)

(1) A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
(2) A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the first law.
(3) A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.
'The Three Laws of Robotics', in I, Robot (1950), Frontispiece.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Conflict (77)  |  Existence (481)  |  First (1302)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Law (913)  |  Must (1525)  |  Obey (46)  |  Order (638)  |  Protect (65)  |  Protection (41)  |  Robot (14)  |  Through (846)

[1665-12-31] Thus ends this year ... It is true we have gone through great melancholy because of the great plague, and I put to great charges by it, by keeping my family long at Woolwich, and myself and another part of my family, my clerks, at my charge at Greenwich ... But now the plague is abated almost to nothing ... But many of such as I know very well, dead. Yet to our great joy, the town fills apace, and shops begin to open again. Pray God continue the plague's decrease - for that keeps the Court away from the place of business, and so all goes to wrack as to public matters, they at this distance not thinking of it.
Diary of Samuel Pepys (31 Dec 1665)
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Business (156)  |  Charge (63)  |  Clerk (13)  |  Continue (179)  |  Court (35)  |  Distance (171)  |  End (603)  |  Family (101)  |  God (776)  |  Great (1610)  |  Joy (117)  |  Know (1538)  |  Matter (821)  |  Melancholy (17)  |  Myself (211)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Open (277)  |  Plague (42)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Through (846)  |  Year (963)

[American] Motherhood is like being a crack tennis player or ballet dancer—it lasts just so long, then it’s over. We’ve made an abortive effort to turn women into people. We’ve sent them to school and put them in slacks. But we’ve focused on wifehood and reproductivity with no clue about what to do with mother after the children have left home. We’ve found no way of using the resources of women in the 25 years of post-menopausal zest. As a result many women seem to feel they should live on the recognition and care of society.
As quoted in interview with Frances Glennon, 'Student and Teacher of Human Ways', Life (14 Sep 1959), 147.
Science quotes on:  |  Abortive (2)  |  Being (1276)  |  Care (203)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Clue (20)  |  Crack (15)  |  Dancer (4)  |  Do (1905)  |  Effort (243)  |  Feel (371)  |  Focus (36)  |  Home (184)  |  Last (425)  |  Leave (138)  |  Live (650)  |  Menopause (2)  |  Mother (116)  |  Motherhood (2)  |  People (1031)  |  Player (9)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Resource (74)  |  Result (700)  |  School (227)  |  Society (350)  |  Tennis (8)  |  Turn (454)  |  Use (771)  |  Way (1214)  |  Woman (160)  |  Year (963)  |  Zest (4)

[Concerning the Piltdown hoax,] that jaw has been literally a bone of contention for a long time.
In 'Quotation Marks', New York Times (29 Nov 1953), SM71.
Science quotes on:  |  Bone (101)  |  Contention (14)  |  Hoax (6)  |  Jaw (4)  |  Literally (30)  |  Time (1911)

[First use of the term science fiction:] We hope it will not be long before we may have other works of Science-Fiction [like Richard Henry Horne's The Poor Artist], as we believe such books likely to fulfil a good purpose, and create an interest, where, unhappily, science alone might fail.
[Thomas] Campbell says, that “Fiction in Poetry is not the reverse of truth, but her soft and enchanting resemblance.” Now this applies especially to Science-Fiction, in which the revealed truths of Science may be given interwoven with a pleasing story which may itself be poetical and true—thus circulating a knowledge of Poetry of Science, clothed in a garb of the Poetry of life.
In A Little Earnest Book Upon a Great Old Subject (1851), 137.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Artist (97)  |  Book (413)  |  Create (245)  |  Fail (191)  |  First (1302)  |  Garb (6)  |  Good (906)  |  Hope (321)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interwoven (10)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Other (2233)  |  Poem (104)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Poor (139)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Resemblance (39)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Revealed (59)  |  Reverse (33)  |  Say (989)  |  Science Fiction (35)  |  Soft (30)  |  Story (122)  |  Term (357)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Use (771)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

[Herschel and Humboldt] stirred up in me a burning zeal to add even the most humble contribution to the noble structure of Natural Science. No one or a dozen other books influenced me nearly so much as these two. I copied out from Humboldt long passages about Teneriffe and read them aloud on one of [my walking excursions].
Autobiographies, (eds.) Michael Neve and Sharon Messenger (2002), Penguin edn., 36.
Science quotes on:  |  Biography (254)  |  Book (413)  |  Burning (49)  |  Contribution (93)  |  Excursion (12)  |  Sir John Herschel (24)  |  Humble (54)  |  Baron Friedrich Wilhelm Christian Karl Ferdinan von Humboldt (5)  |  Most (1728)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Noble (93)  |  Other (2233)  |  Passage (52)  |  Read (308)  |  Structure (365)  |  Two (936)

[In an established surgical practice] there is a ghost in every bed [and fortunately] surgeons get long lives and short memories.
Anonymous
In B.J. Moran, 'Decision-making and technical factors account for the learning curve in complex surgery', Journal of Public Health (2006), 28375-378.
Science quotes on:  |  Ghost (36)  |  Live (650)  |  Memory (144)  |  Practice (212)  |  Short (200)  |  Surgeon (64)

[In my early youth, walking with my father,] “See that bird?” he says. “It’s a Spencer’s warbler.” (I knew he didn’t know the real name.) “Well, in Italian, it’s a Chutto Lapittida. In Portuguese, it’s a Bom da Peida. In Chinese, it’s a Chung-long-tah, and in Japanese, it’s a Katano Tekeda. You can know the name of that bird in all the languages of the world, but when you’re finished, you’ll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird. You’ll only know about humans in different places, and what they call the bird. So let’s look at the bird and see what it’s doing—that’s what counts.” (I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.)
In 'The Making of a Scientist', What Do You Care What Other People Think?": Further Adventures of a Curious Character (2001), 13-14.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolutely (41)  |  Bird (163)  |  Call (781)  |  Chinese (22)  |  Count (107)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Doing (277)  |  Early (196)  |  Father (113)  |  Finish (62)  |  Human (1512)  |  Italian (13)  |  Japanese (7)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Language (308)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Look (584)  |  Name (359)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Observation (593)  |  Say (989)  |  See (1094)  |  Something (718)  |  Warbler (2)  |  Whatever (234)  |  World (1850)  |  Youth (109)

[Is the Loch Ness Monster] a magnified newt, a long‐necked variety of giant seal, an unextinct Elasmosaurus?
In 'Pieces of the Frame', The Atlantic (1970), collected in Pieces of the Frame (1975), 103.
Science quotes on:  |  Extinct (25)  |  Giant (73)  |  Loch Ness Monster (2)  |  Magnify (4)  |  Monster (33)  |  Neck (15)  |  Newt (2)  |  Seal (19)  |  Variety (138)

[It would not be long] ere the whole surface of this country would be channelled for those nerves which are to diffuse, with the speed of thought, a knowledge of all that is occurring throughout the land, making, in fact, one neighborhood of the whole country.
Samuel F.B. Morse: His Letters and Journals (1914), vol. 2, 85.
Science quotes on:  |  Communication (101)  |  Country (269)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Internet (24)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Making (300)  |  Neighborhood (12)  |  Nerve (82)  |  Speed (66)  |  Surface (223)  |  Telegraph (45)  |  Thought (995)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Whole (756)

[It] is the little causes, long continued, which are considered as bringing about the greatest changes of the earth.
Theory of the Earth, with Proofs and Illustrations, Vol. 2 (1795), 205.
Science quotes on:  |  Cause (561)  |  Change (639)  |  Consider (428)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Little (717)  |  Time (1911)

[It] may be laid down as a general rule that, if the result of a long series of precise observations approximates a simple relation so closely that the remaining difference is undetectable by observation and may be attributed to the errors to which they are liable, then this relation is probably that of nature.
'Mémoire sur les Inégalites Séculaires des Planètes et des Satellites' (I 785, published 1787). In Oeuvres completes de Laplace, 14 Vols. (1843-1912), Vol. 11, 57, trans. Charles Coulston Gillispie, Pierre-Simon Laplace 1749-1827: A Life in Exact Science (1997), 130.
Science quotes on:  |  Approximate (25)  |  Approximation (32)  |  Attribute (65)  |  Difference (355)  |  Down (455)  |  Error (339)  |  General (521)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Observation (593)  |  Precise (71)  |  Precision (72)  |  Relation (166)  |  Remaining (45)  |  Result (700)  |  Rule (307)  |  Series (153)  |  Simple (426)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Undetectable (3)

[Like people] if you torture statistics long enough, they'll tell you anything you want to hear.
Anonymous
In Erica Beecher-Monas, Evaluating Scientific Evidence (2007), 63.
Science quotes on:  |  Enough (341)  |  Hear (144)  |  People (1031)  |  Quip (81)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Tell (344)  |  Torture (30)  |  Want (504)

[M]y work, which I’ve done for a long time, was not pursued in order to gain the praise I now enjoy, but chiefly from a craving after knowledge, which I notice resides in me more than in most other men. And therewithal, whenever I found out anything remarkable, I have thought it my duty to put down my discovery on paper, so that all ingenious people might be informed thereof.
Letter (27 Jun 1716) thanking the University of Louvain for ending him a medal designed in honour of his research. (Leeuwenhoek was then in his 84th year.) As cited by Charles-Edward Amory Winslow in The Conquest of Epidemic Disease: A Chapter in the History of Ideas (), 156.
Science quotes on:  |  Chiefly (47)  |  Craving (5)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Down (455)  |  Duty (71)  |  Find (1014)  |  Gain (146)  |  Inform (50)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Notice (81)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paper (192)  |  People (1031)  |  Praise (28)  |  Remarkable (50)  |  Research (753)  |  Reside (25)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Whenever (81)  |  Work (1402)  |  Write (250)

[May] this civic and social landmark [the Washington, D.C., Jewish Community Center] ... be a constant reminder of the inspiring service that has been rendered to civilization by men and women of the Jewish faith. May [visitors] recall the long array of those who have been eminent in statecraft, in science, in literature, in art, in the professions, in business, in finance, in philanthropy and in the spiritual life of the world.
Speech upon laying the cornerstone of the Jewish Community Center, Washington, D.C. (3 May 1925). In William J. Federer, A Treasury of Presidential Quotations (2004), 240.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Business (156)  |  Civic (3)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Community (111)  |  Constant (148)  |  Eminence (25)  |  Faith (209)  |  Jew (11)  |  Jewish (15)  |  Landmark (9)  |  Life (1870)  |  Literature (116)  |  Philanthropy (2)  |  Profession (108)  |  Render (96)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Service (110)  |  Social (261)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  World (1850)

[Modern science] passed through a long period of uncertainty and inconclusive experiment, but as the instrumental aids to research improved, and the results of observation accumulated, phantoms of the imagination were exorcised, idols of the cave were shattered, trustworthy materials were obtained for logical treatment, and hypotheses by long and careful trial were converted into theories.
In The Present Relations of Science and Religion (1913, 2004), 3
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulation (51)  |  Aid (101)  |  Careful (28)  |  Cave (17)  |  Conversion (17)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Idol (5)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Inconclusive (3)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Logic (311)  |  Material (366)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Science (55)  |  Observation (593)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Pass (241)  |  Period (200)  |  Phantom (9)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Shatter (8)  |  Shattered (8)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Through (846)  |  Treatment (135)  |  Trial (59)  |  Trustworthy (14)  |  Uncertainty (58)

[Napoleon] directed Bourrienne to leave all his letters unopened for three weeks, and then observed with satisfaction how large a part of the correspondence had thus disposed of itself, and no longer required an answer.
Lecture, 'Napoleon', collected in Representative Men (1850), 177.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Emperor Napoléon Bonaparte (20)  |  Communication (101)  |  Correspondence (24)  |  Direct (228)  |  Dispose (10)  |  Large (398)  |  Leave (138)  |  Letter (117)  |  Napoleon (16)  |  Observe (179)  |  Observed (149)  |  Part (235)  |  Require (229)  |  Required (108)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  Unopened (3)  |  Week (73)

[O]ur long-term security is threatened by a problem at least as dangerous as chemical, nuclear or biological weapons, or indeed international terrorism: human-induced climate change. … The impacts of global warming are such that I have no hesitation in describing it as a “weapon of mass destruction.” Like terrorism, this weapon knows no boundaries. It can strike anywhere, in any form…
London Guardian (28 Jul 2003)
Science quotes on:  |  Biological (137)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Change (639)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Climate (102)  |  Climate Change (76)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Form (976)  |  Global (39)  |  Global Warming (29)  |  Hesitation (19)  |  Human (1512)  |  Impact (45)  |  Indeed (323)  |  International (40)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mass (160)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Nuclear Weapon (17)  |  Problem (731)  |  Security (51)  |  Strike (72)  |  Term (357)  |  Terrorism (3)  |  Threat (36)  |  Threaten (33)  |  Warming (24)  |  Weapon (98)  |  Weapons (57)

[The compass needle] as the guide of Vasco de Gama to the East Indies, and of Columbus to the West Indies and the New World, it was pre-eminently the precursor and pioneer of the telegraph. Silently, and as with finger on its lips, it led them across the waste of waters to the new homes of the world; but when these were largely filled, and houses divided between the old and new hemispheres longed to exchange affectionate greetings, it removed its finger and broke silence. The quivering magnetic needle which lies in the coil of the galvanometer is the tongue of the electric telegraph, and already engineers talk of it as speaking.
'Progress of the Telegraph.' In Jesse Aitken Wilson, Memoirs of George Wilson. Quoted in Natural History Society of Montreal, 'Reviews and Notices of Books,' The Canadian Naturalist and Geologist (1861) Vol. 6, 392.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Compass (37)  |  Divided (50)  |  Electric (76)  |  Engineer (136)  |  Exchange (38)  |  Galvanometer (4)  |  Greeting (10)  |  Guide (107)  |  Home (184)  |  House (143)  |  Lie (370)  |  Magnetic (44)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)  |  Pioneer (37)  |  Precursor (5)  |  Silence (62)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Telegraph (45)  |  Tongue (44)  |  Waste (109)  |  Water (503)  |  World (1850)

[The steamboat] will answer for sea voyages as well as for inland navigation, in particular for packets, where there may be a great number of passengers. He is also of opinion, that fuel for a short voyage would not exceed the weight of water for a long one, and it would produce a constant supply of fresh water. ... [T]he boat would make head against the most violent tempests, and thereby escape the danger of a lee shore; and that the same force may be applied to a pump to free a leaky ship of her water. ... [T]he good effects of the machine, is the almost omnipotent force by which it is actuated, and the very simple, easy, and natural way by which the screws or paddles are turned to answer the purpose of oars.
[This letter was written in 1785, before the first steamboat carried a man (Fitch) on 27 Aug 1787.]
Letter to Benjamin Franklin (12 Oct 1785), in The Works of Benjamin Franklin (1882), Vol. 10, 232.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Answer (389)  |  Applied (176)  |  Constant (148)  |  Danger (127)  |  Ease (40)  |  Easy (213)  |  Effect (414)  |  Escape (85)  |  First (1302)  |  Force (497)  |  Free (239)  |  Fresh (69)  |  Fuel (39)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Inland (3)  |  Leak (4)  |  Letter (117)  |  Machine (271)  |  Man (2252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Natural (810)  |  Navigation (26)  |  Number (710)  |  Oar (2)  |  Omnipotent (13)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Packet (3)  |  Paddle (3)  |  Passenger (10)  |  Pump (9)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Screw (17)  |  Sea (326)  |  Ship (69)  |  Short (200)  |  Simple (426)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Steamboat (7)  |  Supply (100)  |  Tempest (7)  |  Turn (454)  |  Violent (17)  |  Voyage (13)  |  Water (503)  |  Way (1214)  |  Weight (140)  |  Will (2350)

[The toughest part of being in charge is] killing ideas that are great but poorly timed. And delivering tough feedback that’s difficult to hear but that I know will help people—and the team—in the long term.
In Issie Lapowsky, 'Scott Belsky', Inc. (Nov 2013), 140. Biography in Context,
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Business (156)  |  Charge (63)  |  Deliver (30)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Feedback (10)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hear (144)  |  Help (116)  |  Idea (881)  |  Kill (100)  |  Know (1538)  |  Leadership (13)  |  Long Term (4)  |  People (1031)  |  Poorly (2)  |  Team (17)  |  Term (357)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tough (22)  |  Will (2350)

[We] can easily distinguish what relates to Mathematics in any question from that which belongs to the other sciences. But as I considered the matter carefully it gradually came to light that all those matters only were referred to Mathematics in which order and measurements are investigated, and that it makes no difference whether it be in numbers, figures, stars, sounds or any other object that the question of measurement arises. I saw consequently that there must be some general science to explain that element as a whole which gives rise to problems about order and measurement, restricted as these are to no special subject matter. This, I perceived was called “Universal Mathematics,” not a far-fetched asignation, but one of long standing which has passed into current use, because in this science is contained everything on account of which the others are called parts of Mathematics.
Rules for the Direction of the Mind (written 1628). As translated by Elizabeth Sanderson Haldane and George Robert Thomson Ross in The Philosophical Works of Descartes (1911, 1931), 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Arise (162)  |  Belong (168)  |  Call (781)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Consider (428)  |  Current (122)  |  Difference (355)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Element (322)  |  Everything (489)  |  Explain (334)  |  Figure (162)  |  General (521)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Light (635)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Matter (821)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Must (1525)  |  Number (710)  |  Object (438)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pass (241)  |  Problem (731)  |  Question (649)  |  Rise (169)  |  Saw (160)  |  Sound (187)  |  Special (188)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Subject (543)  |  Universal (198)  |  Use (771)  |  Whole (756)

[When I was a child] I grew up in Brooklyn, New York, and I was a street kid. … [T]here was one aspect of that environment that, for some reason, struck me as different, and that was the stars. … I could tell they were lights in the sky, but that wasn’t an explanation. I mean, what were they? Little electric bulbs on long black wires, so you couldn’t see what they were held up by? What were they? … My mother said to me, "Look, we’ve just got you a library card … get out a book and find the answer.” … It was in there. It was stunning. The answer was that the Sun was a star, except very far away. … The dazzling idea of a universe vast beyond imagining swept over me. … I sensed awe.
In 'Wonder and Skepticism', Skeptical Enquirer (Jan-Feb 1995), 19, No. 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Awe (43)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Biography (254)  |  Book (413)  |  Brooklyn (3)  |  Bulb (10)  |  Child (333)  |  Dazzling (13)  |  Different (595)  |  Electric (76)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Environment (239)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Far (158)  |  Find (1014)  |  Idea (881)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Kid (18)  |  Library (53)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Look (584)  |  Mean (810)  |  Mother (116)  |  New (1273)  |  New York (17)  |  Reason (766)  |  See (1094)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sky (174)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Street (25)  |  Stunning (4)  |  Sun (407)  |  Tell (344)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vast (188)  |  Vastness (15)  |  Wire (36)

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)  |  Assert (69)  |  Classical (49)  |  Do (1905)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enough (341)  |  Expand (56)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Friend (180)  |  Fulcrum (3)  |  Greek (109)  |  Lever (13)  |  Move (223)  |  Possible (560)  |  Proof (304)  |  Stand (284)  |  Strength (139)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Variation (93)  |  Weight (140)  |  World (1850)

“The Universe repeats itself, with the possible exception of history.” Of all earthly studies history is the only one that does not repeat itself. ... Astronomy repeats itself; botany repeats itself; trigonometry repeats itself; mechanics repeats itself; compound long division repeats itself. Every sum if worked out in the same way at any time will bring out the same answer. ... A great many moderns say that history is a science; if so it occupies a solitary and splendid elevation among the sciences; it is the only science the conclusions of which are always wrong.
In 'A Much Repeated Repetition', Daily News (26 Mar 1904). Collected in G. K. Chesterton and Dale Ahlquist (ed.), In Defense of Sanity: The Best Essays of G.K. Chesterton (2011), 82.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Botany (63)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Compound (117)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Division (67)  |  Earthly (8)  |  Elevation (13)  |  Evaluation (10)  |  Exception (74)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Modern (402)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Possible (560)  |  Repetition (29)  |  Say (989)  |  French Saying (67)  |  Solitary (16)  |  Splendid (23)  |  Study (701)  |  Sum (103)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trigonometry (7)  |  Universe (900)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)  |  Wrong (246)

“Ye, sire,” I seide,
“By so no man were greved,
Alle the sciences under sonne,
And alle sotile craftes,
Ich wolde ich knewe and kouthe
Kyndely in myn harte.”

“Yes, sir,” I said, “so long as no one minds. All science under the sun, and all subtle arts. Were it possible, I would know and hold naturally within my heart!”
In William Langland and B. Thomas Wright (ed.) The Vision and Creed of Piers Ploughman (1842), 297. Modern translation by Terrence Tiller in Piers Plowman (1981, 1999), 157.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Craft (11)  |  Heart (243)  |  Know (1538)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Possible (560)  |  Sun (407)

[Answering question whether he was tired of life:] Tired! Not so long as there is an undescribed intestinal worm, or the riddle of a fossil bone, or a rhizopod new to me.
Related about Joseph Leidy by Dr. Weir Mitchell, as stated in Richard A. Gregory, Discovery: Or, The Spirit and Service of Science (1916), 17.
Science quotes on:  |  Bone (101)  |  Describe (132)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Intestine (16)  |  Life (1870)  |  New (1273)  |  Question (649)  |  Riddle (28)  |  Tired (13)  |  Worm (47)

[When questioned on his longevity] First of all, I selected my ancestors very wisely. ... They were long-lived, healthy people. Then, as a chemist, I know how to eat, how to exercise, keep my blood circulating. ... I don't worry. I don't get angry at people. I don't worry about things I can't help. I do what I can to make the world a better place to live, but I don't complain if things aren't right. As a scientist I take the world as I find it.
[About celebrating his 77th birthday by swimming a half mile in 22 minutes] I used swim fins and webbed gloves because a man of intelligence should apply his power efficiently, not just churn the water.
As quoted in obituary by Wallace Turner, 'Joel Hildebrand, 101', New York Times (3 May 1983), D27.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancestor (63)  |  Anger (21)  |  Application (257)  |  Apply (170)  |  Better (493)  |  Birthday (9)  |  Blood (144)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Churn (4)  |  Circulation (27)  |  Complaint (13)  |  Do (1905)  |  Eat (108)  |  Eating (46)  |  Efficiency (46)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Fin (4)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Glove (4)  |  Health (210)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Keeping (9)  |  Know (1538)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Long-Lived (2)  |  Longevity (6)  |  Man (2252)  |  Minute (129)  |  Obituary (11)  |  People (1031)  |  Person (366)  |  Power (771)  |  Question (649)  |  Right (473)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Select (45)  |  Selection (130)  |  Swim (32)  |  Swimming (19)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Water (503)  |  Web (17)  |  Wisdom (235)  |  World (1850)  |  Worry (34)

Aber das Leben ist kurz und die Wahrheit wirkt ferne und lebt lange: sagen wir die Wahrheit.
Life is short and truth works far and lives long: let us speak the truth.
Concluding remark in Preface, written at Dresden in August 1818, first German edition, Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, 4 Bücher nebst einem Anhange der die Kritik der Kentischen Philosophie (1819), xvi. As translated by Richard Burton Haldane and John Kemp in The World as Will and Representation (1883, 1907), Vol. 1, xv.
Science quotes on:  |  Far (158)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Short (200)  |  Speak (240)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Work (1402)

Ars longa, vita brevis.
Art is long, life is short.
Aphorisms, i. The original was written in Greek. This Latin translation, by Seneca (De Brevitate Vitae, 1.1), is in John Bartlett, Familiar Quotations (1905), 6, footnote 3. The sense is generally taken to be, 'Life is short, but to learn a profession (an art) takes a long time.'
Science quotes on:  |  Aphorism (22)  |  Art (680)  |  Learning (291)  |  Life (1870)  |  Profession (108)  |  Short (200)  |  Skill (116)

Compounds formed by chemical attraction, possess new properties different from those of their component parts... chemists have long believed that the contrary took place in their combination. They thought, in fact, that the compounds possessed properties intermediate between those of their component parts; so that two bodies, very coloured, very sapid, or insapid, soluble or insoluble, fusible or infusible, fixed or volatile, assumed in chemical combination, a shade or colour, or taste, solubility or volatility, intermediate between, and in some sort composed of, the same properties which were considered in their principles. This is an illusion or error which modern chemistry is highly interested to overthrow.
Quoted in A General System of Chemical Knowledge (1804), Vol. I, trans. W. Nicholson, 102-3.
Science quotes on:  |  Attraction (61)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Combination (150)  |  Component (51)  |  Compound (117)  |  Consider (428)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Different (595)  |  Error (339)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Form (976)  |  Illusion (68)  |  Interest (416)  |  Intermediate (38)  |  Modern (402)  |  New (1273)  |  Possess (157)  |  Principle (530)  |  Property (177)  |  Shade (35)  |  Solubility (2)  |  Soluble (5)  |  Taste (93)  |  Thought (995)  |  Two (936)

Error of confounding cause and effect.—There is no more dangerous error than confounding consequence with cause: I call it the intrinsic depravity of reason. … I take an example: everybody knows the book of the celebrated Comaro, in which he recommends his spare diet as a recipe for a long and happy life,—for a virtuous life also. Few books have been read so much… I believe hardly any book … has caused so much harm, has shortened so many lives, as this well-meant curiosity. The source of this mischief is in confounding consequence with cause. The candid Italian saw in his diet the cause of his long life, while the prerequisite to long life, the extraordinary slowness of the metabolic process, small consumption, was the cause of his spare diet. He was not at liberty to eat little or much; his frugality—was not of “free will;” he became sick when he ate more.
From 'The Four Great Errors', The Twilight of the Idols (1888), collected in Thomas Common (trans.), The Works of Friedrich Nietzsche (1896), Vol. 11, 139.
Science quotes on:  |  Book (413)  |  Call (781)  |  Cause (561)  |  Cause And Effect (21)  |  Confound (21)  |  Confounding (8)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Consumption (16)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Diet (56)  |  Eat (108)  |  Effect (414)  |  Error (339)  |  Everybody (72)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  Free (239)  |  Free Will (15)  |  Happy (108)  |  Intrinsic (18)  |  Italian (13)  |  Know (1538)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Live (650)  |  Metabolism (15)  |  Mischief (13)  |  More (2558)  |  Prerequisite (9)  |  Process (439)  |  Read (308)  |  Reason (766)  |  Recommend (27)  |  Saw (160)  |  Sick (83)  |  Slowness (6)  |  Small (489)  |  Virtuous (9)  |  Will (2350)

For-thi loke thow lovye,
As longe as thow durest;
For is no science under sonne
So sovereyn for the soule.

So long as you live, see that you love,
For no science under the sun can so heal the soul.
In William Langland and B. Thomas Wright (ed.) The Vision and Creed of Piers Ploughman (1842), 184. Modern translation by Terrence Tiller in Piers Plowman (1981, 1999), 94.
Science quotes on:  |  Heal (7)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Love (328)  |  See (1094)  |  Soul (235)  |  Sun (407)

Ihm in vollem Maaße das Schicksal werde, welches in jeder Erkenntniß, … allezeit der Wahrheit zu Theil ward, der nur ein kurzes Siegesfest beschieden ist, zwischen den beiden langen Zeiträumen, wo sie als parador verdammt und als trivial geringgeschätzt wird.
[It] has always fallen to the lot of truth in every branch of knowledge, … [that] to truth only a brief celebration of victory is allowed between the two long periods during which it is condemned as paradoxical, or disparaged as trivial. The author of truth also usually meets with the former fate.
Conclusion for Preface, written at Dresden in August 1818, first German edition, Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, 4 Bücher nebst einem Anhange der die Kritik der Kentischen Philosophie (1819), xvi. As translated by E.F.J. Payne in The World as Will and Representation (1958, 1969), Vol. 1, xvii. In the preface, Schopenhauer is writing his hope that what he has written in the book will be accepted by those it reaches. Notice the statement of three stages of truth: condemnation; acceptance; trivializing. It may be the source of a condensed quote attributed (wrongly?) to Schopenhauer—seen in this collection as the quote that begins, “All truth passes through three stages…”
Science quotes on:  |  Allowed (3)  |  Author (175)  |  Branch (155)  |  Brief (37)  |  Celebration (7)  |  Condemn (44)  |  Condemned (5)  |  Disparage (5)  |  Fate (76)  |  Former (138)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lot (151)  |  Paradox (54)  |  Period (200)  |  Trivial (59)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Two (936)  |  Usually (176)  |  Victory (40)  |  Ward (7)

Il est impossible de contempler le spectacle de l’univers étoilé sans se demander comment il s’est formé: nous devions peut-être attendre pour chercher une solution que nous ayons patiemment rassemblé les éléments …mais si nous étions si raisonnables, si nous étions curieux sans impatience, il est probable que nous n’avions jamais créé la Science et que nous nous serions toujours contentés de vivre notre petite vie. Notre esprit a donc reclamé impérieusement cette solution bien avant qu’elle fut mûre, et alors qu’il ne possédait que de vagues lueurs, lui permettant de la deviner plutôt que de l’attendre.
It is impossible to contemplate the spectacle of the starry universe without wondering how it was formed: perhaps we ought to wait, and not look for a solution until have patiently assembled the elements … but if we were so reasonable, if we were curious without impatience, it is probable we would never have created Science and we would always have been content with a trivial existence. Thus the mind has imperiously laid claim to this solution long before it was ripe, even while perceived in only faint glimmers—allowing us to guess a solution rather than wait for it.
From Leçons sur les Hypothèses Consmogoniques (1913) as cited in D. Ter Haar and A.G.W. Cameron, 'Historical Review of Theories of the Origin of the Solar System', collected in Robert Jastrow and A. G. W. Cameron (eds.), Origin of the Solar System: Proceedings of a Conference Held at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, New York, January 23-24, 1962, (1963), 3. 'Cosmogonical Hypotheses' (1913), collected in Harlow Shapley, Source Book in Astronomy, 1900-1950 (1960), 347.
Science quotes on:  |  Assemble (14)  |  Claim (154)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Content (75)  |  Created (6)  |  Curious (95)  |  Element (322)  |  Existence (481)  |  Faint (10)  |  Form (976)  |  Formation (100)  |  Glimmer (5)  |  Guess (67)  |  Impatience (13)  |  Impossibility (60)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Look (584)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Never (1089)  |  Origin Of The Universe (20)  |  Patience (58)  |  Perceived (4)  |  Reasonable (29)  |  Ripe (5)  |  Solution (282)  |  Spectacle (35)  |  Star (460)  |  Trivial (59)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vague (50)  |  Wait (66)  |  Wonder (251)

La pensée n’est qu’un éclair au milieu d’une longue nuit. Mais c’est cet éclair qui est tout.
Thought is only a gleam in the midst of a long night. But it is this gleam which is everything.
Concluding remark to La Valeur de la Science (1904), 276, translated by George Bruce Halsted, in The Value of Science (1907), 142. “Éclair” might also be translated as “flash” or “lightning,” which would better signify only an instantaneous existence in his context of geologic time.
Science quotes on:  |  Everything (489)  |  Flash (49)  |  Gleam (13)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Night (133)  |  Thought (995)

Longtemps les objets dont s'occupent les mathématiciens étaient our la pluspart mal définis; on croyait les connaître, parce qu'on se les représentatit avec le sens ou l'imagination; mais on n'en avait qu'une image grossière et non une idée précise sure laquelle le raisonment pût avoir prise.
For a long time the objects that mathematicians dealt with were mostly ill-defined; one believed one knew them, but one represented them with the senses and imagination; but one had but a rough picture and not a precise idea on which reasoning could take hold.
La valeur de la science. In Anton Bovier, Statistical Mechanics of Disordered Systems (2006), 97.
Science quotes on:  |  Idea (881)  |  Image (97)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Object (438)  |  Picture (148)  |  Precise (71)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Represent (157)  |  Sense (785)  |  Time (1911)

Quelquefois, par exemple, je me figure que je suis suspendu en l’air, et que j’y demeure sans mouvement, pendant que la Terre tourne sous moi en vingt-quatre heures. Je vois passer sous mes yeux tous ces visages différents, les uns blancs, les autres noirs, les autres basanés, les autres olivâtres. D’abord ce sont des chapeaux et puis des turbans, et puis des têtes chevelues, et puis des têtes rasées; tantôt des villes à clochers, tantôt des villes à longues aiguilles qui ont des croissants, tantôt des villes à tours de porcelaine, tantôt de grands pays qui n’ont que des cabanes; ici de vastes mers, là des déserts épouvantables; enfin, toute cette variété infinie qui est sur la surface de la Terre.
Sometimes, for instance, I imagine that I am suspended in the air, and remain there motionless, while the earth turns under me in four-and-twenty hours. I see pass beneath me all these different countenances, some white, others black, others tawny, others olive-colored. At first they wear hats, and then turbans, then heads with long hair, then heads shaven; sometimes towns with steeples, sometimes towns with long spires, which have crescents, sometimes towns with porcelain towers, sometimes extensive countries that have only huts; here wide seas; there frightful deserts; in short, all this infinite variety on the surface of the earth.
In 'Premier Soir', Entretiens Sur La Pluralité Des Mondes (1686, 1863), 43. French and translation in Craufurd Tait Ramage, Beautiful Thoughts from French and Italian Authors (1866), 117-118.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Beneath (68)  |  Black (46)  |  Color (155)  |  Countenance (9)  |  Country (269)  |  Crescent (4)  |  Desert (59)  |  Different (595)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Extensive (34)  |  Face (214)  |  Figure (162)  |  First (1302)  |  Hair (25)  |  Hat (9)  |  Hour (192)  |  Hut (2)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pass (241)  |  Porcelain (4)  |  Remain (355)  |  Sea (326)  |  See (1094)  |  Short (200)  |  Space Flight (26)  |  Spire (5)  |  Steeple (4)  |  Surface (223)  |  Surface Of The Earth (36)  |  Tawny (3)  |  Tower (45)  |  Turban (2)  |  Turn (454)  |  Variety (138)  |  White (132)  |  Wide (97)

Question: If you walk on a dry path between two walls a few feet apart, you hear a musical note or “ring” at each footstep. Whence comes this?
Answer: This is similar to phosphorescent paint. Once any sound gets between two parallel reflectors or walls, it bounds from one to the other and never stops for a long time. Hence it is persistent, and when you walk between the walls you hear the sounds made by those who walked there before you. By following a muffin man down the passage within a short time you can hear most distinctly a musical note, or, as it is more properly termed in the question, a “ring” at every (other) step.
Genuine student answer* to an Acoustics, Light and Heat paper (1880), Science and Art Department, South Kensington, London, collected by Prof. Oliver Lodge. Quoted in Henry B. Wheatley, Literary Blunders (1893), 175-6, Question 2. (*From a collection in which Answers are not given verbatim et literatim, and some instances may combine several students' blunders.)
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Before (8)  |  Bound (120)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Down (455)  |  Dry (65)  |  Examination (102)  |  Following (16)  |  Footstep (5)  |  Hear (144)  |  Howler (15)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Music (133)  |  Never (1089)  |  Note (39)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paint (22)  |  Parallel (46)  |  Passage (52)  |  Path (159)  |  Persistence (25)  |  Persistent (18)  |  Phosphorescent (3)  |  Question (649)  |  Reflector (4)  |  Short (200)  |  Similarity (32)  |  Sound (187)  |  Step (234)  |  Stop (89)  |  Term (357)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Walk (138)  |  Wall (71)

Theologus esse volebam: diu angebar: Deus ecce mea opera etiam in astronomia celebratur.
I wanted to become a theologian. For a long time I was restless. Now, however, behold how through my effort God is being celebrated in astronomy.
Letter to Michael Maestlin (3 Oct 1595). Johannes Kepler Gesammelte Werke (1937- ), Vol. 13, letter 23, l. 256-7, p. 40. As translated in Owen Gingerich, 'Johannes Kepler' article in Charles Coulston Gillespie (ed.) Dictionary of Scientific Biography (1973), Vol. 7, 291. Also seen translated as “I wanted to become a theologian; for a long time I was unhappy. Now, behold, God is praised by my work even in astronomy.”
Science quotes on:  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Effort (243)  |  God (776)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Theologian (23)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Want (504)

~~[Attributed]~~ I have had my results for a long time; but I do not yet know how I am to arrive at them.
Quoted, without primary source citation, in Agnes Arber, The Mind and the Eye: A Study of the Biologist’s Standpoint (1954, 1964), 47. Arber footnotes finding the quote also in Leonard Nelson and T.K. Brown (trans.), Socratic Method and Critical Philosophy (1949, 1965), 89; W.I.B. Beveridge, The Art of Scientific Investigation (1950, 1957), 149. Notably, Arber states being “unable to trace this dictum to its original source.” With benefit of Google, Webmaster also has, yet, no success, either. In German, guessed as, “Meine Lösungen habe ich schon lange, ich weiß nur noch nicht, wie ich zu ihnen gelangel!” Webmaster found the quote in a 1968 German book, and “Meine Resultate habe ich schon lange, ich weiß nur nicht, wie ich zu ihnen gelangen kann” (1958). All of these leave a century of apparent silence before them. Can you help?
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Know (1538)  |  Proof (304)  |  Result (700)  |  Time (1911)

~~[No known source]~~ Once you have flown, you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, there you long return.
Best attributed simply to “Anonymous” because there seems to be no known reliable primary source. Another example of a feral quote that is almost certainly not authentic, yet spreads virally like a lexicographic plague. It must be centuries old, but does not show up in major 19th-century quote collections. It is simply too good to be true. Included here to attach this caution.
Science quotes on:  |  Earth (1076)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fly (153)  |  Known (453)  |  Return (133)  |  Skyward (2)  |  Turn (454)  |  Walk (138)  |  Will (2350)

1066. … At that time, throughout all England, a portent such as men had never seen before was seen in the heavens. Some declared that the star was a comet, which some call “the long-haired star”: it first appeared on the eve of the festival of Letania Maior, that is on 24 April, and shone every night for a week.
In George Norman Garmonsway (ed., trans.), 'The Parker Chronicle', The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (1953), 195. This translation from the original Saxon, is a modern printing of an ancient anthology known as The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Manuscript copies were held at various English monasteries. These copies of the Chronicle include content first recorded in the late 9th century. The monasteries continued independently updating these annals. This quote comes from a copy once owned by Matthew Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury. Known as the Winchester (or Parker) Chronicle, it is the oldest surviving manuscript.
Science quotes on:  |  April (9)  |  Call (781)  |  Comet (65)  |  Declared (24)  |  England (43)  |  Eve (4)  |  Festival (2)  |  First (1302)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Never (1089)  |  Night (133)  |  Portent (2)  |  Shine (49)  |  Star (460)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Week (73)

1097 … Then at Michaelmas, on the 4th before the Nones of October, an uncommon star appeared shining in the evening, and soon going down: it was seen in the south-west, and the light which streamed from it seemed very long, shining towards the south-east; and it appeared after this manner nearly all the week. Many allowed that it was a comet.
From the The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as translated in The Venerable Bede's Ecclesiastical History of England. Also the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (1894), 474. The Chronicle is the work of many successive hands at several monasteries across England.
Science quotes on:  |  Comet (65)  |  Down (455)  |  Light (635)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Shining (35)  |  Soon (187)  |  South (39)  |  Star (460)  |  Stream (83)  |  Week (73)

1106. … In the first week of Lent, on the Friday, 16 February, a strange star appeared in the evening, and for a long time afterwards was seen shining for a while each evening. The star made its appearance in the south-west, and seemed to be small and dark, but the light that shone from it was very bright, and appeared like an enormous beam of light shining north-east; and one evening it seemed as if the beam were flashing in the opposite direction towards the star. Some said that they had seen other unknown stars about this time, but we cannot speak about these without reservation, because we did not ourselves see them.
In George Norman Garmonsway (ed., trans.), 'The Parker Chronicle', The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (1953), 240. This translation from the original Saxon, is a modern printing of an ancient anthology known as The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Manuscript copies were held at various English monasteries. These copies of the Chronicle include content first recorded in the late 9th century. This quote comes from the copy known as the Peterborough Chronicle (a.k.a. Laud manuscript).
Science quotes on:  |  Appearance (145)  |  Beam (26)  |  Bright (81)  |  Comet (65)  |  Dark (145)  |  Direction (185)  |  Enormous (44)  |  First (1302)  |  Flash (49)  |  Light (635)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  See (1094)  |  Shine (49)  |  Shining (35)  |  Small (489)  |  South (39)  |  Speak (240)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Strange (160)  |  Time (1911)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Week (73)

1839—The fermentation satire
THE MYSTERY OF ALCOHOLIC FERMENTATION RESOLVED
(Preliminary Report by Letter) Schwindler
I am about to develop a new theory of wine fermentation … Depending on the weight, these seeds carry fermentation to completion somewhat less than as in the beginning, which is understandable … I shall develop a new theory of wine fermentation [showing] what simple means Nature employs in creating the most amazing phenomena. I owe it to the use of an excellent microscope designed by Pistorius.
When brewer’s yeast is mixed with water the microscope reveals that the yeast dissolves into endless small balls, which are scarcely 1/800th of a line in diameter … If these small balls are placed in sugar water, it can be seen that they consist of the eggs of animals. As they expand, they burst, and from them develop small creatures that multiply with unbelievable rapidity in a most unheard of way. The form of these animals differs from all of the 600 types described up until now. They possess the shape of a Beinsdorff still (without the cooling apparatus). The head of the tube is a sort of proboscis, the inside of which is filled with fine bristles 1/2000th of a line long. Teeth and eyes are not discernible; however, a stomach, intestinal canal, anus (a rose red dot), and organs for secretion of urine are plainly discernible. From the moment they are released from the egg one can see these animals swallow the sugar from the solution and pass it to the stomach. It is digested immediately, a process recognized easily by the resultant evacuation of excrements. In a word, these infusors eat sugar, evacuate ethyl alcohol from the intestinal canal, and carbon dioxide from the urinary organs. The bladder, in the filled state, has the form of a champagne bottle; when empty, it is a small button … As soon as the animals find no more sugar present, they eat each other up, which occurs through a peculiar manipulation; everything is digested down to the eggs which pass unchanged through the intestinal canal. Finally, one again fermentable yeast, namely the seed of the animals, which remain over.
In 'Das entriithselle Geheimiss der geisligen Giihrung', Annalen der Pharmacie und Chemie (1839), 29, 100-104; adapted from English translalion by Ralph E. Oesper, The Human Side of Scientists (1975), 203-205.
Science quotes on:  |  Alcohol (22)  |  Amazing (35)  |  Animal (651)  |  Apparatus (70)  |  Ball (64)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Burst (41)  |  Canal (18)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Carbon Dioxide (25)  |  Carry (130)  |  Completion (23)  |  Consist (223)  |  Cooling (10)  |  Creature (242)  |  Design (203)  |  Develop (278)  |  Diameter (28)  |  Differ (88)  |  Discernible (9)  |  Dissolve (22)  |  Dot (18)  |  Down (455)  |  Eat (108)  |  Egg (71)  |  Employ (115)  |  Empty (82)  |  Endless (60)  |  Everything (489)  |  Expand (56)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fermentation (15)  |  Find (1014)  |  Form (976)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Letter (117)  |  Manipulation (19)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Microscope (85)  |  Moment (260)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Multiply (40)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Occur (151)  |  Organ (118)  |  Other (2233)  |  Owe (71)  |  Pass (241)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Possess (157)  |  Present (630)  |  Proboscis (2)  |  Process (439)  |  Rapidity (29)  |  Remain (355)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Rose (36)  |  Satire (4)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  See (1094)  |  Seed (97)  |  Simple (426)  |  Small (489)  |  Solution (282)  |  Soon (187)  |  State (505)  |  Still (614)  |  Stomach (40)  |  Structure (365)  |  Sugar (26)  |  Swallow (32)  |  Teeth (43)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Through (846)  |  Type (171)  |  Unbelievable (7)  |  Understandable (12)  |  Urine (18)  |  Use (771)  |  Water (503)  |  Way (1214)  |  Weight (140)  |  Wine (39)  |  Word (650)  |  Yeast (7)

A ... hypothesis may be suggested, which supposes the word 'beginning' as applied by Moses in the first of the Book of Genesis, to express an undefined period of time which was antecedent to the last great change that affected the surface of the earth, and to the creation of its present animal and vegetable inhabitants; during which period a long series of operations and revolutions may have been going on, which, as they are wholly unconnected with the history of the human race, are passed over in silence by the sacred historian, whose only concern with them was largely to state, that the matter of the universe is not eternal and self-existent but was originally created by the power of the Almighty.
Vindiciae Geologicae (1820), 31-2.
Science quotes on:  |  Almighty (23)  |  Animal (651)  |  Applied (176)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Book (413)  |  Change (639)  |  Concern (239)  |  Creation (350)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Express (192)  |  First (1302)  |   Genesis (26)  |  Geology (240)  |  Great (1610)  |  Historian (59)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Inhabitant (50)  |  Last (425)  |  Matter (821)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Pass (241)  |  Period (200)  |  Power (771)  |  Present (630)  |  Race (278)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Sacred (48)  |  Self (268)  |  Series (153)  |  Silence (62)  |  State (505)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Surface (223)  |  Surface Of The Earth (36)  |  Time (1911)  |  Unconnected (10)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vegetable (49)  |  Wholly (88)  |  Word (650)

A biologist, if he wishes to know how many toes a cat has, does not "frame the hypothesis that the number of feline digital extremities is 4, or 5, or 6," he simply looks at a cat and counts. A social scientist prefers the more long-winded expression every time, because it gives an entirely spurious impression of scientificness to what he is doing.
In Science is a Sacred Cow (1950), 151.
Science quotes on:  |  Biologist (70)  |  Cat (52)  |  Count (107)  |  Digital (10)  |  Doing (277)  |  Expression (181)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Impression (118)  |  Know (1538)  |  Look (584)  |  More (2558)  |  Number (710)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Social (261)  |  Social Science (37)  |  Spurious (3)  |  Time (1911)  |  Toe (8)  |  Wind (141)

A circumstance which influenced my whole career more than any other … was my friendship with Professor Henslow … a man who knew every branch of science…. During the latter half of my time at Cambridge [I] took long walks with him on most days; so that I was called by some of the dons “the man who walks with Henslow.”
In Charles Darwin and Francis Darwin (ed.), 'Autobiography', The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin (1887, 1896), Vol. 1, 44.
Science quotes on:  |  Biography (254)  |  Branch (155)  |  Call (781)  |  Career (86)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Friendship (18)  |  John Stevens Henslow (2)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Other (2233)  |  Professor (133)  |  Time (1911)  |  Walk (138)  |  Whole (756)

A good preparation takes longer than the delivery.
As quoted, without citation, in Howard W. Eves Return to Mathematical Circles, (1988), 160. [Note the E. Kim Nebeuts is probably a pen name since reversed it reads Mike Stueben —Webmaster]
Science quotes on:  |  Delivery (7)  |  Good (906)  |  Preparation (60)

A great part of its [higher arithmetic] theories derives an additional charm from the peculiarity that important propositions, with the impress of simplicity on them, are often easily discovered by induction, and yet are of so profound a character that we cannot find the demonstrations till after many vain attempts; and even then, when we do succeed, it is often by some tedious and artificial process, while the simple methods may long remain concealed.
Quoted in H. Eves, Mathematical Circles (1977) .
Science quotes on:  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Character (259)  |  Charm (54)  |  Concealed (25)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Derive (70)  |  Discover (571)  |  Do (1905)  |  Find (1014)  |  Great (1610)  |  Impress (66)  |  Induction (81)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Method (531)  |  Peculiarity (26)  |  Process (439)  |  Profound (105)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Remain (355)  |  Simple (426)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Success (327)  |  Tedious (15)  |  Vain (86)

A man avails himself of the truth so long as it is serviceable; but he seizes on what is false with a passionate eloquence as soon as he can make a momentary use of it; whether it be to dazzle others with it as a kind of half-truth, or to employ it as a stopgap for effecting all apparent union between things that have been disjointed.
In The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe (1906), 193.
Science quotes on:  |  Apparent (85)  |  Avail (4)  |  Dazzle (4)  |  Disjointed (2)  |  Effect (414)  |  Eloquence (7)  |  Employ (115)  |  False (105)  |  Himself (461)  |  Kind (564)  |  Man (2252)  |  Momentary (5)  |  Other (2233)  |  Passionate (22)  |  Seize (18)  |  Serviceable (2)  |  Soon (187)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Union (52)  |  Use (771)

A man has a very insecure tenure of a property which another can carry away with his eyes. A few months reduced me to the cruel necessity either of destroying my machine, or of giving it to the public. To destroy it, I could not think of; to give up that for which I had laboured so long, was cruel. I had no patent, nor the means of purchasing one. In preference to destroying, I gave it to the public.
[On his inability to keep for himself a profitable income from his invention of the Spinning Mule.]
As quoted in James Mason, The Great Triumphs of Great Men (1875), 579.
Science quotes on:  |  Carry (130)  |  Cruel (25)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Eye (440)  |  Eyes (2)  |  Give (208)  |  Himself (461)  |  Inability (11)  |  Income (18)  |  Insecure (5)  |  Invention (400)  |  Labor (200)  |  Machine (271)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Month (91)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Patent (34)  |  Preference (28)  |  Profitable (29)  |  Property (177)  |  Public (100)  |  Spinning (18)  |  Spinning Mule (2)  |  Tenure (8)  |  Think (1122)

A man who is all theory is like “a rudderless ship on a shoreless sea.” … Theories and speculations may be indulged in with safety only as long as they are based on facts that we can go back to at all times and know that we are on solid ground.
In Nature's Miracles: Familiar Talks on Science (1899), Vol. 1, Introduction, vii.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Base (120)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Ground (222)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Man (2252)  |  Rudder (4)  |  Safety (58)  |  Sea (326)  |  Ship (69)  |  Shore (25)  |  Solid (119)  |  Speculation (137)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)

A man who keeps company with glaciers comes to feel tolerably insignificiant by and by. The Alps and the glaciers together are able to take every bit of conceit out of a man and reduce his self-importance to zero if he will only remain within the influence of their sublime presence long enough to give it a fair and reasonable chance to do its work.
In A Tramp Abroad (1880), 466.
Science quotes on:  |  Alp (9)  |  Alps (9)  |  Chance (244)  |  Company (63)  |  Conceit (15)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enough (341)  |  Fair (16)  |  Feel (371)  |  Glacier (17)  |  Importance (299)  |  Influence (231)  |  Insignificance (12)  |  Keeping (9)  |  Man (2252)  |  Presence (63)  |  Reasonable (29)  |  Reduce (100)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remaining (45)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Importance (3)  |  Sublime (50)  |  Taking (9)  |  Together (392)  |  Toleration (7)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)  |  Zero (38)

A man, in his books, may be said to walk the earth a long time after he is gone.
John Muir
Quoted, without citation, in John Muir and Edwin Way Teale (ed.) The Wilderness World of John Muir (1954, 2001), Introduction, xx.
Science quotes on:  |  Book (413)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Man (2252)  |  Time (1911)  |  Walk (138)

A mind is accustomed to mathematical deduction, when confronted with the faulty foundations of astrology, resists a long, long time, like an obstinate mule, until compelled by beating and curses to put its foot into that dirty puddle.
As quoted in Arthur Koestler, The Sleep Walkers: A History of Man’s Changing Vision of the Universe (1959), 243, citing De Stella Nova in Pede Serpentarii (1606).
Science quotes on:  |  Accustom (52)  |  Accustomed (46)  |  Astrology (46)  |  Beat (42)  |  Compel (31)  |  Confront (18)  |  Curse (20)  |  Deduction (90)  |  Dirt (17)  |  Dirty (17)  |  Faulty (3)  |  Foot (65)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mule (2)  |  Obstinate (5)  |  Resist (15)  |  Time (1911)

A noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing insistency. Remember that our sons and our grandsons are going to do things that would stagger us.
(1907) As quoted in 'Closing In', Charles Moore, Daniel H. Burnham, Architect, Planner of Cities (1921), Vol. 2, 147.
Science quotes on:  |  Amaze (5)  |  Diagram (20)  |  Do (1905)  |  Future (467)  |  Growing (99)  |  Live (650)  |  Living (492)  |  Logical (57)  |  Never (1089)  |  Noble (93)  |  Record (161)  |  Recorded (2)  |  Remember (189)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Will (2350)

A people that were to honor falsehood, defamation, fraud, and murder would be unable, indeed, to subsist for very long.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Defamation (2)  |  Falsehood (30)  |  Fraud (15)  |  Honor (57)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Murder (16)  |  People (1031)  |  Subsist (5)  |  Unable (25)

A principle of induction would be a statement with the help of which we could put inductive inferences into a logically acceptable form. In the eyes of the upholders of inductive logic, a principle of induction is of supreme importance for scientific method: “... this principle”, says Reichenbach, “determines the truth of scientific theories. To eliminate it from science would mean nothing less than to deprive science of the power to decide the truth or falsity of its theories. Without it, clearly, science would no longer have the right to distinguish its theories from the fanciful and arbitrary creations of the poet’s mind.” Now this principle of induction cannot be a purely logical truth like a tautology or an analytic statement. Indeed, if there were such a thing as a purely logical principle of induction, there would be no problem of induction; for in this case, all inductive inferences would have to be regarded as purely logical or tautological transformations, just like inferences in inductive logic. Thus the principle of induction must be a synthetic statement; that is, a statement whose negation is not self-contradictory but logically possible. So the question arises why such a principle should be accepted at all, and how we can justify its acceptance on rational grounds.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Acceptable (14)  |  Acceptance (56)  |  Analytic (11)  |  Arbitrary (27)  |  Arise (162)  |  Case (102)  |  Clearly (45)  |  Creation (350)  |  Decide (50)  |  Deprive (14)  |  Determine (152)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Eliminate (25)  |  Eye (440)  |  Falsity (16)  |  Fanciful (6)  |  Form (976)  |  Ground (222)  |  Help (116)  |  Importance (299)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Induction (81)  |  Inductive (20)  |  Inference (45)  |  Justify (26)  |  Less (105)  |  Logic (311)  |  Logical (57)  |  Mean (810)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Must (1525)  |  Negation (2)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Poet (97)  |  Possible (560)  |  Power (771)  |  Principle (530)  |  Problem (731)  |  Purely (111)  |  Question (649)  |  Rational (95)  |  Regard (312)  |  Right (473)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Scientific Theory (24)  |  Self (268)  |  Statement (148)  |  Supreme (73)  |  Synthetic (27)  |  Tautological (2)  |  Tautology (4)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Transformation (72)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Why (491)

A strange feeling of complete, almost solemn contentment suddenly overcame me when the descent module landed, rocked, and stilled. The weather was foul, but I smelled Earth, unspeakably sweet and intoxicating. And wind. Now utterly delightful; wind after long days in space.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Complete (209)  |  Contentment (11)  |  Delightful (18)  |  Descent (30)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Foul (15)  |  Intoxicating (2)  |  Land (131)  |  Module (3)  |  Overcome (40)  |  Rock (176)  |  Smell (29)  |  Solemn (20)  |  Space (523)  |  Still (614)  |  Strange (160)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Sweet (40)  |  Unspeakably (3)  |  Utterly (15)  |  Weather (49)  |  Wind (141)

A system such as classical mechanics may be ‘scientific’ to any degree you like; but those who uphold it dogmatically — believing, perhaps, that it is their business to defend such a successful system against criticism as long as it is not conclusively disproved — are adopting the very reverse of that critical attitude which in my view is the proper one for the scientist.
In The Logic of Scientific Discovery (1959, reprint 2002), 28.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Business (156)  |  Classical (49)  |  Critical (73)  |  Criticism (85)  |  Degree (277)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Proof (304)  |  Proper (150)  |  Reverse (33)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Successful (134)  |  System (545)  |  View (496)

Accordingly the primordial state of things which I picture is an even distribution of protons and electrons, extremely diffuse and filling all (spherical) space, remaining nearly balanced for an exceedingly long time until its inherent instability prevails. We shall see later that the density of this distribution can be calculated; it was about one proton and electron per litre. There is no hurry for anything to begin to happen. But at last small irregular tendencies accumulate, and evolution gets under way. The first stage is the formation of condensations ultimately to become the galaxies; this, as we have seen, started off an expansion, which then automatically increased in speed until it is now manifested to us in the recession of the spiral nebulae.
As the matter drew closer together in the condensations, the various evolutionary processes followed—evolution of stars, evolution of the more complex elements, evolution of planets and life.
The Expanding Universe (1933), 56-57.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Begin (275)  |  Closer (43)  |  Complex (202)  |  Condensation (12)  |  Density (25)  |  Distribution (51)  |  Electron (96)  |  Element (322)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Exceedingly (28)  |  Expansion (43)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Formation (100)  |  Galaxies (29)  |  Happen (282)  |  Hurry (16)  |  Inherent (43)  |  Last (425)  |  Life (1870)  |  Matter (821)  |  More (2558)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Picture (148)  |  Planet (402)  |  Prevail (47)  |  Proton (23)  |  Remaining (45)  |  See (1094)  |  Small (489)  |  Space (523)  |  Speed (66)  |  Spiral (19)  |  Stage (152)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Start (237)  |  State (505)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Ultimately (56)  |  Various (205)  |  Way (1214)

Accurate and minute measurement seems to the non-scientific imagination, a less lofty and dignified work than looking for something new. But nearly all the grandest discoveries of science have been but the rewards of accurate measurement and patient long-continued labour in the minute sifting of numerical results.
Presidential inaugural address, to the General Meeting of the British Association, Edinburgh (2 Aug 1871). In Report of the Forty-First Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (1872), xci.
Science quotes on:  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Accurate (88)  |  Dignified (13)  |  Dignity (44)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Grandest (10)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Labor (200)  |  Lofty (16)  |  Looking (191)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Minute (129)  |  Minuteness (8)  |  Nearly (137)  |  New (1273)  |  Non-Scientific (7)  |  Number (710)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Patience (58)  |  Patient (209)  |  Result (700)  |  Reward (72)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Something (718)  |  Work (1402)

Advertising may be described as the science of arresting the human intelligence long enough to get money from it.
In The Garden of Folly (1924), 123.
Science quotes on:  |  Advertising (9)  |  Arrest (9)  |  Enough (341)  |  Human (1512)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Money (178)

After long reflection in solitude and meditation, I suddenly had the idea, during the year 1923, that the discovery made by Einstein in 1905 should be generalised by extending it to all material particles and notably to electrons.
Preface to his re-edited 1924 Ph.D. Thesis, Recherches sur la théorie des quanta (1963), 4. In Steve Adams, Frontiers (2000), 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Discovery (837)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  Electron (96)  |  Idea (881)  |  Material (366)  |  Meditation (19)  |  Particle (200)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Solitude (20)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Wave (112)  |  Year (963)

After the planet becomes theirs, many millions of years will have to pass before a beetle particularly loved by God, at the end of its calculations will find written on a sheet of paper in letters of fire that energy is equal to the mass multiplied by the square of the velocity of light. The new kings of the world will live tranquilly for a long time, confining themselves to devouring each other and being parasites among each other on a cottage industry scale.
'Beetles' Other People’s Trades (1985, trans. 1989).
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Beetle (19)  |  Being (1276)  |  Calculation (134)  |  End (603)  |  Energy (373)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fire (203)  |  God (776)  |  Industry (159)  |  Insect (89)  |  Letter (117)  |  Light (635)  |  Live (650)  |  Mass (160)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paper (192)  |  Parasite (33)  |  Pass (241)  |  Planet (402)  |  Scale (122)  |  Square (73)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Velocity (51)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

All admit that the mountains of the globe are situated mostly along the border regions of the continents (taking these regions as 300 to 1000 miles or more in width), and that over these same areas the sedimentary deposits have, as a general thing, their greatest thickness. At first thought, it would seem almost incredible that the upliftings of mountains, whatever their mode of origin, should have taken place just where the earth’s crust, through these sedimentary accumulations, was the thickest, and where, therefore, there was the greatest weight to be lifted. … Earthquakes show that even now, in this last of the geological ages, the same border regions of the continents, although daily thickening from the sediments borne to the ocean by rivers, are the areas of the greatest and most frequent movements of the earth’s crust. (1866)
[Thus, the facts were known long ago; the explanation by tectonic activity came many decades later.]
In 'Observations on the Origin of Some of the Earth’s Features', The American Journal of Science (Sep 1866), Second Series, 42, No. 125, 210-211.
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulation (51)  |  Activity (218)  |  Age (509)  |  Border (10)  |  Continent (79)  |  Crust (43)  |  Daily (91)  |  Decade (66)  |  Deposit (12)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Earthquake (37)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  First (1302)  |  General (521)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Incredible (43)  |  Known (453)  |  Last (425)  |  Lift (57)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Movement (162)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Origin (250)  |  Plate Tectonics (22)  |  River (140)  |  Sediment (9)  |  Show (353)  |  Thickness (5)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Uplift (6)  |  Weight (140)  |  Whatever (234)

All the old constellations had gone from the sky, however: that slow movement which is imperceptible in a hundred human lifetimes, had long since rearranged them in unfamiliar groupings. But the Milky Way, it seemed to me, was still the same tattered streamer of star-dust as of yore.
In The Time Machine (1898), 144.
Science quotes on:  |  Constellation (18)  |  Dust (68)  |  Grouping (2)  |  Human (1512)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Imperceptible (8)  |  Milky Way (29)  |  Movement (162)  |  Old (499)  |  Rearrange (5)  |  Same (166)  |  Seemed (3)  |  Sky (174)  |  Slow (108)  |  Star (460)  |  Still (614)  |  Tattered (2)  |  Unfamiliar (17)  |  Way (1214)

All the summer long is the swallow a most instructive pattern of unwearied industry and affection; for, from morning to night, while there is a family to be supported, she spends the whole day in skimming close to the ground, and exerting the most sudden turns and quick evolutions. Avenues, and long walks under hedges, and pasture-fields, and mown meadows where cattle graze, are her delight, especially if there are trees interspersed; because in such spots insects most abound. When a fly is taken a smart snap from her bill is heard, resembling the noise at the shutting of a watch case; but the motion of the mandibles are too quick for the eye.
In Letter to Daines Barrington (29 Jan 1774), in In The Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne (1789), 169-170.
Science quotes on:  |  Abound (17)  |  Affection (44)  |  Avenue (14)  |  Cattle (18)  |  Delight (111)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Eye (440)  |  Family (101)  |  Field (378)  |  Fly (153)  |  Flying (74)  |  Ground (222)  |  Industry (159)  |  Insect (89)  |  Meadow (21)  |  Morning (98)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motion (320)  |  Noise (40)  |  Pasture (15)  |  Pattern (116)  |  Smart (33)  |  Snap (7)  |  Spend (97)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Summer (56)  |  Support (151)  |  Swallow (32)  |  Tree (269)  |  Turn (454)  |  Walk (138)  |  Watch (118)  |  Whole (756)

All things on the earth are the result of chemical combination. The operation by which the commingling of molecules and the interchange of atoms take place we can imitate in our laboratories; but in nature they proceed by slow degrees, and, in general, in our hands they are distinguished by suddenness of action. In nature chemical power is distributed over a long period of time, and the process of change is scarcely to be observed. By acts we concentrate chemical force, and expend it in producing a change which occupies but a few hours at most.
In chapter 'Chemical Forces', The Poetry of Science: Or, Studies of the Physical Phenomena of Nature (1848), 235-236. Charles Dicken used this quote, with his own sub-head of 'Relative Importance Of Time To Man And Nature', to conclude his review of the book, published in The Examiner (1848).
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Action (342)  |  Atom (381)  |  Change (639)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Combination (150)  |  Concentrate (28)  |  Concentration (29)  |  Degree (277)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Distinguishing (14)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Force (497)  |  General (521)  |  Hour (192)  |  Imitate (18)  |  Interchange (4)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Observed (149)  |  Operation (221)  |  Period (200)  |  Place (192)  |  Power (771)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Proceeding (38)  |  Process (439)  |  Producing (6)  |  Result (700)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Slow (108)  |  Suddenness (6)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)

An evolutionary perspective of our place in the history of the earth reminds us that Homo sapiens sapiens has occupied the planet for the tiniest fraction of that planet's four and a half thousand million years of existence. In many ways we are a biological accident, the product of countless propitious circumstances. As we peer back through the fossil record, through layer upon layer of long-extinct species, many of which thrived far longer than the human species is ever likely to do, we are reminded of our mortality as a species. There is no law that declares the human animal to be different, as seen in this broad biological perspective, from any other animal. There is no law that declares the human species to be immortal.
Co-author with American science writer Roger Amos Lewin (1946), Origins: What New Discoveries Reveal about the Emergence of our Species and its Possible Future (1977), 256.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Animal (651)  |  Back (395)  |  Biological (137)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Countless (39)  |  Declare (48)  |  Different (595)  |  Do (1905)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Existence (481)  |  Extinct (25)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Fossil Record (12)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Earth (2)  |  Homo Sapiens (23)  |  Human (1512)  |  Immortal (35)  |  Law (913)  |  Layer (41)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perspective (28)  |  Planet (402)  |  Product (166)  |  Record (161)  |  Species (435)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Through (846)  |  Way (1214)  |  Year (963)

An honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that in some sense, the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to have been satisfied to get it going. But this should not be taken to imply that there are good reasons to believe that it could not have started on the earth by a perfectly reasonable sequence of fairly ordinary chemical reactions. The plain fact is that the time available was too long, the many microenvironments on the earth’s surface too diverse, the various chemical possibilities too numerous and our own knowledge and imagination too feeble to allow us to be able to unravel exactly how it might or might not have happened such a long time ago, especially as we have no experimental evidence from that era to check our ideas against.
In Life Itself: Its Origin and Nature (1981), 88.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Arm (82)  |  Available (80)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemical Reaction (17)  |  Chemical Reactions (13)  |  Condition (362)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Era (51)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Good (906)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Honest (53)  |  Idea (881)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Miracle (85)  |  Moment (260)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Origin (250)  |  Origin Of Life (37)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Reason (766)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sequence (68)  |  Start (237)  |  State (505)  |  Surface (223)  |  Time (1911)  |  Unravel (16)  |  Various (205)

And as long as industrial systems have bowels
The boss should reside in the nest that he fouls.
Economists argue that all the world lacks is
A suitable system of effluent taxes.
In Kenneth Ewart Boulding and Richard P. Beilock (Ed.), Illustrating Economics: Beasts, Ballads and Aphorisms (1980, 2009), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Argue (25)  |  Boss (4)  |  Bowel (17)  |  Economist (20)  |  Effluent (2)  |  Foul (15)  |  Industry (159)  |  Lack (127)  |  Nest (26)  |  Reside (25)  |  Suitable (10)  |  System (545)  |  Tax (27)  |  World (1850)

And don’t confound the language of the nation
With long-tailed words in osity and ation.
From The Monks and the Giants (1817), canto I, verse VI, line 7-8. Collected in William and Robert Whistlecraft (pseudonyms), The Monks and the Giants: Prospectus and Specimen of an Intended National Work (1821), 4.
Science quotes on:  |  Confound (21)  |  Language (308)  |  Nation (208)  |  Word (650)

And I do not take my medicines from the apothecaries; their shops are but foul sculleries, from which comes nothing but foul broths. As for you, you defend your kingdom with belly-crawling and flattery. How long do you think this will last? ... let me tell you this: every little hair on my neck knows more than you and all your scribes, and my shoebuckles are more learned than your Galen and Avicenna, and my beard has more experience than all your high colleges.
'Credo', in J. Jacobi (ed.), Paracelsus: Selected Writings (1951), 80.
Science quotes on:  |  Apothecary (10)  |  Avicenna (19)  |  Beard (8)  |  Broth (2)  |  College (71)  |  Defense (26)  |  Do (1905)  |  Experience (494)  |  Flattery (7)  |  Foul (15)  |  Galen (20)  |  Hair (25)  |  High (370)  |  Kingdom (80)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Last (425)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Learning (291)  |  Little (717)  |  Medicine (392)  |  More (2558)  |  Neck (15)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Scribe (3)  |  Shop (11)  |  Tell (344)  |  Think (1122)  |  Will (2350)

Another advantage of observation is, that we may gain knowledge all the day long, and every moment of our lives, and every moment of our existence, we may be adding to our intellectual treasures thereby.
In Interesting Anecdotes, Memoirs, Allegories, Essays, and Poetical Fragments (1793), Vols 3-4, Vol 4, 73.
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (144)  |  Existence (481)  |  Gain (146)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Live (650)  |  Moment (260)  |  Observation (593)  |  Treasure (59)

Any customer can have a car painted any color that he wants so long as it is black.
Remark made while announcing (1909) that production was being switched to only one model, the Model T. As quoted in Henry Ford and Samuel Crowther, My Life and Work (1922), 71. Often seen as a shorter paraphrase, such as “You can have any color as long as it's black.”
Science quotes on:  |  Black (46)  |  Car (75)  |  Color (155)  |  Customer (8)  |  Want (504)

Any fool can destroy trees. They cannot run away; and if they could, they would still be destroyed,—chased and hunted down as long as fun or a dollar could be got out of their bark hides, branching horns, or magnificent bole backbones. Few that fell trees plant them; nor would planting avail much towards getting back anything like the noble primeval forests. During a man’s life only saplings can be grown, in the place of the old trees—tens of centuries old—that have been destroyed.
John Muir
In 'The American Forests', Atlantic Monthly (Aug 1897), Vol. 80, 157.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Backbone (12)  |  Bark (19)  |  Branch (155)  |  Branching (10)  |  Chase (14)  |  Clear-Cut (10)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Deforestation (50)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Dollar (22)  |  Down (455)  |  Environment (239)  |  Fell (2)  |  Fool (121)  |  Forest (161)  |  Fun (42)  |  Hide (70)  |  Horn (18)  |  Hunt (32)  |  Life (1870)  |  Magnificence (14)  |  Magnificent (46)  |  Man (2252)  |  Noble (93)  |  Old (499)  |  Plant (320)  |  Primeval (15)  |  Run (158)  |  Still (614)  |  Tree (269)

Around here, however, we don't look backwards for very long. We keep moving forward, opening up new doors, and doing new things, because we're curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.
In Juz Griffiths, Disneyland Paris - The Family Guide (2007), opening page.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Backwards (18)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Curious (95)  |  Doing (277)  |  Door (94)  |  Down (455)  |  Forward (104)  |  Innovation (49)  |  Look (584)  |  New (1273)  |  Path (159)  |  Progress (492)  |  Thing (1914)

As a nation, we are too young to have true mythic heroes, and we must press real human beings into service. Honest Abe Lincoln the legend is quite a different character from Abraham Lincoln the man. And so should they be. And so should both be treasured, as long as they are distinguished. In a complex and confusing world, the perfect clarity of sports provides a focus for legitimate, utterly unambiguous support or disdain. The Dodgers are evil, the Yankees good. They really are, and have been for as long as anyone in my family can remember.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Anyone (38)  |  Being (1276)  |  Both (496)  |  Character (259)  |  Clarity (49)  |  Complex (202)  |  Confuse (22)  |  Different (595)  |  Disdain (10)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Evil (122)  |  Family (101)  |  Focus (36)  |  Good (906)  |  Hero (45)  |  Honest (53)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Legend (18)  |  Legitimate (26)  |  Abraham Lincoln (13)  |  Man (2252)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nation (208)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Press (21)  |  Provide (79)  |  Real (159)  |  Really (77)  |  Remember (189)  |  Service (110)  |  Sport (23)  |  Support (151)  |  Treasure (59)  |  True (239)  |  Unambiguous (6)  |  Utterly (15)  |  World (1850)  |  Yankee (2)  |  Young (253)

As agonizing a disease as cancer is, I do not think it can be said that our civilization is threatened by it. … But a very plausible case can be made that our civilization is fundamentally threatened by the lack of adequate fertility control. Exponential increases of population will dominate any arithmetic increases, even those brought about by heroic technological initiatives, in the availability of food and resources, as Malthus long ago realized.
From 'In Praise of Science and Technology', in Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science (1975, 2011), 43.
Science quotes on:  |  Adequate (50)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Availability (10)  |  Cancer (61)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Control (182)  |  Disease (340)  |  Do (1905)  |  Domination (12)  |  Exponential (3)  |  Fertility (23)  |  Food (213)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Heroic (4)  |  Increase (225)  |  Initiative (17)  |  Lack (127)  |  Thomas Robert Malthus (13)  |  Plausible (24)  |  Population (115)  |  Realization (44)  |  Resource (74)  |  Technological (62)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Threat (36)  |  Threaten (33)  |  Will (2350)

As Herschel ruminated long ago, particles moving in mutual gravitational interaction are, as we human investigators see it forever solving differential equations which, if written out in full, might circle the earth.
In Forbidden Knowledge: And Other Essays on the Philosophy of Cognition (2012), 55.John Herschel. Rescher was not quoting, but restating from John Herschel, 'On Atoms', Familiar Lectures on Scientific Subjects (1867, 1872), 458. (Previously published in Fortnightly Review)
Science quotes on:  |  Circle (117)  |  Differential Equation (18)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Equation (138)  |  Forever (111)  |  Gravitation (72)  |  Sir John Herschel (24)  |  Human (1512)  |  Interaction (47)  |  Investigator (71)  |  Mutual (54)  |  Particle (200)  |  See (1094)  |  Solve (145)

As in the experimental sciences, truth cannot be distinguished from error as long as firm principles have not been established through the rigorous observation of facts.
Ésur la maladie des vers ásoie (1870), 39.
Science quotes on:  |  Distinction (72)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Error (339)  |  Establish (63)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Firm (47)  |  Observation (593)  |  Principle (530)  |  Rigorous (50)  |  Rigour (21)  |  Through (846)  |  Truth (1109)

As long as a branch of science offers an abundance of problems, so long it is alive; a lack of problems foreshadows extinction or the cessation of independent development.
In 'Mathematical Problems', Bulletin American Mathematical Society, 8, 438.
Science quotes on:  |  Abundance (26)  |  Alive (97)  |  Branch (155)  |  Cessation (13)  |  Development (441)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Foreshadow (5)  |  Independent (74)  |  Lack (127)  |  Offer (142)  |  Problem (731)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)

As long as Algebra and Geometry have been separated, their progress has been slow and their usages limited; but when these two sciences were reunited, they lent each other mutual strength and walked together with a rapid step towards perfection.
From the original French, “Tant que l’Algèbre et la Géométrie ont été séparées, leur progrès ont été lents et leurs usages bornés; mais lorsque ces deux sciences se sont réunies, elles se sont prêté des forces mutuelles et ont marché ensemble d’un pas rapide vers la perfection,” in Leçons Élémentaires sur la Mathematiques, Leçon 5, as collected in J.A. Serret (ed.), Œuvres de Lagrange (1877), Tome 7, Leçon 15, 271. English translation above by Google translate, tweeked by Webmaster. Also seen translated as, “As long as algebra and geometry proceeded along separate paths, their advance was slow and their applications limited. But when these sciences joined company, they drew from each other fresh vitality and thenceforward marched on at a rapid pace toward perfection,” in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-Book (1914), 81.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Algebra (117)  |  Application (257)  |  Company (63)  |  Fresh (69)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Join (32)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  March (48)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pace (18)  |  Path (159)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Rapid (37)  |  Separate (151)  |  Slow (108)  |  Teaching of Mathematics (39)  |  Vitality (24)

As long as an individual mollusk remains unregistered it is deprived of its full usefulness; but even then it may reveal an important fact—as the trilobite speaks of the Palaeozoic period, and a nummulite of the Tertiary.
In 'A Brief Account of the Thesaurus Siluricus with a Few Facts and Inferences', Proceedings op the Royal Society (1867), No. 90, 373.
Science quotes on:  |  Deprive (14)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Important (229)  |  Individual (420)  |  Mollusk (6)  |  Paleontology (32)  |  Period (200)  |  Register (22)  |  Remain (355)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Speak (240)  |  Tertiary (4)  |  Trilobite (6)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)

As long as museums and universities send out expeditions to bring to light new forms of living and extinct animals and new data illustrating the interrelations of organisms and their environments, as long as anatomists desire a broad comparative basis human for anatomy, as long as even a few students feel a strong curiosity to learn about the course of evolution and relationships of animals, the old problems of taxonomy, phylogeny and evolution will gradually reassert themselves even in competition with brilliant and highly fruitful laboratory studies in cytology, genetics and physiological chemistry.
'Genetics Versus Paleontology', The American Naturalist, 1917, 51, 623.
Science quotes on:  |  Anatomist (24)  |  Anatomy (75)  |  Animal (651)  |  Basis (180)  |  Brilliant (57)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Competition (45)  |  Course (413)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Cytology (7)  |  Data (162)  |  Desire (212)  |  Environment (239)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Expedition (9)  |  Extinct (25)  |  Feel (371)  |  Form (976)  |  Fruitful (61)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genetics (105)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Human (1512)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Learn (672)  |  Light (635)  |  Living (492)  |  Museum (40)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)  |  Organism (231)  |  Paleontologist (19)  |  Phylogeny (10)  |  Physiological (64)  |  Problem (731)  |  Relationship (114)  |  Strong (182)  |  Student (317)  |  Taxonomy (19)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Will (2350)

As long as our brain is a mystery, the universe, the reflection of the structure of the brain will also be a mystery.
In Charlas de Café: pensamientos, anécdotas y confidencias (1920,1967), 276. (Café Chats: Thoughts, Anecdotes and Confidences). As translated in Roger Carpenter and Benjamin Redd, Neurophysiology: A Conceptual Approach (2012), 5th ed., 16. From the original Spanish, “Mientras nuestro cerebro sea un arcano, el universo reflejo de su estructura también será un misterio.”
Science quotes on:  |  Brain (281)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Structure (365)  |  Universe (900)  |  Will (2350)

As long as vitalism and spiritualism are open questions so long will the gateway of science be open to mysticism.
Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine (1928), 4, 994.
Science quotes on:  |  Gateway (6)  |  Mysticism (14)  |  Open (277)  |  Question (649)  |  Spiritualism (3)  |  Vitalism (5)  |  Will (2350)

As the world has seen its age of stone, its age of bronze, and its age of iron, so it may before long have embarked on a new and even more prosperous era—the age of aluminium.
Concluding remark in uncredited 'Topics of the Day' article, 'The Future of Aluminium', The Spectator (15 Jul 1893), 77.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Aluminum (15)  |  Bronze (5)  |  Bronze Age (2)  |  Era (51)  |  Iron (99)  |  Iron Age (3)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1273)  |  Prosperity (31)  |  Stone (168)  |  Stone Age (14)  |  World (1850)

At a distance in the meadow I hear still, at long intervals, the hurried commencement of the bobolink s strain, the bird just dashing into song, which is as suddenly checked, as it were, by the warder of the seasons, and the strain is left incomplete forever. Like human beings they are inspired to sing only for a short season.
(29 Jun 1851). In Henry David Thoreau and Bradford Torrey (ed.), The Writings of Henry Thoreau: Journal: II: 1850-September 15, 1851 (1906), 275.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Bird (163)  |  Commencement (14)  |  Distance (171)  |  Forever (111)  |  Hear (144)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Incomplete (31)  |  Inspire (58)  |  Meadow (21)  |  Ornithology (21)  |  Season (47)  |  Short (200)  |  Sing (29)  |  Song (41)  |  Still (614)  |  Strain (13)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Warder (2)

At the bottom of every leaf-stem is a cradle, and in it is an infant germ; the winds will rock it, the birds will sing to it all summer long, but the next season it will unfold and go alone.
In Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit (1887), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Bird (163)  |  Cradle (19)  |  Germ (54)  |  Infant (26)  |  Leaf (73)  |  Next (238)  |  Rock (176)  |  Rocking (2)  |  Season (47)  |  Song (41)  |  Stem (31)  |  Summer (56)  |  Unfolding (16)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wind (141)

At the entrance to the observatory Stjerneborg located underground, Tycho Brahe built a Ionic portal. On top of this were three sculptured lions. On both sides were inscriptions and on the backside was a longer inscription in gold letters on a porfyr stone: Consecrated to the all-good, great God and Posterity. Tycho Brahe, Son of Otto, who realized that Astronomy, the oldest and most distinguished of all sciences, had indeed been studied for a long time and to a great extent, but still had not obtained sufficient firmness or had been purified of errors, in order to reform it and raise it to perfection, invented and with incredible labour, industry, and expenditure constructed various exact instruments suitable for all kinds of observations of the celestial bodies, and placed them partly in the neighbouring castle of Uraniborg, which was built for the same purpose, partly in these subterranean rooms for a more constant and useful application, and recommending, hallowing, and consecrating this very rare and costly treasure to you, you glorious Posterity, who will live for ever and ever, he, who has both begun and finished everything on this island, after erecting this monument, beseeches and adjures you that in honour of the eternal God, creator of the wonderful clockwork of the heavens, and for the propagation of the divine science and for the celebrity of the fatherland, you will constantly preserve it and not let it decay with old age or any other injury or be removed to any other place or in any way be molested, if for no other reason, at any rate out of reverence to the creator’s eye, which watches over the universe. Greetings to you who read this and act accordingly. Farewell!
(Translated from the original in Latin)
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Age (509)  |  Application (257)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Both (496)  |  Celestial (53)  |  Constant (148)  |  Construct (129)  |  Creator (97)  |  Decay (59)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Divine (112)  |  Entrance (16)  |  Error (339)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Everything (489)  |  Expenditure (16)  |  Extent (142)  |  Eye (440)  |  Finish (62)  |  Glorious (49)  |  God (776)  |  Gold (101)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greeting (10)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Honour (58)  |  Incredible (43)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Industry (159)  |  Injury (36)  |  Inscription (12)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Island (49)  |  Kind (564)  |  Labor (200)  |  Letter (117)  |  Lion (23)  |  Live (650)  |  Monument (45)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observatory (18)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Old (499)  |  Old Age (35)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Portal (9)  |  Posterity (29)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Propagation (15)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Rare (94)  |  Read (308)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reform (22)  |  Research (753)  |  Side (236)  |  Still (614)  |  Stone (168)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Time (1911)  |  Top (100)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Underground (12)  |  Universe (900)  |  Useful (260)  |  Various (205)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wonderful (155)

At the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory, we have long had a tradition of close cooperation between physicists and technicians.
From Nobel Lecture (11 Dec 1968). Collected in Yong Zhou (ed.), Nobel Lecture: Physics, 1963-1970 (2013), 250.
Science quotes on:  |  Close (77)  |  Cooperation (38)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (2)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Radiation (48)  |  Technician (9)  |  Tradition (76)

AZT stood up and said, 'Stop your pessimism. Stop your sense of futility. Go back to the lab. Go back to development. Go back to clinical trials. Things will work.'
[On the impact of AZT emerging as the long-sought first significant AIDS drug.]
As quoted in Emily Langer, 'Researcher Jerome P. Horwitz, 93, created AZT, the first approved treatment for HIV/AIDS' Washington Post (19 Sep 2012). The article was excerpted on blogs, sometimes referring to this quote by saying "AZT was more a cure for fatalism than for AIDS."
Science quotes on:  |  Aid (101)  |  AIDS (3)  |  AZT (2)  |  Back (395)  |  Clinic (4)  |  Clinical (18)  |  Clinical Trial (3)  |  Development (441)  |  Drug (61)  |  First (1302)  |  Futility (7)  |  Impact (45)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Perseverance (24)  |  Pessimism (4)  |  Research (753)  |  Sense (785)  |  Significant (78)  |  Success (327)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Trial (59)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

Be not afeard.
The isle is full of noises,
Sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears; and sometime voices
That if I then had waked after long sleep
Will make me sleep again; and then, in dreaming
The clouds methought would open and show riches
Ready to drop upon me, that, when I waked,
I cried to dream again.
The Tempest (1611), III, ii.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Delight (111)  |  Dream (222)  |  Drop (77)  |  Ear (69)  |  Humming (5)  |  Hurt (14)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Isle (6)  |  Mine (78)  |  Noise (40)  |  Open (277)  |  Riches (14)  |  Show (353)  |  Sleep (81)  |  Sound (187)  |  Sweet (40)  |  Thought (995)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Voice (54)  |  Waking (17)  |  Will (2350)

Before the promulgation of the periodic law the chemical elements were mere fragmentary incidental facts in nature; there was no special reason to expect the discovery of new elements, and the new ones which were discovered from time to time appeared to be possessed of quite novel properties. The law of periodicity first enabled us to perceive undiscovered elements at a distance which formerly were inaccessible to chemical vision, and long ere they were discovered new elements appeared before our eyes possessed of a number of well-defined properties.
In Faraday Lecture, delivered before the Fellows of the Chemical Society in the Theatre of the Royal Institution (4 Jun 1889), printed in Professor Mendeléeff, 'The Periodic Law of the Chemical Elements', Transactions of the Chemical Society (1889), 55, 648.
Science quotes on:  |  Chemical (303)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Distance (171)  |  Element (322)  |  Expect (203)  |  Expectation (67)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  First (1302)  |  Fragmentary (8)  |  Inaccessible (18)  |  Incidental (15)  |  Law (913)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Novel (35)  |  Number (710)  |  Periodic Law (6)  |  Periodicity (6)  |  Possess (157)  |  Promulgation (5)  |  Property (177)  |  Reason (766)  |  Special (188)  |  Time (1911)  |  Undiscovered (15)  |  Vision (127)  |  Well-Defined (9)

Being also in accord with Goethe that discoveries are made by the age and not by the individual, I should consider the instances to be exceedingly rare of men who can be said to be living before their age, and to be the repository of knowledge quite foreign to the thought of the time. The rule is that a number of persons are employed at a particular piece of work, but one being a few steps in advance of the others is able to crown the edifice with his name, or, having the ability to generalise already known facts, may become in time to be regarded as their originator. Therefore it is that one name is remembered whilst those of coequals have long been buried in obscurity.
In Historical Notes on Bright's Disease, Addison's Disease, and Hodgkin's Disease', Guy's Hospital Reports (1877), 22, 259-260.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Advance (298)  |  Age (509)  |  Already (226)  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Coequal (2)  |  Consider (428)  |  Crown (39)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Edifice (26)  |  Employ (115)  |  Exceedingly (28)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Foreign (45)  |  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (150)  |  Individual (420)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Living (492)  |  Name (359)  |  Number (710)  |  Obscurity (28)  |  Originator (7)  |  Other (2233)  |  Person (366)  |  Rare (94)  |  Regard (312)  |  Remember (189)  |  Repository (5)  |  Rule (307)  |  Step (234)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Work (1402)

Biologists have long attempted by chemical means to induce in higher organisms predictable and specific changes which thereafter could be transmitted in series as hereditary characters. Among microorganisms the most striking example of inheritable and specific alterations in cell structure and function that can be experimentally induced and are reproducible under well defined and adequately controlled conditions is the transformation of specific types of Pneumococcus.
Oswald T. Avery (1877-1955), Colin Macleod (1909-72) and Maclyn McCarty (1911-2005), 'Studies on the Chemical Nature of the Substance Inducing Transformation of Pneumococcal Types', Journal of Experimental Medicine 1944, 79, 137.
Science quotes on:  |  Alteration (31)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Biologist (70)  |  Change (639)  |  Character (259)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Condition (362)  |  Function (235)  |  Genetics (105)  |  Induce (24)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Micro-Organism (3)  |  Microorganism (29)  |  Most (1728)  |  Organism (231)  |  Reproducible (9)  |  Series (153)  |  Specific (98)  |  Striking (48)  |  Structure (365)  |  Transformation (72)  |  Type (171)

Botany here is but an object of amusement, a great one indeed and in which all our family mingles more or less. mr Randolph is our leader, and a good one. my mind has been so long ingrossed by other objects, that those I loved most have escaped from it, and none more than botany.
Letter (22 Oct 1810) from Jefferson at Monticello to Benjamin Smith Barton.
Science quotes on:  |  Amusement (37)  |  Botany (63)  |  Family (101)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Leader (51)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mingle (9)  |  More (2558)  |  More Or Less (71)  |  Most (1728)  |  Object (438)  |  Other (2233)

Bradley is one of the few basketball players who have ever been appreciatively cheered by a disinterested away-from-home crowd while warming up. This curious event occurred last March, just before Princeton eliminated the Virginia Military Institute, the year’s Southern Conference champion, from the NCAA championships. The game was played in Philadelphia and was the last of a tripleheader. The people there were worn out, because most of them were emotionally committed to either Villanova or Temple-two local teams that had just been involved in enervating battles with Providence and Connecticut, respectively, scrambling for a chance at the rest of the country. A group of Princeton players shooting basketballs miscellaneously in preparation for still another game hardly promised to be a high point of the evening, but Bradley, whose routine in the warmup time is a gradual crescendo of activity, is more interesting to watch before a game than most players are in play. In Philadelphia that night, what he did was, for him, anything but unusual. As he does before all games, he began by shooting set shots close to the basket, gradually moving back until he was shooting long sets from 20 feet out, and nearly all of them dropped into the net with an almost mechanical rhythm of accuracy. Then he began a series of expandingly difficult jump shots, and one jumper after another went cleanly through the basket with so few exceptions that the crowd began to murmur. Then he started to perform whirling reverse moves before another cadence of almost steadily accurate jump shots, and the murmur increased. Then he began to sweep hook shots into the air. He moved in a semicircle around the court. First with his right hand, then with his left, he tried seven of these long, graceful shots-the most difficult ones in the orthodoxy of basketball-and ambidextrously made them all. The game had not even begun, but the presumably unimpressible Philadelphians were applauding like an audience at an opera.
A Sense of Where You Are: Bill Bradley at Princeton
Science quotes on:  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Accurate (88)  |  Activity (218)  |  Air (366)  |  Appreciatively (2)  |  Audience (28)  |  Back (395)  |  Basket (8)  |  Basketball (4)  |  Battle (36)  |  Begin (275)  |  Bradley (2)  |  Cadence (2)  |  Champion (6)  |  Championship (2)  |  Chance (244)  |  Cheer (7)  |  Close (77)  |  Commit (43)  |  Conference (18)  |  Country (269)  |  Court (35)  |  Crescendo (3)  |  Crowd (25)  |  Curious (95)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Disinterest (8)  |  Drop (77)  |  Dropped (17)  |  Eliminate (25)  |  Emotionally (3)  |  Event (222)  |  Exception (74)  |  First (1302)  |  Foot (65)  |  Game (104)  |  Graceful (3)  |  Gradual (30)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Group (83)  |  Hand (149)  |  Hardly (19)  |  High (370)  |  Home (184)  |  Hook (7)  |  Increase (225)  |  Institute (8)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Involve (93)  |  Involved (90)  |  Jump (31)  |  Last (425)  |  Leave (138)  |  Local (25)  |  March (48)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Military (45)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Move (223)  |  Murmur (4)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Net (12)  |  Night (133)  |  Occur (151)  |  Opera (3)  |  Orthodoxy (11)  |  People (1031)  |  Perform (123)  |  Philadelphia (3)  |  Play (116)  |  Player (9)  |  Point (584)  |  Preparation (60)  |  Presumably (3)  |  Princeton (4)  |  Promise (72)  |  Providence (19)  |  Respectively (13)  |  Rest (287)  |  Reverse (33)  |  Rhythm (21)  |  Right (473)  |  Routine (26)  |  Series (153)  |  Set (400)  |  Shoot (21)  |  Southern (3)  |  Start (237)  |  Steadily (7)  |  Still (614)  |  Sweep (22)  |  Team (17)  |  Temple (45)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Try (296)  |  Two (936)  |  Unusual (37)  |  Virginia (2)  |  Warm (74)  |  Warming (24)  |  Watch (118)  |  Whirl (10)  |  Worn Out (2)  |  Year (963)

But as my conclusions have lately been much misrepresented, and it has been stated that I attribute the modification of species exclusively to natural selection, I may be permitted to remark that in the first edition of this work, and subsequently, I placed in a most conspicuous position—namely, at the close of the Introduction—the following words: “I am convinced that natural selection has been the main but not the exclusive means of modification.” This has been of no avail. Great is the power of steady misrepresentation; but the history of science shows that fortunately this power does not long endure.
In The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection with additions and corrections from sixth and last English edition (1899), Vol. 2, 293.
Science quotes on:  |  Attribute (65)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Conspicuous (13)  |  Edition (5)  |  Endure (21)  |  Exclusive (29)  |  First (1302)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Science (80)  |  Introduction (37)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Misrepresentation (5)  |  Modification (57)  |  Most (1728)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Selection (98)  |  Origin Of Species (42)  |  Power (771)  |  Remark (28)  |  Selection (130)  |  Show (353)  |  Species (435)  |  State (505)  |  Steady (45)  |  Word (650)  |  Work (1402)

But I should be very sorry if an interpretation founded on a most conjectural scientific hypothesis were to get fastened to the text in Genesis... The rate of change of scientific hypothesis is naturally much more rapid than that of Biblical interpretations, so that if an interpretation is founded on such an hypothesis, it may help to keep the hypothesis above ground long after it ought to be buried and forgotten.
Letter to Rev. C. J. Ellicott, Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol (22 Nov 1876). Quoted in Lewis Campbell and William Garnett, The Life of James Clerk Maxwell (1882), 394.
Science quotes on:  |  Bible (105)  |  Bury (19)  |  Change (639)  |  Conjecture (51)  |  Forget (125)  |  Forgotten (53)  |  Found (11)  |   Genesis (26)  |  Ground (222)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Sorry (31)

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)  |  Assert (69)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Both (496)  |  Casting (10)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Deception (9)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Inquirer (9)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  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)

But of all environments, that produced by man’s complex technology is perhaps the most unstable and rickety. In its present form, our society is not two centuries old, and a few nuclear bombs will do it in.
To be sure, evolution works over long periods of time and two centuries is far from sufficient to breed Homo technikos… .
The destruction of our technological society in a fit of nuclear peevishness would become disastrous even if there were many millions of immediate survivors.
The environment toward which they were fitted would be gone, and Darwin’s demon would wipe them out remorselessly and without a backward glance.
Asimov on Physics (1976), 151. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 181.
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  Backward (10)  |  Become (821)  |  Breed (26)  |  Century (319)  |  Complex (202)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Demon (8)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Disaster (58)  |  Do (1905)  |  Environment (239)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fit (139)  |  Form (976)  |  Glance (36)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Man (2252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Old (499)  |  Period (200)  |  Present (630)  |  Produced (187)  |  Remorse (9)  |  Rickety (2)  |  Society (350)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Survivor (2)  |  Technological (62)  |  Technology (281)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Unstable (9)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

But why, it has been asked, did you go there [the Antarctic]? Of what use to civilization can this lifeless continent be? ... [Earlier] expeditions contributed something to the accumulating knowledge of the Antarctic ... that helps us thrust back further the physical and spiritual shadows enfolding our terrestrial existence. Is it not true that one of the strongest and most continuously sustained impulses working in civilization is that which leads to discovery? As long as any part of the world remains obscure, the curiosity of man must draw him there, as the lodestone draws the mariner's needle, until he comprehends its secret.
In 'Hoover Presents Special Medal to Byrd...', New York Times (21 Jun 1930), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulation (51)  |  Antarctic (7)  |  Ask (420)  |  Asking (74)  |  Back (395)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Continent (79)  |  Contribution (93)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Draw (140)  |  Existence (481)  |  Expedition (9)  |  Going (6)  |  Impulse (52)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lead (391)  |  Lifeless (15)  |  Lodestone (7)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mariner (12)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Obscure (66)  |  Obscurity (28)  |  Physical (518)  |  Remain (355)  |  Secret (216)  |  Shadow (73)  |  Something (718)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Sustain (52)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Thrust (13)  |  Use (771)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)

But, further, no animal can live upon a mixture of pure protein, fat and carbohydrate, and even when the necessary inorganic material is carefully supplied, the animal still cannot flourish. The animal body is adjusted to live either upon plant tissues or the tissues of other animals, and these contain countless substances other than the proteins, carbohydrates and fats... In diseases such as rickets, and particularly in scurvy, we have had for long years knowledge of a dietetic factor; but though we know how to benefit these conditions empirically, the real errors in the diet are to this day quite obscure. They are, however, certainly of the kind which comprises these minimal qualitative factors that I am considering.
'The Analyst and the Medical Man', The Analyst (1906), 31, 395-6.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Body (557)  |  Carbohydrate (3)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Condition (362)  |  Countless (39)  |  Diet (56)  |  Dietetic (4)  |  Disease (340)  |  Error (339)  |  Fat (11)  |  Flourish (34)  |  Food (213)  |  Kind (564)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Live (650)  |  Material (366)  |  Mixture (44)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Obscure (66)  |  Other (2233)  |  Plant (320)  |  Protein (56)  |  Pure (299)  |  Scurvy (5)  |  Still (614)  |  Substance (253)  |  Tissue (51)  |  Vitamin (13)  |  Year (963)

By death the moon was gathered in Long ago, ah long ago;
Yet still the silver corpse must spin
And with another's light must glow.
Her frozen mountains must forget
Their primal hot volcanic breath,
Doomed to revolve for ages yet,
Void amphitheatres of death.
And all about the cosmic sky,
The black that lies beyond our blue,
Dead stars innumerable lie,
And stars of red and angry hue
Not dead but doomed to die.
'Cosmic Death' (1923), in The Captive Shrew and Other Poems of a Biologist (1932), 30.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Amphitheatre (2)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Breath (61)  |  Cosmic (74)  |  Cosmos (64)  |  Crater (8)  |  Death (406)  |  Doom (34)  |  Forget (125)  |  Gather (76)  |  Hot (63)  |  Innumerable (56)  |  Lie (370)  |  Light (635)  |  Moon (252)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Must (1525)  |  Orbit (85)  |  Poem (104)  |  Revolve (26)  |  Silver (49)  |  Sky (174)  |  Spin (26)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Still (614)  |  Sun (407)  |  Void (31)  |  Volcano (46)

By God’s mercy British and American science outpaced all German efforts. … This revelation of the secrets of nature, long mercifully withheld from man, should arouse the most solemn reflections in the mind and conscience of every human being capable of comprehension. We must indeed pray that these awful agencies will be made to conduce to peace among the nations, and that instead of wreaking measureless havoc upon the entire globe, may become a perennial fountain of world prosperity.
[Concerning use of the atomic bomb.]
Statement drafted by Churchill following the use of an atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Due to the change in government, the statement was released by Clement Attlee (6 Aug 1945). In Sir Winston Churchill, Victory: War Speeches by the Right Hon. Winston Churchill (1946), 289.
Science quotes on:  |  Agency (14)  |  Arousal (2)  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  Awful (9)  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  British (42)  |  Capability (44)  |  Capable (174)  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Conduce (2)  |  Conscience (52)  |  Effort (243)  |  Fountain (18)  |  German (37)  |  Globe (51)  |  God (776)  |  Havoc (7)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mercy (12)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nation (208)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Peace (116)  |  Perennial (9)  |  Prayer (30)  |  Prosperity (31)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Revelation (51)  |  Secret (216)  |  Solemn (20)  |  Use (771)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

Can a society in which thought and technique are scientific persist for a long period, as, for example, ancient Egypt persisted, or does it necessarily contain within itself forces which must bring either decay or explosion?
The Impact of Science on Society (1951, 1985), 109.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Ancient Egypt (4)  |  Decay (59)  |  Egypt (31)  |  Explosion (51)  |  Force (497)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Period (200)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Society (350)  |  Technique (84)  |  Thought (995)

Can one think that because we are engineers, beauty does not preoccupy us or that we do not try to build beautiful, as well as solid and long lasting structures? Aren’t the genuine functions of strength always in keeping with unwritten conditions of harmony? … Besides, there is an attraction, a special charm in the colossal to which ordinary theories of art do not apply.
As translated in Henry Petroski, Remaking the World: Adventures in Engineering (1998), 173. From the original French in interview of Eiffel by Paul Bourde, in the newspaper Le Temps (14 Feb 1887). Quoted in 'Au Jour le Jour: Les Artistes Contre la Tour Eiffel', Gazette Anecdotique, Littéraire, Artistique et Bibliographique (Feb 1887), 126, and in Gustave Eiffel, Travaux Scientifiques Exécutés à la Tour de 300 Mètres de 1889 à 1900 (1900), 14. “Parce que nous sommes des ingénieurs, croit-on donc que la beauté ne nous préoccupe pas dans nos constructions et qu'en même temps que nous faisons solide et durable nous ne nous efforçons pas rletfaire élégant? Est-ce que les véritables conditions de la force ne sont pas toujours conformes aux conditions secrètes de l'harmonie?.… Il y a du reste dans le colossal une attraction, un charme propre auxquels les théories d'art ordinaires ne sont guère applicables.
Science quotes on:  |  Apply (170)  |  Art (680)  |  Attraction (61)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Build (211)  |  Charm (54)  |  Colossal (15)  |  Condition (362)  |  Do (1905)  |  Eiffel Tower (13)  |  Engineer (136)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Function (235)  |  Genuine (54)  |  Harmony (105)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Preoccupy (4)  |  Solid (119)  |  Special (188)  |  Strength (139)  |  Structure (365)  |  Think (1122)  |  Try (296)

Can the cultural evolution of higher ethical values gain a direction and momentum of its own and completely replace genetic evolution? I think not. The genes hold culture an a leash. The leash is very long, but inevitably values will be constrained in accordance with their effects in the human gene pool. The brain is a product of evolution. Human behaviour—like the deepest capacities for emotional response which drive and guide it—is the circuitous technique by which human genetic material has been and will be kept intact. Morality has no other demonstrable ultimate function.
In On Human Nature (1978), 167. In William Andrew Rottschaefer, The Biology and Psychology of Moral Agency (1998), 58.
Science quotes on:  |  Behaviour (42)  |  Brain (281)  |  Completely (137)  |  Culture (157)  |  Direction (185)  |  Effect (414)  |  Ethical (34)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Function (235)  |  Gain (146)  |  Gene (105)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Guide (107)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Nature (71)  |  Intact (9)  |  Material (366)  |  Momentum (10)  |  Morality (55)  |  Other (2233)  |  Product (166)  |  Response (56)  |  Technique (84)  |  Think (1122)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Value (393)  |  Will (2350)

Cayley was singularly learned in the work of other men, and catholic in his range of knowledge. Yet he did not read a memoir completely through: his custom was to read only so much as would enable him to grasp the meaning of the symbols and understand its scope. The main result would then become to him a subject of investigation: he would establish it (or test it) by algebraic analysis and, not infrequently, develop it so to obtain other results. This faculty of grasping and testing rapidly the work of others, together with his great knowledge, made him an invaluable referee; his services in this capacity were used through a long series of years by a number of societies to which he was almost in the position of standing mathematical advisor.
In Proceedings of London Royal Society (1895), 58, 11-12.
Science quotes on:  |  Advisor (3)  |  Algebraic (5)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Become (821)  |  Capacity (105)  |  Catholic (18)  |  Arthur Cayley (17)  |  Completely (137)  |  Custom (44)  |  Develop (278)  |  Enable (122)  |  Establish (63)  |  Faculty (76)  |  Grasp (65)  |  Great (1610)  |  Infrequent (2)  |  Invaluable (11)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Main (29)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Memoir (13)  |  Number (710)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Other (2233)  |  Position (83)  |  Range (104)  |  Rapid (37)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  Read (308)  |  Referee (8)  |  Result (700)  |  Scope (44)  |  Series (153)  |  Service (110)  |  Society (350)  |  Stand (284)  |  Subject (543)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Test (221)  |  Through (846)  |  Together (392)  |  Understand (648)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)

Certainly, speaking for the United States of America, I pledge that, as we sign this treaty in an era of negotiation, we consider it only one step toward a greater goal: the control of nuclear weapons on earth and the reduction of the danger that hangs over all nations as long as those weapons are not controlled.
'Remarks at the Signing Ceremony of the Seabed Arms Control Treaty' (11 Feb 1971), Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Richard M. Nixon (1972), 150.
Science quotes on:  |  America (143)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Consider (428)  |  Control (182)  |  Danger (127)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Era (51)  |  Goal (155)  |  Greater (288)  |  Hang (46)  |  Nation (208)  |  Negotiation (3)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Nuclear Weapon (17)  |  Pledge (4)  |  Reduction (52)  |  Sign (63)  |  Speaking (118)  |  State (505)  |  Step (234)  |  Treaty (3)  |  United States (31)  |  Weapon (98)  |  Weapons (57)

Chandra [Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar] probably thought longer and deeper about our universe than anyone since Einstein.
Quoted without citation in NASA MFSC News Release 98-253 from Marshall Space Flight Center, 'NASA Selects New Name And Sets New Launch Date For Advanced Space X-Ray Telescope' (21 Dec 1998). Several copies can be found with web search.
Science quotes on:  |  Anyone (38)  |  Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (8)  |  Deep (241)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  Probable (24)  |  Thought (995)  |  Universe (900)

Chemistry and physics are experimental sciences; and those who are engaged in attempting to enlarge the boundaries of science by experiment are generally unwilling to publish speculations; for they have learned, by long experience, that it is unsafe to anticipate events. It is true, they must make certain theories and hypotheses. They must form some kind of mental picture of the relations between the phenomena which they are trying to investigate, else their experiments would be made at random, and without connection.
From 'Radium and Its Products', Harper’s Magazine (Dec 1904), 52.
Science quotes on:  |  Anticipate (20)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Certain (557)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Connection (171)  |  Enlarge (37)  |  Event (222)  |  Experience (494)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Form (976)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Kind (564)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Mental (179)  |  Must (1525)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Picture (148)  |  Publish (42)  |  Random (42)  |  Relation (166)  |  Speculation (137)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Trying (144)  |  Unsafe (5)  |  Unwilling (9)

Chemistry is one of those branches of human knowledge which has built itself upon methods and instruments by which truth can presumably be determined. It has survived and grown because all its precepts and principles can be re-tested at any time and anywhere. So long as it remained the mysterious alchemy by which a few devotees, by devious and dubious means, presumed to change baser metals into gold, it did not flourish, but when it dealt with the fact that 56 g. of fine iron, when heated with 32 g. of flowers of sulfur, generated extra heat and gave exactly 88 g. of an entirely new substance, then additional steps could be taken by anyone. Scientific research in chemistry, since the birth of the balance and the thermometer, has been a steady growth of test and observation. It has disclosed a finite number of elementary reagents composing an infinite universe, and it is devoted to their inter-reaction for the benefit of mankind.
Address upon receiving the Perkin Medal Award, 'The Big Things in Chemistry', The Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry (Feb 1921), 13, No. 2, 163.
Science quotes on:  |  Alchemy (31)  |  Balance (82)  |  Base (120)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Birth (154)  |  Branch (155)  |  Building (158)  |  Change (639)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Determination (80)  |  Devious (2)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Devotee (7)  |  Element (322)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Finite (60)  |  Flourish (34)  |  Flourishing (6)  |  Flower (112)  |  Gold (101)  |  Growth (200)  |  Heat (180)  |  Human (1512)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Inter (12)  |  Iron (99)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Metal (88)  |  Method (531)  |  Mysterious (83)  |  Mystery (188)  |  New (1273)  |  Number (710)  |  Observation (593)  |  Precept (10)  |  Presumption (15)  |  Principle (530)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Reagent (8)  |  Remain (355)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Steady (45)  |  Step (234)  |  Stoichiometry (2)  |  Substance (253)  |  Sulfur (5)  |  Sulphur (19)  |  Survival (105)  |  Test (221)  |  Thermometer (11)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Universe (900)

Chemists show us that strange property, catalysis, which enables a substance while unaffected itself to incite to union elements around it. So a host, or hostess, who may know but little of those concerned, may, as a social switchboard, bring together the halves of pairs of scissors, men who become life-long friends, men and women who marry and are happy husbands and wives.
From chapter 'Jottings from a Note-book', in Canadian Stories (1918), 179.
Science quotes on:  |  Around (7)  |  Become (821)  |  Bring (95)  |  Catalysis (7)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Concern (239)  |  Element (322)  |  Enable (122)  |  Friend (180)  |  Half (63)  |  Happy (108)  |  Host (16)  |  Hostess (2)  |  Husband (13)  |  Incite (3)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lifelong (10)  |  Little (717)  |  Marry (11)  |  Pair (10)  |  Property (177)  |  Show (353)  |  Social (261)  |  Strange (160)  |  Substance (253)  |  Together (392)  |  Unaffected (6)  |  Union (52)  |  Wife (41)  |  Woman (160)

Coastal sailing as long as it is perfectly safe and easy commands no magic. Overseas expeditions are invariably bound up with ceremonies and ritual. Man resorts to magic only where chance and circumstances are not fully controlled by knowledge.
Culture (1931), 636.
Science quotes on:  |  Bound (120)  |  Ceremony (6)  |  Chance (244)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Coast (13)  |  Command (60)  |  Control (182)  |  Easy (213)  |  Expedition (9)  |  Invariably (35)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Magic (92)  |  Man (2252)  |  Ritual (9)  |  Safe (61)  |  Safety (58)  |  Sailing (14)

Common sense … may be thought of as a series of concepts and conceptual schemes which have proved highly satisfactory for the practical uses of mankind. Some of those concepts and conceptual schemes were carried over into science with only a little pruning and whittling and for a long time proved useful. As the recent revolutions in physics indicate, however, many errors can be made by failure to examine carefully just how common sense ideas should be defined in terms of what the experimenter plans to do.
In Science and Common Sense (1951), 32-33.
Science quotes on:  |  Careful (28)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Common (447)  |  Common Sense (136)  |  Concept (242)  |  Define (53)  |  Do (1905)  |  Error (339)  |  Examine (84)  |  Experimenter (40)  |  Failure (176)  |  Idea (881)  |  Indicate (62)  |  Little (717)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Plan (122)  |  Practical (225)  |  Prune (7)  |  Pruning (7)  |  Recent (78)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Satisfactory (19)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Sense (785)  |  Series (153)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Use (771)  |  Useful (260)

Conservation is the foresighted utilization, preservation. And/or renewal of forest, waters, lands and minerals, for the greatest good of the greatest number for the longest time.
In Breaking New Ground (1947, 1998), 505.
Science quotes on:  |  Conservation (187)  |  Forest (161)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Land (131)  |  Mineral (66)  |  Number (710)  |  Preservation (39)  |  Renewal (4)  |  Time (1911)  |  Utilization (16)  |  Water (503)

Correct is to recognize what diseases are and whence they come; which are long and which are short; which are mortal and which are not; which are in the process of changing into others; which are increasing and which are diminishing; which are major and which are minor; to treat the diseases that can be treated, but to recognize the ones that cannot be, and to know why they cannot be; by treating patients with the former, to give them the benefit of treatment as far as it is possible.
Diseases, in Hippocrates, trans. P. Potter (1988), Vol. 5, 113.
Science quotes on:  |  Benefit (123)  |  Diagnosis (65)  |  Disease (340)  |  Former (138)  |  Know (1538)  |  Major (88)  |  Mortal (55)  |  Other (2233)  |  Patient (209)  |  Possible (560)  |  Process (439)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Short (200)  |  Treatment (135)  |  Why (491)

Creative imagination is likely to find corroborating novel evidence even for the most 'absurd' programme, if the search has sufficient drive. This look-out for new confirming evidence is perfectly permissible. Scientists dream up phantasies and then pursue a highly selective hunt for new facts which fit these phantasies. This process may be described as “science creating its own universe” (as long as one remembers that “creating” here is used in a provocative-idiosyncratic sense). A brilliant school of scholars (backed by a rich society to finance a few well-planned tests) might succeed in pushing any fantastic programme ahead, or alternatively, if so inclined, in overthrowing any arbitrarily chosen pillar of “established knowledge”.
In 'Falsification and the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes', in I. Lakatos and A. Musgrave (eds.), Criticism and the Growth of Knowledge: Proceedings of the International Colloquium in the Philosophy of Science, London 1965 (1970), Vol. 4, 187-8.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurd (60)  |  Back (395)  |  Brilliant (57)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Creative (144)  |  Dream (222)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Fantastic (21)  |  Fantasy (15)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fit (139)  |  Hunt (32)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Inclined (41)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Look (584)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Novel (35)  |  Permissible (9)  |  Process (439)  |  Program (57)  |  Pursue (63)  |  Remember (189)  |  Research (753)  |  Scholar (52)  |  School (227)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Search (175)  |  Selective (21)  |  Sense (785)  |  Society (350)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Test (221)  |  Universe (900)

Dear Mr. Bell: … Sir Wm. Thomson … speaks with much enthusiasm of your achievement. What yesterday he would have declared impossible he has today seen realized, and he declares it the most wonderful thing he has seen in America. You speak of it as an embryo invention, but to him it seems already complete, and he declares that, before long, friends will whisper their secrets over the electric wire. Your undulating current he declares a great and happy conception.
Letter to Alexander Graham Bell (25 Jun 1876). Quoted in Alexander Graham Bell, The Bell Telephone: The Deposition of Alexander Graham Bell, in the Suit Brought by the United States to Annul the Bell Patents (1908), 101. Note: William Thomson is better known as Lord Kelvin.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Already (226)  |  America (143)  |  Bell (35)  |  Alexander Graham Bell (37)  |  Complete (209)  |  Conception (160)  |  Current (122)  |  Declare (48)  |  Declared (24)  |  Electric (76)  |  Embryo (30)  |  Enthusiasm (59)  |  Friend (180)  |  Great (1610)  |  Happy (108)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Invention (400)  |  Baron William Thomson Kelvin (74)  |  Most (1728)  |  Realize (157)  |  Secret (216)  |  Speak (240)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Today (321)  |  Whisper (11)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wire (36)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  Yesterday (37)

Death seems to have been a rather late invention in evolution. One can go a long way in evolution before encountering an authentic corpse.
In talk, 'Origin of Death' (1970). Evolution began with one-celled organisms reproducing indefinitely by cell division.
Science quotes on:  |  Authentic (9)  |  Corpse (7)  |  Death (406)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Invention (400)  |  Late (119)  |  Lateness (4)  |  Way (1214)

Despite the high long-term probability of extinction, every organism alive today, including every person reading this paper, is a link in an unbroken chain of parent-offspring relationships that extends back unbroken to the beginning of life on earth. Every living organism is a part of an enormously long success story—each of its direct ancestors has been sufficiently well adapted to its physical and biological environments to allow it to mature and reproduce successfully. Viewed thus, adaptation is not a trivial facet of natural history, but a biological attribute so central as to be inseparable from life itself.
In 'Integrative Biology: An Organismic Biologist’s Point of View', Integrative and Comparative Biology (2005), 45, 330.
Science quotes on:  |  Adapt (70)  |  Adaptation (59)  |  Alive (97)  |  Allow (51)  |  Ancestor (63)  |  Attribute (65)  |  Back (395)  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Biological (137)  |  Central (81)  |  Chain (51)  |  Despite (7)  |  Direct (228)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enormously (4)  |  Environment (239)  |  Extend (129)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Facet (9)  |  High (370)  |  History (716)  |  Include (93)  |  Inseparable (18)  |  Life (1870)  |  Life On Earth (16)  |  Link (48)  |  Live (650)  |  Living (492)  |  Long-Term (11)  |  Mature (17)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Offspring (27)  |  Organism (231)  |  Paper (192)  |  Parent (80)  |  Part (235)  |  Person (366)  |  Physical (518)  |  Probability (135)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Relationship (114)  |  Reproduce (12)  |  Story (122)  |  Success (327)  |  Successful (134)  |  Sufficiently (9)  |  Term (357)  |  Today (321)  |  Trivial (59)  |  Unbroken (10)  |  View (496)

Discovery follows discovery, each both raising and answering questions, each ending a long search, and each providing the new instruments for a new search.
In 'Prospects in the Arts and Sciences,' in Fifty Famous Essays (1964).
Science quotes on:  |  Both (496)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Follow (389)  |  Instrument (158)  |  New (1273)  |  Question (649)  |  Search (175)

Do you remember what Darwin says about music? He claims that the power of producing and appreciating it existed among the human race long before the power of speech was arrived at. Perhaps that is why we are so subtly influenced by it. There are vague memories in our souls of those misty centuries when the world was in its childhood.
Spoken by character, Sherlock Holmes, in A Study in Scarlet (1887), Chap. 5. Collected in Works of Arthur Conan Doyle (1902), Vol. 11, 68-69.
Science quotes on:  |  Appreciate (67)  |  Century (319)  |  Childhood (42)  |  Claim (154)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Do (1905)  |  Exist (458)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Influence (231)  |  Memory (144)  |  Misty (6)  |  Music (133)  |  Power (771)  |  Produce (117)  |  Race (278)  |  Remember (189)  |  Say (989)  |  Soul (235)  |  Speech (66)  |  Subtle (37)  |  Vague (50)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)

Dreams do not vanish, so long as people do not abandon them.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Abandon (73)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dream (222)  |  People (1031)  |  Vanish (19)

During cycles long anterior to the creation of the human race, and while the surface of the globe was passing from one condition to another, whole races of animals–each group adapted to the physical conditions in which they lived–were successively created and exterminated.
Siluria (1854), 5.
Science quotes on:  |  Adapt (70)  |  Animal (651)  |  Anterior (4)  |  Condition (362)  |  Creation (350)  |  Cycle (42)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Extermination (14)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Globe (51)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Pass (241)  |  Passing (76)  |  Physical (518)  |  Race (278)  |  Succession (80)  |  Surface (223)  |  Whole (756)

During my second year at Edinburgh [1826-27] I attended Jameson's lectures on Geology and Zoology, but they were incredible dull. The sole effect they produced on me was the determination never as long as I lived to read a book on Geology.
Charles Darwin, His Life Told in an Autobiographical Chapter and a Selected Series of his Published Letters (1892), 15. In Patrick Wyse Jackson, Four Centuries of Geological Travel (2007), 32.
Science quotes on:  |  Attend (67)  |  Biography (254)  |  Book (413)  |  Determination (80)  |  Dull (58)  |  Effect (414)  |  Geology (240)  |  Incredible (43)  |   Robert Jameson (2)  |  Lecture (111)  |  Never (1089)  |  Produced (187)  |  Read (308)  |  Sole (50)  |  Year (963)  |  Zoology (38)

During my stay in London I resided for a considerable time in Clapham Road in the neighbourhood of Clapham Common... One fine summer evening I was returning by the last bus 'outside' as usual, through the deserted streets of the city, which are at other times so full of life. I fell into a reverie (Träumerei), and 10, the atoms were gambolling before my eyes! Whenever, hitherto, these diminutive beings had appeared to me, they had always been in motion: but up to that time I had never been able to discern the nature of their motion. Now, however, I saw how, frequently, two smaller atoms united to form a pair: how the larger one embraced the two smaller ones: how still larger ones kept hold of three or even four of the smaller: whilst the whole kept whirling in a giddy dance. I saw how the larger ones formed a chain, dragging the smaller ones after them but only at the ends of the chain. I saw what our past master, Kopp, my highly honoured teacher and friend has depicted with such charm in his Molekular-Welt: but I saw it long before him. The cry of the conductor 'Clapham Road', awakened me from my dreaming: but I spent part of the night in putting on paper at least sketches of these dream forms. This was the origin of the 'Structural Theory'.
Kekule at Benzolfest in Berichte (1890), 23, 1302.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Being (1276)  |  Chain (51)  |  Charm (54)  |  City (87)  |  Common (447)  |  Compound (117)  |  Conductor (17)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Cry (30)  |  Dance (35)  |  Desert (59)  |  Discern (35)  |  Dragging (6)  |  Dream (222)  |  End (603)  |  Eye (440)  |  Form (976)  |  Friend (180)  |  Honour (58)  |  Hermann Franz Moritz Kopp (2)  |  Last (425)  |  Life (1870)  |  Master (182)  |  Motion (320)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Origin (250)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outside (141)  |  Paper (192)  |  Past (355)  |  Saw (160)  |  Spent (85)  |  Still (614)  |  Structural (29)  |  Structure (365)  |  Summer (56)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Whenever (81)  |  Whole (756)

During the eight days I spent in space, I realized that mankind needs height primarily to better know our long-suffering Earth, to see what cannot be seen close up. Not just to love her beauty, but also to ensure that we do not bring even the slightest harm to the natural world
In Jack Hassard and Julie Weisberg , Environmental Science on the Net: The Global Thinking Project (1999), 40.
Science quotes on:  |  Beauty (313)  |  Better (493)  |  Bring (95)  |  Close (77)  |  Do (1905)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Ensure (27)  |  Harm (43)  |  Height (33)  |  Know (1538)  |  Love (328)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural World (33)  |  Need (320)  |  Primarily (12)  |  Realize (157)  |  See (1094)  |  Slight (32)  |  Space (523)  |  Spend (97)  |  Spent (85)  |  Suffering (68)  |  World (1850)

During the half-century that has elapsed since the enunciation of the cell-theory by Schleiden and Schwann, in 1838-39, it has became ever more clearly apparent that the key to all ultimate biological problems must, in the last analysis, be sought in the cell. It was the cell-theory that first brought the structure of plants and animals under one point of view by revealing their common plan of organization. It was through the cell-theory that Kolliker and Remak opened the way to an understanding of the nature of embryological development, and the law of genetic continuity lying at the basis of inheritance. It was the cell-­theory again which, in the hands of Virchaw and Max Schultze, inaugurated a new era in the history of physiology and pathology, by showing that all the various functions of the body, in health and in disease, are but the outward expression of cell­-activities. And at a still later day it was through the cell-theory that Hertwig, Fol, Van Beneden, and Strasburger solved the long-standing riddle of the fertilization of the egg, and the mechanism of hereditary transmission. No other biological generalization, save only the theory of organic evolution, has brought so many apparently diverse phenomena under a common point of view or has accomplished more far the unification of knowledge. The cell-theory must therefore be placed beside the evolution-theory as one of the foundation stones of modern biology.
In The Cell in Development and Inheritance (1896), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Analysis (244)  |  Animal (651)  |  Apparent (85)  |  Basis (180)  |  Biological (137)  |  Biology (232)  |  Body (557)  |  Cell Theory (4)  |  Century (319)  |  Common (447)  |  Continuity (39)  |  Development (441)  |  Disease (340)  |  Egg (71)  |  Embryo (30)  |  Enunciation (7)  |  Era (51)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Expression (181)  |  Fertilization (15)  |  First (1302)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Function (235)  |  Generalization (61)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Health (210)  |  Heredity (62)  |  Oskar Hertwig (2)  |  History (716)  |  Inheritance (35)  |  Key (56)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Last (425)  |  Law (913)  |  Lying (55)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Modern (402)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Open (277)  |  Organic (161)  |  Organization (120)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pathology (19)  |  Physiology (101)  |  Plan (122)  |  Plant (320)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Problem (731)  |  Robert Remak (2)  |  Riddle (28)  |  Save (126)  |  Theodor Schwann (12)  |  Still (614)  |  Stone (168)  |  Structure (365)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Through (846)  |  Transmission (34)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Unification (11)  |  Various (205)  |  View (496)  |  Rudolf Virchow (50)  |  Way (1214)

During the long ages of class rule, which are just beginning to cease, only one form of sovereignty has been assigned to all men—that, namely, over all women. Upon these feeble and inferior companions all men were permitted to avenge the indignities they suffered from so many men to whom they were forced to submit.
In “Common Sense” Applied to Woman Suffrage (1894), 180.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Avenge (2)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Cease (81)  |  Class (168)  |  Companion (22)  |  Feeble (28)  |  Form (976)  |  Indignity (2)  |  Inferior (37)  |  Man (2252)  |  Permit (61)  |  Rule (307)  |  Sovereignty (6)  |  Submit (21)  |  Suffer (43)  |  Woman (160)

Each of the major sciences has contributed an essential ingredient in our long retreat from an initial belief in our own cosmic importance. Astronomy defined our home as a small planet tucked away in one corner of an average galaxy among millions; biology took away our status as paragons created in the image of God; geology gave us the immensity of time and taught us how little of it our own species has occupied.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Average (89)  |  Belief (615)  |  Biology (232)  |  Contribute (30)  |  Corner (59)  |  Cosmic (74)  |  Create (245)  |  Define (53)  |  Essential (210)  |  Galaxy (53)  |  Geology (240)  |  Give (208)  |  God (776)  |  Home (184)  |  Image (97)  |  Immensity (30)  |  Importance (299)  |  Ingredient (16)  |  Initial (17)  |  Little (717)  |  Major (88)  |  Millions (17)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Occupy (27)  |  Paragon (4)  |  Planet (402)  |  Retreat (13)  |  Small (489)  |  Species (435)  |  Status (35)  |  Teach (299)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tuck (3)

Each of us has read somewhere that in New Guinea pidgin the word for 'piano' is (I use English spelling) 'this fellow you hit teeth belonging to him he squeal all same pig'. I am inclined to doubt whether this expression is authentic; it looks just like the kind of thing a visitor to the Islands would facetiously invent. But I accept 'cut grass belong head belong me' for 'haircut' as genuine... Such phrases seem very funny to us, and make us feel very superior to the ignorant foreigners who use long winded expressions for simple matters. And then it is our turn to name quite a simple thing, a small uncomplicated molecule consisting of nothing more than a measly 11 carbons, seven hydrogens, one nitrogen and six oxygens. We sharpen our pencils, consult our rule books and at last come up with 3-[(1, 3- dihydro-1, 3-dioxo-2H-isoindol-2-yl) oxy]-3-oxopropanoic acid. A name like that could drive any self-respecting Papuan to piano-playing.
The Chemist's English (1990), 3rd Edition, 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Acid (83)  |  Authentic (9)  |  Belong (168)  |  Belonging (36)  |  Book (413)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Complication (30)  |  Cut (116)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Expression (181)  |  Feel (371)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Foreigner (3)  |  Funny (11)  |  Genuine (54)  |  Grass (49)  |  Hydrogen (80)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Inclined (41)  |  Invention (400)  |  Island (49)  |  Kind (564)  |  Last (425)  |  Look (584)  |  Matter (821)  |  Molecule (185)  |  More (2558)  |  Name (359)  |  New (1273)  |  New Guinea (4)  |  Nitrogen (32)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Oxygen (77)  |  Pencil (20)  |  Phrase (61)  |  Piano (12)  |  Playing (42)  |  Read (308)  |  Rule (307)  |  Self (268)  |  Sharpen (22)  |  Simple (426)  |  Small (489)  |  Spelling (8)  |  Superior (88)  |  Teeth (43)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Turn (454)  |  Use (771)  |  Wind (141)  |  Word (650)

Education, like everything else, goes in fads, and has the normal human tendency to put up with something bad for just so long, and then rush to the other extreme.
In Science is a Sacred Cow (1950), 43.
Science quotes on:  |  Bad (185)  |  Education (423)  |  Everything (489)  |  Extreme (78)  |  Fad (10)  |  Human (1512)  |  Other (2233)  |  Rush (18)  |  Something (718)  |  Tendency (110)  |  Tolerance (11)

EMBALM, v.t. To cheat vegetation by locking up the gases upon which it feeds. By embalming their dead and thereby deranging the natural balance between animal and vegetable life, the Egyptians made their once fertile and populous country barren and incapable of supporting more than a meagre crew. The modern metallic burial casket is a step in the same direction, and many a dead man who ought now to be ornamenting his neighbor's lawn as a tree, or enriching his table as a bunch of radishes, is doomed to a long inutility. We shall get him after awhile if we are spared, but in the meantime the violet and rose are languishing for a nibble at his glutæus maximus.
The Cynic's Word Book (1906), 90. Also published later as The Devil's Dictionary.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Balance (82)  |  Barren (33)  |  Cheat (13)  |  Country (269)  |  Direction (185)  |  Doom (34)  |  Embalming (2)  |  Fertile (30)  |  Humour (116)  |  Incapable (41)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Modern (402)  |  More (2558)  |  Natural (810)  |  Rose (36)  |  Step (234)  |  Table (105)  |  Tree (269)  |  Vegetable (49)  |  Vegetation (24)  |  Violet (11)

Engineering or Technology is the making of things that did not previously exist, whereas science is the discovering of things that have long existed.
The Tower and the Bridge: The New Art of Structural Engineering (1983), 9.
Science quotes on:  |  Discovery (837)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Exist (458)  |  Making (300)  |  Science And Engineering (16)  |  Technology (281)  |  Thing (1914)

Ere long intelligence—transmitted without wires—will throb through the earth like a pulse through a living organism. The wonder is that, with the present state of knowledge and the experiences gained, no attempt is being made to disturb the electrostatic or magnetic condition of the earth, and transmit, if nothing else, intelligence.
Electrical Engineer (24 Jun 1892), 11, 609.
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (266)  |  Being (1276)  |  Condition (362)  |  Disturb (31)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Electrical Engineering (12)  |  Electrostatic (7)  |  Experience (494)  |  Gain (146)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Living (492)  |  Magnetic (44)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Organism (231)  |  Present (630)  |  Pulse (22)  |  Radio (60)  |  State (505)  |  Throb (6)  |  Through (846)  |  Transmission (34)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wire (36)  |  Wonder (251)

Error has indeed long darkened the horizon of medical science; and albeit there have been lightnings like coruscations of genius from time to time, still they have passed away, and left the atmosphere as dark as before.
Memoirs of John Abernethy (1854), 293.
Science quotes on:  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Dark (145)  |  Error (339)  |  Genius (301)  |  Horizon (47)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Medical Science (19)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Pass (241)  |  Still (614)  |  Time (1911)

Etna presents us not merely with an image of the power of subterranean heat, but a record also of the vast period of time during which that power has been exerted. A majestic mountain has been produced by volcanic action, yet the time of which the volcanic forms the register, however vast, is found by the geologist to be of inconsiderable amount, even in the modern annals of the earth’s history. In like manner, the Falls of Niagara teach us not merely to appreciate the power of moving water, but furnish us at the same time with data for estimating the enormous lapse of ages during which that force has operated. A deep and long ravine has been excavated, and the river has required ages to accomplish the task, yet the same region affords evidence that the sum of these ages is as nothing, and as the work of yesterday, when compared to the antecedent periods, of which there are monuments in the same district.
Travels in North America (1845), Vol. 1, 28-9.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Age (509)  |  Amount (153)  |  Appreciate (67)  |  Data (162)  |  Deep (241)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Erosion (20)  |  Etna (5)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Exert (40)  |  Fall (243)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Furnish (97)  |  Geologist (82)  |  Heat (180)  |  History (716)  |  Image (97)  |  Lava (12)  |  Merely (315)  |  Modern (402)  |  Monument (45)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Niagara (8)  |  Niagara Falls (4)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Period (200)  |  Power (771)  |  Present (630)  |  Produced (187)  |  Ravine (5)  |  Record (161)  |  Register (22)  |  Required (108)  |  River (140)  |  Sum (103)  |  Task (152)  |  Teach (299)  |  Time (1911)  |  Vast (188)  |  Volcano (46)  |  Water (503)  |  Work (1402)  |  Yesterday (37)

Every new theory as it arises believes in the flush of youth that it has the long sought goal; it sees no limits to its applicability, and believes that at last it is the fortunate theory to achieve the 'right' answer. This was true of electron theory—perhaps some readers will remember a book called The Electrical Theory of the Universe by de Tunzelman. It is true of general relativity theory with its belief that we can formulate a mathematical scheme that will extrapolate to all past and future time and the unfathomed depths of space. It has been true of wave mechanics, with its first enthusiastic claim a brief ten years ago that no problem had successfully resisted its attack provided the attack was properly made, and now the disillusionment of age when confronted by the problems of the proton and the neutron. When will we learn that logic, mathematics, physical theory, are all only inventions for formulating in compact and manageable form what we already know, like all inventions do not achieve complete success in accomplishing what they were designed to do, much less complete success in fields beyond the scope of the original design, and that our only justification for hoping to penetrate at all into the unknown with these inventions is our past experience that sometimes we have been fortunate enough to be able to push on a short distance by acquired momentum.
The Nature of Physical Theory (1936), 136.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquired (77)  |  Age (509)  |  Already (226)  |  Answer (389)  |  Arise (162)  |  Attack (86)  |  Belief (615)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Book (413)  |  Brief (37)  |  Call (781)  |  Claim (154)  |  Compact (13)  |  Complete (209)  |  Depth (97)  |  Design (203)  |  Disillusionment (2)  |  Distance (171)  |  Do (1905)  |  Electrical (57)  |  Electron (96)  |  Enough (341)  |  Experience (494)  |  Field (378)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Fortunate (31)  |  Future (467)  |  General (521)  |  General Relativity (10)  |  Goal (155)  |  Invention (400)  |  Justification (52)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Learn (672)  |  Limit (294)  |  Logic (311)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Momentum (10)  |  Neutron (23)  |  New (1273)  |  Past (355)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  Physical (518)  |  Problem (731)  |  Proton (23)  |  Push (66)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Relativity (91)  |  Remember (189)  |  Right (473)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Scope (44)  |  See (1094)  |  Short (200)  |  Space (523)  |  Success (327)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Wave (112)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)  |  Youth (109)

Every time a significant discovery is being made one sets in motion a tremendous activity in laboratories and industrial enterprises throughout the world. It is like the ant who suddenly finds food and walks back to the anthill while sending out material called food attracting substance. The other ants follow the path immediately in order to benefit from the finding and continue to do so as long as the supply is rich.
Nobel Banquet speech (10 Dec 1982). In Wilhelm Odelberg (ed.), Les Prix Nobel. The Nobel Prizes 1982 (1983)
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Ant (34)  |  Back (395)  |  Being (1276)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Call (781)  |  Continue (179)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enterprise (56)  |  Find (1014)  |  Follow (389)  |  Food (213)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Material (366)  |  Motion (320)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Path (159)  |  Set (400)  |  Significant (78)  |  Substance (253)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Supply (100)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tremendous (29)  |  Walk (138)  |  World (1850)

Everybody gets so much information all day long that they lose their common sense.
In 'Reflection on the Atomic Bomb', Yale Poetry Review (Dec 1947). Reprinted in Robert Bartlett Haas (Ed.), Reflection on the Atomic Bomb: Volume One of the Previously Uncollected Writings of Gertrude Stein (1973), Vol. 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Common (447)  |  Common Sense (136)  |  Everybody (72)  |  Information (173)  |  Lose (165)  |  Sense (785)

Everything that the human race has done and thought is concerned with the satisfaction of deeply felt needs and the assuagement of pain. One has to keep this constantly in mind if one wishes to understand spiritual movements and their development. Feeling and longing are the motive force behind all human endeavor and human creation, in however exalted a guise the latter may present themselves to us.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Behind (139)  |  Concern (239)  |  Constantly (27)  |  Creation (350)  |  Deeply (17)  |  Development (441)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  Everything (489)  |  Exalt (29)  |  Exalted (22)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Force (497)  |  Guise (6)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Keep (104)  |  Latter (21)  |  Longing (19)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Motive (62)  |  Movement (162)  |  Need (320)  |  Pain (144)  |  Present (630)  |  Race (278)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thought (995)  |  Understand (648)  |  Wish (216)

Everything that we call Invention or Discovery in the higher sense of the word is the serious exercise and activity of an original feeling for truth, which, after a long course of silent cultivation, suddenly flashes out into fruitful knowledge.
In The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe (1906), 193.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Call (781)  |  Course (413)  |  Cultivation (36)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Everything (489)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Flash (49)  |  Fruitful (61)  |  Invention (400)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Original (61)  |  Sense (785)  |  Serious (98)  |  Silent (31)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Word (650)

Evolution has no long-term goal. There is no long-distance target, no final perfection to serve as a criterion for selection, although human vanity cherishes the absurd notion that our species is the final goal of evolution.
The Blind Watchmaker (1996), 50.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurd (60)  |  Criterion (28)  |  Distance (171)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Final (121)  |  Goal (155)  |  Human (1512)  |  Notion (120)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Selection (130)  |  Species (435)  |  Target (13)  |  Term (357)

Evolution is an obstacle course not a freeway; the correct analogue for long-term success is a distant punt receiver evading legions of would-be tacklers in an oddly zigzagged path toward a goal, not a horse thundering down the flat.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Analogue (7)  |  Correct (95)  |  Course (413)  |  Distant (33)  |  Down (455)  |  Evade (4)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Flat (34)  |  Goal (155)  |  Horse (78)  |  Legion (4)  |  Long-Term (11)  |  Obstacle (42)  |  Oddly (3)  |  Path (159)  |  Receiver (5)  |  Success (327)  |  Term (357)  |  Thunder (21)  |  Toward (45)  |  Would-Be (2)  |  Zigzag (3)

Evolution is ecology on a longer time scale.
From interview (16 Jul 2009) on rorotoko.com about his book The Balance of Nature: Ecology’s Enduring Myth (2009).
Science quotes on:  |  Ecology (81)  |  Evolution (635)

False facts are highly injurious to the progress of science, for they often long endure; but false views, if supported by some evidence, do little harm, as every one takes a salutary pleasure in proving their falseness; and when this is done, one path towards error is closed and the road to truth is often at the same time opened.
The Descent of Man (1871), Vol. 2, 385.
Science quotes on:  |  Closed (38)  |  Do (1905)  |  Error (339)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Injurious (14)  |  Little (717)  |  Open (277)  |  Path (159)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Progress (492)  |  Progress Of Science (40)  |  Support (151)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  View (496)

Fear of something is at the root of hate for others and hate within will eventually destroy the hater. Keep your thoughts free from hate, and you will have no fear from those who hate you. ...
David, though small, was filled with truth, right thinking and good will for others. Goliath represents one who let fear into his heart, and it stayed there long enough to grow into hate for others.
In Alvin D. Smith, George Washington Carver: Man of God (1954), 43. Cited in Linda O. McMurry, George Washington Carver, Scientist and Symbol (1982), 107. Smith's book is about his recollections of G.W. Carver's Sunday School classes at Tuskegee, some 40 years earlier. Webmaster, who has not yet been able to see the original book, cautions this quote may be the gist of Carver's words, rather than a verbatim quote.
Science quotes on:  |  David (6)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Enough (341)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Fear (212)  |  Free (239)  |  Good (906)  |  Grow (247)  |  Hate (68)  |  Heart (243)  |  Other (2233)  |  Represent (157)  |  Right (473)  |  Root (121)  |  Small (489)  |  Something (718)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Will (2350)

Feeling weightless… it’s so many things together. A feeling of pride, of healthy solitude, of dignified freedom from everything that’s dirty, sticky. You feel exquisitely comfortable . . . and you feel you have so much energy, such an urge to do things, such an ability to do things. And you work well, yes, you think well, without sweat, without difficulty as if the biblical curse in the sweat of thy face and in sorrow no longer exists, As if you’ve been born again.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Bear (162)  |  Bible (105)  |  Comfortable (13)  |  Curse (20)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Dignified (13)  |  Dirty (17)  |  Do (1905)  |  Energy (373)  |  Everything (489)  |  Exist (458)  |  Exquisitely (2)  |  Face (214)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Freedom (145)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Pride (84)  |  Solitude (20)  |  Sorrow (21)  |  Sweat (17)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thou (9)  |  Together (392)  |  Urge (17)  |  Work (1402)

Finally I got to carbon, and as you all know, in the case of carbon the reaction works out beautifully. One goes through six reactions, and at the end one comes back to carbon. In the process one has made four hydrogen atoms into one of helium. The theory, of course, was not made on the railway train from Washington to Ithaca … It didn’t take very long, it took about six weeks, but not even the Trans-Siberian railroad [has] taken that long for its journey.
'Pleasure from Physics', From A Life of Physics: Evening Lectures at the International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy. A Special Supplement of the IAEA Bulletin (1968), 14.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Back (395)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Course (413)  |  End (603)  |  Helium (11)  |  Hydrogen (80)  |  Journey (48)  |  Know (1538)  |  Process (439)  |  Railroad (36)  |  Railway (19)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Through (846)  |  Train (118)  |  Week (73)  |  Work (1402)

Finally, I aim at giving denominations to things, as agreeable to truth as possible. I am not ignorant that words, like money, possess an ideal value, and that great danger of confusion may be apprehended from a change of names; in the mean time it cannot be denied that chemistry, like the other sciences, was formerly filled with improper names. In different branches of knowledge, we see those matters long since reformed: why then should chemistry, which examines the real nature of things, still adopt vague names, which suggest false ideas, and favour strongly of ignorance and imposition? Besides, there is little doubt but that many corrections may be made without any inconvenience.
Physical and Chemical Essays (1784), Vol. I, xxxvii.
Science quotes on:  |  Agreeable (20)  |  Aim (175)  |  Change (639)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Confusion (61)  |  Correction (42)  |  Danger (127)  |  Denomination (6)  |  Different (595)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Error (339)  |  Examine (84)  |  Great (1610)  |  Idea (881)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Little (717)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Money (178)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nature Of Things (30)  |  Other (2233)  |  Possess (157)  |  Possible (560)  |  Reform (22)  |  Reformed (4)  |  See (1094)  |  Still (614)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Vague (50)  |  Value (393)  |  Why (491)  |  Word (650)

Finite systems of deterministic ordinary nonlinear differential equations may be designed to represent forced dissipative hydrodynamic flow. Solutions of these equations can be identified with trajectories in phase space. For those systems with bounded solutions, it is found that nonperiodic solutions are ordinarily unstable with respect to small modifications, so that slightly differing initial states can evolve into considerably different states. Systems with bounded solutions are shown to possess bounded numerical solutions.
A simple system representing cellular convection is solved numerically. All of the solutions are found to be unstable, and almost all of them are nonperiodic.
The feasibility of very-long-range weather prediction is examined in the light of these results
Abstract from his landmark paper introducing Chaos Theory in relation to weather prediction, 'Deterministic Nonperiodic Flow', Journal of the Atmospheric Science (Mar 1963), 20, 130.
Science quotes on:  |  Bound (120)  |  Chaos Theory (4)  |  Convection (3)  |  Design (203)  |  Different (595)  |  Differential Equation (18)  |  Equation (138)  |  Feasibility (4)  |  Finite (60)  |  Flow (89)  |  Hydrodynamics (5)  |  Light (635)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Modification (57)  |  Nonlinear (4)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Phase (37)  |  Phase Space (2)  |  Possess (157)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Range (104)  |  Represent (157)  |  Respect (212)  |  Result (700)  |  Simple (426)  |  Small (489)  |  Solution (282)  |  Solution. (53)  |  Space (523)  |  State (505)  |  System (545)  |  Unstable (9)  |  Weather (49)  |  Weather Prediction (2)

For a long time it has been known that the first systems of representations with which men have pictured to themselves the world and themselves were of religious origin. There is no religion that is not a cosmology at the same time that it is a speculation upon divine things. If philosophy and the sciences were born of religion, it is because religion began by taking the place of the sciences and philosophy.
The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life (1912), trans. J. W. Swain (2nd edition 1976), 9.
Science quotes on:  |  Cosmology (26)  |  Divine (112)  |  First (1302)  |  Known (453)  |  Origin (250)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Religion (369)  |  Religious (134)  |  Representation (55)  |  Speculation (137)  |  System (545)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  World (1850)

For a modern ruler the laws of conservation and transformation of energy, when the vivifing stream takes its source, the ways it wends its course in nature, and how, under wisdom and knowledge, it may be intertwined with human destiny, instead of careering headlong to the ocean, are a study at least as pregnant with consequences to life as any lesson taught by the long unscientific history of man.
Science and Life (1920), 5.
Science quotes on:  |  Consequence (220)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Course (413)  |  Destiny (54)  |  Energy (373)  |  Energy Conservation (6)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Law (913)  |  Lesson (58)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Modern (402)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Ruler (21)  |  Stream (83)  |  Study (701)  |  Transformation (72)  |  Unscientific (13)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wisdom (235)

For my confirmation, I didn't get a watch and my first pair of long pants, like most Lutheran boys. I got a telescope. My mother thought it would make the best gift.
Quoted in 'Reach For The Stars', Time (17 Feb 1958), 71, 22.
Science quotes on:  |  Best (467)  |  Boy (100)  |  Confirmation (25)  |  First (1302)  |  Gift (105)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mother (116)  |  Telescope (106)  |  Thought (995)  |  Trousers (5)  |  Watch (118)

For the Members of the Assembly having before their eyes so many fatal Instances of the errors and falshoods, in which the greatest part of mankind has so long wandred, because they rely'd upon the strength of humane Reason alone, have begun anew to correct all Hypotheses by sense, as Seamen do their dead Reckonings by Cœlestial Observations; and to this purpose it has been their principal indeavour to enlarge and strengthen the Senses by Medicine, and by such outward Instruments as are proper for their particular works.
Micrographia, or some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies made by Magnifying Glasses with Observations and Inquiries thereupon (1665), preface sig.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Anew (19)  |  Assembly (13)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enlarge (37)  |  Error (339)  |  Eye (440)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Humane (19)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Observation (593)  |  Principal (69)  |  Proper (150)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reckoning (19)  |  Sense (785)  |  Strength (139)  |  Work (1402)

For the most part we humans live with the false impression of security and a feeling of being at home in a seemingly trustworthy physical and human environment. But when the expected course of everyday life is interrupted, we are like shipwrecked people on a miserable plank in the open sea, having forgotten where they came from and not knowing whither they are drifting. But once we fully accept this, life becomes easier and there is no longer any disappointment.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Course (413)  |  Disappointment (18)  |  Drift (14)  |  Easier (53)  |  Easy (213)  |  Environment (239)  |  Everyday (32)  |  Everyday Life (15)  |  Expect (203)  |  False (105)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Forget (125)  |  Forgotten (53)  |  Fully (20)  |  Home (184)  |  Human (1512)  |  Impression (118)  |  Interrupt (6)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Miserable (8)  |  Most (1728)  |  Open (277)  |  Part (235)  |  People (1031)  |  Physical (518)  |  Plank (4)  |  Sea (326)  |  Security (51)  |  Seemingly (28)  |  Shipwreck (8)  |  Trustworthy (14)  |  Whither (11)

For the past 10 years I have had the interesting experience of observing the development of Parkinson's syndrome on myself. As a matter of fact, this condition does not come under my special medical interests or I would have had it solved long ago. … The condition has its compensations: one is not yanked from interesting work to go to the jungles of Burma ... one avoids all kinds of deadly committee meetings, etc.
Article for his 25th anniversary class report. In Barry G. Firkin, Judith A. Whitworth, Dictionary of Medical Eponyms (1996), 5.
Science quotes on:  |  Avoid (123)  |  Condition (362)  |  Deadly (21)  |  Development (441)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Jungle (24)  |  Kind (564)  |  Matter (821)  |  Myself (211)  |  Past (355)  |  Special (188)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)

For the philosopher, order is the entirety of repetitions manifested, in the form of types or of laws, by perceived objects. Order is an intelligible relation. For the biologist, order is a sequence in space and time. However, according to Plato, all things arise out of their opposites. Order was born of the original disorder, and the long evolution responsible for the present biological order necessarily had to engender disorder.
An organism is a molecular society, and biological order is a kind of social order. Social order is opposed to revolution, which is an abrupt change of order, and to anarchy, which is the absence of order.
I am presenting here today both revolution and anarchy, for which I am fortunately not the only one responsible. However, anarchy cannot survive and prosper except in an ordered society, and revolution becomes sooner or later the new order. Viruses have not failed to follow the general law. They are strict parasites which, born of disorder, have created a very remarkable new order to ensure their own perpetuation.
'Interaction Among Virus, Cell, and Organism', Nobel Lecture (11 Dec 1965). In Nobel Lectures: Physiology or Medicine 1963-1970 (1972), 174.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Anarchy (8)  |  Arise (162)  |  Become (821)  |  Biological (137)  |  Biologist (70)  |  Both (496)  |  Cell (146)  |  Change (639)  |  Disorder (45)  |  Ensure (27)  |  Entirety (6)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fail (191)  |  Follow (389)  |  Form (976)  |  General (521)  |  Intelligible (35)  |  Kind (564)  |  Law (913)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  New (1273)  |  Object (438)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Order (638)  |  Organism (231)  |  Parasite (33)  |  Perpetuation (4)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Plato (80)  |  Present (630)  |  Prosper (8)  |  Repetition (29)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Sequence (68)  |  Social (261)  |  Social Order (8)  |  Society (350)  |  Space (523)  |  Space And Time (38)  |  Survive (87)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Today (321)  |  Type (171)  |  Virus (32)

For the saving the long progression of the thoughts to remote and first principles in every case, the mind should provide itself several stages; that is to say, intermediate principles, which it might have recourse to in the examining those positions that come in its way. These, though they are not self-evident principles, yet, if they have been made out from them by a wary and unquestionable deduction, may be depended on as certain and infallible truths, and serve as unquestionable truths to prove other points depending upon them, by a nearer and shorter view than remote and general maxims. … And thus mathematicians do, who do not in every new problem run it back to the first axioms through all the whole train of intermediate propositions. Certain theorems that they have settled to themselves upon sure demonstration, serve to resolve to them multitudes of propositions which depend on them, and are as firmly made out from thence as if the mind went afresh over every link of the whole chain that tie them to first self-evident principles.
In The Conduct of the Understanding, Sect. 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Afresh (4)  |  Axiom (65)  |  Back (395)  |  Case (102)  |  Certain (557)  |  Chain (51)  |  Deduction (90)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Depend (238)  |  Do (1905)  |  Evident (92)  |  Examine (84)  |  Firmly (6)  |  First (1302)  |  General (521)  |  Infallible (18)  |  Intermediate (38)  |  Link (48)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Maxim (19)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Multitude (50)  |  Nature Of Mathematics (80)  |  Nearer (45)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Point (584)  |  Position (83)  |  Principle (530)  |  Problem (731)  |  Progression (23)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Prove (261)  |  Provide (79)  |  Recourse (12)  |  Remote (86)  |  Resolve (43)  |  Run (158)  |  Save (126)  |  Say (989)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Evident (22)  |  Serve (64)  |  Settle (23)  |  Settled (34)  |  Several (33)  |  Short (200)  |  Stage (152)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Tie (42)  |  Train (118)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Unquestionable (10)  |  View (496)  |  Wary (3)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whole (756)

For these two years I have been gravitating towards your doctrines, and since the publication of your primula paper with accelerated velocity. By about this time next year I expect to have shot past you, and to find you pitching into me for being more Darwinian than yourself. However, you have set me going, and must just take the consequences, for I warn you I will stop at no point so long as clear reasoning will take me further.
Thomas Henry Huxley, Leonard Huxley, Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley (1901), 211.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Doctrine (81)  |  Expect (203)  |  Find (1014)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Next (238)  |  Paper (192)  |  Past (355)  |  Point (584)  |  Publication (102)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Set (400)  |  Stop (89)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Velocity (51)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

For we may remark generally of our mathematical researches, that these auxiliary quantities, these long and difficult calculations into which we are often drawn, are almost always proofs that we have not in the beginning considered the objects themselves so thoroughly and directly as their nature requires, since all is abridged and simplified, as soon as we place ourselves in a right point of view.
In Théorie Nouvelle de la Rotation des Corps (1834). As translated by Charles Thomas Whitley in Outlines of a New Theory of Rotatory Motion (1834), 4.
Science quotes on:  |  Abridge (3)  |  Auxiliary (11)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Consider (428)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Direct (228)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Object (438)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Proof (304)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Require (229)  |  Research (753)  |  Right (473)  |  Simplify (14)  |  Soon (187)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thorough (40)  |  Thoroughly (67)  |  View (496)

For, dear me, why abandon a belief
Merely because it ceases to be true.
Cling to it long enough, and not a doubt
It will turn true again, for so it goes.
Most of the change we think we see in life
Is due to truths being in and out of favour.
'The Black Cottage'. In Edward Connery Latham (ed.), The Poetry of Robert Frost (1971), 77.
Science quotes on:  |  Abandon (73)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belief (615)  |  Cease (81)  |  Change (639)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Due (143)  |  Enough (341)  |  Life (1870)  |  Merely (315)  |  Most (1728)  |  See (1094)  |  Think (1122)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Turn (454)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)

Four college students taking a class together, had done so well through the semester, and each had an “A”. They were so confident, the weekend before finals, they went out partying with friends. Consequently, on Monday, they overslept and missed the final. They explained to the professor that they had gone to a remote mountain cabin for the weekend to study, but, unfortunately, they had a flat tire on the way back, didn’t have a spare, and couldn’t get help for a long time. As a result, they missed the final. The professor kindly agreed they could make up the final the following day. When they arrived the next morning, he placed them each in separate rooms, handed each one a test booklet, and told them to begin. The the first problem was simple, worth 5 points. Turning the page they found the next question, written: “(For 95 points): Which tire?”
Anonymous
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Begin (275)  |  Class (168)  |  College (71)  |  Confident (25)  |  Education (423)  |  Exam (5)  |  Excuse (27)  |  Explain (334)  |  Final (121)  |  First (1302)  |  Flat (34)  |  Friend (180)  |  Joke (90)  |  Miss (51)  |  Morning (98)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Next (238)  |  Point (584)  |  Problem (731)  |  Professor (133)  |  Question (649)  |  Remote (86)  |  Result (700)  |  Separate (151)  |  Simple (426)  |  Student (317)  |  Study (701)  |  Test (221)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tire (7)  |  Together (392)  |  Unfortunately (40)  |  Way (1214)  |  Worth (172)

From a long view of the history of mankind—seen from, say, ten thousand years from now—there can be little doubt that the most significant event of the 19th century will be judged as Maxwell’s discovery of the laws of electrodynamics. The American Civil War will pale into provincial insignificance in comparison with this important scientific event of the same decade.
In The Feynman Lectures on Physics (1964), Vol. 2, page 1-11.
Science quotes on:  |  19th Century (41)  |  Century (319)  |  Civil (26)  |  Comparison (108)  |  Decade (66)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Electrodynamics (10)  |  Event (222)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Mankind (15)  |  Insignificance (12)  |  Law (913)  |  Little (717)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  James Clerk Maxwell (91)  |  Most (1728)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Significant (78)  |  Thousand (340)  |  View (496)  |  War (233)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

From common salt are obtained chemically as primary derivatives chlorine—both a war gas and a means of purifying water; and 'caustic soda.' … [O]n the chlorine side there is obtained chloride of lime, (a bleaching powder and a disinfectant), chloroform (an anesthetic), phosgene (a frightful ware gas), chloroacetophenone (another war gas), and an indigo and a yellow dye. [O]n the soda side we get metallic sodium, from which are derived sodium cyanide (a disinfectant), two medicines with [long] names, another war gas, and a beautiful violet dye. Thus, from a healthful, preservative condiment come things useful and hurtful—according to the intent or purpose.
Anonymous
The Homiletic Review, Vol. 83-84 (1922), Vol. 83, 209.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Both (496)  |  Chlorine (15)  |  Chloroform (5)  |  Common (447)  |  Dye (10)  |  Gas (89)  |  Hurtful (8)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Name (359)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Phosgene (2)  |  Powder (9)  |  Primary (82)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Salt (48)  |  Side (236)  |  Sodium (15)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Two (936)  |  Useful (260)  |  Violet (11)  |  War (233)  |  Water (503)  |  Yellow (31)

From very ancient times, the question of the constitution of matter with respect to divisibility has been debated, some adopting the opinion that this divisibility is infinite …. We have absolutely no means at our disposal for deciding such a question, which remains at the present day in the same state as when it first engaged the attention of the Greek philosophers, or perhaps that of the sages of Egypt and Hindostan long before them.
In Elementary Chemistry, Theoretical and Practical (1854), 206. Note: this was the limit of knowledge, or even speculation, decades before the discovery of the nucleus, electron, proton and other particles.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Attention (196)  |  Constitution (78)  |  Debate (40)  |  Divisible (5)  |  Egypt (31)  |  First (1302)  |  Greek (109)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Present (630)  |  Question (649)  |  Remain (355)  |  Respect (212)  |  Sage (25)  |  State (505)  |  Time (1911)

Gauss [replied], when asked how soon he expected to reach certain mathematical conclusions, “that he had them long ago, all he was worrying about was how to reach them.”
In Louis Pasteur, Free Lance of Science (1950), 365. Also excerpted in 'Mechanisms of Discovery', collected in I.S. Gordon and S. Sorkin (eds.) The Armchair Science Reader (1959), 336.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Certain (557)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Expect (203)  |  Carl Friedrich Gauss (79)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Reach (286)  |  Soon (187)

Gel’fand amazed me by talking of mathematics as though it were poetry. He once said about a long paper bristling with formulas that it contained the vague beginnings of an idea which could only hint at and which he had never managed to bring out more clearly. I had always thought of mathematics as being much more straightforward: a formula is a formula, and an algebra is an algebra, but Gel’fand found hedgehogs lurking in the rows of his spectral sequences!
In '1991 Ruth Lyttle Satter Prize', Notices of the American Mathematical Society (Mar 1991), 38, No. 3, 186. This is from her acceptance of the 1991 Ruth Lyttle Satter Prize.
Science quotes on:  |  Algebra (117)  |  Amazed (4)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Beginnings (5)  |  Being (1276)  |  Bring Out (4)  |  Bristle (3)  |  Clearly (45)  |  Contain (68)  |  Find (1014)  |  Formula (102)  |  Hedgehog (4)  |  Hint (21)  |  Idea (881)  |  Lurk (5)  |  Lurking (7)  |  Manage (26)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  More (2558)  |  Never (1089)  |  Paper (192)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Row (9)  |  Sequence (68)  |  Straightforward (10)  |  Talk (108)  |  Talking (76)  |  Thought (995)  |  Vague (50)

Genes make enzymes, and enzymes control the rates of chemical processes. Genes do not make ‘novelty seeking’ or any other complex and overt behavior. Predisposition via a long chain of complex chemical reactions, mediated through a more complex series of life’s circumstances, does not equal identification or even causation.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Behavior (95)  |  Causation (14)  |  Chain (51)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemical Reaction (17)  |  Chemical Reactions (13)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Complex (202)  |  Control (182)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enzyme (19)  |  Equal (88)  |  Gene (105)  |  Identification (20)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mediate (4)  |  More (2558)  |  Novelty (31)  |  Other (2233)  |  Predisposition (4)  |  Process (439)  |  Rate (31)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Seek (218)  |  Series (153)  |  Through (846)

Genetics is to biology what atomic theory is to physics. Its principle is clear: that inheritance is based on particles and not on fluids. Instead of the essence of each parent mixing, with each child the blend of those who made him, information is passed on as a series of units. The bodies of successive generations transport them through time, so that a long-lost character may emerge in a distant descendant. The genes themselves may be older than the species that bear them.
Almost Like a Whale: The Origin of Species Updated (1999), 115.
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic Theory (16)  |  Bear (162)  |  Biology (232)  |  Character (259)  |  Child (333)  |  Descendant (18)  |  Essence (85)  |  Fluid (54)  |  Gene (105)  |  Generation (256)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genetics (105)  |  Information (173)  |  Inheritance (35)  |  Parent (80)  |  Particle (200)  |  Pass (241)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Principle (530)  |  Series (153)  |  Species (435)  |  Successive (73)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Transport (31)

Geologists have not been slow to admit that they were in error in assuming that they had an eternity of past time for the evolution of the earth’s history. They have frankly acknowledged the validity of the physical arguments which go to place more or less definite limits to the antiquity of the earth. They were, on the whole, disposed to acquiesce in the allowance of 100 millions of years granted to them by Lord Kelvin, for the transaction of the whole of the long cycles of geological history. But the physicists have been insatiable and inexorable. As remorseless as Lear’s daughters, they have cut down their grant of years by successive slices, until some of them have brought the number to something less than ten millions. In vain have the geologists protested that there must somewhere be a flaw in a line of argument which tends to results so entirely at variance with the strong evidence for a higher antiquity, furnished not only by the geological record, but by the existing races of plants and animals. They have insisted that this evidence is not mere theory or imagination, but is drawn from a multitude of facts which become hopelessly unintelligible unless sufficient time is admitted for the evolution of geological history. They have not been able to disapprove the arguments of the physicists, but they have contended that the physicists have simply ignored the geological arguments as of no account in the discussion.
'Twenty-five years of Geological Progress in Britain', Nature, 1895, 51, 369.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Age Of The Earth (12)  |  Allowance (6)  |  Animal (651)  |  Antiquity (34)  |  Argument (145)  |  Become (821)  |  Controversy (30)  |  Cut (116)  |  Cycle (42)  |  Daughter (30)  |  Definite (114)  |  Discussion (78)  |  Down (455)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Error (339)  |  Eternity (64)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Flaw (18)  |  Furnish (97)  |  Geologist (82)  |  Grant (76)  |  History (716)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Inexorable (10)  |  Insatiable (7)  |  Baron William Thomson Kelvin (74)  |  Limit (294)  |  Lord (97)  |  More (2558)  |  More Or Less (71)  |  Multitude (50)  |  Must (1525)  |  Number (710)  |  Past (355)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Plant (320)  |  Protest (9)  |  Race (278)  |  Record (161)  |  Result (700)  |  Slow (108)  |  Something (718)  |  Strong (182)  |  Successive (73)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Tend (124)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)  |  Transaction (13)  |  Unintelligible (17)  |  Vain (86)  |  Validity (50)  |  Variance (12)  |  Whole (756)  |  Year (963)

Get a shot off fast. This upsets him long enough to let you make your second shot perfect.
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 257.
Science quotes on:  |  Enough (341)  |  Fast (49)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Second (66)  |  Shoot (21)  |  Upset (18)

Gold is found in our own part of the world; not to mention the gold extracted from the earth in India by the ants, and in Scythia by the Griffins. Among us it is procured in three different ways; the first of which is in the shape of dust, found in running streams. … A second mode of obtaining gold is by sinking shafts or seeking among the debris of mountains …. The third method of obtaining gold surpasses the labors of the giants even: by the aid of galleries driven to a long distance, mountains are excavated by the light of torches, the duration of which forms the set times for work, the workmen never seeing the light of day for many months together.
In Pliny and John Bostock (trans.), The Natural History of Pliny (1857), Vol. 6, 99-101.
Science quotes on:  |  Aid (101)  |  Ant (34)  |  Debris (7)  |  Different (595)  |  Distance (171)  |  Dust (68)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Excavate (4)  |  Extract (40)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Gallery (7)  |  Giant (73)  |  Gold (101)  |  India (23)  |  Labor (200)  |  Light (635)  |  Mention (84)  |  Method (531)  |  Month (91)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Never (1089)  |  Procure (6)  |  Run (158)  |  Running (61)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Seek (218)  |  Set (400)  |  Shaft (5)  |  Stream (83)  |  Surpass (33)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Torch (13)  |  Way (1214)  |  Work (1402)  |  Workman (13)  |  World (1850)

Great is the power of steady misrepresentation - but the history of science shows how, fortunately, this power does not endure long.
Origin of Species (1878), 421.
Science quotes on:  |  Endure (21)  |  Error (339)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Science (80)  |  Misrepresentation (5)  |  Power (771)  |  Show (353)  |  Steady (45)

Hands-on experience at the critical time, not systematic knowledge, is what counts in the making of a naturalist. Better to be an untutored savage for a while, not to know the names or anatomical detail. Better to spend long stretches of time just searching and dreaming.
In Naturalist (1994), 11-12.
Science quotes on:  |  Anatomy (75)  |  Better (493)  |  Count (107)  |  Critical (73)  |  Detail (150)  |  Dreaming (3)  |  Experience (494)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Making (300)  |  Name (359)  |  Naturalist (79)  |  Savage (33)  |  Searching (7)  |  Spend (97)  |  Systematic (58)  |  Time (1911)

Have the changes which lead us from one geologic state to another been, on a long average uniform in their intensity, or have they consisted of epochs of paroxysmal and catastrophic action, interposed between periods of comparative tranquillity? These two opinions will probably for some time divide the geological world into two sects, which may perhaps be designated as the Uniformitarians and the Catastrophists.
In 'Review of Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology', Quarterly Review (1832), 47, 126.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Average (89)  |  Catastrophe (35)  |  Catastrophic (10)  |  Change (639)  |  Consist (223)  |  Divide (77)  |  Epoch (46)  |  Geology (240)  |  Intensity (34)  |  Lead (391)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Period (200)  |  Sect (5)  |  State (505)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Uniformitarian (4)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

He [a student] liked to look at the … remains of queer animals: funny little skulls and bones and disjointed skeletons of strange monsters that must have been remarkable when they were alive … [he] wondered if the long one with the flat, triangular head used to crawl, or hop, or what.
In 'The Great Paste-pot Handicap' Maroon Tales: University of Chicago Stories (1910), 289. Note: the fictional student is in the University of Chicago’s Walker Museum.
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (97)  |  Animal (651)  |  Bone (101)  |  Crawl (9)  |  Disjointed (2)  |  Flat (34)  |  Funny (11)  |  Head (87)  |  Hop (3)  |  Little (717)  |  Look (584)  |  Monster (33)  |  Must (1525)  |  Paleontology (32)  |  Queer (9)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remarkable (50)  |  Skeleton (25)  |  Skull (5)  |  Strange (160)  |  Student (317)  |  Wonder (251)

He had read much, if one considers his long life; but his contemplation was much more than his reading. He was wont to say that if he had read as much as other men he should have known no more than other men.
From 'Thomas Hobbes', in Andrew Clark (ed.) Brief Lives (1898), Vol. 1, 349.
Science quotes on:  |  Consider (428)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Thomas Hobbes (24)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Life (1870)  |  More (2558)  |  Other (2233)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Say (989)

He who would lead a Christ-like life is he who is perfectly and absolutely himself. He may be a great poet, or a great man of science, or a young student at the University, or one who watches sheep upon a moor, or a maker of dramas like Shakespeare, or a thinker about God, like Spinoza. or a child who plays in a garden, or a fisherman who throws his nets into the sea. It does not matter what he is as long as he realises the perfection of the soul that is within him.
In 'The Critic As Artist', Oscariana: Epigrams (1907), 27-28
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Child (333)  |  Christ (17)  |  Drama (24)  |  Dramatist (2)  |  Fisherman (9)  |  Garden (64)  |  God (776)  |  Great (1610)  |  Himself (461)  |  Lead (391)  |  Life (1870)  |  Maker (34)  |  Man (2252)  |  Matter (821)  |  Moor (2)  |  Net (12)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Play (116)  |  Poet (97)  |  Realize (157)  |  Sea (326)  |  Shakespeare (6)  |  Shepherd (6)  |  Soul (235)  |  Spinoza (11)  |  Baruch Spinoza (7)  |  Student (317)  |  Thinker (41)  |  University (130)  |  Young (253)

He, who for an ordinary cause, resigns the fate of his patient to mercury, is a vile enemy to the sick; and, if he is tolerably popular, will, in one successful season, have paved the way for the business of life, for he has enough to do, ever afterward, to stop the mercurial breach of the constitutions of his dilapidated patients. He has thrown himself in fearful proximity to death, and has now to fight him at arm's length as long as the patient maintains a miserable existence.
Quoted by William M. Scribner, 'Treatment of Pneumonia and Croup, Once More, Etc,' in The Medical World (1885), 3, 187.
Science quotes on:  |  Arm (82)  |  Business (156)  |  Cause (561)  |  Constitution (78)  |  Death (406)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enemy (86)  |  Enough (341)  |  Existence (481)  |  Fate (76)  |  Himself (461)  |  Life (1870)  |  Maintain (105)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Mercury (54)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Patient (209)  |  Poison (46)  |  Season (47)  |  Sick (83)  |  Successful (134)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

Heraldry has been contemptuously termed “the science of fools with long memories.”
The Pursuivant of Arms: Or, Heraldry Founded Upon Facts (1873), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Fool (121)  |  Memory (144)  |  Term (357)

Here about the beach I wandered, nourishing a youth sublime
With the fairy tales of science, and the long result of Time.
'Locksley Hall' (1842), collected in Alfred Tennyson and William James Rolfe (ed.) The Poetic and Dramatic Works of Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1898), 90.
Science quotes on:  |  Beach (23)  |  Fairy Tale (7)  |  Nourishment (26)  |  Result (700)  |  Sublime (50)  |  Time (1911)  |  Wander (44)  |  Wandering (6)  |  Youth (109)

Here I most violently want you to
Avoid one fearful error, a vicious flaw.
Don’t think that our bright eyes were made that we
Might look ahead; that hips and knees and ankles
So intricately bend that we might take
Big strides, and the arms are strapped to the sturdy shoulders
And hands are given for servants to each side
That we might use them to support our lives.
All other explanations of this sort
Are twisted, topsy-turvy logic, for
Nothing what is born produces its own use.
Sight was not born before the light of the eyes,
Nor were words and pleas created before the tongue
Rather the tongue's appearance long preceded
Speech, and the ears were formed far earlier than
The sound first heard. To sum up, all the members Existed, I should think, before their use, So use has not caused them to have grown.
On the Nature of Things, trans. Anthony M. Esolen (1995), Book 4, lines 820-8, 145.
Science quotes on:  |  Appearance (145)  |  Arm (82)  |  Arms (37)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Bright (81)  |  Ear (69)  |  Error (339)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Eye (440)  |  First (1302)  |  Flaw (18)  |  Form (976)  |  Light (635)  |  Live (650)  |  Logic (311)  |  Look (584)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Other (2233)  |  Servant (40)  |  Shoulder (33)  |  Side (236)  |  Sight (135)  |  Sound (187)  |  Speech (66)  |  Stride (15)  |  Sum (103)  |  Support (151)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tongue (44)  |  Twist (10)  |  Use (771)  |  Want (504)  |  Word (650)

High in the North in a land called Svithjod there is a mountain. It is a hundred miles long and a hundred miles high and once every thousand years a little bird comes to this mountain to sharpen its beak. When the mountain has thus been worn away a single day of eternity will have passed
In The Story of America (1921). As cited in David Blatner, Spectrums: Our Mind-boggling Universe from Infinitesimal to Infinity (2012), 24.
Science quotes on:  |  Beak (5)  |  Bird (163)  |  Call (781)  |  Eternity (64)  |  High (370)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Infinity (96)  |  Little (717)  |  Mile (43)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Pass (241)  |  Sharpen (22)  |  Single (365)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Will (2350)  |  Worn (5)  |  Year (963)

His mother’s favorite, he [Freud] possessed the self-confidence that told him he would achieve something worth while in life, and the ambition to do so, though for long the direction this would take remained uncertain.
In The Life and Work of Sigmund Freud: The Formative Years and the Great Discoveries, 1856-1900 (1957), 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Ambition (46)  |  Biography (254)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Direction (185)  |  Do (1905)  |  Favorite (37)  |  Sigmund Freud (70)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mother (116)  |  Possess (157)  |  Remain (355)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Confidence (11)  |  Something (718)  |  Uncertain (45)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Worth (172)

Hogwash! … On our way to the moon, and on the moon, I worked as hard as John Young and it took me another six years before I found out the truth about God. In the days of Apollo and long afterwards I still believed in the theory of evolution and rejected the Biblical creation story. [Commenting on an American reporter’s printed intimation that Lunar Module pilots “had less things to do and had time to look out the spaceship’s window, or to explore the surroundings. Afterwards they could not cope with what they had seen, felt and experienced.”]
As quoted in Colin Burgess, Footprints in the Dust: The Epic Voyages of Apollo, 1969-1975 (2010), 422. Burgess introduced the quote with: “Charles Moss Duke Jr. has always been wrongly labeled as the astronaut who found God during his Apollo 16 mission, but even though he did eventually become a born-again Christian, this life-altering epiphany came some years after the event.” Burgess explained that Duke dislikes “misinformed characterizations of himself and his Apollo colleagues and of the religious impact of his own lunar mission.” [The ellipsis in the subject quote spans from one paragraph to the next in Burgess’ book. The ellipsis was added by Webmaster, on the assumption that the word “Hogwash!” belongs with the statement in the following paragraph.]
Science quotes on:  |  Apollo (9)  |  Belief (615)  |  Bible (105)  |  Cope (9)  |  Creation (350)  |  Experience (494)  |  Exploration (161)  |  God (776)  |  Look (584)  |  Moon (252)  |  Reject (67)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Spaceship (5)  |  Story (122)  |  Surroundings (6)  |  Theory Of Evolution (5)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Window (59)  |  Work (1402)  |  Young_Johnwatts (2)

Houston, that may have seemed like a very long final phase. The autotargeting was taking us right into a... crater, with a large number of big boulders and rocks ... and it required... flying manually over the rock field to find a reasonably good area.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Area (33)  |  Big (55)  |  Boulder (8)  |  Crater (8)  |  Field (378)  |  Final (121)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fly (153)  |  Flying (74)  |  Good (906)  |  Houston (5)  |  Large (398)  |  Number (710)  |  Phase (37)  |  Reasonably (3)  |  Require (229)  |  Required (108)  |  Right (473)  |  Rock (176)  |  Seem (150)

How did I discover saccharin? Well, it was partly by accident and partly by study. I had worked a long time on the compound radicals and substitution products of coal tar... One evening I was so interested in my laboratory that I forgot about my supper till quite late, and then rushed off for a meal without stopping to wash my hands. I sat down, broke a piece of bread, and put it to my lips. It tasted unspeakably sweet. I did not ask why it was so, probably because I thought it was some cake or sweetmeat. I rinsed my mouth with water, and dried my moustache with my napkin, when, to my surprise the napkin tasted sweeter than the bread. Then I was puzzled. I again raised my goblet, and, as fortune would have it, applied my mouth where my fingers had touched it before. The water seemed syrup. It flashed on me that I was the cause of the singular universal sweetness, and I accordingly tasted the end of my thumb, and found it surpassed any confectionery I had ever eaten. I saw the whole thing at once. I had discovered some coal tar substance which out-sugared sugar. I dropped my dinner, and ran back to the laboratory. There, in my excitement, I tasted the contents of every beaker and evaporating dish on the table.
Interview with American Analyst. Reprinted in Pacific Record of Medicine and Surgery (1886), 1, No. 3, 78.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Applied (176)  |  Artificial (38)  |  Ask (420)  |  Back (395)  |  Beaker (5)  |  Bread (42)  |  Cake (6)  |  Cause (561)  |  Coal (64)  |  Coal Tar (2)  |  Compound (117)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Down (455)  |  Dropped (17)  |  End (603)  |  Excitement (61)  |  Finger (48)  |  Flash (49)  |  Fortune (50)  |  Interest (416)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Late (119)  |  Meal (19)  |  Mouth (54)  |  Napkin (2)  |  Product (166)  |  Puzzle (46)  |  Radical (28)  |  Research (753)  |  Saccharin (2)  |  Saw (160)  |  Serendipity (17)  |  Singular (24)  |  Study (701)  |  Substance (253)  |  Sugar (26)  |  Supper (10)  |  Surpass (33)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Sweet (40)  |  Sweetness (12)  |  Table (105)  |  Taste (93)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Thumb (18)  |  Time (1911)  |  Touch (146)  |  Universal (198)  |  Wash (23)  |  Water (503)  |  Whole (756)  |  Why (491)  |  Work (1402)

How peacefully he sleep!
Yet may his ever-questing spirit, freed at length
from all the frettings of this little world,
Wander at will among the uncharted stars.
Fairfield his name. Perchance celestial fields
disclosing long sought secrets of the past
Spread 'neath his enraptured gaze
And beasts and men that to his earthly sight
were merely bits of stone shall live again to
gladden those eager eyes.
o let us picture him—enthusiast—scientist—friend—
Seeker of truth and light through all eternity!
New York Sun (13 Nov 1935). Reprinted in 'Henry Fairfield Osborn', Supplement to Natural History (Feb 1936), 37:2, 135. Bound in Kofoid Collection of Pamphlets on Biography, University of California.
Science quotes on:  |  Beast (58)  |  Celestial (53)  |  Enthusiast (9)  |  Eternity (64)  |  Eulogy (2)  |  Eye (440)  |  Field (378)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Friend (180)  |  Gaze (23)  |  Gladness (5)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Live (650)  |  Merely (315)  |  Name (359)  |  Henry Fairfield Osborn (16)  |  Past (355)  |  Picture (148)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Secret (216)  |  Sight (135)  |  Sleep (81)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Spread (86)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Stone (168)  |  Through (846)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Uncharted (10)  |  Wander (44)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

However much we may enlarge our ideas of the time which has elapsed since the Niagara first began to drain the waters of the upper lakes, we have seen that this period was one only of a series, all belonging to the present zoological epoch; or that in which the living testaceous fauna, whether freshwater or marine, had already come into being. If such events can take place while the zoology of the earth remains almost stationary and unaltered, what ages may not be comprehended in those successive tertiary periods during which the Flora and Fauna of the globe have been almost entirely changed. Yet how subordinate a place in the long calendar of geological chronology do the successive tertiary periods themselves occupy! How much more enormous a duration must we assign to many antecedent revolutions of the earth and its inhabitants! No analogy can be found in the natural world to the immense scale of these divisions of past time, unless we contemplate the celestial spaces which have been measured by the astronomer.
Travels in North America (1845), Vol. 1, 51-2.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Already (226)  |  Analogy (76)  |  Astronomer (97)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belonging (36)  |  Calendar (9)  |  Celestial (53)  |  Chronology (9)  |  Division (67)  |  Do (1905)  |  Drain (12)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enlarge (37)  |  Epoch (46)  |  Event (222)  |  First (1302)  |  Freshwater (3)  |  Idea (881)  |  Immense (89)  |  Inhabitant (50)  |  Lake (36)  |  Living (492)  |  Marine Biology (24)  |  Marine Geology (2)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Niagara (8)  |  Niagara Falls (4)  |  Past (355)  |  Period (200)  |  Present (630)  |  Remain (355)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Scale (122)  |  Series (153)  |  Space (523)  |  Stationary (11)  |  Successive (73)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Water (503)  |  World (1850)  |  Zoology (38)

However, all scientific statements and laws have one characteristic in common: they are “true or false” (adequate or inadequate). Roughly speaking, our reaction to them is “yes” or “no.” The scientific way of thinking has a further characteristic. The concepts which it uses to build up its coherent systems are not expressing emotions. For the scientist, there is only “being,” but no wishing, no valuing, no good, no evil; no goal. As long as we remain within the realm of science proper, we can never meet with a sentence of the type: “Thou shalt not lie.” There is something like a Puritan's restraint in the scientist who seeks truth: he keeps away from everything voluntaristic or emotional.
Essays in Physics (1950), 68.
Science quotes on:  |  Adequate (50)  |  Being (1276)  |  Build (211)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Common (447)  |  Concept (242)  |  Emotion (106)  |  Everything (489)  |  Evil (122)  |  False (105)  |  Goal (155)  |  Good (906)  |  Inadequate (20)  |  Law (913)  |  Lie (370)  |  Never (1089)  |  Proper (150)  |  Puritan (3)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Realm (87)  |  Remain (355)  |  Restraint (16)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Seek (218)  |  Something (718)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Statement (148)  |  System (545)  |  Thinking (425)  |  True (239)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Type (171)  |  Use (771)  |  Value (393)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wish (216)

However, if we consider that all the characteristics which have been cited are only differences in degree of structure, may we not suppose that this special condition of organization of man has been gradually acquired at the close of a long period of time, with the aid of circumstances which have proved favorable? What a subject for reflection for those who have the courage to enter into it!
In Recherches sur l'Organization des corps vivans (1802), as translated in Alpheus Spring Packard, Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution: His Life and Work (1901), 363. Packard's italics.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquired (77)  |  Acquisition (46)  |  Aid (101)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Close (77)  |  Condition (362)  |  Consider (428)  |  Courage (82)  |  Degree (277)  |  Difference (355)  |  Enter (145)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Favorable (24)  |  Gradual (30)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Man (2252)  |  Organization (120)  |  Period (200)  |  Prove (261)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Special (188)  |  Structure (365)  |  Subject (543)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Time (1911)

Human civilization is but a few thousand years long. Imagine having the audacity to think that we can devise a program to store lethal radioactive materials for a period of time that is longer than all of human culture to date.
In Jeremy Rifkin and Ted Howard, Entropy: Into the Greenhouse World (1980), 110.
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic Energy (25)  |  Audacity (7)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Culture (157)  |  Devise (16)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Culture (10)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Lethal (4)  |  Material (366)  |  Period (200)  |  Program (57)  |  Radioactive (24)  |  Store (49)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Time (1911)  |  Year (963)

Hurrah for positive science! long live exact demonstration!
In Leaves of Grass (1855), 28.
Science quotes on:  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Exact (75)  |  Live (650)  |  Positive (98)  |  Scientific Method (200)

Hyper-selectionism has been with us for a long time in various guises; for it represents the late nineteenth century’s scientific version of the myth of natural harmony–all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds (all structures well designed for a definite purpose in this case). It is, indeed, the vision of foolish Dr. Pangloss, so vividly satirized by Voltaire in Candide–the world is not necessarily good, but it is the best we could possibly have.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Best (467)  |  Case (102)  |  Century (319)  |  Definite (114)  |  Design (203)  |  Foolish (41)  |  Good (906)  |  Guise (6)  |  Harmony (105)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Late (119)  |  Myth (58)  |  Natural (810)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Nineteenth (5)  |  Possible (560)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Represent (157)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Structure (365)  |  Time (1911)  |  Various (205)  |  Version (7)  |  Vision (127)  |  Vividly (11)  |  Francois Marie Arouet Voltaire (42)  |  World (1850)

I admired Bohr very much. We had long talks together, long talks in which Bohr did practically all the talking.
Recalling his Sep 1926-Feb 1927 stay in Copenhagen.
In History of Twentieth Century Physics (1977), 109. In A. Pais, 'Playing With Equations, the Dirac Way'. Behram N. Kursunoglu (Ed.) and Eugene Paul Wigner (Ed.), Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac: Reminiscences about a Great Physicist (1990), 94.
Science quotes on:  |  Biography (254)  |  Niels Bohr (55)  |  Copenhagen (6)  |  Talking (76)  |  Together (392)

I am a believer in unconscious cerebration. The brain is working all the time, though we do not know it. At night it follows up what we think in the daytime. When I have worked a long time on one thing, I make it a point to bring all the facts regarding it together before I retire; I have often been surprised at the results… We are thinking all the time; it is impossible not to think.
In Orison Swett Marden, 'Bell Telephone Talk: Hints on Success by Alexander G. Bell', How They Succeeded: Life Stories of Successful Men Told by Themselves (1901), 33.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (615)  |  Believer (26)  |  Brain (281)  |  Daytime (3)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Follow (389)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Know (1538)  |  Night (133)  |  Point (584)  |  Result (700)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Unconscious (24)  |  Work (1402)

I am a firm believer in the theory that you can do or be anything that you wish in this world, within reason, if you are prepared to make the sacrifices, think and work hard enough and long enough.
From Cameron Prize Lecture (1928), delivered before the University of Edinburgh. As quoted and cited in Editorial Section, 'Sir Frederick Banting', Canadian Public Health Journal (May 1941), 32, No. 5, 266-267.
Science quotes on:  |  Believer (26)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enough (341)  |  Firm (47)  |  Hard (246)  |  Prepare (44)  |  Reason (766)  |  Sacrifice (58)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Think (1122)  |  Wish (216)  |  Work (1402)  |  Work Hard (14)  |  World (1850)

I am among the most durable and passionate participants in the scientific exploration of the solar system, and I am a long-time advocate of the application of space technology to civil and military purposes of direct benefit to life on Earth and to our national security.
In 'Is Human Spaceflight Obsolete?' Quoted in Issues in Science and Technology (Summer 2004).
Science quotes on:  |  Advocate (20)  |  Application (257)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Civil (26)  |  Direct (228)  |  Durable (7)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Life (1870)  |  Life On Earth (16)  |  Military (45)  |  Most (1728)  |  National Security (3)  |  Participant (6)  |  Passionate (22)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Security (51)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Space (523)  |  System (545)  |  Technology (281)  |  Time (1911)

I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it. I’ve been an atheist for years and years, but somehow I felt it was intellectually unrespectable to say one was an atheist, because it assumed knowledge that one didn't have. Somehow, it was better to say one was a humanist or an agnostic. I finally decided that I’m a creature of emotion as well as of reason. Emotionally, I am an atheist. I don't have the evidence to prove that God doesn’t exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn’t that I don’t want to waste my time.
'Isaac Asimov on Science and the Bible'. In Sidney Hook, et. al. On the Barricades: Religion and Free Inquiry in Conflict (1989), 329.
Science quotes on:  |  Agnostic (10)  |  Atheist (16)  |  Better (493)  |  Biography (254)  |  Creature (242)  |  Emotion (106)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  God (776)  |  Humanist (8)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Prove (261)  |  Reason (766)  |  Say (989)  |  Somehow (48)  |  Suspect (18)  |  Time (1911)  |  Want (504)  |  Waste (109)  |  Year (963)

I am more of a sponge than an inventor. I absorb ideas from every source. I take half-matured schemes for mechanical development and make them practical. I am a sort of middleman between the long-haired and impractical inventor and the hard-headed businessman who measures all things in terms of dollars and cents. My principal business is giving commercial value to the brilliant but misdirected ideas of others.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Absorb (54)  |  Brilliant (57)  |  Business (156)  |  Businessman (4)  |  Cent (5)  |  Commercial (28)  |  Development (441)  |  Dollar (22)  |  Give (208)  |  Hard (246)  |  Hard-Headed (2)  |  Idea (881)  |  Impractical (3)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Measure (241)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Middleman (2)  |  Misdirect (2)  |  More (2558)  |  Other (2233)  |  Practical (225)  |  Principal (69)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Sort (50)  |  Source (101)  |  Sponge (9)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Value (393)

I am now convinced that we have recently become possessed of experimental evidence of the discrete or grained nature of matter, which the atomic hypothesis sought in vain for hundreds and thousands of years. The isolation and counting of gaseous ions, on the one hand, which have crowned with success the long and brilliant researches of J.J. Thomson, and, on the other, agreement of the Brownian movement with the requirements of the kinetic hypothesis, established by many investigators and most conclusively by J. Perrin, justify the most cautious scientist in now speaking of the experimental proof of the atomic nature of matter, The atomic hypothesis is thus raised to the position of a scientifically well-founded theory, and can claim a place in a text-book intended for use as an introduction to the present state of our knowledge of General Chemistry.
In Grundriss der allgemeinen Chemie (4th ed., 1909), Preface, as cited by Erwin N. Hiebert and Hans-Gunther Korber in article on Ostwald in Charles Coulston Gillespie (ed.), Dictionary of Scientific Biography Supplement 1, Vol 15-16, 464.
Science quotes on:  |  Agreement (55)  |  Atom (381)  |  Become (821)  |  Book (413)  |  Brilliant (57)  |  Robert Brown (2)  |  Caution (24)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Claim (154)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Counting (26)  |  Crown (39)  |  Discrete (11)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Gas (89)  |  General (521)  |  Grain (50)  |  Granular (4)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Introduction (37)  |  Investigator (71)  |  Ion (21)  |  Isolation (32)  |  Kinetic (12)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Matter (821)  |  Most (1728)  |  Movement (162)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Other (2233)  |  Jean Perrin (2)  |  Possess (157)  |  Possession (68)  |  Present (630)  |  Proof (304)  |  Recent (78)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Seeking (31)  |  Speaking (118)  |  State (505)  |  Success (327)  |  Text-Book (5)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Sir J.J. Thomson (18)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Use (771)  |  Vain (86)  |  Year (963)

I believe with Schopenhauer that one of the strongest motives that lead men to art and science is escape from everyday life with its painful crudity and hopeless dreariness, from the fetters of one’s own ever shifting desires. A finely tempered nature longs to escape from personal life into the world of objective perception and thought; this desire may be compared with the townsman’s irresistible longing to escape from his noisy, cramped surroundings into the silence of high mountains, where the eye ranges freely through the still, pure air and fondly traces out the restful contours apparently built for eternity.
Address at The Physical Society, Berlin (1918) for Max Planck’s 60th birthday, 'Principles of Research', collected in Essays in Science (1934) 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Apparently (22)  |  Art (680)  |  Belief (615)  |  Built (7)  |  Compared (8)  |  Contour (3)  |  Crudity (4)  |  Desire (212)  |  Dreariness (3)  |  Escape (85)  |  Eternity (64)  |  Everyday (32)  |  Everyday Life (15)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fetter (4)  |  Fetters (7)  |  Finely (3)  |  Freely (13)  |  High (370)  |  Hopeless (17)  |  Hopelessness (6)  |  Irresistible (17)  |  Lead (391)  |  Life (1870)  |  Longing (19)  |  Motive (62)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Noisy (3)  |  Objective (96)  |  Pain (144)  |  Perception (97)  |  Personal (75)  |  Pure (299)  |  Range (104)  |  Restful (2)  |  Schopenhauer (6)  |  Arthur Schopenhauer (19)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Shifting (5)  |  Silence (62)  |  Still (614)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Surrounding (13)  |  Tempered (2)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Trace (109)  |  World (1850)

I believed that, instead of the multiplicity of rules that comprise logic, I would have enough in the following four, as long as I made a firm and steadfast resolution never to fail to observe them.
The first was never to accept anything as true if I did not know clearly that it was so; that is, carefully to avoid prejudice and jumping to conclusions, and to include nothing in my judgments apart from whatever appeared so clearly and distinctly to my mind that I had no opportunity to cast doubt upon it.
The second was to subdivide each on the problems I was about to examine: into as many parts as would be possible and necessary to resolve them better.
The third was to guide my thoughts in an orderly way by beginning, as if by steps, to knowledge of the most complex, and even by assuming an order of the most complex, and even by assuming an order among objects in! cases where there is no natural order among them.
And the final rule was: in all cases, to make such comprehensive enumerations and such general review that I was certain not to omit anything.
The long chains of inferences, all of them simple and easy, that geometers normally use to construct their most difficult demonstrations had given me an opportunity to think that all the things that can fall within the scope of human knowledge follow from each other in a similar way, and as long as one avoids accepting something as true which is not so, and as long as one always observes the order required to deduce them from each other, there cannot be anything so remote that it cannot be reached nor anything so hidden that it cannot be uncovered.
Discourse on Method in Discourse on Method and Related Writings (1637), trans. Desmond M. Clarke, Penguin edition (1999), Part 2, 16.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Accepting (22)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Better (493)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Cast (69)  |  Certain (557)  |  Complex (202)  |  Comprehensive (29)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Construct (129)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Easy (213)  |  Enough (341)  |  Examine (84)  |  Fail (191)  |  Fall (243)  |  Final (121)  |  Firm (47)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  General (521)  |  Guide (107)  |  Human (1512)  |  Include (93)  |  Inference (45)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Logic (311)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Multiplicity (14)  |  Natural (810)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Object (438)  |  Observe (179)  |  Omit (12)  |  Opportunity (95)  |  Order (638)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Other (2233)  |  Possible (560)  |  Prejudice (96)  |  Problem (731)  |  Reach (286)  |  Remote (86)  |  Required (108)  |  Resolution (24)  |  Resolve (43)  |  Review (27)  |  Rule (307)  |  Scope (44)  |  Simple (426)  |  Something (718)  |  Step (234)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Uncover (20)  |  Use (771)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whatever (234)

I can certainly wish for new, large, and properly constructed instruments, and enough of them, but to state where and by what means they are to be procured, this I cannot do. Tycho Brahe has given Mastlin an instrument of metal as a present, which would be very useful if Mastlin could afford the cost of transporting it from the Baltic, and if he could hope that it would travel such a long way undamaged… . One can really ask for nothing better for the observation of the sun than an opening in a tower and a protected place underneath.
As quoted in James Bruce Ross and Mary Martin McLaughlin, The Portable Renaissance Reader (1968), 605.
Science quotes on:  |  Afford (19)  |  Ask (420)  |  Better (493)  |  Tycho Brahe (24)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Construct (129)  |  Cost (94)  |  Damage (38)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enough (341)  |  Hope (321)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Large (398)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Metal (88)  |  New (1273)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Observation (593)  |  Opening (15)  |  Place (192)  |  Present (630)  |  Procure (6)  |  Protect (65)  |  State (505)  |  Sun (407)  |  Telescope (106)  |  Tower (45)  |  Transport (31)  |  Travel (125)  |  Underneath (4)  |  Useful (260)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wish (216)

I can never satisfy myself until I can make a mechanical model of a thing. If I can make a mechanical model, I can understand it. As long as I cannot make a mechanical model all the way through I cannot understand.
From stenographic report by A.S. Hathaway of the Lecture 20 Kelvin presented at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, on 'Molecular Dynamics and the Wave Theory of Light' (1884), 270-271. (Hathaway was a Mathematics fellow there.) This remark is not included in the first typeset publication—a revised version, printed twenty years later, in 1904, as Lord Kelvin’s Baltimore Lectures on Molecular Dynamics and the Wave Theory of Light. The original notes were reproduced by the “papyrograph” process. They are excerpted in Pierre Maurice Marie Duhem, Essays in the History and Philosophy of Science (1996), 55.
Science quotes on:  |  Acceptance (56)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Model (106)  |  Myself (211)  |  Never (1089)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  Understand (648)  |  Way (1214)

I cannot let the year run out without sending you a sign of my continued existence and to extend my sincere wishes for the well-being of you and your dear ones in the New Year. We will not be able to send New Year greetings much longer; but even when we have passed away and have long since decomposed, the bonds that united us in life will remain and we shall be remembered as a not too common example of two men, who truly without envy and jealousy, contended and struggled in the same field, yet nevertheless remained always closely bound in friendship.
Letter from Liebig to Wohler (31 Dec 1871). Quoted in Ralph Oesper, The Human Side of Scientists (1975), 206.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Bond (46)  |  Bound (120)  |  Common (447)  |  Envy (15)  |  Existence (481)  |  Extend (129)  |  Field (378)  |  Friend (180)  |  Friendship (18)  |  Greeting (10)  |  Jealousy (9)  |  Letter (117)  |  Life (1870)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  New (1273)  |  Pass (241)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remember (189)  |  Run (158)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Truly (118)  |  Two (936)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

I cannot serve as an example for younger scientists to follow. What I teach cannot be learned. I have never been a “100 percent scientist.” My reading has always been shamefully nonprofessional. I do not own an attaché case, and therefore cannot carry it home at night, full of journals and papers to read. I like long vacations, and a catalogue of my activities in general would be a scandal in the ears of the apostles of cost-effectiveness. I do not play the recorder, nor do I like to attend NATO workshops on a Greek island or a Sicilian mountain top; this shows that I am not even a molecular biologist. In fact, the list of what I have not got makes up the American Dream. Readers, if any, will conclude rightly that the Gradus ad Parnassum will have to be learned at somebody else’s feet.
In Heraclitean Fire: Sketches from a Life before Nature (1978), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Attend (67)  |  Biography (254)  |  Biologist (70)  |  Carry (130)  |  Conclude (66)  |  Cost (94)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dream (222)  |  Ear (69)  |  Effectiveness (13)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Follow (389)  |  General (521)  |  Greek (109)  |  Home (184)  |  Island (49)  |  Journal (31)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Molecular Biologist (3)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Never (1089)  |  Paper (192)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Show (353)  |  Teach (299)  |  Top (100)  |  Will (2350)  |  Workshop (14)  |  Younger (21)

I cannot write long books; I leave that for those who have nothing to say.
In The Decline and Fall of Science (1976), 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Book (413)  |  Leave (138)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Say (989)  |  Write (250)

I confess freely to you I could never look long upon a Monkey, without very mortifying reflections.
Letter to John Dennis (10 Jul 1695). In William Makepeace Thackeray, Lectures on the English Humourists of the Eighteenth Century (1885), 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Confess (42)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Look (584)  |  Monkey (57)  |  Never (1089)  |  Reflection (93)

I did not expect to find the electric cable in its primitive state, such as it was on leaving the manufactory. The long serpent, covered with the remains of shells, bristling with foraminiferae, was encrusted with a strong coating which served as a protection against all boring mollusks. It lay quietly sheltered from the motions of the sea, and under a favorable pressure for the transmission of the electric spark which passes from Europe to America in .32 of a second. Doubtless this cable will last for a great length of time, for they find that the gutta-percha covering is improved by the sea water.
[Referring to the Transatlantic telegraph cable laid in 1866, as viewed from the fictional submarine Nautilus.]
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Seas, (1874), 285. Translated from the original French edition, Vingt Mille Lieues Sous Les Mers (1870).
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  America (143)  |  Boring (7)  |  Cable (11)  |  Covering (14)  |  Electric (76)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Europe (50)  |  Expect (203)  |  Favorable (24)  |  Find (1014)  |  Great (1610)  |  Gutta-Percha (2)  |  Last (425)  |  Marine Biology (24)  |  Mollusk (6)  |  Motion (320)  |  Nautilus (2)  |  Pressure (69)  |  Primitive (79)  |  Protection (41)  |  Remain (355)  |  Sea (326)  |  Shell (69)  |  Shelter (23)  |  Spark (32)  |  State (505)  |  Strong (182)  |  Submarine (12)  |  Telegraph (45)  |  Time (1911)  |  Transatlantic (4)  |  Transmission (34)  |  View (496)  |  Water (503)  |  Will (2350)

I do not intend to go deeply into the question how far mathematical studies, as the representatives of conscious logical reasoning, should take a more important place in school education. But it is, in reality, one of the questions of the day. In proportion as the range of science extends, its system and organization must be improved, and it must inevitably come about that individual students will find themselves compelled to go through a stricter course of training than grammar is in a position to supply. What strikes me in my own experience with students who pass from our classical schools to scientific and medical studies, is first, a certain laxity in the application of strictly universal laws. The grammatical rules, in which they have been exercised, are for the most part followed by long lists of exceptions; accordingly they are not in the habit of relying implicitly on the certainty of a legitimate deduction from a strictly universal law. Secondly, I find them for the most part too much inclined to trust to authority, even in cases where they might form an independent judgment. In fact, in philological studies, inasmuch as it is seldom possible to take in the whole of the premises at a glance, and inasmuch as the decision of disputed questions often depends on an aesthetic feeling for beauty of expression, or for the genius of the language, attainable only by long training, it must often happen that the student is referred to authorities even by the best teachers. Both faults are traceable to certain indolence and vagueness of thought, the sad effects of which are not confined to subsequent scientific studies. But certainly the best remedy for both is to be found in mathematics, where there is absolute certainty in the reasoning, and no authority is recognized but that of one’s own intelligence.
In 'On the Relation of Natural Science to Science in general', Popular Lectures on Scientific Subjects, translated by E. Atkinson (1900), 25-26.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Accordingly (5)  |  Aesthetic (48)  |  Application (257)  |  Attainable (3)  |  Authority (99)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Best (467)  |  Both (496)  |  Case (102)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Classical (49)  |  Compel (31)  |  Confine (26)  |  Conscious (46)  |  Course (413)  |  Decision (98)  |  Deduction (90)  |  Deeply (17)  |  Depend (238)  |  Dispute (36)  |  Do (1905)  |  Education (423)  |  Effect (414)  |  Exception (74)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Experience (494)  |  Expression (181)  |  Extend (129)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Far (158)  |  Fault (58)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Form (976)  |  Genius (301)  |  Glance (36)  |  Grammar (15)  |  Grammatical (2)  |  Habit (174)  |  Happen (282)  |  Important (229)  |  Improve (64)  |  Inasmuch (5)  |  Inclined (41)  |  Independent (74)  |  Individual (420)  |  Indolence (8)  |  Inevitably (6)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Intend (18)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Language (308)  |  Law (913)  |  Laxity (2)  |  Legitimate (26)  |  List (10)  |  Logical (57)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Medical (31)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Often (109)  |  Organization (120)  |  Part (235)  |  Pass (241)  |  Philological (3)  |  Place (192)  |  Position (83)  |  Possible (560)  |  Premise (40)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Question (649)  |  Range (104)  |  Reality (274)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Refer (14)  |  Rely (12)  |  Remedy (63)  |  Representative (14)  |  Rule (307)  |  Sadness (36)  |  School (227)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Seldom (68)  |  Strict (20)  |  Strictly (13)  |  Strike (72)  |  Student (317)  |  Study (701)  |  Subsequent (34)  |  Supply (100)  |  System (545)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Traceable (5)  |  Training (92)  |  Trust (72)  |  Universal (198)  |  Universal Law (4)  |  Vagueness (15)  |  Value Of Mathematics (60)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)

I don't really care how time is reckoned so long as there is some agreement about it, but I object to being told that I am saving daylight when my reason tells me that I am doing nothing of the kind. I even object to the implication that I am wasting something valuable if I stay in bed after the sun has risen. As an admirer of moonlight I resent the bossy insistence of those who want to reduce my time for enjoying it. At the back of the Daylight Saving scheme I detect the bony, blue-fingered hand of Puritanism, eager to push people into bed earlier, and get them up earlier, to make them healthy, wealthy and wise in spite of themselves.
In The Diary of Samuel Marchbanks (1947), 75.
Science quotes on:  |  Admirer (9)  |  Agreement (55)  |  Back (395)  |  Bed (25)  |  Being (1276)  |  Blue (63)  |  Care (203)  |  Daylight (23)  |  Daylight Saving Time (10)  |  Detect (45)  |  Detection (19)  |  Doing (277)  |  Eager (17)  |  Earlier (9)  |  Enjoyment (37)  |  Finger (48)  |  Hand (149)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Insistence (12)  |  Kind (564)  |  Moonlight (5)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Object (438)  |  People (1031)  |  Push (66)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reckon (31)  |  Reckoning (19)  |  Reduce (100)  |  Reduction (52)  |  Resent (4)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Something (718)  |  Spite (55)  |  Sun (407)  |  Sunrise (14)  |  Tell (344)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Value (393)  |  Want (504)  |  Waste (109)  |  Wealthy (5)  |  Wise (143)

I find in Geology a never failing interest, as [it] has been remarked, it creates the same gran[d] ideas respecting this world, which Astronomy do[es] for the universe.—We have seen much fine scenery that of the Tropics in its glory & luxuriance, exceeds even the language of Humboldt to describe. A Persian writer could alone do justice to it, & if he succeeded he would in England, be called the 'grandfather of all liars'.— But I have seen nothing, which more completely astonished me, than the first sight of a Savage; It was a naked Fuegian his long hair blowing about, his face besmeared with paint. There is in their countenances, an expression, which I believe to those who have not seen it, must be inconceivably wild. Standing on a rock he uttered tones & made gesticulations than which, the cries of domestic animals are far more intelligible.
Letter to Charles Whitley, 23 July 1834. In F. Burkhardt and S. Smith (eds.), The Correspondence of Charles Darwin 1821-1836 (1985), Vol. I, 397.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Animal (651)  |  Anthropology (61)  |  Astonish (39)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Blowing (22)  |  Call (781)  |  Completely (137)  |  Countenance (9)  |  Create (245)  |  Describe (132)  |  Do (1905)  |  Domestic (27)  |  Expression (181)  |  Face (214)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Geology (240)  |  Grandfather (14)  |  Baron Friedrich Wilhelm Christian Karl Ferdinan von Humboldt (5)  |  Idea (881)  |  Intelligible (35)  |  Interest (416)  |  Justice (40)  |  Language (308)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Persian (4)  |  Rock (176)  |  Sight (135)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Tone (22)  |  Universe (900)  |  Wild (96)  |  World (1850)  |  Writer (90)

I found the best ideas usually came, not when one was actively striving for them, but when one was in a more relaxed state… I used to take long solitary walks on Sundays, during which I tended to review the current situation in a leisurely way. Such occasions often proved fruitful, even though (or perhaps, because) the primary purpose of the walk was relaxation and not research.
'Methods in Theoretical Physics', From A Life of Physics: Evening Lectures at the International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy. A Special Supplement of the IAEA Bulletin (1968), 24.
Science quotes on:  |  Autobiography (58)  |  Best (467)  |  Current (122)  |  Fruitful (61)  |  Idea (881)  |  More (2558)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Primary (82)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Research (753)  |  Review (27)  |  Situation (117)  |  State (505)  |  Tend (124)  |  Usually (176)  |  Walk (138)  |  Way (1214)

I had an immense advantage over many others dealing with the problem inasmuch as I had no fixed ideas derived from long-established practice to control and bias my mind, and did not suffer from the general belief that whatever is, is right.
In Sir Henry Bessemer, F.R.S.: An Autobiography (1905), 93.
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (144)  |  Belief (615)  |  Bias (22)  |  Control (182)  |  General (521)  |  Idea (881)  |  Immense (89)  |  Innovation (49)  |  Invention (400)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Other (2233)  |  Practice (212)  |  Problem (731)  |  Right (473)  |  Whatever (234)

I had at one time a very bad fever of which I almost died. In my fever I had a long consistent delirium. I dreamt that I was in Hell, and that Hell is a place full of all those happenings that are improbable but not impossible. The effects of this are curious. Some of the damned, when they first arrive below, imagine that they will beguile the tedium of eternity by games of cards. But they find this impossible, because, whenever a pack is shuffled, it comes out in perfect order, beginning with the Ace of Spades and ending with the King of Hearts. There is a special department of Hell for students of probability. In this department there are many typewriters and many monkeys. Every time that a monkey walks on a typewriter, it types by chance one of Shakespeare's sonnets. There is another place of torment for physicists. In this there are kettles and fires, but when the kettles are put on the fires, the water in them freezes. There are also stuffy rooms. But experience has taught the physicists never to open a window because, when they do, all the air rushes out and leaves the room a vacuum.
'The Metaphysician's Nightmare', Nightmares of Eminent Persons and Other Stories (1954), 38-9.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Arrival (15)  |  Bad (185)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Chance (244)  |  Consistent (50)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Curious (95)  |  Damned (4)  |  Death (406)  |  Delirium (3)  |  Department (93)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dream (222)  |  Effect (414)  |  Eternity (64)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fever (34)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fire (203)  |  First (1302)  |  Freeze (6)  |  Game (104)  |  Happening (59)  |  Heart (243)  |  Hell (32)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Impossibility (60)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Improbable (15)  |  Kettle (3)  |  Monkey (57)  |  Never (1089)  |  Open (277)  |  Opening (15)  |  Order (638)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Probability (135)  |  Room (42)  |  Rush (18)  |  William Shakespeare (109)  |  Shuffle (7)  |  Sonnet (5)  |  Special (188)  |  Student (317)  |  Tedium (3)  |  Time (1911)  |  Torment (18)  |  Type (171)  |  Typewriter (6)  |  Vacuum (41)  |  Walk (138)  |  Water (503)  |  Whenever (81)  |  Will (2350)  |  Window (59)

I hate and fear 'science' because of my conviction that, for long to come if not for ever, it will be the remorseless enemy of mankind. I see it destroying all simplicity and gentleness of life, all the beauty of the world; I see it restoring barbarism under a mask of civilization; I see it darkening men's minds and hardening their hearts.
The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft (1903), 268-9.
Science quotes on:  |  Barbarism (8)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Enemy (86)  |  Fear (212)  |  Gentleness (4)  |  Hate (68)  |  Heart (243)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Mask (12)  |  Mind (1377)  |  See (1094)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

I have always felt that astronomical hypotheses should not be regarded as articles of faith, but should only serve as a framework for astronomical calculations, so that it does not matter whether they were right or wrong, as long as the phenomena can be characterized precisely. For who could possibly be certain as to whether the uneven movement of the sun, if we follow the hypotheses of Ptolemy, can be explained by assuming an epicycle or eccentricity. Both assumptions are plausible. That’s why I would consider it quite desirable for you to tell something about that in the preface. In this way you would appease the Aristotelians and the theologians, whose opposition you dread.
From surviving fragment of a Letter (20 Apr 1541) answering a query from Copernicus as to whether he should publish his book (De Revolutionibus). From the German in Leopold Friedrich Prowe, Nicolaus Coppernicus (1883), Vol. 1, Part 2, 521-522. Translated from Prowe by Webmaster using web resources. Original German: “Hypothesen nicht als Glaubens-Artikel zu betrachten seien, sondern nur als Grundlage für die astronomischen Rechnungen zu dienen hätten, so dass es nicht darauf ankomme, ob sie richtig oder falsch seien, wofern sich nur die Erscheinungen dadurch genau bestimmen liessen. »Denn wer dürfte uns wohl darüber sichere Auskunft geben, ob die ungleiche Bewegung der Sonne, wenn wir den Hypothesen des Ptolemaeus folgen, durch Annahme eines Epicykels oder der Ekcentricität zu erklären sei. Beide Annahmen sind gestattet. Daher würde ich—so schliesst Osiander—es für recht wünschenswerth erachten, wenn Du hierüber in der Vorrede etwas beibrächtest. Auf diese Weise würdest Du die Aristoteliker und die Theologen milder stimmen, von denen Du befürchtest, dass sie heftigen Widerspruch kundthun werden.«” Compare Latin text, from Johannes Kepler, 'Apologia Tychonia', Astronomi Opera Omnia (1858), Vol. 1, 246: “De hypothesibus ego sic sensi semper, non esse articulos fidei, sed fundamenta calculi ita ut, etiamsi falsae sint, modo motuum φαινομενα exacte exhibeant, nihil referat; quis enim nos certiores reddet, an Solis inaequalis motus nomine epicycli an nomine eccentricitatis contingat, si Ptolemaei hypotheses sequamur, cum id possit utrumque. Quare plausibile fore videretur, si hac de re in praefatione nonnihil attingeres. Sic enim placidiores redderes peripatheticos et theologos, quos contradicturos metuis.”
Science quotes on:  |  Allowable (2)  |  Appease (6)  |  Aristotelian (2)  |  Article (22)  |  Assumption (96)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Both (496)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Certain (557)  |  Characterize (22)  |  Consider (428)  |  Desirable (33)  |  Eccentricity (3)  |  Epicycle (4)  |  Explain (334)  |  Faith (209)  |  Fear (212)  |  Follow (389)  |  Framework (33)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Matter (821)  |  Movement (162)  |  Opposition (49)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Plausible (24)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Preface (9)  |  Ptolemy (19)  |  Regard (312)  |  Right (473)  |  Something (718)  |  Sun (407)  |  Tell (344)  |  Theologian (23)  |  Vehement (2)  |  Way (1214)  |  Why (491)  |  Wrong (246)

I have decided today that the United States should proceed at once with the development of an entirely new type of space transportation system designed to help transform the space frontier of the 1970s into familiar territory, easily accessible for human endeavor in the 1980s and ’90s. This system will center on a space vehicle that can shuttle repeatedly from Earth to orbit and back. It will revolutionize transportation into near space, by routinizing it. It will take the astronomical costs out of astronautics. In short, it will go a long way toward delivering the rich benefits of practical space utilization and the valuable spin-offs from space efforts into the daily lives of Americans and all people.
Statement by President Nixon (5 Jan 1972).
Science quotes on:  |  Accessible (27)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Back (395)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Cost (94)  |  Daily (91)  |  Daily Life (18)  |  Decide (50)  |  Deliver (30)  |  Design (203)  |  Development (441)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Easily (36)  |  Effort (243)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  Familiar (47)  |  Frontier (41)  |  Human (1512)  |  Live (650)  |  New (1273)  |  Orbit (85)  |  People (1031)  |  Practical (225)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Repeat (44)  |  Revolutionize (8)  |  Routine (26)  |  Short (200)  |  Shuttle (3)  |  Space (523)  |  Space Shuttle (12)  |  Spin (26)  |  Spin-Off (2)  |  State (505)  |  System (545)  |  Territory (25)  |  Today (321)  |  Transform (74)  |  Transportation (19)  |  Type (171)  |  United States (31)  |  Utilization (16)  |  Utilize (10)  |  Value (393)  |  Vehicle (11)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

I have divers times examined the same matter (human semen) from a healthy man... not from a sick man... nor spoiled by keeping... for a long time and not liquefied after the lapse of some time... but immediately after ejaculation before six beats of the pulse had intervened; and I have seen so great a number of living animalcules... in it, that sometimes more than a thousand were moving about in an amount of material the size of a grain of sand... I saw this vast number of animalcules not all through the semen, but only in the liquid matter adhering to the thicker part.
Letter to W. Brouncker, President of the Royal Society, undated, Nov 1677. In The Collected Letters of Antoni van Leeuwenhoek (1957), Vol. 2, 283-4.
Science quotes on:  |  Amount (153)  |  Animalcule (12)  |  Beat (42)  |  Grain (50)  |  Great (1610)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Human (1512)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Living (492)  |  Man (2252)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Microorganism (29)  |  Microscope (85)  |  More (2558)  |  Number (710)  |  Pulse (22)  |  Sand (63)  |  Saw (160)  |  Semen (5)  |  Sick (83)  |  Sperm (7)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Vast (188)

I have had a fairly long life, above all a very happy one, and I think that I shall be remembered with some regrets and perhaps leave some reputation behind me. What more could I ask? The events in which I am involved will probably save me from the troubles of old age. I shall die in full possession of my faculties, and that is another advantage that I should count among those that I have enjoyed. If I have any distressing thoughts, it is of not having done more for my family; to be unable to give either to them or to you any token of my affection and my gratitude is to be poor indeed.
Letter to Augez de Villiers, undated. Quoted in D. McKie, Antoine Lavoisier: Scientist, Economist, Social Reformer (1952), 303.
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (144)  |  Affection (44)  |  Age (509)  |  Ask (420)  |  Behind (139)  |  Count (107)  |  Death (406)  |  Event (222)  |  Family (101)  |  Gratitude (14)  |  Happy (108)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Involved (90)  |  Letter (117)  |  Life (1870)  |  More (2558)  |  Old (499)  |  Old Age (35)  |  Poor (139)  |  Possession (68)  |  Regret (31)  |  Remember (189)  |  Reputation (33)  |  Save (126)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Token (10)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Will (2350)

I have long aspired to make our company a noble prototype of industry, penetrating in science, reliable in engineering, creative in aesthetics and wholesomely prosperous in economics.
In Alan R. Earls and Nasrin Rohani, Polaroid (2005), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Aesthetic (48)  |  Aesthetics (12)  |  Aspiration (35)  |  Company (63)  |  Creative (144)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Economic (84)  |  Economics (44)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Industry (159)  |  Noble (93)  |  Penetration (18)  |  Prototype (9)  |  Reliability (18)  |  Wholesome (12)

I have long been active in and supportive of conservation and historical preservation causes.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Active (80)  |  Cause (561)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Historical (70)  |  Preservation (39)

I have long been interested in landscape history, and when younger and more robust I used to do much tramping of the English landscape in search of ancient field systems, drove roads, indications of prehistoric settlement. Towns and cities, too, which always retain the ghost of their earlier incarnations beneath today's concrete and glass.
From 'An Interview With Penelope Lively', in a Reading Guide to the book The Photograph on the publisher's Penguin website.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Beneath (68)  |  City (87)  |  Concrete (55)  |  Do (1905)  |  Earlier (9)  |  England (43)  |  Field (378)  |  Ghost (36)  |  Glass (94)  |  History (716)  |  Incarnation (3)  |  Indication (33)  |  Interest (416)  |  Landscape (46)  |  More (2558)  |  Prehistoric (12)  |  Retain (57)  |  Road (71)  |  Search (175)  |  Settlement (3)  |  System (545)  |  Today (321)  |  Town (30)  |  Younger (21)

I have long held an admiration for the work of engineers, a sentiment that is shared by other members of my family.
Opening statement in Speech (25 Jun 2013), for the 2013 Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering.
Science quotes on:  |  Admiration (61)  |  Engineer (136)  |  Family (101)  |  Other (2233)  |  Sentiment (16)  |  Share (82)  |  Work (1402)

I have long held an opinion, almost amounting to conviction, in common I believe with many other lovers of natural knowledge, that the various forms under which the forces of matter are made manifest have one common origin; or, in other words, are so directly related and mutually dependent, that they are convertible, as it were, one into another, and possess equivalents of power in their action.
Paper read to the Royal Institution (20 Nov 1845). 'On the Magnetization of Light and the Illumination of Magnetic Lines of Force', Series 19. In Experimental Researches in Electricity (1855), Vol. 3, 1. Reprinted from Philosophical Transactions (1846), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Belief (615)  |  Common (447)  |  Conservation Of Energy (30)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Dependence (46)  |  Electromagnetism (19)  |  Equivalent (46)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Manifestation (61)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mutual (54)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Origin (250)  |  Other (2233)  |  Possess (157)  |  Possession (68)  |  Power (771)  |  Relationship (114)  |  Various (205)  |  Word (650)

I have long recognized the theory and aesthetic of such comprehensive display: show everything and incite wonder by sheer variety. But I had never realized how power fully the decor of a cabinet museum can promote this goal until I saw the Dublin [Natural History Museum] fixtures redone right ... The exuberance is all of one piece–organic and architectural. I write this essay to offer my warmest congratulations to the Dublin Museum for choosing preservation–a decision not only scientifically right, but also ethically sound and decidedly courageous. The avant-garde is not an exclusive locus of courage; a principled stand within a reconstituted rear unit may call down just as much ridicule and demand equal fortitude. Crowds do not always rush off in admirable or defendable directions.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Admirable (20)  |  Aesthetic (48)  |  Cabinet (5)  |  Call (781)  |  Choose (116)  |  Comprehensive (29)  |  Congratulation (5)  |  Congratulations (3)  |  Courage (82)  |  Crowd (25)  |  Decidedly (2)  |  Decision (98)  |  Demand (131)  |  Direction (185)  |  Display (59)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Dublin (3)  |  Equal (88)  |  Essay (27)  |  Ethically (4)  |  Everything (489)  |  Exclusive (29)  |  Exuberance (3)  |  Fixture (2)  |  Fortitude (2)  |  Fully (20)  |  Goal (155)  |  History (716)  |  Incite (3)  |  Locus (5)  |  Museum (40)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Never (1089)  |  Offer (142)  |  Organic (161)  |  Piece (39)  |  Power (771)  |  Preservation (39)  |  Principle (530)  |  Promote (32)  |  Realize (157)  |  Rear (7)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Reconstitute (2)  |  Ridicule (23)  |  Right (473)  |  Rush (18)  |  Saw (160)  |  Scientifically (3)  |  See (1094)  |  Sheer (9)  |  Show (353)  |  Sound (187)  |  Stand (284)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Unit (36)  |  Variety (138)  |  Warm (74)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Write (250)

I have long since come to see that no one deserves either praise or blame for the ideas that come to him, but only for the actions resulting therefrom. Ideas and beliefs are certainly not voluntary acts. They come to us—we hardly know how or whence, and once they have got possession of us we can not reject or change them at will. It is for the common good that the promulgation of ideas should be free—uninfluenced by either praise or blame, reward or punishment. But the actions which result from our ideas may properly be so treated, because it is only by patient thought and work, that new ideas, if good and true, become adopted and utilized; while, if untrue or if not adequately presented to the world, they are rejected or forgotten.
In 'The Origin of the Theory of Natural Selection', Popular Science Monthly (1909), 74, 400.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Action (342)  |  Become (821)  |  Belief (615)  |  Blame (31)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Change (639)  |  Common (447)  |  Deserve (65)  |  Forgotten (53)  |  Free (239)  |  Good (906)  |  Idea (881)  |  Know (1538)  |  New (1273)  |  Patient (209)  |  Possession (68)  |  Praise (28)  |  Present (630)  |  Promulgation (5)  |  Punishment (14)  |  Reject (67)  |  Rejected (26)  |  Result (700)  |  Reward (72)  |  See (1094)  |  Thought (995)  |  Treated (2)  |  True (239)  |  Untrue (12)  |  Voluntary (6)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

I have no desire to write my own biography, as long as I have strength and means to do better work.
Passages From the Life of a Philosopher (1864), vii.
Science quotes on:  |  Ambition (46)  |  Better (493)  |  Biography (254)  |  Desire (212)  |  Do (1905)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Strength (139)  |  Work (1402)  |  Write (250)

I have seen oaks of many species in many kinds of exposure and soil, but those of Kentucky excel in grandeur all I had ever before beheld. They are broad and dense and bright green. In the leafy bowers and caves of their long branches dwell magnificent avenues of shade, and every tree seems to be blessed with a double portion of strong exulting life.
John Muir
Notebook entry, (2 Sep 1867). In A Thousand-Mile Walk to the Gulf (1916), xix. This was the first day of Muir's journey, which he had began at Louisville, Kentucky.
Science quotes on:  |  Avenue (14)  |  Bless (25)  |  Blessed (20)  |  Bower (2)  |  Branch (155)  |  Bright (81)  |  Grandeur (35)  |  Green (65)  |  Kentucky (4)  |  Kind (564)  |  Leaf (73)  |  Life (1870)  |  Magnificent (46)  |  Oak (16)  |  Portion (86)  |  Shade (35)  |  Soil (98)  |  Species (435)  |  Strong (182)  |  Tree (269)

I have tried to avoid long numerical computations, thereby following Riemann’s postulate that proofs should be given through ideas and not voluminous computations.
In Report on Number Theory (1897). As given in epigraph, without citation, in Eberhard Zeidler and Juergen Quandt (trans.), Nonlinear Functional Analysis and its Applications: IV: Applications to Mathematical Physics (2013), 448.
Science quotes on:  |  Avoid (123)  |  Computation (28)  |  Idea (881)  |  Number (710)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Postulate (42)  |  Proof (304)  |  Bernhard Riemann (7)  |  Through (846)  |  Try (296)

I heard long ago in the Army: Plans are worthless, but planning is everything.
From Speech (14 Nov 1957) to the National Defense Executive Reserve Conference, Washington, D.C., in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States, Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1957 (1999), 818. Note that this is often seen attributed to Eisenhauer, without the introductory clause. Thus, it is not his original idea, though it may be his wording of it.
Science quotes on:  |  Army (35)  |  Everything (489)  |  Plan (122)  |  Planning (21)  |  Worthless (22)

I long to speak out the intense inspiration that comes to me from the lives of strong women. They have made of their lives a great adventure.
In a Journal Fragment (Jan 1917), collected in Margaret Mead, An Anthropologist at Work: Writings of Ruth Benedict (1959, 1966), 140.
Science quotes on:  |  Adventure (69)  |  Great (1610)  |  Inspiration (80)  |  Intensity (34)  |  Live (650)  |  Role Model (9)  |  Speak (240)  |  Strength (139)  |  Strong (182)

I love to do research, I want to do research, I have to do research, and I hate to sit down and begin to do research—I always try to put it off just as long as I can.
In I Want to be a Mathematician: an Automathography (1985), 321.
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Hate (68)  |  Love (328)  |  Research (753)  |  Try (296)  |  Want (504)

I read … that geometry is the art of making no mistakes in long calculations. I think that this is an underestimation of geometry. Our brain has two halves: one is responsible for the multiplication of polynomials and languages, and the other half is responsible for orientation of figures in space and all the things important in real life. Mathematics is geometry when you have to use both halves.
In S.H. Lui, 'An Interview with Vladimir Arnol’d', Notices of the AMS (Apr 1997) 44, No. 4, 438. Reprinted from the Hong Kong Mathematics Society (Feb 1996).
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Both (496)  |  Brain (281)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Figure (162)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Half (63)  |  Important (229)  |  Language (308)  |  Life (1870)  |  Making (300)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Multiplication (46)  |  Orientation (4)  |  Other (2233)  |  Polynomial (2)  |  Read (308)  |  Real Life (8)  |  Responsible (19)  |  Space (523)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Two (936)  |  Underestimate (7)  |  Use (771)

I realized that my prior projects were just finger warm-ups. Now I have to tackle complexity itself. But it took long, before I had assembled the courage to do so.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Assemble (14)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Courage (82)  |  Do (1905)  |  Finger (48)  |  Prior (6)  |  Project (77)  |  Realize (157)  |  Tackle (6)  |  Warm (74)

I saw a horrible brown heap on the floor in the corner, which, but for previous experience in this dismal wise, I might not have suspected to be “the bed.” There was something thrown upon it and I asked what it was. “’Tis the poor craythur that stays here, sur; and ’tis very bad she is, ’tis very bad she’s been this long time, and ’tis better she’ll never be, and ’tis slape she doos all day, and ’tis wake she doos all night, and ‘tis the lead, Sur.” “The what?” “The lead, Sur. Sure, ’tis the lead-mills, where women gets took on at eighteen pence a day, Sur, when they makes application early enough, and is lucky and wanted, and ’tis lead-pisoned she is, Sur, and some of them gits lead-pisoned soon and some of them gets lead-pisoned later, and some but not many, niver, and ’tis all according to the constitooshun, Sur, and some constitooshuns is strong, and some is weak, and her constitooshun is lead-pisoned, bad as can be, Sur, and her brain is coming out at her ear, and it hurts her dreadful, and that’s what it is and niver no more and niver so less, Sur.”
In 'New Uncommercial Samples: A Small Star in the East', All the Year Round (19 Dec 1868), New Series, No. 3, 62.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Application (257)  |  Ask (420)  |  Bad (185)  |  Better (493)  |  Brain (281)  |  Brown (23)  |  Coming (114)  |  Corner (59)  |  Disabled (2)  |  Disease (340)  |  Dreadful (16)  |  Ear (69)  |  Early (196)  |  Enough (341)  |  Experience (494)  |  Lead (391)  |  Lead Poisoning (4)  |  Mill (16)  |  More (2558)  |  Never (1089)  |  Poor (139)  |  Saw (160)  |  Something (718)  |  Soon (187)  |  Strong (182)  |  Time (1911)  |  Want (504)  |  Weak (73)  |  Wise (143)

I say it is impossible that so sensible a people [citizens of Paris], under such circumstances, should have lived so long by the smoky, unwholesome, and enormously expensive light of candles, if they had really known that they might have had as much pure light of the sun for nothing.
[Describing the energy-saving benefit of adopting daylight saving time. (1784)]
'An Economical Project', The Life and Miscellaneous Writings of Benjamin Franklin (1839), 58. A translation of this letter appeared in one of the Paris daily papers about 1784. He estimated, during six months, a saving of over 64 million pound weight of candles, worth over 96 million livres tournois.
Science quotes on:  |  Benefit (123)  |  Candle (32)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Citizen (52)  |  Daylight (23)  |  Daylight Saving Time (10)  |  Energy (373)  |  Expense (21)  |  Free (239)  |  Impossibility (60)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Known (453)  |  Light (635)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Paris (11)  |  People (1031)  |  Pure (299)  |  Saving (20)  |  Say (989)  |  Sense (785)  |  Smoke (32)  |  Sun (407)  |  Time (1911)

I should rejoice to see mathematics taught with that life and animation which the presence and example of her young and buoyant sister [natural and experimental science] could not fail to impart, short roads preferred to long ones.
From Presidential Address (1869) to the British Association, Exeter, Section A, collected in Collected Mathematical Papers of Lames Joseph Sylvester (1908), Vol. 2, 657.
Science quotes on:  |  Animation (6)  |  Buoyant (6)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Experimental Science (3)  |  Fail (191)  |  Impart (24)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Prefer (27)  |  Presence (63)  |  Rejoice (11)  |  Road (71)  |  Science And Mathematics (10)  |  See (1094)  |  Short (200)  |  Sister (8)  |  Teach (299)  |  Teaching of Mathematics (39)  |  Young (253)

I sometimes think there is a malign force loose in the universe that is the social equivalent of cancer, and it’s plastic. It infiltrates everything. It’s metastasis. It gets into every single pore of productive life. I mean there won’t be anything that isn’t made of plastic before long. They’ll be paving the roads with plastic before they’re done. Our bodies, our skeletons, will be replaced with plastic.
From Robert Begiebing, 'Twelfth Round: An Interview with Norman Mailer', collected in J. Michael Lennon (ed.), Conversations with Norman Mailer (1988), 321.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Cancer (61)  |  Equivalent (46)  |  Everything (489)  |  Force (497)  |  Life (1870)  |  Malign (2)  |  Mean (810)  |  Paving (2)  |  Plastic (30)  |  Pore (7)  |  Productive (37)  |  Productivity (23)  |  Road (71)  |  Single (365)  |  Skeleton (25)  |  Social (261)  |  Society (350)  |  Think (1122)  |  Universe (900)  |  Will (2350)

I suppose that I tend to be optimistic about the future of physics. And nothing makes me more optimistic than the discovery of broken symmetries. In the seventh book of the Republic, Plato describes prisoners who are chained in a cave and can see only shadows that things outside cast on the cave wall. When released from the cave at first their eyes hurt, and for a while they think that the shadows they saw in the cave are more real than the objects they now see. But eventually their vision clears, and they can understand how beautiful the real world is. We are in such a cave, imprisoned by the limitations on the sorts of experiments we can do. In particular, we can study matter only at relatively low temperatures, where symmetries are likely to be spontaneously broken, so that nature does not appear very simple or unified. We have not been able to get out of this cave, but by looking long and hard at the shadows on the cave wall, we can at least make out the shapes of symmetries, which though broken, are exact principles governing all phenomena, expressions of the beauty of the world outside.
In Nobel Lecture (8 Dec 1989), 'Conceptual Foundations of the Unified Theory of Weak and Electromagnetic Interactions.' Nobel Lectures: Physics 1971-1980 (1992), 556.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Book (413)  |  Broken (56)  |  Cast (69)  |  Cave (17)  |  Describe (132)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Expression (181)  |  Eye (440)  |  First (1302)  |  Future (467)  |  Governing (20)  |  Hard (246)  |  Limitation (52)  |  Looking (191)  |  Low (86)  |  Matter (821)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Object (438)  |  Outside (141)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Plato (80)  |  Principle (530)  |  Prisoner (8)  |  Reality (274)  |  Republic (16)  |  Saw (160)  |  See (1094)  |  Shadow (73)  |  Shape (77)  |  Simple (426)  |  Study (701)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Symmetry (44)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Tend (124)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Vision (127)  |  Wall (71)  |  World (1850)

I think that we shall have to get accustomed to the idea that we must not look upon science as a 'body of knowledge,' but rather as a system of hypotheses; that is to say, as a system of guesses or anticipations which in principle cannot be justified, but with which we work as long as they stand up to tests, and of which we are never justified in saying that we know they are 'true' or 'more or less certain' or even 'probable.'
The Logic of Scientific Discovery (1959), 317.
Science quotes on:  |  Accustom (52)  |  Accustomed (46)  |  Anticipation (18)  |  Body (557)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Guess (67)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Idea (881)  |  Justification (52)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Look (584)  |  More (2558)  |  More Or Less (71)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  Principle (530)  |  Probability (135)  |  Say (989)  |  Stand (284)  |  System (545)  |  Test (221)  |  Think (1122)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Work (1402)

I think there probably is life, maybe primitive life, in outer space. There might be very primitive life in our solar system—single-cell animals, that sort of thing. We may know the answer to that in five or ten years. There is very likely to be life in other solar systems, in planets around other stars. But we won’t know about that for a long time.
Interview conducted on Scholastic website (20 Nov 1998).
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Answer (389)  |  Know (1538)  |  Know The Answer (9)  |  Life (1870)  |  Other (2233)  |  Planet (402)  |  Primitive (79)  |  Single (365)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Space (523)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  System (545)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Year (963)

I took a good clear piece of Cork and with a Pen-knife sharpen'd as keen as a Razor, I cut a piece of it off, and thereby left the surface of it exceeding smooth, then examining it very diligently with a Microscope, me thought I could perceive it to appear a little porous; but I could not so plainly distinguish them, as to be sure that they were pores, much less what Figure they were of: But judging from the lightness and yielding quality of the Cork, that certainly the texture could not be so curious, but that possibly, if I could use some further diligence, I might find it to be discernable with a Microscope, I with the same sharp Penknife, cut off from the former smooth surface an exceeding thin piece of it with a deep plano-convex Glass, I could exceedingly plainly perceive it to be all perforated and porous, much like a Honey-comb, but that the pores of it were not regular; yet it was not unlike a Honey-comb in these particulars.
First, in that it had a very little solid substance, in comparison of the empty cavity that was contain'd between, ... for the Interstitia or walls (as I may so call them) or partitions of those pores were neer as thin in proportion to their pores as those thin films of Wax in a Honey-comb (which enclose and constitute the sexangular cells) are to theirs.
Next, in that these pores, or cells, were not very deep, but constituted of a great many little Boxes, separated out of one continued long pore, by certain Diaphragms...
I no sooner discerned these (which were indeed the first microscopical pores I ever saw, and perhaps, that were ever seen, for I had not met with any Writer or Person, that had made any mention of them before this) but me thought I had with the discovery of them, presently hinted to me the true and intelligible reason of all the Phænomena of Cork.
Micrographia, or some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies made by Magnifying Glasses with Observations and Inquiries thereupon (1665), 112-6.
Science quotes on:  |  Call (781)  |  Cavity (9)  |  Cell (146)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Comparison (108)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Convex (6)  |  Cork (2)  |  Curious (95)  |  Cut (116)  |  Deep (241)  |  Diligence (22)  |  Discern (35)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Empty (82)  |  Exceedingly (28)  |  Figure (162)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Former (138)  |  Glass (94)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hint (21)  |  Honey (15)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Intelligible (35)  |  Knife (24)  |  Little (717)  |  Mention (84)  |  Microscope (85)  |  Next (238)  |  Pen (21)  |  Person (366)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Quality (139)  |  Reason (766)  |  Regular (48)  |  Saw (160)  |  Sharpen (22)  |  Smooth (34)  |  Solid (119)  |  Substance (253)  |  Surface (223)  |  Thought (995)  |  Use (771)  |  Wall (71)  |  Wax (13)  |  Writer (90)

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)  |  Chaos (99)  |  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)  |  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 used to wonder how it comes about that the electron is negative. Negative-positive—these are perfectly symmetric in physics. There is no reason whatever to prefer one to the other. Then why is the electron negative? I thought about this for a long time and at last all I could think was 'It won the fight!'
Quoted in George Wald, 'The Origin of Optical Activity', Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences (1957), 60, 352-68.
Science quotes on:  |  Charge (63)  |  Electron (96)  |  Last (425)  |  Negative (66)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Positive (98)  |  Reason (766)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Why (491)  |  Wonder (251)

Thomas Edison quote “Afraid of things that worked”, record track background+colorized photo of Edison & tinfoil phonograph
derivative art and colorization © todayinsci.com (Terms of Use) (source)

Please respect the colorization artist’s wishes and do not copy this image for ONLINE use anywhere else.

Thank you.

For offline use, click Terms of Use tab on top menu.

I was always afraid of things that worked the first time. Long experience proved that there were great drawbacks found generally before they could be got commercial; but here was something there was no doubt of.
[Recalling astonishment when his tin-foil cylinder phonograph first played back his voice recording of “Mary had a little lamb.”]
Quoted in Frank Lewis Dyer, Thomas Commerford Martin, Edison: His Life and Inventions (1910), 208.
Science quotes on:  |  Afraid (24)  |  Astonishment (30)  |  Back (395)  |  Commercial (28)  |  Cylinder (11)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Drawback (4)  |  Experience (494)  |  First (1302)  |  Great (1610)  |  Invention (400)  |  Little (717)  |  Phonograph (8)  |  Recording (13)  |  Something (718)  |  Success (327)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tin (18)  |  Work (1402)

I was always very interested in science, and I knew that for me, science was a better long-term career than tennis. So I decided on science when I was in college.
Interview conducted on Scholastic website (20 Nov 1998).
Science quotes on:  |  Better (493)  |  Career (86)  |  College (71)  |  Decide (50)  |  Interest (416)  |  Tennis (8)  |  Term (357)

I was reading in an article on Bizet not long ago that music has ceased to be an art and has become a science—in which event it must have a mathematical future!
In letter to H.E. Krehbiel (1887), collected in Elizabeth Bisland The Writings of Lafcadio Hearn (1922), Vol. 14, 8.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Article (22)  |  Become (821)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Event (222)  |  Future (467)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Music (133)  |  Must (1525)  |  Reading (136)  |  Science And Art (195)

I was sitting writing at my textbook but the work did not progress; my thoughts were elsewhere. I turned my chair to the fire and dozed. Again the atoms were gambolling before my eyes. This time the smaller groups kept modestly in the background. My mental eye, rendered more acute by the repeated visions of the kind, could now distinguish larger structures of manifold confirmation: long rows, sometimes more closely fitted together all twining and twisting in snake like motion. But look! What was that? One of the snakes had seized hold of its own tail, and the form whirled mockingly before my eyes. As if by a flash of lightning I awoke; and this time also I spent the rest of the night in working out the rest of the hypothesis. Let us learn to dream, gentlemen, then perhaps we shall find the truth... But let us beware of publishing our dreams till they have been tested by waking understanding.
Kekule at Benzolfest in Berichte (1890), 23, 1302.
Science quotes on:  |  Aromatic (4)  |  Atom (381)  |  Background (44)  |  Beware (16)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Chair (25)  |  Confirmation (25)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Dream (222)  |  Eye (440)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fire (203)  |  Flash (49)  |  Form (976)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Kind (564)  |  Learn (672)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Look (584)  |  Manifold (23)  |  Mental (179)  |  Molecule (185)  |  More (2558)  |  Motion (320)  |  Progress (492)  |  Render (96)  |  Rest (287)  |  Ring (18)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Snake (29)  |  Spent (85)  |  Structure (365)  |  Test (221)  |  Textbook (39)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Turn (454)  |  Twisting (3)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Verification (32)  |  Vision (127)  |  Waking (17)  |  Whirl (10)  |  Work (1402)  |  Writing (192)

I was suffering from a sharp attack of intermittent fever, and every day during the cold and succeeding hot fits had to lie down for several hours, during which time I had nothing to do but to think over any subjects then particularly interesting me. One day something brought to my recollection Malthus's 'Principles of Population', which I had read about twelve years before. I thought of his clear exposition of 'the positive checks to increase'—disease, accidents, war, and famine—which keep down the population of savage races to so much lower an average than that of more civilized peoples. It then occurred to me that these causes or their equivalents are continually acting in the case of animals also; and as animals usually breed much more rapidly than does mankind, the destruction every year from these causes must be enormous in order to keep down the numbers of each species, since they evidently do not increase regularly from year to year, as otherwise the world would long ago have been densely crowded with those that breed most quickly. Vaguely thinking over the enormous and constant destruction which this implied, it occurred to me to ask the question, Why do some die and some live? The answer was clearly, that on the whole the best fitted live. From the effects of disease the most healthy escaped; from enemies, the strongest, swiftest, or the most cunning; from famine, the best hunters or those with the best digestion; and so on. Then it suddenly flashed upon me that this self-acting process would necessarily improve the race, because in every generation the inferior would inevitably be killed off and the superior would remain—that is, the fittest would survive.
[The phrase 'survival of the fittest,' suggested by the writings of Thomas Robert Malthus, was expressed in those words by Herbert Spencer in 1865. Wallace saw the term in correspondence from Charles Darwin the following year, 1866. However, Wallace did not publish anything on his use of the expression until very much later, and his recollection is likely flawed.]
My Life: A Record of Events and Opinions (1905), Vol. 1, 361-362, or in reprint (2004), 190.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Animal (651)  |  Answer (389)  |  Ask (420)  |  Attack (86)  |  Average (89)  |  Best (467)  |  Cause (561)  |  Cold (115)  |  Constant (148)  |  Correspondence (24)  |  Cunning (17)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Digestion (29)  |  Disease (340)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Effect (414)  |  Equivalent (46)  |  Evidently (26)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Express (192)  |  Expression (181)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Famine (18)  |  Fever (34)  |  Fit (139)  |  Flash (49)  |  Flaw (18)  |  Generation (256)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Hot (63)  |  Hour (192)  |  Hunter (28)  |  Increase (225)  |  Inferior (37)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Kill (100)  |  Lie (370)  |  Live (650)  |  Thomas Robert Malthus (13)  |  Mankind (356)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Number (710)  |  Order (638)  |  People (1031)  |  Phrase (61)  |  Population (115)  |  Positive (98)  |  Principle (530)  |  Process (439)  |  Question (649)  |  Race (278)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  Read (308)  |  Remain (355)  |  Saw (160)  |  Self (268)  |  Small (489)  |  Something (718)  |  Species (435)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Subject (543)  |  Succeeding (14)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Suffering (68)  |  Superior (88)  |  Survival (105)  |  Survival Of The Fittest (43)  |  Survive (87)  |  Term (357)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Use (771)  |  Usually (176)  |  War (233)  |  Whole (756)  |  Why (491)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)  |  Writing (192)  |  Year (963)

I was working with these very long-chain … extended-chain polymers, where you had a lot of benzene rings in them. … Transforming a polymer solution from a liquid to a fiber requires a process called spinning. … We spun it and it spun beautifully. It [Kevlar] was very strong and very stiff—unlike anything we had made before. I knew that I had made a discovery. I didn’t shout “Eureka!” but I was very excited, as was the whole laboratory excited, and management was excited, because we were looking for something new. Something different. And this was it.
From transcript for video interview (2007, published Aug 2012), 'Stephanie Kwolek: Curiosity and the Discovery of Kevlar', in the series Women in Chemistry, on Chemical Heritage Foundation website.
Science quotes on:  |  Benzene (7)  |  Call (781)  |  Different (595)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Eureka (13)  |  Excitement (61)  |  Extend (129)  |  Fiber (16)  |  Invention (400)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Looking (191)  |  Lot (151)  |  Management (23)  |  New (1273)  |  Polymer (4)  |  Process (439)  |  Require (229)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Research (753)  |  Ring (18)  |  Shout (25)  |  Solution (282)  |  Something (718)  |  Spinning (18)  |  Stiff (3)  |  Strong (182)  |  Transforming (4)  |  Whole (756)

I wish there was a verb to otter, ottering around in pure play, to honour Otter ludens, which plays in my mind long after I’ve seen one.
In 'Fifty Years On, the Silence of Rachel Carson’s Spring Consumes Us', The Guardian (25 Sep 2012),
Science quotes on:  |  Honor (57)  |  Honour (58)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Otter (2)  |  Play (116)  |  Pure (299)  |  Wish (216)  |  Word (650)

I would never use a long word, even, where a short one would answer the purpose. I know there are professors in this country who “ligate” arteries. Other surgeons only tie them, and it stops the bleeding just as well.
'Scholastic and Bedside Teaching', Introductory Lecture to the Medical Class of Harvard University (6 Nov 1867). In Medical Essays 1842-1882 (1891), 302.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Country (269)  |  Know (1538)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Other (2233)  |  Professor (133)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Short (200)  |  Surgeon (64)  |  Surgery (54)  |  Tie (42)  |  Use (771)  |  Word (650)

I would picture myself as a virus, or as a cancer cell, for example, and try to sense what it would be like to be either. I would also imagine myself as the immune system, and I would try to reconstruct what I would do as an immune system engaged in combating a virus or cancer cell. When I had played through a series of such scenarios on a particular problem and had acquired new insights, I would design laboratory experiments accordingly… Based upon the results of the experiment, I would then know what question to ask next… When I observed phenomena in the laboratory that I did not understand, I would also ask questions as if interrogating myself: “Why would I do that if I were a virus or a cancer cell, or the immune system?” Before long, this internal dialogue became second nature to me; I found that my mind worked this way all the time.
In Anatomy of Reality: Merging of Intuition and Reason (1983), 7, footnote b, as quoted and cited in Roger Frantz, Two Minds: Intuition and Analysis in the History of Economic Thought (2006), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquired (77)  |  Ask (420)  |  Cancer (61)  |  Cell (146)  |  Combat (16)  |  Design (203)  |  Dialogue (10)  |  Do (1905)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Immune System (3)  |  Insight (107)  |  Internal (69)  |  Interrogate (4)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Know (1538)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Myself (211)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Next (238)  |  Observe (179)  |  Observed (149)  |  Picture (148)  |  Problem (731)  |  Question (649)  |  Result (700)  |  Scenario (3)  |  Second Nature (3)  |  Sense (785)  |  Series (153)  |  System (545)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Try (296)  |  Understand (648)  |  Virus (32)  |  Way (1214)  |  Why (491)  |  Work (1402)

I’m addicted to the entire planet. I don’t want to leave it. I want to get down into it. I want to say hello. On the beach, I could have stopped all day long and looked at those damned shells, looked for all the messages that come not in bottles but in shells...
In Encounters with the Archdruid (1971), 144.
Science quotes on:  |  Addict (4)  |  Beach (23)  |  Bottle (17)  |  Damn (12)  |  Down (455)  |  Entire (50)  |  Leave (138)  |  Look (584)  |  Message (53)  |  Planet (402)  |  Say (989)  |  Shell (69)  |  Stop (89)  |  Want (504)

I’m such a long-term investor, I’ve never really let go and celebrated what I did with the Hubble telescope.
Interview (22 May 1997). On Academy of Achievement website.
Science quotes on:  |  Celebration (7)  |  Hubble Space Telescope (9)  |  Long-Term (11)  |  Never (1089)  |  Telescope (106)  |  Term (357)

If a man, holding a belief which he was taught in childhood or persuaded of afterwards, keeps down and pushes away any doubts which arise about it in his mind, purposely avoids the reading of books and the company of men that call in question or discuss it, and regards as impious those questions which cannot easily be asked without disturbing it—the life of that man is one long sin against mankind.
In 'The Ethics of Belief', Contemporary Review (Jan 1877), collected in Leslie Stephen and Frederick Pollock (eds.), Lectures and Essays: By the Late William Kingdon Clifford, F.R.S. (1886), 346.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Arise (162)  |  Ask (420)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Belief (615)  |  Book (413)  |  Call (781)  |  Childhood (42)  |  Company (63)  |  Discuss (26)  |  Disturb (31)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Down (455)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Persuade (11)  |  Question (649)  |  Reading (136)  |  Regard (312)  |  Sin (45)

If a Schirrus by long standing, increasing, and motion of the adjacent Parts is thus moved, that the neighbouring Vessels around its edges begin to inflame, it’s become malignant, and from its likeness to a Crab, is now called a Cancer, or Carcinoma.
Aphorism No. 492 in Boerhaave’s Aphorisms: Concerning The Knowledge and Cure of Diseases (1715), 113.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Begin (275)  |  Call (781)  |  Cancer (61)  |  Carcinoma (3)  |  Crab (6)  |  Edge (51)  |  Inflammation (7)  |  Likeness (18)  |  Malignant (3)  |  Motion (320)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Vessel (63)

If a small animal and a lighted candle be placed in a closed flask, so that no air can enter, in a short time the candle will go out, nor will the animal long survive. ... The animal is not suffocated by the smoke of the candle. ... The reason why the animal can live some time after the candle has gone out seems to be that the flame needs a continuous rapid and full supply of nitro-aereal particles. ... For animals, a less aereal spirit is sufficient. ... The movements of the lungs help not a little towards sucking in aereal particles which may remain in said flask and towards transferring them to the blood of the animal.
Remarking (a hundred years before Priestley identified oxygen) that a component of the air is taken into the blood.
Quoted in William Stirling, Some Apostles of Physiology (1902), 45.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Animal (651)  |  Blood (144)  |  Candle (32)  |  Closed (38)  |  Component (51)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Enter (145)  |  Flame (44)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Live (650)  |  Lung (37)  |  Movement (162)  |  Oxygen (77)  |  Particle (200)  |  Reason (766)  |  Remain (355)  |  Respiration (14)  |  Short (200)  |  Small (489)  |  Smoke (32)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Supply (100)  |  Survive (87)  |  Time (1911)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

If entropy must constantly and continuously increase, then the universe is remorselessly running down, thus setting a limit (a long one, to be sure) on the existence of humanity. To some human beings, this ultimate end poses itself almost as a threat to their personal immortality, or as a denial of the omnipotence of God. There is, therefore, a strong emotional urge to deny that entropy must increase.
In Asimov on Physics (1976), 141. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 279.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Denial (20)  |  Deny (71)  |  Down (455)  |  Emotion (106)  |  End (603)  |  Entropy (46)  |  Existence (481)  |  God (776)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Immortality (11)  |  Increase (225)  |  Limit (294)  |  Must (1525)  |  Omnipotence (4)  |  Running (61)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Setting (44)  |  Strong (182)  |  Threat (36)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Universe (900)

If gold medals and prizes were awarded to institutions instead of individuals, the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital of 30 years ago would have qualified. The ruling board and administrative structure of that hospital did not falter in their support of the quixotic objective of treating end-stage renal disease despite a long list of tragic failures that resulted from these early efforts.
In Tore Frängsmyr and Jan E. Lindsten (eds.), Nobel Lectures: Physiology Or Medicine: 1981-1990 (1993), 558.
Science quotes on:  |  Administrator (11)  |  Award (13)  |  Board (13)  |  Brigham Hospital (2)  |  Disease (340)  |  Early (196)  |  Effort (243)  |  End (603)  |  Failure (176)  |  Gold (101)  |  Gold Medal (2)  |  Hospital (45)  |  Individual (420)  |  Institution (73)  |  Nobel Prize (42)  |  Objective (96)  |  Qualified (12)  |  Qualify (6)  |  Renal (4)  |  Result (700)  |  Stage (152)  |  Structure (365)  |  Support (151)  |  Tragic (19)  |  Treatment (135)  |  Year (963)

If it were possible for a metaphysician to be a golfer, he might perhaps occasionally notice that his ball, instead of moving forward in a vertical plane (like the generality of projectiles, such as brickbats and cricket balls), skewed away gradually to the right. If he did notice it, his methods would naturally lead him to content himself with his caddies’s remark-“ye heeled that yin,” or “Ye jist sliced it.” … But a scientific man is not to be put off with such flimsy verbiage as that. He must know more. What is “Heeling”, what is “slicing”, and why would either operation (if it could be thoroughly carried out) send a ball as if to cover point, thence to long slip, and finally behind back-stop? These, as Falstaff said, are “questions to be asked.”
In 'The Unwritten Chapter on Golf, Nature (1887), 36, 502.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Back (395)  |  Ball (64)  |  Behind (139)  |  Contentment (11)  |  Cricket (8)  |  Flimsy (2)  |  Forward (104)  |  Generality (45)  |  Generalization (61)  |  Golfer (3)  |  Gradual (30)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Himself (461)  |  Know (1538)  |  Lead (391)  |  Man (2252)  |  Metaphysician (7)  |  Method (531)  |  More (2558)  |  Movement (162)  |  Must (1525)  |  Notice (81)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Operation (221)  |  Plane (22)  |  Point (584)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Possible (560)  |  Projection (5)  |  Question (649)  |  Right (473)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Thoroughly (67)  |  Verbiage (3)  |  Vertical (4)  |  Why (491)

If it were possible to transfer the methods of physical or of biological science directly to the study of man, the transfer would long ago have been made ... We have failed not for lack of hypotheses which equate man with the rest of the universe, but for lack of a hypothesis (short of animism) which provides for the peculiar divergence of man ... Let me now state my belief that the peculiar factor in man which forbids our explaining his actions upon the ordinary plane of biology is a highly specialized and unstable biological complex, and that this factor is none other than language.
Linguistics as a Science (1930), 555.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Belief (615)  |  Biological (137)  |  Biology (232)  |  Complex (202)  |  Divergence (6)  |  Fail (191)  |  Forbid (14)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Lack (127)  |  Language (308)  |  Man (2252)  |  Method (531)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Other (2233)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Physical (518)  |  Possible (560)  |  Rest (287)  |  Short (200)  |  State (505)  |  Study (701)  |  Transfer (21)  |  Universe (900)

If Melancholy increases so far, that from the great motion of the Liquid of the Brain the Patient be thrown into a wild Fury, it is call’d Madness.… The greatest Remedy for it is to throw the Patient unwarily into the Sea, and to keep him under Water as long as he can possibly bear without being quite stifled.
Aphorism No. 1118 and 1123 in Boerhaave’s Aphorisms: Concerning The Knowledge and Cure of Diseases (1715), 302-303.
Science quotes on:  |  Bear (162)  |  Being (1276)  |  Brain (281)  |  Call (781)  |  Depression (26)  |  Fury (6)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Increase (225)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Madness (33)  |  Melancholy (17)  |  Motion (320)  |  Patient (209)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Remedy (63)  |  Sea (326)  |  Stifled (2)  |  Throw (45)  |  Water (503)  |  Wild (96)

If one be bird-witted, that is easily distracted and unable to keep his attention as long as he should, mathematics provides a remedy; for in them if the mind be caught away but a moment, the demonstration has to be commenced anew.
In De Augmentis, Bk. 6; Advancement of Learning, Bk. 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Anew (19)  |  Attention (196)  |  Bird (163)  |  Catch (34)  |  Commence (5)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Distract (6)  |  Easily (36)  |  Keep (104)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Moment (260)  |  Provide (79)  |  Remedy (63)  |  Unable (25)  |  Value Of Mathematics (60)  |  Wit (61)

If patterns of ones and zeros were “like” patterns of human lives and death, if everything about an individual could be represented in a computer record by a long string of ones and zeros, then what kind of creature would be represented by a long string of lives and deaths?
Vineland (1900, 1997), 90.
Science quotes on:  |  Binary (12)  |  Computer (131)  |  Creature (242)  |  Death (406)  |  Everything (489)  |  Human (1512)  |  Individual (420)  |  Kind (564)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Pattern (116)  |  Record (161)  |  Represent (157)  |  String (22)  |  Zero (38)

If seeds in the black Earth can turn into such beautiful roses what might not the heart of man become in its long journey towards the stars?
As quoted in Maisie Ward, Return to Chesterton (1952), 161.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Become (821)  |  Black (46)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Heart (243)  |  Journey (48)  |  Man (2252)  |  Rose (36)  |  Seed (97)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Turn (454)

If they should make the standard for the measure, we call a Chancellor’s foot; what an uncertain measure would this be? One Chancellor has a long foot, another a short foot, a third an indifferent foot.
In John Selden, Richard Milward (ed.), 'Equity', Table-Talk of John Selden (1689), 18.
Science quotes on:  |  Call (781)  |  Chancellor (8)  |  Foot (65)  |  Indifferent (17)  |  Measure (241)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Short (200)  |  Standard (64)  |  Third (17)  |  Uncertain (45)  |  Unit (36)

If this fire determined by the sun, be received on the blackest known bodies, its heat will be long retain'd therein; and hence such bodies are the soonest and the strongest heated by the flame fire, as also the quickest dried, after having been moisten'd with water; and it may be added, that they also burn by much the readiest: all which points are confirm'd by daily observations. Let a piece of cloth be hung in the air, open to the sun, one part of it dyed black, another part of a white colour, others of scarlet, and diverse other colours; the black part will always be found to heat the most, and the quickest of all; and the others will each be found to heat more slowly, by how much they reflect the rays more strongly to the eye; thus the white will warm the slowest of them all, and next to that the red, and so of the rest in proportion, as their colour is brighter or weaker.
A New Method of Chemistry, 2nd edition (1741), 262.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Black Body (2)  |  Burn (99)  |  Confirm (58)  |  Daily (91)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fire (203)  |  Flame (44)  |  Heat (180)  |  Known (453)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Next (238)  |  Observation (593)  |  Open (277)  |  Other (2233)  |  Point (584)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Ray (115)  |  Rest (287)  |  Retain (57)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Sun (407)  |  Warm (74)  |  Water (503)  |  White (132)  |  Will (2350)

If we can combine our knowledge of science with the wisdom of wildness, if we can nurture civilization through roots in the primitive, man’s potentialities appear to be unbounded, Through this evolving awareness, and his awareness of that awareness, he can emerge with the miraculous—to which we can attach what better name than “God”? And in this merging, as long sensed by intuition but still only vaguely perceived by rationality, experience may travel without need for accompanying life.
A Letter From Lindbergh', Life (4 Jul 1969), 61. In Eugene C. Gerhart, Quote it Completely! (1998), 409.
Science quotes on:  |  Accompany (22)  |  Attach (57)  |  Awareness (42)  |  Better (493)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Combine (58)  |  Experience (494)  |  God (776)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Miracle (85)  |  Name (359)  |  Nurture (17)  |  Potential (75)  |  Primitive (79)  |  Rationality (25)  |  Root (121)  |  Still (614)  |  Through (846)  |  Travel (125)  |  Wildness (6)  |  Wisdom (235)

If we examine the accomplishments of man in his most advanced endeavors, in theory and in practice, we find that the cell has done all this long before him, with greater resourcefulness and much greater efficiency.
Nobel Lecture, The Coming Age of the Cell, 12 Dec 1974
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Cell (146)  |  Efficiency (46)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  Examine (84)  |  Find (1014)  |  Greater (288)  |  Man (2252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Practice (212)  |  Resourcefulness (2)  |  Theory (1015)

If we long to believe that the stars rise and set for us, that we are the reason there is a Universe, does science do us a disservice in deflating our conceits
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (615)  |  Conceit (15)  |  Deflate (2)  |  Disservice (4)  |  Do (1905)  |  Reason (766)  |  Rise (169)  |  Set (400)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Universe (900)

If you dream of something worth doing and then simply go to work on it and don't think anything of personalities, or emotional conflicts, or of money, or of family distractions; if you think of, detail by detail, what you have to do next, it is a wonderful dream even though the end is a long way off, for there are about five thousand steps to be taken before we realize it; and [when you] start taking the first ten, and ... twenty after that, it is amazing how quickly you get through through the four thousand [nine hundred] and ninety. The last ten steps you never seem to work out. But you keep on coming nearer to giving the world something.
Victor K. McElheny, Insisting on the Impossible (1999), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Amazing (35)  |  Coming (114)  |  Conflict (77)  |  Detail (150)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Dream (222)  |  End (603)  |  Family (101)  |  First (1302)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Last (425)  |  Money (178)  |  Nearer (45)  |  Never (1089)  |  Next (238)  |  Realize (157)  |  Something (718)  |  Start (237)  |  Step (234)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Through (846)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)  |  Worth (172)

If you know how to make chemical or electrical energy out of solar energy the way plants do it—without going through a heat engine—that is certainly a trick. And I’m sure we can do it. It’s just a question of how long it will take to solve the technical question.
As quoted in 'Melvin Calvin and Photosynthesis', Science Matters@Berkeley, 2, No. 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Certainly (185)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Do (1905)  |  Electrical (57)  |  Energy (373)  |  Engine (99)  |  Heat (180)  |  Heat Engine (4)  |  Know (1538)  |  Plant (320)  |  Question (649)  |  Solar (8)  |  Solar Energy (21)  |  Solve (145)  |  Technology (281)  |  Through (846)  |  Trick (36)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

If you know you're right, you don't care. You know that sooner or later, it will come out in the wash.
When asked about the long delay in recognition for her discovery.
Quoted in Thomson Gale (Online), 'Barbara McClintock', World of Biology. Also quoted in Claudia Wallis, 'Honoring a Modern Mendel', Time (24 Oct 1983), 43-4.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Autobiography (58)  |  Care (203)  |  Delay (21)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Know (1538)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Right (473)  |  Wash (23)  |  Will (2350)

If you're going to spend a long time locked in somebody's basement, take a professor with you.
Speaking at Westfield State College's 157th Commencement. Quoted on webpage www.wsc.ma.edu/math/faculty/fleron/quotes.
Science quotes on:  |  Hostage (2)  |  Professor (133)  |  Spend (97)  |  Time (1911)

Imagine that … the world is something like a great chess game being played by the gods, and we are observers of the game. … If we watch long enough, we may eventually catch on to a few of the rules…. However, we might not be able to understand why a particular move is made in the game, merely because it is too complicated and our minds are limited…. We must limit ourselves to the more basic question of the rules of the game.
If we know the rules, we consider that we “understand” the world.
In 'Basic Physics', The Feynman Lectures on Physics (1964, 2013), Vol. 1, 2-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Basic (144)  |  Being (1276)  |  Chess (27)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Consider (428)  |  Enough (341)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Game (104)  |  God (776)  |  Great (1610)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Know (1538)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Merely (315)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Move (223)  |  Must (1525)  |  Observer (48)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Play (116)  |  Question (649)  |  Rule (307)  |  Something (718)  |  Understand (648)  |  Watch (118)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)

In a moment the ashes are made, but a forest is a long time growing.
Momento fit cinis: diu sylva.
Cited as from Quæstionum Naturalium, Book III. 27 in Kate Louise Roberts (ed.) Hoyt’s New Cyclopedia of Practical Quotations (1922), 798.
Science quotes on:  |  Ash (21)  |  Deforestation (50)  |  Fit (139)  |  Forest (161)  |  Grow (247)  |  Growing (99)  |  Moment (260)  |  Time (1911)

In attempting to discover how much blood passes from the veins into the arteries I made dissections of living animals, opened up arteries in them, and carried out various other investigations. I also considered the symmetry and size of the ventricles of the heart and of the vessels which enter and leave them (since Nature, who does nothing purposelessly, would not purposelessly have given these vessels such relatively large size). I also recalled the elegant and carefully contrived valves and fibres and other structural artistry of the heart; and many other points. I considered rather often and with care all this evidence, and took correspondingly long trying to assess how much blood was transmitted and in how short a time. I also noted that the juice of the ingested food could not supply this amount without our having the veins, on the one hand, completely emptied and the arteries, on the other hand, brought to bursting through excessive inthrust of blood, unless the blood somehow flowed back again from the arteries into the veins and returned to the right ventricle of the heart. In consequence, I began privately to consider that it had a movement, as it were, in a circle.
De Motu Cordis (1628), The Circulation of the Blood and Other Writings, trans. Kenneth j. Franklin (1957), Chapter 8, 57-8.
Science quotes on:  |  Amount (153)  |  Animal (651)  |  Back (395)  |  Blood (144)  |  Care (203)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Circle (117)  |  Circulation (27)  |  Completely (137)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Consider (428)  |  Discover (571)  |  Dissection (35)  |  Elegant (37)  |  Enter (145)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Excessive (24)  |  Flow (89)  |  Food (213)  |  Heart (243)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Large (398)  |  Living (492)  |  Movement (162)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Open (277)  |  Other (2233)  |  Point (584)  |  Return (133)  |  Right (473)  |  Short (200)  |  Somehow (48)  |  Structural (29)  |  Supply (100)  |  Symmetry (44)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trying (144)  |  Various (205)  |  Vein (27)  |  Ventricle (7)  |  Vessel (63)

In geometry, as in most sciences, it is very rare that an isolated proposition is of immediate utility. But the theories most powerful in practice are formed of propositions which curiosity alone brought to light, and which long remained useless without its being able to divine in what way they should one day cease to be so. In this sense it may be said, that in real science, no theory, no research, is in effect useless.
In 'Geometry', A Philosophical Dictionary, (1881), Vol. l, 374.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Being (1276)  |  Bring (95)  |  Cease (81)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Divine (112)  |  Effect (414)  |  Form (976)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Isolate (24)  |  Light (635)  |  Most (1728)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Practice (212)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Rare (94)  |  Real (159)  |  Remain (355)  |  Research (753)  |  Say (989)  |  Sense (785)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Useless (38)  |  Utility (52)  |  Way (1214)

In its famous paradox, the equation of money and excrement, psychoanalysis becomes the first science to state what common sense and the poets have long known—that the essence of money is in its absolute worthlessness.
Life Against Death: the Psychoanalytical Meaning of History (1985), 254.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Become (821)  |  Common (447)  |  Common Sense (136)  |  Equation (138)  |  Essence (85)  |  Excrement (2)  |  First (1302)  |  Known (453)  |  Money (178)  |  Paradox (54)  |  Poet (97)  |  Psychoanalysis (37)  |  Sense (785)  |  State (505)  |  Worthlessness (3)

In like manner, the loadstone has from nature its two poles, a northern and a southern; fixed, definite points in the stone, which are the primary termini of the movements and effects, and the limits and regulators of the several actions and properties. It is to be understood, however, that not from a mathematical point does the force of the stone emanate, but from the parts themselves; and all these parts in the whole—while they belong to the whole—the nearer they are to the poles of the stone the stronger virtues do they acquire and pour out on other bodies. These poles look toward the poles of the earth, and move toward them, and are subject to them. The magnetic poles may be found in very loadstone, whether strong and powerful (male, as the term was in antiquity) or faint, weak, and female; whether its shape is due to design or to chance, and whether it be long, or flat, or four-square, or three-cornered or polished; whether it be rough, broken-off, or unpolished: the loadstone ever has and ever shows its poles.
On the Loadstone and Magnetic Bodies and on the Great Magnet the Earth: A New Physiology, Demonstrated with many Arguments and Experiments (1600), trans. P. Fleury Mottelay (1893), 23.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Antiquity (34)  |  Belong (168)  |  Broken (56)  |  Chance (244)  |  Corner (59)  |  Definite (114)  |  Design (203)  |  Do (1905)  |  Due (143)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effect (414)  |  Female (50)  |  Flat (34)  |  Force (497)  |  Limit (294)  |  Look (584)  |  Magnetic (44)  |  Magnetism (43)  |  Move (223)  |  Movement (162)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nearer (45)  |  Other (2233)  |  Point (584)  |  Pole (49)  |  Polish (17)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Primary (82)  |  Show (353)  |  Square (73)  |  Stone (168)  |  Strong (182)  |  Stronger (36)  |  Subject (543)  |  Term (357)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Two (936)  |  Understood (155)  |  Virtue (117)  |  Weak (73)  |  Whole (756)

In long intervals I have expressed an opinion on public issues whenever they appeared to be so bad and unfortunate that silence would have made me feel guilty of complicity.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Appear (122)  |  Bad (185)  |  Express (192)  |  Feel (371)  |  Guilty (8)  |  Interval (14)  |  Issue (46)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Public (100)  |  Silence (62)  |  Unfortunate (19)  |  Whenever (81)

In man’s brain the impressions from outside are not merely registered; they produce concepts and ideas. They are the imprint of the external world upon the human brain. Therefore, it is not surprising that, after a long period of searching and erring, some of the concepts and ideas in human thinking should have come gradually closer to the fundamental laws of the world, that some of our thinking should reveal the true structure of atoms and the true movements of the stars. Nature, in the form of man, begins to recognize itself.
In Knowledge and Wonder (1962).
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Begin (275)  |  Brain (281)  |  Closer (43)  |  Concept (242)  |  Form (976)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Human (1512)  |  Idea (881)  |  Impression (118)  |  Law (913)  |  Man (2252)  |  Merely (315)  |  Movement (162)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Outside (141)  |  Period (200)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Register (22)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Structure (365)  |  Thinking (425)  |  World (1850)

In my opinion there is no other salvation for civilization and even for the human race than the creation of a world government with security on the basis of law. As long as there are sovereign states with their separate armaments and armament secrets, new world wars cannot be avoided.
Interview comment reported in 'For a World Government: Einstein Says This is Only Way to Save Mankind', New York Times (15 Sep 1945), 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Armament (6)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Avoidance (11)  |  Basis (180)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Creation (350)  |  Government (116)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Law (913)  |  New (1273)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Other (2233)  |  Race (278)  |  Salvation (13)  |  Secret (216)  |  Security (51)  |  Separate (151)  |  Sovereign (5)  |  State (505)  |  War (233)  |  World (1850)  |  World War II (9)

In my opinion, there is absolutely no trustworthy proof that talents have been improved by their exercise through the course of a long series of generations. The Bach family shows that musical talent, and the Bernoulli family that mathematical power, can be transmitted from generation to generation, but this teaches us nothing as to the origin of such talents. In both families the high-watermark of talent lies, not at the end of the series of generations, as it should do if the results of practice are transmitted, but in the middle. Again, talents frequently appear in some member of a family which has not been previously distinguished.
In 'On Heredity', Essays upon Heredity and Kindred Biological Problems (1889), Vol. 1, 95-96.
Science quotes on:  |  Appear (122)  |  Bach (7)  |  Bach_Johann (2)  |  Jacob Bernoulli (6)  |  Both (496)  |  Course (413)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Do (1905)  |  End (603)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Family (101)  |  Frequent (26)  |  Generation (256)  |  High (370)  |  Improve (64)  |  Lie (370)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Member (42)  |  Middle (19)  |  Musical (10)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Origin (250)  |  Power (771)  |  Practice (212)  |  Previous (17)  |  Proof (304)  |  Result (700)  |  Series (153)  |  Show (353)  |  Talent (99)  |  Teach (299)  |  Through (846)  |  Transmit (12)  |  Trustworthy (14)

In my work I now have the comfortable feeling that I am so to speak on my own ground and territory and almost certainly not competing in an anxious race and that I shall not suddenly read in the literature that someone else had done it all long ago. It is really at this point that the pleasure of research begins, when one is, so to speak, alone with nature and no longer worries about human opinions, views and demands. To put it in a way that is more learned than clear: the philological aspect drops out and only the philosophical remains.
In Davis Baird, R.I.G. Hughes and Alfred Nordmann, Heinrich Hertz: Classical Physicist, Modern Philosopher (1998), 157.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Anxiety (30)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Comfort (64)  |  Competition (45)  |  Demand (131)  |  Drop (77)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Ground (222)  |  Human (1512)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Literature (116)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Point (584)  |  Race (278)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Remain (355)  |  Research (753)  |  Speak (240)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Territory (25)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)  |  Work (1402)

In not a few the [opium-eating] habit has crept upon them almost unconsciously, during the medicinal use of opiates to soothe pain, to remove sleeplessness, or to arrest protracted bowel-complaint. The risk of this evil should therefore be carefully borne in mind, for life-long misery has often been caused by undue laxity in the prescribing of opiates.
In 'Clinical Lecture On The Treatment Of The Habit Of Opium-Eating', The British Medical Journal (15 Feb 1868), 1, No. 372, 137.
Science quotes on:  |  Addiction (6)  |  Arrest (9)  |  Bowel (17)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Cause (561)  |  Complaint (13)  |  Creep (15)  |  Eating (46)  |  Evil (122)  |  Habit (174)  |  Laxity (2)  |  Life (1870)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Misery (31)  |  Opiate (2)  |  Opium (7)  |  Pain (144)  |  Prescribe (11)  |  Prescribing (5)  |  Protracted (2)  |  Remove (50)  |  Risk (68)  |  Unconscious (24)  |  Use (771)

In October 1838, that is, fifteen months after I had begun my systematic enquiry, I happened to read for amusement Malthus on Population, and being well prepared to appreciate the struggle for existence which everywhere goes on from long-continued observation of the habits of animals and plants, it at once struck me that under these circumstances favourable variations would tend to be, preserved, and unfavourable ones to be destroyed. The result of this would be the formation of new species. Here, then, I had at last got a theory by which to work; but I was so anxious to avoid prejudice, that I determined not for some time to write even the briefest sketch of it.
In Charles Darwin and Francis Darwin (ed.), Charles Darwin: His Life Told in an Autobiographical Chapter, and in a Selected Series of His Published Letters (1892), 40.
Science quotes on:  |  Amusement (37)  |  Animal (651)  |  Appreciate (67)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Being (1276)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Everywhere (98)  |  Existence (481)  |  Formation (100)  |  Habit (174)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Last (425)  |  Thomas Robert Malthus (13)  |  Month (91)  |  New (1273)  |  Observation (593)  |  Plant (320)  |  Population (115)  |  Prejudice (96)  |  Read (308)  |  Result (700)  |  Species (435)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Survival Of The Fittest (43)  |  Systematic (58)  |  Tend (124)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)  |  Variation (93)  |  Work (1402)  |  Write (250)

In one department of his [Joseph Black’s] lecture he exceeded any I have ever known, the neatness and unvarying success with which all the manipulations of his experiments were performed. His correct eye and steady hand contributed to the one; his admirable precautions, foreseeing and providing for every emergency, secured the other. I have seen him pour boiling water or boiling acid from a vessel that had no spout into a tube, holding it at such a distance as made the stream’s diameter small, and so vertical that not a drop was spilt. While he poured he would mention this adaptation of the height to the diameter as a necessary condition of success. I have seen him mix two substances in a receiver into which a gas, as chlorine, had been introduced, the effect of the combustion being perhaps to produce a compound inflammable in its nascent state, and the mixture being effected by drawing some string or wire working through the receiver's sides in an air-tight socket. The long table on which the different processes had been carried on was as clean at the end of the lecture as it had been before the apparatus was planted upon it. Not a drop of liquid, not a grain of dust remained.
In Lives of Men of Letters and Science, Who Flourished in the Time of George III (1845), 346-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Acid (83)  |  Adaptation (59)  |  Air (366)  |  Apparatus (70)  |  Being (1276)  |  Joseph Black (14)  |  Chlorine (15)  |  Clean (52)  |  Combustion (22)  |  Compound (117)  |  Condition (362)  |  Department (93)  |  Diameter (28)  |  Different (595)  |  Distance (171)  |  Drawing (56)  |  Drop (77)  |  Dust (68)  |  Effect (414)  |  Emergency (10)  |  End (603)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Eye (440)  |  Gas (89)  |  Grain (50)  |  Inflammable (5)  |  Introduce (63)  |  Known (453)  |  Lecture (111)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Manipulation (19)  |  Mention (84)  |  Mixture (44)  |  Nascent (4)  |  Neatness (6)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perform (123)  |  Plant (320)  |  Remain (355)  |  Secured (18)  |  Side (236)  |  Small (489)  |  Spout (2)  |  State (505)  |  Steady (45)  |  Stream (83)  |  Substance (253)  |  Success (327)  |  Table (105)  |  Through (846)  |  Two (936)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Water (503)  |  Wire (36)

In order that an inventory of plants may be begun and a classification of them correctly established, we must try to discover criteria of some sort for distinguishing what are called “species”. After a long and considerable investigation, no surer criterion for determining species had occurred to me than distinguishing features that perpetuate themselves in propagation from seed. Thus, no matter what variations occur in the individuals or the species, if they spring from the seed of one and the same plant, they are accidental variations and not such as to distinguish a species. For these variations do not perpetuate themselves in subsequent seeding. Thus, for example, we do not regard caryophylli with full or multiple blossoms as a species distinct from caryophylli with single blossoms, because the former owe their origin to the seed of the latter and if the former are sown from their own seed, they once more produce single-blossom caryophylli. But variations that never have as their source seed from one and the same species may finally be regarded as distinct species. Or, if you make a comparison between any two plants, plants which never spring from each other's seed and never, when their seed is sown, are transmuted one into the other, these plants finally are distinct species. For it is just as in animals: a difference in sex is not enough to prove a difference of species, because each sex is derived from the same seed as far as species is concerned and not infrequently from the same parents; no matter how many and how striking may be the accidental differences between them; no other proof that bull and cow, man and woman belong to the same species is required than the fact that both very frequently spring from the same parents or the same mother. Likewise in the case of plants, there is no surer index of identity of species than that of origin from the seed of one and the same plant, whether it is a matter of individuals or species. For animals that differ in species preserve their distinct species permanently; one species never springs from the seed of another nor vice versa.
John Ray
Historia Plantarum (1686), Vol. 1, 40. Trans. Edmund Silk. Quoted in Barbara G. Beddall, 'Historical Notes on Avian Classification', Systematic Zoology (1957), 6, 133-4.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Accidental (31)  |  Animal (651)  |  Belong (168)  |  Blossom (22)  |  Both (496)  |  Bull (3)  |  Call (781)  |  Classification (102)  |  Comparison (108)  |  Concern (239)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Cow (42)  |  Criterion (28)  |  Differ (88)  |  Difference (355)  |  Discover (571)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguishing (14)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enough (341)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Former (138)  |  Identity (19)  |  Individual (420)  |  Inventory (7)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Likewise (2)  |  Man (2252)  |  Matter (821)  |  More (2558)  |  Mother (116)  |  Multiple (19)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  Occur (151)  |  Order (638)  |  Origin (250)  |  Other (2233)  |  Owe (71)  |  Parent (80)  |  Permanence (26)  |  Perpetuate (11)  |  Perpetuation (4)  |  Plant (320)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Production (190)  |  Proof (304)  |  Propagation (15)  |  Prove (261)  |  Regard (312)  |  Required (108)  |  Seed (97)  |  Sex (68)  |  Single (365)  |  Species (435)  |  Spring (140)  |  Striking (48)  |  Subsequent (34)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Try (296)  |  Two (936)  |  Variation (93)  |  Vice (42)  |  Woman (160)

In our daily lives, we enjoy the pervasive benefits of long-lived robotic spacecraft that provide high-capacity worldwide telecommunications; reconnaissance of Earth’s solid surface and oceans, with far-reaching cultural and environmental implications; much-improved weather and climatic forecasts; improved knowledge about the terrestrial effects of the Sun’s radiations; a revolutionary new global navigational system for all manner of aircraft and many other uses both civil and military; and the science of Earth itself as a sustainable abode of life.
In 'Is Human Spaceflight Obsolete?', Issues in Science and Technology (Summer 2004).
Science quotes on:  |  Abode (2)  |  Aircraft (9)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Both (496)  |  Capacity (105)  |  Civil (26)  |  Climate (102)  |  Cultural (26)  |  Daily (91)  |  Daily Life (18)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effect (414)  |  Environment (239)  |  Forecast (15)  |  Global (39)  |  Global Positioning System (2)  |  GPS (2)  |  High (370)  |  Implication (25)  |  Improve (64)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Manner (62)  |  Military (45)  |  New (1273)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pervasive (6)  |  Radiation (48)  |  Revolutionary (31)  |  Robot (14)  |  Solid (119)  |  Spacecraft (6)  |  Sun (407)  |  Surface (223)  |  Sustainable (14)  |  System (545)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Use (771)  |  Weather (49)  |  Worldwide (19)

In place of science, the Eskimo has only magic to bridge the gap between what he can understand and what is not known. Without magic, his life would be one long panic.
In Man’s Rise to Civilization (1968), 48.
Science quotes on:  |  Bridge (49)  |  Gap (36)  |  Known (453)  |  Life (1870)  |  Magic (92)  |  Understand (648)

In science, address the few; in literature, the many. In science, the few must dictate opinion to the many; in literature, the many, sooner or later, force their judgement on the few. But the few and the many are not necessarily the few and the many of the passing time: for discoverers in science have not un-often, in their own day, had the few against them; and writers the most permanently popular not unfrequently found, in their own day, a frigid reception from the many. By the few, I mean those who must ever remain the few, from whose dieta we, the multitude, take fame upon trust; by the many, I mean those who constitute the multitude in the long-run. We take the fame of a Harvey or a Newton upon trust, from the verdict of the few in successive generations; but the few could never persuade us to take poets and novelists on trust. We, the many, judge for ourselves of Shakespeare and Cervantes.
Caxtoniana: A Series of Essays on Life, Literature, and Manners (1863), Vol. 2, 329- 30.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Discoverer (43)  |  Fame (51)  |  Force (497)  |  Generation (256)  |  William Harvey (30)  |  Judge (114)  |  Literature (116)  |  Mean (810)  |  Most (1728)  |  Multitude (50)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Never (1089)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Passing (76)  |  Poet (97)  |  Reception (16)  |  Remain (355)  |  Run (158)  |  William Shakespeare (109)  |  Successive (73)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trust (72)  |  Verdict (8)  |  Writer (90)

In scientific matters ... the greatest discoverer differs from the most arduous imitator and apprentice only in degree, whereas he differs in kind from someone whom nature has endowed for fine art. But saying this does not disparage those great men to whom the human race owes so much in contrast to those whom nature has endowed for fine art. For the scientists' talent lies in continuing to increase the perfection of our cognitions and on all the dependent benefits, as well as in imparting that same knowledge to others; and in these respects they are far superior to those who merit the honour of being called geniuses. For the latter's art stops at some point, because a boundary is set for it beyond which it cannot go and which has probably long since been reached and cannot be extended further.
The Critique of Judgement (1790), trans. J. C. Meredith (1991), 72.
Science quotes on:  |  Apprentice (4)  |  Art (680)  |  Being (1276)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Call (781)  |  Cognition (7)  |  Contrast (45)  |  Degree (277)  |  Differ (88)  |  Discoverer (43)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Disparage (5)  |  Endowed (52)  |  Extend (129)  |  Genius (301)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Honour (58)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Imitator (3)  |  Imparting (6)  |  Increase (225)  |  Kind (564)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lie (370)  |  Matter (821)  |  Merit (51)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Other (2233)  |  Owe (71)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Point (584)  |  Race (278)  |  Reach (286)  |  Respect (212)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Set (400)  |  Superior (88)  |  Talent (99)

In spite of what moralists say, the, animals are scarcely less wicked or less unhappy than we are ourselves. The arrogance of the strong, the servility of the weak, low rapacity, ephemeral pleasure purchased by great effort, death preceded by long suffering, all belong to the animals as they do to men.
Recueil des Éloges Historiques 1819-27, Vol. 1, 91.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Arrogance (22)  |  Belong (168)  |  Death (406)  |  Do (1905)  |  Effort (243)  |  Great (1610)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Low (86)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Say (989)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Spite (55)  |  Strong (182)  |  Suffering (68)  |  Unhappy (16)  |  Weak (73)

In structure these little animals were fashioned like a bell, and at the round opening they made such a stir, that the particles in the water thereabout were set in motion thereby. … And though I must have seen quite 20 of these little animals on their long tails alongside one another very gently moving, with outstretcht bodies and straitened-out tails; yet in an instant, as it were, they pulled their bodies and their tails together, and no sooner had they contracted their bodies and tails, than they began to stick their tails out again very leisurely, and stayed thus some time continuing their gentle motion: which sight I found mightily diverting.
[Describing the ciliate Vorticella.]
Letter to the Royal Society, London (25 Dec 1702). In Clifford Dobell (ed.), Anthony van Leewenhoek and his “Little Animals” (1932), 277.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Animalcule (12)  |  Bell (35)  |  Contract (11)  |  Diversion (10)  |  Instant (46)  |  Little (717)  |  Motion (320)  |  Must (1525)  |  Particle (200)  |  Protist (3)  |  Pull (43)  |  Set (400)  |  Sight (135)  |  Stir (23)  |  Structure (365)  |  Tail (21)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Water (503)

In summary, very large populations may differentiate rapidly, but their sustained evolution will be at moderate or slow rates and will be mainly adaptive. Populations of intermediate size provide the best conditions for sustained progressive and branching evolution, adaptive in its main lines, but accompanied by inadaptive fluctuations, especially in characters of little selective importance. Small populations will be virtually incapable of differentiation or branching and will often be dominated by random inadaptive trends and peculiarly liable to extinction, but will be capable of the most rapid evolution as long as this is not cut short by extinction.
Tempo and Mode in Evolution (1944), 70-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Accompany (22)  |  Adaptation (59)  |  Best (467)  |  Branch (155)  |  Branching (10)  |  Capability (44)  |  Capable (174)  |  Character (259)  |  Condition (362)  |  Cut (116)  |  Differentiate (19)  |  Differentiation (28)  |  Domination (12)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Fluctuation (15)  |  Importance (299)  |  Incapable (41)  |  Intermediate (38)  |  Large (398)  |  Liability (7)  |  Little (717)  |  Most (1728)  |  Peculiarity (26)  |  Population (115)  |  Progressive (21)  |  Provision (17)  |  Random (42)  |  Rapidity (29)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  Selection (130)  |  Selective (21)  |  Short (200)  |  Size (62)  |  Slow (108)  |  Small (489)  |  Summary (11)  |  Sustain (52)  |  Trend (23)  |  Will (2350)

In the beginning of the year 1800 the illustrious professor [Volta] conceived the idea of forming a long column by piling up, in succession, a disc of copper, a disc of zinc, and a disc of wet cloth, with scrupulous attention to not changing this order. What could be expected beforehand from such a combination? Well, I do not hesitate to say, this apparently inert mass, this bizarre assembly, this pile of so many couples of unequal metals separated by a little liquid is, in the singularity of effect, the most marvellous instrument which men have yet invented, the telescope and the steam engine not excepted.
In François Arago, 'Bloge for Volta' (1831), Oeuvres Completes de François Arago (1854), Vol. 1, 219-20.
Science quotes on:  |  Assembly (13)  |  Attention (196)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Bizarre (6)  |  Changing (7)  |  Cloth (6)  |  Column (15)  |  Combination (150)  |  Conceived (3)  |  Copper (25)  |  Couple (9)  |  Do (1905)  |  Effect (414)  |  Engine (99)  |  Expect (203)  |  Expected (5)  |  Forming (42)  |  Hesitate (24)  |  Idea (881)  |  Illustrious (10)  |  Inert (14)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Invention (400)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Little (717)  |  Marvel (37)  |  Marvellous (25)  |  Mass (160)  |  Metal (88)  |  Most (1728)  |  Order (638)  |  Pile (12)  |  Professor (133)  |  Say (989)  |  Scrupulous (7)  |  Separate (151)  |  Singularity (4)  |  Steam (81)  |  Steam Engine (47)  |  Succession (80)  |  Telescope (106)  |  Unequal (12)  |  Count Alessandro Giuseppe Antonio Anastasio Volta (5)  |  Wet (6)  |  Year (963)  |  Zinc (3)

In the bleak midwinter Frosty wind made moan, Earth stood hard as iron, Water like a stone; Snow had fallen, snow on snow, Snow on snow, In the bleak midwinter, Long ago.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Bleak (2)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Fall (243)  |  Frosty (3)  |  Hard (246)  |  Iron (99)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  Moan (2)  |  Snow (39)  |  Stand (284)  |  Stone (168)  |  Water (503)  |  Wind (141)

In the experimental sciences, the epochs of the most brilliant progress are almost always separated by long intervals of almost absolute repose.
In François Arago, trans. by William Henry Smyth, Baden Powell and Robert Grant, 'Fourier', Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men (1859), Vol. 1, 411.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Brilliant (57)  |  Epoch (46)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Interval (14)  |  Most (1728)  |  Progress (492)  |  Repose (9)  |  Separation (60)

In the fight which we have to wage incessantly against ignorance and quackery among the masses and follies of all sorts among the classes, diagnosis, not drugging, is our chief weapon of offence. Lack of systematic personal training in the methods of the recognition of disease leads to the misapplication of remedies, to long courses of treatment when treatment is useless, and so directly to that lack of confidence in our methods which is apt to place us in the eyes of the public on a level with empirics and quacks.
Address to the Canadian Medical Association, Montreal (17 Sep 1902), 'Chauvinism in Medicine', published in The Montreal Medical Journal (1902), 31, 267. Collected in Aequanimitas, with Other Addresses to Medical Students, Nurses and Practitioners of Medicine (1904), 299.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Chief (99)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Course (413)  |  Diagnosis (65)  |  Disease (340)  |  Drug (61)  |  Eye (440)  |  Folly (44)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Lack (127)  |  Lead (391)  |  Method (531)  |  Public (100)  |  Quack (18)  |  Quackery (4)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Remedy (63)  |  Systematic (58)  |  Training (92)  |  Treatment (135)  |  Useless (38)  |  Weapon (98)

In the first papers concerning the aetiology of tuberculosis I have already indicated the dangers arising from the spread of the bacilli-containing excretions of consumptives, and have urged moreover that prophylactic measures should be taken against the contagious disease. But my words have been unheeded. It was still too early, and because of this they still could not meet with full understanding. It shared the fate of so many similar cases in medicine, where a long time has also been necessary before old prejudices were overcome and the new facts were acknowledged to be correct by the physicians.
'The current state of the struggle against tuberculosis', Nobel Lecture (12 Dec 1905). In Nobel Lectures: Physiology or Medicine 1901-1921 (1967), 169.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Agreement (55)  |  Already (226)  |  Arising (22)  |  Bacillus (9)  |  Contagious (5)  |  Danger (127)  |  Disease (340)  |  Early (196)  |  Excretion (7)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Fate (76)  |  First (1302)  |  Measure (241)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Necessary (370)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)  |  Overcome (40)  |  Paper (192)  |  Patient (209)  |  Physician (284)  |  Prejudice (96)  |  Spread (86)  |  Still (614)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tuberculosis (9)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Word (650)

In the last fifteen years we have witnessed an event that, I believe, is unique in the history of the natural sciences: their subjugation to and incorporation into the whirls and frenzies of disgusting publicity and propaganda. This is no doubt symptomatic of the precarious position assigned by present-day society to any form of intellectual activity. Such intellectual pursuits have at all times been both absurd and fragile; but they become ever more ludicrous when, as is now true of science, they become mass professions and must, as homeless pretentious parasites, justify their right to exist in a period devoted to nothing but the rapid consumption of goods and amusements. These sciences were always a divertissement in the sense in which Pascal used the word; but what is their function in a society living under the motto lunam et circenses? Are they only a band of court jesters in search of courts which, if they ever existed, have long lost their desire to be amused?
Voices in the Labyrinth: Nature, Man, and Science (1979), 27.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurd (60)  |  Activity (218)  |  Amusement (37)  |  Become (821)  |  Both (496)  |  Consumption (16)  |  Court (35)  |  Desire (212)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Event (222)  |  Exist (458)  |  Form (976)  |  Fragile (26)  |  Function (235)  |  Good (906)  |  History (716)  |  Incorporation (5)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Last (425)  |  Living (492)  |  Ludicrous (7)  |  Mass (160)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Parasite (33)  |  Blaise Pascal (81)  |  Period (200)  |  Present (630)  |  Pretentious (4)  |  Profession (108)  |  Propaganda (13)  |  Publicity (7)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Right (473)  |  Search (175)  |  Sense (785)  |  Society (350)  |  Time (1911)  |  Unique (72)  |  Whirl (10)  |  Witness (57)  |  Word (650)  |  Year (963)

In the Life of Darwin by his son, there is related an incident of how the great naturalist once studied long as to just what a certain spore was. Finally he said, “It is this, for if it isn’t, then what is it?” And all during his life he was never able to forget that he had been guilty of this unscientific attitude, for science is founded on certitude, not assumption.
In Elbert Hubbard (ed. and publ.), The Philistine (May 1908), 26, No. 6, 172.
Science quotes on:  |  Assumption (96)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certitude (6)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Forget (125)  |  Forgetting (13)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Great (1610)  |  Guilt (13)  |  Life (1870)  |  Naturalist (79)  |  Never (1089)  |  Spore (3)  |  Unscientific (13)

In the light of knowledge attained, the happy achievement seems almost a matter of course, and any intelligent student can grasp it without too much trouble. But the years of anxious searching in the dark, with their intense longing, their alternations of confidence and exhaustion, and the final emergence into the light—only those who have experienced it can understand that.
Quoted in Banesh Hoffmann and Helen Dukas, Albert Einstein: Creator and Rebel (1972), 124.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Alternation (5)  |  Anxious (4)  |  Attain (126)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Course (413)  |  Dark (145)  |  Emergence (35)  |  Exhaustion (18)  |  Experience (494)  |  Final (121)  |  Grasp (65)  |  Happy (108)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Intense (22)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Light (635)  |  Longing (19)  |  Matter (821)  |  Search (175)  |  Student (317)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Understand (648)  |  Year (963)

In the long course of cell life on this earth it remained, for our age for our generation, to receive the full ownership of our inheritance. We have entered the cell, the Mansion of our birth, and started the inventory of our acquired wealth.
Talking about the new information revealed by electron microscopy Nobel Lecture, The Coming Age of the Cell, 12 Dec 1974
Science quotes on:  |  Acquired (77)  |  Age (509)  |  Birth (154)  |  Cell (146)  |  Course (413)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enter (145)  |  Generation (256)  |  Inheritance (35)  |  Life (1870)  |  Receive (117)  |  Remain (355)  |  Start (237)  |  Wealth (100)

In the main, Bacon prophesied the direction of subsequent progress. But he “anticipated” the advance. He did not see that the new science was for a long time to be worked in the interest of old ends of human exploitation. He thought that it would rapidly give man new ends. Instead, it put at the disposal of a class the means to secure their old ends of aggrandizement at the expense of another class. The industrial revolution followed, as he foresaw, upon a revolution in scientific method. But it is taking the revolution many centuries to produce a new mind.
In Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education (1916), 330-331.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Aggrandizement (2)  |  Anticipate (20)  |  Sir Francis Bacon (188)  |  Century (319)  |  Class (168)  |  Direction (185)  |  End (603)  |  Expense (21)  |  Exploitation (14)  |  Follow (389)  |  Foresee (22)  |  Human (1512)  |  Industrial Revolution (10)  |  Interest (416)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)  |  Produce (117)  |  Progress (492)  |  Prophesy (11)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Secure (23)  |  See (1094)  |  Subsequent (34)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Work (1402)

In the modern interpretation of Mendelism, facts are being transformed into factors at a rapid rate. If one factor will not explain the facts, then two are involved; if two prove insufficient, three will sometimes work out. The superior jugglery sometimes necessary to account for the results may blind us, if taken too naively, to the common-place that the results are often so excellently 'explained' because the explanation was invented to explain them. We work backwards from the facts to the factors, and then, presto! explain the facts by the very factors that we invented to account for them. I am not unappreciative of the distinct advantages that this method has in handling the facts. I realize how valuable it has been to us to be able to marshal our results under a few simple assumptions, yet I cannot but fear that we are rapidly developing a sort of Mendelian ritual by which to explain the extraordinary facts of alternative inheritance. So long as we do not lose sight of the purely arbitrary and formal nature of our formulae, little harm will be done; and it is only fair to state that those who are doing the actual work of progress along Mendelian lines are aware of the hypothetical nature of the factor-assumption.
'What are 'Factors' in Mendelian Explanations?', American Breeders Association (1909), 5, 365.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Actual (118)  |  Advantage (144)  |  Arbitrary (27)  |  Assumption (96)  |  Backwards (18)  |  Being (1276)  |  Blind (98)  |  Common (447)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Factor (47)  |  Facts (553)  |  Fear (212)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Inheritance (35)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Involved (90)  |  Little (717)  |  Lose (165)  |  Gregor Mendel (22)  |  Method (531)  |  Modern (402)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Progress (492)  |  Prove (261)  |  Purely (111)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  Realize (157)  |  Result (700)  |  Ritual (9)  |  Sight (135)  |  Simple (426)  |  State (505)  |  Superior (88)  |  Transform (74)  |  Transformation (72)  |  Two (936)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

In the space of one hundred and seventy-six years the Lower Mississippi has shortened itself two hundred and forty-two miles. That is an average of a trifle over one mile and a third per year. Therefore, any calm person, who is not blind or idiotic, can see that in the old Oolitic Silurian Period, must a million years ago next November, the Lower Mississippi River was upward of one million three hundred thousand miles long, and stuck out over the Gulf of Mexico like a fishing-rod. And by the same token any person can see that seven hundred and forty-two years from now the Lower Mississippi will be only a mile and three-quarters long, and Cairo and New Orleans will have their streets joined together, and be plodding comfortably along under a single mayor and a mutual board of aldermen. There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.
Life on the Mississippi (1883, 2000), 173.
Science quotes on:  |  Average (89)  |  Blind (98)  |  Calm (32)  |  Conjecture (51)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Fascinating (38)  |  Fishing (20)  |  Gulf (18)  |  Gulf Of Mexico (5)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Investment (15)  |  Must (1525)  |  Mutual (54)  |  New (1273)  |  Next (238)  |  Old (499)  |  Period (200)  |  Person (366)  |  Return (133)  |  River (140)  |  See (1094)  |  Silurian (3)  |  Single (365)  |  Something (718)  |  Space (523)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Together (392)  |  Token (10)  |  Two (936)  |  Upward (44)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

Inexact method of observation, as I believe, is one flaw in clinical pathology to-day. Prematurity of conclusion is another, and in part follows from the first; but in chief part an unusual craving and veneration for hypothesis, which besets the minds of most medical men, is responsible. Except in those sciences which deal with the intangible or with events of long past ages, no treatises are to be found in which hypothesis figures as it does in medical writings. The purity of a science is to be judged by the paucity of its recorded hypotheses. Hypothesis has its right place, it forms a working basis; but it is an acknowledged makeshift, and, at the best, of purpose unaccomplished. Hypothesis is the heart which no man with right purpose wears willingly upon his sleeve. He who vaunts his lady love, ere yet she is won, is apt to display himself as frivolous or his lady a wanton.
The Mechanism and Graphic Registration of the Heart Beat (1920), vii.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Basis (180)  |  Best (467)  |  Chief (99)  |  Clinical (18)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Craving (5)  |  Deal (192)  |  Display (59)  |  Event (222)  |  Figure (162)  |  First (1302)  |  Flaw (18)  |  Follow (389)  |  Form (976)  |  Frivolous (8)  |  Heart (243)  |  Himself (461)  |  History (716)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Inexact (3)  |  Intangible (6)  |  Love (328)  |  Makeshift (2)  |  Man (2252)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Observation (593)  |  Past (355)  |  Pathology (19)  |  Paucity (3)  |  Physician (284)  |  Premature (22)  |  Purity (15)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Record (161)  |  Right (473)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Unusual (37)  |  Wanton (2)  |  Writing (192)

Instead of disbursing her annual millions for these dye stuffs, England will, beyond question, at no distant day become herself the greatest coloring producing country in the world; nay, by the very strangest of revolutions she may ere long send her coal-derived blues to indigo-growing India, her tar-distilled crimson to cochineal-producing Mexico, and her fossil substitutes for quercitron and safflower to China, Japan and the other countries whence these articles are now derived.
From 'Report on the Chemical Section of the Exhibition of 1862.' As quoted in Sir Frederick Abel, 'The Work of the Imperial Institute' Nature (28 Apr 1887), 35, No. 913, 620. Abel called the display of the first dye-products derived from coal tar at the Exhibition of 1862, “one of the features of greatest novelty.”
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Blue (63)  |  China (27)  |  Coal (64)  |  Color (155)  |  Country (269)  |  Crimson (4)  |  Derived (5)  |  Distilled (2)  |  Dye (10)  |  England (43)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Growing (99)  |  India (23)  |  Japan (9)  |  Other (2233)  |  Producing (6)  |  Question (649)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Send (23)  |  Strangest (4)  |  Substitute (47)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

Inventions that are not made, like babies that are not born, are rarely missed. In the absence of new developments, old ones may seem very impressive for quite a long while.
The Affluent Society (1958), 127.
Science quotes on:  |  Development (441)  |  Impressive (27)  |  Invention (400)  |  Miss (51)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)

Investigation may be likened to the long months of pregnancy, and solving a problem to the day of birth. To investigate a problem is, indeed, to solve it.
In Winberg Chai, The Foreign Relations of the People's Republic of China (1972), 46.
Science quotes on:  |  Birth (154)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Month (91)  |  Pregnancy (9)  |  Problem (731)  |  Solution (282)  |  Solve (145)

Is it not evident, that if the child is at any epoch of his long period of helplessness inured into any habit or fixed form of activity belonging to a lower stage of development, the tendency will be to arrest growth at that standpoint and make it difficult or next to impossible to continue the growth of the child?
In 'The Old Psychology vs. the New', Journal of Pedagogy (1894), 8, 76.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Arrest (9)  |  Belonging (36)  |  Child (333)  |  Continue (179)  |  Development (441)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Education (423)  |  Epoch (46)  |  Evident (92)  |  Fixed (17)  |  Form (976)  |  Growth (200)  |  Habit (174)  |  Helpless (14)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Next (238)  |  Period (200)  |  Stage (152)  |  Standpoint (28)  |  Tendency (110)  |  Will (2350)

Is no one inspired by our present picture of the universe? This value of science remains unsung by singers: you are reduced to hearing not a song or poem, but an evening lecture about it. This is not yet a scientific age.
Perhaps one of the reasons for this silence is that you have to know how to read music. For instance, the scientific article may say, “The radioactive phosphorus content of the cerebrum of the rat decreases to one-half in a period of two weeks.” Now what does that mean?
It means that phosphorus that is in the brain of a rat—and also in mine, and yours—is not the same phosphorus as it was two weeks ago. It means the atoms that are in the brain are being replaced: the ones that were there before have gone away.
So what is this mind of ours: what are these atoms with consciousness? Last week’s potatoes! They now can remember what was going on in my mind a year ago—a mind which has long ago been replaced. To note that the thing I call my individuality is only a pattern or dance, that is what it means when one discovers how long it takes for the atoms of the brain to be replaced by other atoms. The atoms come into my brain, dance a dance, and then go out—there are always new atoms, but always doing the same dance, remembering what the dance was yesterday.
'What do You Care What Other People Think?' Further Adventures of a Curious Character (1988), 244.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Atom (381)  |  Being (1276)  |  Brain (281)  |  Call (781)  |  Cerebrum (10)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Dance (35)  |  Discover (571)  |  Doing (277)  |  Hearing (50)  |  Individuality (25)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Lecture (111)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Memory (144)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mine (78)  |  Music (133)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pattern (116)  |  Period (200)  |  Phosphorus (18)  |  Picture (148)  |  Poem (104)  |  Present (630)  |  Radioactive (24)  |  Rat (37)  |  Read (308)  |  Reason (766)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remember (189)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Silence (62)  |  Song (41)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Two (936)  |  Universe (900)  |  Unsung (4)  |  Value (393)  |  Week (73)  |  Year (963)  |  Yesterday (37)

It appears unlikely that the role of the genes in development is to be understood so long as the genes are considered as dictatorial elements in the cellular economy. It is not enough to know what a gene does when it manifests itself. One must also know the mechanisms determining which of the many gene-controlled potentialities will be realized.
'The Role of the Cytoplasm in Heredity', in William D. McElroy and Bentley Glass (eds.), A Symposium on the Chemical Basis of Heredity (1957), 162.
Science quotes on:  |  Cell (146)  |  Consider (428)  |  Determination (80)  |  Development (441)  |  Economy (59)  |  Element (322)  |  Enough (341)  |  Gene (105)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Manifestation (61)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Must (1525)  |  Potentiality (9)  |  Realization (44)  |  Role (86)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Understood (155)  |  Will (2350)

It does not matter what men say in words, so long as their activities are controlled by settled instincts. The words may ultimately destroy the instincts. But until this has occurred, words do not count.
In Science and the Modern World (1925), 4.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Control (182)  |  Count (107)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Do (1905)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Man (2252)  |  Matter (821)  |  Occur (151)  |  Say (989)  |  Settle (23)  |  Settled (34)  |  Ultimately (56)  |  Word (650)

It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Attention (196)  |  Back (395)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Let (64)  |  People (1031)  |  Rarely (21)  |  Sit (51)  |  Thing (1914)

It had the old double keyboard, an entirely different set of keys for capitals and figures, so that the paper seemed a long way off, and the machine was as big and solid as a battle cruiser. Typing was then a muscular activity. You could ache after it. If you were not familiar with those vast keyboards, your hand wandered over them like a child lost in a wood. The noise might have been that of a shipyard on the Clyde. You would no more have thought of carrying one of those grim structures as you would have thought of travelling with a piano.
[About his first typewriter.]
English Journey (1934), 122-123.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Child (333)  |  Different (595)  |  Figure (162)  |  First (1302)  |  Keyboard (3)  |  Machine (271)  |  More (2558)  |  Noise (40)  |  Old (499)  |  Paper (192)  |  Piano (12)  |  Set (400)  |  Solid (119)  |  Structure (365)  |  Thought (995)  |  Travel (125)  |  Travelling (17)  |  Typewriter (6)  |  Vast (188)  |  Wander (44)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wood (97)

It has been long considered possible to explain the more ancient revolutions on... [the Earth's] surface by means of these still existing causes; in the same manner as it is found easy to explain past events in political history, by an acquaintance with the passions and intrigues of the present day. But we shall presently see that unfortunately this is not the case in physical history:—the thread of operation is here broken, the march of nature is changed, and none of the agents that she now employs were sufficient for the production of her ancient works.
'Preliminary discourse', to Recherches sur les Ossemens Fossiles (1812), trans. R. Kerr Essay on the Theory of the Earth (1813), 24.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquaintance (38)  |  Agent (73)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Broken (56)  |  Cause (561)  |  Consider (428)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Easy (213)  |  Employ (115)  |  Event (222)  |  Explain (334)  |  Fossil (143)  |  History (716)  |  March (48)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Operation (221)  |  Passion (121)  |  Past (355)  |  Physical (518)  |  Political (124)  |  Possible (560)  |  Present (630)  |  Production (190)  |  Revolution (133)  |  See (1094)  |  Still (614)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Surface (223)  |  Thread (36)  |  Unfortunately (40)  |  Work (1402)

It has been stated that the research should be discontinued because it involved “meddling with evolution.” Homo sapiens has been meddling with evolution in many ways and for a long time. We started in a big way when we domesticated plants and animals. We continue every time we alter the environment. In general, recombinant DNA research docs not seem to represent a significant increase in the risks associated with such meddling—although it may significantly increase the rate at which we meddle.
In letter to the Board of Directors of Friends of the Earth, published in The Coevolutionary Quarterly (Spring 1978), as abstracted and cited in New Scientist (6 Jul 1978), 35.
Science quotes on:  |  Alter (64)  |  Altering (3)  |  Animal (651)  |  Continue (179)  |  DNA (81)  |  Domestication (5)  |  Environment (239)  |  Evolution (635)  |  General (521)  |  Homo Sapiens (23)  |  Increase (225)  |  Involved (90)  |  Meddling (2)  |  Plant (320)  |  Rate (31)  |  Represent (157)  |  Research (753)  |  Risk (68)  |  Significant (78)  |  Start (237)  |  Time (1911)  |  Way (1214)

It has long been a complaint against mathematicians that they are hard to convince: but it is a far greater disqualification both for philosophy, and for the affairs of life, to be too easily convinced; to have too low a standard of proof. The only sound intellects are those which, in the first instance, set their standards of proof high. Practice in concrete affairs soon teaches them to make the necessary abatement: but they retain the consciousness, without which there is no sound practical reasoning, that in accepting inferior evidence because there is no better to be had, they do not by that acceptance raise it to completeness.
In An Examination of Sir William Hamilton’s Philosophy (1878), 611.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Acceptance (56)  |  Accepting (22)  |  Affair (29)  |  Against (332)  |  Better (493)  |  Both (496)  |  Complaint (13)  |  Completeness (19)  |  Concrete (55)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Convince (43)  |  Convinced (23)  |  Disqualification (2)  |  Do (1905)  |  Easily (36)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Far (158)  |  First (1302)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greater (288)  |  Hard (246)  |  High (370)  |  Inferior (37)  |  Instance (33)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Life (1870)  |  Low (86)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Practical (225)  |  Practice (212)  |  Proof (304)  |  Raise (38)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Retain (57)  |  Set (400)  |  Soon (187)  |  Sound (187)  |  Standard (64)  |  Teach (299)

It has long been known that one horse can run faster than another—but which one? Differences are crucial.
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 257.
Science quotes on:  |  Crucial (10)  |  Difference (355)  |  Fast (49)  |  Faster (50)  |  Horse (78)  |  Known (453)  |  Run (158)

It is a curious and painful fact that almost all the completely futile treatments that have been believed in during the long history of medical folly have been such as caused acute suffering to the patient. When anesthetics were discovered, pious people considered them an attempt to evade the will of God. It was pointed out, however, that when God extracted Adam's rib He put him into a deep sleep. This proved that anesthetics are all right for men; women, however, ought to suffer, because of the curse of Eve.
In An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish (1943), 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Acute (8)  |  Adam And Eve (5)  |  Anesthetic (4)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Completely (137)  |  Consider (428)  |  Curious (95)  |  Curse (20)  |  Deep (241)  |  Discover (571)  |  Extract (40)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Folly (44)  |  Futile (13)  |  God (776)  |  History (716)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Pain (144)  |  Patient (209)  |  People (1031)  |  Pious (4)  |  Point (584)  |  Rib (6)  |  Right (473)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Sleep (81)  |  Suffering (68)  |  Treatment (135)  |  Will (2350)

It is always the case with the best work, that it is misrepresented, and disparaged at first, for it takes a curiously long time for new ideas to become current, and the older men who ought to be capable of taking them in freely, will not do so through prejudice.
From letter reprinted in Journal of Political Economy (Feb 1977), 85, No. 1, back cover, as cited in Stephen M. Stigler, The History of Statistics: The Measurement of Uncertainty Before 1900 (1986), 307. Stigler notes the letter is held by David E. Butler of Nuffield College, Oxford.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Best (467)  |  Capability (44)  |  Capable (174)  |  Current (122)  |  Disparage (5)  |  Do (1905)  |  First (1302)  |  Idea (881)  |  Misrepresentation (5)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)  |  Prejudice (96)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

It is as if Cleopatra fell off her barge in 40 BC and hasn't hit the water yet.
[Illustrating how strange the behaviour of kaon particles, when first found in cosmic rays, which lived without predicted decay for a surprisingly long time—seemingly postponed a million billion times longer than early theory expected.]
Anonymous
In Frank Close, Michael Marten, Christine Sutton, The Particle Odyssey: a Journey to the Heart of the Matter (2004),75.
Science quotes on:  |  Barge (2)  |  Behaviour (42)  |  Billion (104)  |  Cosmic (74)  |  Cosmic Ray (7)  |  Decay (59)  |  Early (196)  |  Expect (203)  |  Fall (243)  |  First (1302)  |  Particle (200)  |  Predict (86)  |  Ray (115)  |  Seemingly (28)  |  Strange (160)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)  |  Water (503)

It is characteristic of science that the full explanations are often seized in their essence by the percipient scientist long in advance of any possible proof.
The Origin of Life, 1967
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Essence (85)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Full (68)  |  Often (109)  |  Possible (560)  |  Proof (304)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Seize (18)

It is difficult to conceive a grander mass of vegetation:—the straight shafts of the timber-trees shooting aloft, some naked and clean, with grey, pale, or brown bark; others literally clothed for yards with a continuous garment of epiphytes, one mass of blossoms, especially the white Orchids Caelogynes, which bloom in a profuse manner, whitening their trunks like snow. More bulky trunks were masses of interlacing climbers, Araliaceae, Leguminosae, Vines, and Menispermeae, Hydrangea, and Peppers, enclosing a hollow, once filled by the now strangled supporting tree, which has long ago decayed away. From the sides and summit of these, supple branches hung forth, either leafy or naked; the latter resembling cables flung from one tree to another, swinging in the breeze, their rocking motion increased by the weight of great bunches of ferns or Orchids, which were perched aloft in the loops. Perpetual moisture nourishes this dripping forest: and pendulous mosses and lichens are met with in profusion.
Himalayan Journals (1854), vol. 1, 110-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Bark (19)  |  Blossom (22)  |  Botany (63)  |  Brown (23)  |  Cable (11)  |  Clean (52)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Decay (59)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Fern (10)  |  Forest (161)  |  Garment (13)  |  Great (1610)  |  Himalayas (3)  |  Lichen (2)  |  Literally (30)  |  Loop (6)  |  Mass (160)  |  Moisture (21)  |  More (2558)  |  Motion (320)  |  Orchid (4)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perch (7)  |  Perpetual (59)  |  Profuse (3)  |  Rocking (2)  |  Side (236)  |  Snow (39)  |  Straight (75)  |  Summit (27)  |  Tree (269)  |  Trunk (23)  |  Vegetation (24)  |  Weight (140)  |  White (132)

It is disconcerting that present-day young who did not know Stalin and Hitler are displaying the old naïveté. After all that has happened they still do not know that you cannot build utopia without terror, and that before long terror is all that’s left.
In Before the Sabbath (1979), 120.
Science quotes on:  |  Build (211)  |  Disconcerting (3)  |  Display (59)  |  Do (1905)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Adolf Hitler (20)  |  Iuml (3)  |  Know (1538)  |  Leave (138)  |  Na (3)  |  Old (499)  |  Present (630)  |  Present-Day (2)  |  Stalin_Joseph (5)  |  Still (614)  |  Terror (32)  |  Utopia (5)  |  Young (253)

It is for such inquiries the modern naturalist collects his materials; it is for this that he still wants to add to the apparently boundless treasures of our national museums, and will never rest satisfied as long as the native country, the geographical distribution, and the amount of variation of any living thing remains imperfectly known. He looks upon every species of animal and plant now living as the individual letters which go to make up one of the volumes of our earth’s history; and, as a few lost letters may make a sentence unintelligible, so the extinction of the numerous forms of life which the progress of cultivation invariably entails will necessarily render obscure this invaluable record of the past. It is, therefore, an important object, which governments and scientific institutions should immediately take steps to secure, that in all tropical countries colonised by Europeans the most perfect collections possible in every branch of natural history should be made and deposited in national museums, where they may be available for study and interpretation. If this is not done, future ages will certainly look back upon us as a people so immersed in the pursuit of wealth as to be blind to higher considerations. They will charge us with having culpably allowed the destruction of some of those records of Creation which we had it in our power to preserve; and while professing to regard every living thing as the direct handiwork and best evidence of a Creator, yet, with a strange inconsistency, seeing many of them perish irrecoverably from the face of the earth, uncared for and unknown.
In 'On the Physical Geography of the Malay Archipelago', Journal of the Royal Geographical Society (1863), 33, 234.
Science quotes on:  |  Add (42)  |  Age (509)  |  Allowed (3)  |  Amount (153)  |  Animal (651)  |  Apparently (22)  |  Available (80)  |  Back (395)  |  Best (467)  |  Blind (98)  |  Boundless (28)  |  Branch (155)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Charge (63)  |  Collect (19)  |  Collection (68)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Country (269)  |  Creation (350)  |  Creator (97)  |  Cultivation (36)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Direct (228)  |  Distribution (51)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Entail (4)  |  European (5)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Face (214)  |  Form (976)  |  Future (467)  |  Geographical (6)  |  Government (116)  |  Handiwork (6)  |  Higher (37)  |  History (716)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Imperfectly (2)  |  Important (229)  |  Inconsistency (5)  |  Individual (420)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Institution (73)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Invaluable (11)  |  Invariably (35)  |  Known (453)  |  Letter (117)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Look (584)  |  Lost (34)  |  Made (14)  |  Material (366)  |  Modern (402)  |  Most (1728)  |  Museum (40)  |  National (29)  |  Native (41)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Naturalist (79)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Never (1089)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Object (438)  |  Obscure (66)  |  Past (355)  |  People (1031)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Perish (56)  |  Person (366)  |  Plant (320)  |  Possible (560)  |  Power (771)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Professing (2)  |  Progress (492)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Record (161)  |  Regard (312)  |  Remain (355)  |  Render (96)  |  Rest (287)  |  Satisfied (23)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Secure (23)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Sentence (35)  |  Species (435)  |  Step (234)  |  Still (614)  |  Strange (160)  |  Study (701)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Tropical (9)  |  Unintelligible (17)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Variation (93)  |  Volume (25)  |  Want (504)  |  Wealth (100)  |  Will (2350)

It is imperative in the design process to have a full and complete understanding of how failure is being obviated in order to achieve success. Without fully appreciating how close to failing a new design is, its own designer may not fully understand how and why a design works. A new design may prove to be successful because it has a sufficiently large factor of safety (which, of course, has often rightly been called a “factor of ignorance”), but a design's true factor of safety can never be known if the ultimate failure mode is unknown. Thus the design that succeeds (ie, does not fail) can actually provide less reliable information about how or how not to extrapolate from that design than one that fails. It is this observation that has long motivated reflective designers to study failures even more assiduously than successes.
In Design Paradigms: Case Histories of Error and Judgment in Engineering (1994), 31. books.google.comHenry Petroski - 1994
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Appreciation (37)  |  Being (1276)  |  Call (781)  |  Complete (209)  |  Course (413)  |  Design (203)  |  Extrapolation (6)  |  Factor (47)  |  Fail (191)  |  Failure (176)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Imperative (16)  |  Information (173)  |  Known (453)  |  Large (398)  |  Mode (43)  |  More (2558)  |  Motivated (14)  |  Motivation (28)  |  Never (1089)  |  New (1273)  |  Observation (593)  |  Order (638)  |  Process (439)  |  Prove (261)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Reliability (18)  |  Safety (58)  |  Study (701)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Success (327)  |  Successful (134)  |  Sufficiency (16)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Why (491)  |  Work (1402)

It is inevitable that those to whom is vouchsafed a long life of usefulness should outlive the friends of their youth.
In 'Charles Anthony Scott', Biographical Memoirs: Vol. VIII (1919), 87.
Science quotes on:  |  Friend (180)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Life (1870)  |  Outlive (4)  |  Usefulness (92)  |  Vouchsafe (3)  |  Youth (109)

It is interesting to observe the result of habit in the peculiar shape and size of the giraffe (Camelo-pardalis): this animal, the largest of the mammals, is known to live in the interior of Africa in places where the soil is nearly always arid and barren, so that it is obliged to browse on the leaves on the trees and to make constant efforts to reach them. From this habit long maintained in all its race, it has resulted that the animal's fore-legs have become longer than its hind legs, and that its neck is lengthened to such a degree that the giraffe, without standing up on its hind legs, attains a height of six metres (nearly 20 feet).
Philosophie Zoologique (1809), Vol. 1, 256, trans. Hugh Elliot (1914), 122.
Science quotes on:  |  Africa (38)  |  Animal (651)  |  Arid (6)  |  Attain (126)  |  Barren (33)  |  Become (821)  |  Constant (148)  |  Degree (277)  |  Effort (243)  |  Giraffe (5)  |  Habit (174)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Interior (35)  |  Known (453)  |  Largest (39)  |  Leg (35)  |  Live (650)  |  Maintain (105)  |  Mammal (41)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Neck (15)  |  Observe (179)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Race (278)  |  Reach (286)  |  Result (700)  |  Soil (98)  |  Tree (269)

It is necessary that a surgeon should have a temperate and moderate disposition. That he should have well-formed hands, long slender fingers, a strong body, not inclined to tremble and with all his members trained to the capable fulfilment of the wishes of his mind. He should be of deep intelligence and of a simple, humble, brave, but not audacious disposition. He should be well grounded in natural science, and should know not only medicine but every part of philosophy; should know logic well, so as to be able to understand what is written, to talk properly, and to support what he has to say by good reasons.
Chirurgia Magna (1296, printed 1479), as translated by James Joseph Walsh in Old-Time Makers of Medicine (1911), 261.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Brave (16)  |  Capable (174)  |  Deep (241)  |  Disposition (44)  |  Form (976)  |  Good (906)  |  Ground (222)  |  Humble (54)  |  Inclined (41)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Know (1538)  |  Logic (311)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Reason (766)  |  Say (989)  |  Simple (426)  |  Strong (182)  |  Support (151)  |  Surgeon (64)  |  Train (118)  |  Understand (648)

It is not a simple life to be a single cell, although I have no right to say so, having been a single cell so long ago myself that I have no memory at all of that stage in my life.
In A Long Line of Cells: Collected Essays (1990), 244.
Science quotes on:  |  Cell (146)  |  Life (1870)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  Memory (144)  |  Myself (211)  |  Right (473)  |  Say (989)  |  Simple (426)  |  Single (365)  |  Stage (152)

It is not failure but success that is forcing man off this earth. It is not sickness but the triumph of health... Our capacity to survive has expanded beyond the capacity of Earth to support us. The pains we are feeling are growing pains. We can solve growth problems in direct proportion to our capacity to find new worlds... If man stays on Earth, his extinction is sure even if he lasts till the sun expands and destroys him... It is no longer reasonable to assume that the meaning of life lies on this earth alone. If Earth is all there is for man, we are reaching the foreseeable end of man.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Assume (43)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Capacity (105)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Direct (228)  |  Earth (1076)  |  End (603)  |  Expand (56)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Failure (176)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Find (1014)  |  Force (497)  |  Foreseeable (3)  |  Grow (247)  |  Growing (99)  |  Growth (200)  |  Health (210)  |  Last (425)  |  Lie (370)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  New (1273)  |  New Worlds (5)  |  Pain (144)  |  Problem (731)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reasonable (29)  |  Sickness (26)  |  Solve (145)  |  Stay (26)  |  Success (327)  |  Sun (407)  |  Support (151)  |  Survive (87)  |  Triumph (76)  |  World (1850)

It is not so long since, during one of the meetings of the Association, one of the leading English newspapers briefly described a sitting of this Section in the words, “Saturday morning was devoted to pure mathematics, and so there was nothing of any general interest:” still, such toleration is better than undisguised and ill-informed hostility.
In Report of the 67th meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science.
Science quotes on:  |  Association (49)  |  Better (493)  |  Brief (37)  |  Describe (132)  |  Devote (45)  |  Devoted (59)  |  English (35)  |  General (521)  |  Hostility (16)  |  Inform (50)  |  Interest (416)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Meeting (22)  |  Modern Mathematics (50)  |  Morning (98)  |  Newspaper (39)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Mathematics (72)  |  Saturday (11)  |  Section (11)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Still (614)  |  Toleration (7)  |  Undisguised (2)  |  Word (650)

It is now necessary to indicate more definitely the reason why mathematics not only carries conviction in itself, but also transmits conviction to the objects to which it is applied. The reason is found, first of all, in the perfect precision with which the elementary mathematical concepts are determined; in this respect each science must look to its own salvation .... But this is not all. As soon as human thought attempts long chains of conclusions, or difficult matters generally, there arises not only the danger of error but also the suspicion of error, because since all details cannot be surveyed with clearness at the same instant one must in the end be satisfied with a belief that nothing has been overlooked from the beginning. Every one knows how much this is the case even in arithmetic, the most elementary use of mathematics. No one would imagine that the higher parts of mathematics fare better in this respect; on the contrary, in more complicated conclusions the uncertainty and suspicion of hidden errors increases in rapid progression. How does mathematics manage to rid itself of this inconvenience which attaches to it in the highest degree? By making proofs more rigorous? By giving new rules according to which the old rules shall be applied? Not in the least. A very great uncertainty continues to attach to the result of each single computation. But there are checks. In the realm of mathematics each point may be reached by a hundred different ways; and if each of a hundred ways leads to the same point, one may be sure that the right point has been reached. A calculation without a check is as good as none. Just so it is with every isolated proof in any speculative science whatever; the proof may be ever so ingenious, and ever so perfectly true and correct, it will still fail to convince permanently. He will therefore be much deceived, who, in metaphysics, or in psychology which depends on metaphysics, hopes to see his greatest care in the precise determination of the concepts and in the logical conclusions rewarded by conviction, much less by success in transmitting conviction to others. Not only must the conclusions support each other, without coercion or suspicion of subreption, but in all matters originating in experience, or judging concerning experience, the results of speculation must be verified by experience, not only superficially, but in countless special cases.
In Werke [Kehrbach] (1890), Bd. 5, 105. As quoted, cited and translated in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-Book (1914), 19.
Science quotes on:  |  Accord (36)  |  According (236)  |  Applied (176)  |  Apply (170)  |  Arise (162)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Attach (57)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Belief (615)  |  Better (493)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Care (203)  |  Carry (130)  |  Case (102)  |  Chain (51)  |  Check (26)  |  Clearness (11)  |  Coercion (4)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Computation (28)  |  Concept (242)  |  Concern (239)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Continue (179)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Convince (43)  |  Correct (95)  |  Countless (39)  |  Danger (127)  |  Deceive (26)  |  Definitely (5)  |  Degree (277)  |  Depend (238)  |  Detail (150)  |  Determination (80)  |  Determine (152)  |  Different (595)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Elementary (98)  |  End (603)  |  Error (339)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fail (191)  |  Fare (5)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Generally (15)  |  Give (208)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Hide (70)  |  High (370)  |  Hope (321)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Thought (7)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Inconvenience (3)  |  Increase (225)  |  Indicate (62)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Instant (46)  |  Isolate (24)  |  Judge (114)  |  Know (1538)  |  Lead (391)  |  Least (75)  |  Less (105)  |  Logical (57)  |  Look (584)  |  Making (300)  |  Manage (26)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Matter (821)  |  Metaphysic (7)  |  Metaphysics (53)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature Of Mathematics (80)  |  Necessary (370)  |  New (1273)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Object (438)  |  Old (499)  |  Originate (39)  |  Other (2233)  |  Overlook (33)  |  Part (235)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Perfectly (10)  |  Permanent (67)  |  Point (584)  |  Precise (71)  |  Precision (72)  |  Progression (23)  |  Proof (304)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Rapid (37)  |  Reach (286)  |  Realm (87)  |  Reason (766)  |  Respect (212)  |  Result (700)  |  Reward (72)  |  Rid (14)  |  Right (473)  |  Rigorous (50)  |  Rule (307)  |  Salvation (13)  |  Same (166)  |  Satisfied (23)  |  See (1094)  |  Single (365)  |  Soon (187)  |  Special (188)  |  Special Case (9)  |  Speculation (137)  |  Speculative (12)  |  Still (614)  |  Success (327)  |  Superficial (12)  |  Support (151)  |  Survey (36)  |  Suspicion (36)  |  Thought (995)  |  Transmit (12)  |  True (239)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Use (771)  |  Verify (24)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)

It is now widely realized that nearly all the “classical” problems of molecular biology have either been solved or will be solved in the next decade. The entry of large numbers of American and other biochemists into the field will ensure that all the chemical details of replication and transcription will be elucidated. Because of this, I have long felt that the future of molecular biology lies in the extension of research to other fields of biology, notably development and the nervous system.
Letter to Max Perua, 5 June 1963. Quoted in William B. Wood (ed.), The Nematode Caenorhabditis Elegans (1988), x-xi.
Science quotes on:  |  Biochemist (9)  |  Biochemistry (50)  |  Biology (232)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Classical (49)  |  Decade (66)  |  Detail (150)  |  Development (441)  |  Ensure (27)  |  Extension (60)  |  Field (378)  |  Future (467)  |  Large (398)  |  Lie (370)  |  Molecular Biology (27)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Nervous System (35)  |  Next (238)  |  Number (710)  |  Other (2233)  |  Problem (731)  |  Replication (10)  |  Research (753)  |  System (545)  |  Transcription (2)  |  Will (2350)

It is of interest to inquire what happens when the aviator’s speed… approximates to the velocity of light. Lengths in the direction of flight become smaller and smaller, until for the speed of light they shrink to zero. The aviator and the objects accompanying him shrink to two dimensions. We are saved the difficulty of imagining how the processes of life can go on in two dimensions, because nothing goes on. Time is arrested altogether. This is the description according to the terrestrial observer. The aviator himself detects nothing unusual; he does not perceive that he has stopped moving. He is merely waiting for the next instant to come before making the next movement; and the mere fact that time is arrested means that he does not perceive that the next instant is a long time coming.
In Space, Time and Gravitation: An Outline of the General Relativity Theory (1920, 1921), 26.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Approximate (25)  |  Become (821)  |  Coming (114)  |  Detect (45)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Dimension (64)  |  Direction (185)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Flight (101)  |  Happen (282)  |  Himself (461)  |  Inquire (26)  |  Instant (46)  |  Interest (416)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Making (300)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Merely (315)  |  Movement (162)  |  Next (238)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Object (438)  |  Shrink (23)  |  Speed (66)  |  Speed Of Light (18)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Unusual (37)  |  Velocity (51)  |  Waiting (42)  |  Zero (38)

It is sages and grey-haired philosophers who ought to sit up all night reading Alice in Wonderland in order to study that darkest problem of metaphysics, the borderland between reason and unreason, and the nature of the most erratic of spiritual forces, humour, which eternally dances between the two. That we do find a pleasure in certain long and elaborate stories, in certain complicated and curious forms of diction, which have no intelligible meaning whatever, is not a subject for children to play with; it is a subject for psychologists to go mad over.
In 'The Library of the Nursery', in Lunacy and Letters (1958), 26.
Science quotes on:  |  Alice In Wonderland (8)  |  Borderland (6)  |  Lewis Carroll (48)  |  Certain (557)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Curious (95)  |  Dance (35)  |  Dark (145)  |  Do (1905)  |  Elaborate (31)  |  Erratic (4)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Find (1014)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Humour (116)  |  Intelligible (35)  |  Mad (54)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Metaphysic (7)  |  Metaphysics (53)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Order (638)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Play (116)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Problem (731)  |  Psychologist (26)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Reason (766)  |  Sage (25)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Story (122)  |  Study (701)  |  Subject (543)  |  Two (936)  |  Unreason (3)  |  Whatever (234)

It is said that the composing of the Lilavati was occasioned by the following circumstance. Lilavati was the name of the author’s daughter, concerning whom it appeared, from the qualities of the ascendant at her birth, that she was destined to pass her life unmarried, and to remain without children. The father ascertained a lucky hour for contracting her in marriage, that she might be firmly connected and have children. It is said that when that hour approached, he brought his daughter and his intended son near him. He left the hour cup on the vessel of water and kept in attendance a time-knowing astrologer, in order that when the cup should subside in the water, those two precious jewels should be united. But, as the intended arrangement was not according to destiny, it happened that the girl, from a curiosity natural to children, looked into the cup, to observe the water coming in at the hole, when by chance a pearl separated from her bridal dress, fell into the cup, and, rolling down to the hole, stopped the influx of water. So the astrologer waited in expectation of the promised hour. When the operation of the cup had thus been delayed beyond all moderate time, the father was in consternation, and examining, he found that a small pearl had stopped the course of the water, and that the long-expected hour was passed. In short, the father, thus disappointed, said to his unfortunate daughter, I will write a book of your name, which shall remain to the latest times—for a good name is a second life, and the ground-work of eternal existence.
In Preface to the Persian translation of the Lilavati by Faizi (1587), itself translated into English by Strachey and quoted in John Taylor (trans.) Lilawati, or, A Treatise on Arithmetic and Geometry by Bhascara Acharya (1816), Introduction, 3. [The Lilavati is the 12th century treatise on mathematics by Indian mathematician, Bhaskara Acharya, born 1114.]
Science quotes on:  |  12th Century (3)  |  Accord (36)  |  According (236)  |  Appear (122)  |  Approach (112)  |  Arrangement (93)  |  Ascendant (2)  |  Ascertain (41)  |  Astrologer (10)  |  Attendance (2)  |  Author (175)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Birth (154)  |  Book (413)  |  Bring (95)  |  Chance (244)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Coming (114)  |  Compose (20)  |  Concern (239)  |  Connect (126)  |  Contract (11)  |  Course (413)  |  Cup (7)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Daughter (30)  |  Delay (21)  |  Destined (42)  |  Destiny (54)  |  Disappoint (14)  |  Disappointed (6)  |  Down (455)  |  Dress (10)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Examine (84)  |  Existence (481)  |  Expect (203)  |  Expectation (67)  |  Fall (243)  |  Father (113)  |  Find (1014)  |  Firmly (6)  |  Follow (389)  |  Girl (38)  |  Good (906)  |  Ground (222)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Hole (17)  |  Hour (192)  |  Indian (32)  |  Influx (2)  |  Intend (18)  |  Jewel (10)  |  Keep (104)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Late (119)  |  Leave (138)  |  Life (1870)  |  Look (584)  |  Lucky (13)  |  Marriage (39)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Moderate (6)  |  Name (359)  |  Natural (810)  |  Observe (179)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Operation (221)  |  Order (638)  |  Pass (241)  |  Pearl (8)  |  Precious (43)  |  Promise (72)  |  Quality (139)  |  Remain (355)  |  Roll (41)  |  Say (989)  |  Second (66)  |  Separate (151)  |  Short (200)  |  Small (489)  |  Son (25)  |  Stop (89)  |  Subside (5)  |  Time (1911)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Two (936)  |  Unfortunate (19)  |  United (15)  |  Unmarried (3)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Wait (66)  |  Water (503)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)  |  Write (250)

It is Surgery that, long after it has passed into obsolescence, will be remembered as the glory of Medicine.
In Letters to a Young Doctor (1982), 51.
Science quotes on:  |  Glory (66)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Obsolescence (4)  |  Pass (241)  |  Remember (189)  |  Surgery (54)  |  Will (2350)

It is the reciprocity of these appearances—that each party should think the other has contracted—that is so difficult to realise. Here is a paradox beyond even the imagination of Dean Swift. Gulliver regarded the Lilliputians as a race of dwarfs; and the Lilliputians regarded Gulliver as a giant. That is natural. If the Lilliputians had appeared dwarfs to Gulliver, and Gulliver had appeared a dwarf to the Lilliputians—but no! that is too absurd for fiction, and is an idea only to be found in the sober pages of science. …It is not only in space but in time that these strange variations occur. If we observed the aviator carefully we should infer that he was unusually slow in his movements; and events in the conveyance moving with him would be similarly retarded—as though time had forgotten to go on. His cigar lasts twice as long as one of ours. …But here again reciprocity comes in, because in the aviator’s opinion it is we who are travelling at 161,000 miles a second past him; and when he has made all allowances, he finds that it is we who are sluggish. Our cigar lasts twice as long as his.
In Space, Time and Gravitation: An Outline of the General Relativity Theory (1920, 1921), 23-24.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurd (60)  |  Allowance (6)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Event (222)  |  Find (1014)  |  Forgotten (53)  |  Giant (73)  |  Idea (881)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Last (425)  |  Movement (162)  |  Natural (810)  |  Observed (149)  |  Occur (151)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paradox (54)  |  Past (355)  |  Race (278)  |  Regard (312)  |  Slow (108)  |  Space (523)  |  Strange (160)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Travelling (17)  |  Variation (93)

It is this mythical, or rather this symbolic, content of the religious traditions which is likely to come into conflict with science. This occurs whenever this religious stock of ideas contains dogmatically fixed statements on subjects which be long in the domain of science. Thus, it is of vital importance for the preservation of true religion that such conflicts be avoided when they arise from subjects which, in fact, are not really essential for the pursuance of the religious aims.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Aim (175)  |  Arise (162)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Conflict (77)  |  Contain (68)  |  Content (75)  |  Domain (72)  |  Essential (210)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Fix (34)  |  Idea (881)  |  Importance (299)  |  Likely (36)  |  Mythical (3)  |  Occur (151)  |  Preservation (39)  |  Really (77)  |  Religion (369)  |  Religious (134)  |  Statement (148)  |  Stock (7)  |  Subject (543)  |  Symbolic (16)  |  Tradition (76)  |  True (239)  |  Vital (89)  |  Whenever (81)

It is to geometry that we owe in some sort the source of this discovery [of beryllium]; it is that [science] that furnished the first idea of it, and we may say that without it the knowledge of this new earth would not have been acquired for a long time, since according to the analysis of the emerald by M. Klaproth and that of the beryl by M. Bindheim one would not have thought it possible to recommence this work without the strong analogies or even almost perfect identity that Citizen Haüy found for the geometrical properties between these two stony fossils.
Haüy used the geometry of cleavage to reveal the underlying crystal structure, and thus found the emeral and beryl were geometrically identical. In May Elvira Weeks, The Discovery of the Elements (1934), 153, citing Mellor, Comprehensive Treatise on Inorganic and Theoretical Chemistry (1923), 204-7.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Acquired (77)  |  Analogy (76)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Beryllium (3)  |  Citizen (52)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Earth (1076)  |  First (1302)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Furnish (97)  |  Furnishing (4)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Idea (881)  |  Identity (19)  |  Martin Heinrich Klaproth (3)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Mineral (66)  |  New (1273)  |  Owe (71)  |  Owing (39)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Possible (560)  |  Property (177)  |  Say (989)  |  Source (101)  |  Stone (168)  |  Strong (182)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Work (1402)

It is unreasonable to expect science to produce a system of ethics—ethics are a kind of highway code for traffic among mankind—and the fact that in physics atoms which were yesterday assumed to be square are now assumed to be round is exploited with unjustified tendentiousness by all who are hungry for faith; so long as physics extends our dominion over nature, these changes ought to be a matter of complete indifference to you.
Letter to Oskar Pfister, 24 Feb 1928. Quoted in H. Meng and E. Freud (eds.), Psycho-Analysis and Faith: The Letters of Sigmund Freud and Oscar Pfister (1963), 123.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Change (639)  |  Code (31)  |  Complete (209)  |  Ethic (39)  |  Ethics (53)  |  Expect (203)  |  Exploit (19)  |  Extend (129)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Faith (209)  |  Kind (564)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Matter (821)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Square (73)  |  System (545)  |  Traffic (10)  |  Yesterday (37)

It is very different to make a practical system and to introduce it. A few experiments in the laboratory would prove the practicability of system long before it could be brought into general use. You can take a pipe and put a little coal in it, close it up, heat it and light the gas that comes out of the stem, but that is not introducing gas lighting. I'll bet that if it were discovered to-morrow in New York that gas could be made out of coal it would be at least five years before the system would be in general use.
From the New York Herald (30 Jan 1879), as cited in Leslie Tomory, 'Building the First Gas Network, 1812-1820', Technology and Culture (Jan 2011), 52, No. 1, 75-102.
Science quotes on:  |  Bet (13)  |  Coal (64)  |  Different (595)  |  Discover (571)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Gas (89)  |  General (521)  |  Heat (180)  |  Introduce (63)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Light (635)  |  Lighting (5)  |  Little (717)  |  New (1273)  |  New York (17)  |  Pipe (7)  |  Practical (225)  |  Prove (261)  |  Stem (31)  |  System (545)  |  Tomorrow (63)  |  Use (771)  |  Year (963)

It is when physicians are bogged down … when they lack a clear understanding of disease mechanisms, that the deficiencies of the health-care system are most conspicuous. If I were a policy-maker, interested in saving money for health care over the long haul, I would regard it as an act of high prudence to give high priority to a lot more basic research in biologic science.
In 'The Technology of Medicine', The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher (1974), 41-42.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Basic (144)  |  Basic Research (15)  |  Care (203)  |  Clear (111)  |  Conspicuous (13)  |  Deficiency (15)  |  Disease (340)  |  Down (455)  |  Health (210)  |  Health Care (10)  |  High (370)  |  Human Biology (3)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interested (5)  |  Lack (127)  |  Lot (151)  |  Maker (34)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Money (178)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Physician (284)  |  Priority (11)  |  Prudent (6)  |  Regard (312)  |  Research (753)  |  Saving (20)  |  System (545)  |  Understanding (527)

It must happen that in some cases the author is not understood, or is very imperfectly understood; and the question is what is to be done. After giving a reasonable amount of attention to the passage, let the student pass on, reserving the obscurity for future efforts. … The natural tendency of solitary students, I believe, is not to hurry away prematurely from a hard passage, but to hang far too long over it; the just pride that does not like to acknowledge defeat, and the strong will that cannot endure to be thwarted, both urge to a continuance of effort even when success seems hopeless. It is only by experience we gain the conviction that when the mind is thoroughly fatigued it has neither the power to continue with advantage its course in .an assigned direction, nor elasticity to strike out a new path; but that, on the other hand, after being withdrawn for a time from the pursuit, it may return and gain the desired end.
In 'Private Study of Mathematics', Conflict of Studies and other Essays (1873), 68.
Science quotes on:  |  Acknowledge (33)  |  Advantage (144)  |  Amount (153)  |  Assign (15)  |  Attention (196)  |  Author (175)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belief (615)  |  Both (496)  |  Case (102)  |  Continuance (2)  |  Continue (179)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Course (413)  |  Defeat (31)  |  Desire (212)  |  Direction (185)  |  Effort (243)  |  Elasticity (8)  |  End (603)  |  Endure (21)  |  Experience (494)  |  Far (158)  |  Fatigue (13)  |  Future (467)  |  Gain (146)  |  Give (208)  |  Hang (46)  |  Happen (282)  |  Hard (246)  |  Hopeless (17)  |  Hurry (16)  |  Imperfectly (2)  |  Let (64)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  New (1273)  |  Obscurity (28)  |  On The Other Hand (40)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pass (241)  |  Passage (52)  |  Path (159)  |  Power (771)  |  Premature (22)  |  Pride (84)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Question (649)  |  Reasonable (29)  |  Reserve (26)  |  Return (133)  |  Seem (150)  |  Solitary (16)  |  Strike (72)  |  Strong (182)  |  Student (317)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)  |  Success (327)  |  Tendency (110)  |  Thoroughly (67)  |  Time (1911)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understood (155)  |  Urge (17)  |  Will (2350)  |  Withdraw (11)

It takes most men about two years to completely quit smoking cigarettes and twice as long to quit bragging about it.
Anonymous
In E.C. McKenzie, 14,000 Quips and Quotes for Speakers, Writers, Editors, Preachers, and Teachers (1990), 84.
Science quotes on:  |  Cigarette (26)  |  Completely (137)  |  Most (1728)  |  Quit (10)  |  Smoking (27)  |  Two (936)  |  Year (963)

It took me so long to understand what I was writing about, that I knew how to write about it so most readers would understand it.
As quoted in Alex Bellos, 'Martin Gardner Obituary', The Guardian (27 May 2010)
Science quotes on:  |  Know (1538)  |  Most (1728)  |  Reader (42)  |  Understand (648)  |  Write (250)  |  Writing (192)

It took more than three thousand years to make some of the trees in these western woods ... Through all the wonderful, eventful centuries since Christ's time—and long before that—God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease, avalanches, and a thousand straining, leveling tempests and floods; but he cannot save them from fools.
John Muir
In 'The American Forests', Atlantic Monthly (Aug 1897), Vol. 80, 157.
Science quotes on:  |  Avalanche (5)  |  Car (75)  |  Care (203)  |  Century (319)  |  Christ (17)  |  Disease (340)  |  Drought (14)  |  Flood (52)  |  Fool (121)  |  God (776)  |  More (2558)  |  Save (126)  |  Tempest (7)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tree (269)  |  Western (45)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  Wood (97)  |  Year (963)

It was long before I got at the maxim, that in reading an old mathematician you will not read his riddle unless you plough with his heifer; you must see with his light, if you want to know how much he saw.
Letter to W. R. Hamilton, 27 January 1853. In R. P. Graves (ed.), A Life of Sir W. R. Hamilton (1889), Vol. 3, 438.
Science quotes on:  |  Know (1538)  |  Light (635)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Must (1525)  |  Old (499)  |  Plough (15)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Riddle (28)  |  Saw (160)  |  See (1094)  |  Want (504)  |  Will (2350)

It was noted long ago that the front row of burlesque houses was occupied predominantly by bald-headed men. In fact, such a row became known as the bald-headed row. It might be assumed from this on statistical evidence that the continued close observation of chorus girls in tights caused loss of hair from the top of the head.
[Disputing a statistical study for the American Cancer Society showing smoking to be a cancer causative.]
In Bess Furman, '2 Cite Extraction of Cigarette Tar', New York Times (26 Jul 1957), 21. The article reported on testimony before the Legal and Monetary Affairs Subcommittee of the House Government Operations Committee.
Science quotes on:  |  Assumption (96)  |  Burlesque (2)  |  Cancer (61)  |  Chorus (6)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Continuing (4)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Front (16)  |  Girl (38)  |  Hair (25)  |  Head (87)  |  House (143)  |  Known (453)  |  Loss (117)  |  Observation (593)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Occupy (27)  |  Predominantly (4)  |  Row (9)  |  Smoking (27)  |  Society (350)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Study (701)  |  Top (100)

It was through living among these groups and much more I think, through moving regularly from one to the other and back again that I got occupied with the problem of what, long before I put it on paper, I christened to myself as the ‘two cultures’. For constantly I felt I was moving among two groups [scientists and literary intellectuals] comparable in intelligence, identical in race, not grossly different in social origin, earning about the same incomes, who had almost ceased to communicate at all, who in intellectual, moral and psychological climate had so little in common that instead of going from Burlington House or South Kensington to Chelsea, one might have crossed an ocean.
The Two Cultures: The Rede Lecture (1959), 2. The places mentioned are all in London. Burlington House is the home of the Royal Society and South Kensington is the site of the Natural History Museum, whereas Chelsea represents an affluent centre of artistic life.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Cessation (13)  |  Climate (102)  |  Common (447)  |  Communicate (39)  |  Cross (20)  |  Culture (157)  |  Different (595)  |  House (143)  |  Identical (55)  |  Income (18)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Little (717)  |  Living (492)  |  Moral (203)  |  More (2558)  |  Myself (211)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Origin (250)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paper (192)  |  Problem (731)  |  Psychological (42)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Race (278)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Social (261)  |  Society (350)  |  South (39)  |  Think (1122)  |  Through (846)  |  Two (936)

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)  |  Assert (69)  |  Casual (9)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Ground (222)  |  Hold (96)  |  Hope (321)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Little (717)  |  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:  |  Assert (69)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Ground (222)  |  Hope (321)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Little (717)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Profitable (29)  |  Rash (15)  |  Remain (355)  |  Return (133)  |  Say (989)  |  Thoroughly (67)

It’s not that I’m so smart, it’s just that I stay with problems longer.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Problem (731)  |  Smart (33)  |  Stay (26)

Just as the arts of tanning and dyeing were practiced long before the scientific principles upon which they depend were known, so also the practice of Chemical Engineering preceded any analysis or exposition of the principles upon which such practice is based.
In William H. Walker, Warren K. Lewis and William H. MacAdams, The Principles of Chemical Engineering (1923), Preface to 1st. edition, v.
Science quotes on:  |  Analysis (244)  |  Art (680)  |  Base (120)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemical Engineering (4)  |  Depend (238)  |  Dyeing (2)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Exposition (16)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Practice (212)  |  Precede (23)  |  Principle (530)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Tanning (3)

Knowing what we know from X-ray and related studies of the fibrous proteins, how they are built from long polypeptide chains with linear patterns drawn to a grand scale, how these chains can contract and take up different configurations by intramolecular folding, how the chain- groups are penetrated by, and their sidechains react with, smaller co-operating molecules, and finally how they can combine so readily with nucleic acid molecules and still maintain the fibrous configuration, it is but natural to assume, as a first working hypothesis at least, that they form the long scroll on which is written the pattern of life. No other molecules satisfy so many requirements.
William Thomas Astbury and Florence O. Bell. 'Some Recent Developments in the X-Ray Study of Proteins and Related Structures', Cold Spring Harbor Symposia on Quantitative Biology, 1938, 6, 1144.
Science quotes on:  |  Acid (83)  |  Combine (58)  |  Different (595)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Life (1870)  |  Linear (13)  |  Maintain (105)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nucleic Acid (23)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pattern (116)  |  Protein (56)  |  Ray (115)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Scale (122)  |  Still (614)  |  Structure (365)  |  X-ray (43)

Louis Agassiz quote: Lay aside all conceit Learn to read the book of Nature for yourself. Those who have succeeded best have fol
Lay aside all conceit. Learn to read the book of Nature for yourself. Those who have succeeded best have followed for years some slim thread which once in a while has broadened out and disclosed some treasure worth a life-long search.
Lecture at a teaching laboratory on Penikese Island, Buzzard's Bay. Quoted from the lecture notes by David Starr Jordan, Science Sketches (1911), 145.
Science quotes on:  |  Best (467)  |  Book (413)  |  Book Of Nature (12)  |  Broad (28)  |  Conceit (15)  |  Disclosure (7)  |  Follow (389)  |  Learn (672)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lifelong (10)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Read (308)  |  Search (175)  |  Slim (2)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Success (327)  |  Thread (36)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Worth (172)  |  Year (963)

Lay down your rails, ye nations, near and far—
Yoke your full trains to Steam’s triumphal car;
Link town to town; unite in iron bands
The long-estranged and oft-embattled lands.
From poem, 'Railways' (1846), collected in The Poetical Works of Charles Mackay: Now for the First Time Collected Complete in One Volume (1876), 214.
Science quotes on:  |  Car (75)  |  Down (455)  |  Iron (99)  |  Land (131)  |  Lay (3)  |  Link (48)  |  Nation (208)  |  Rail (5)  |  Railroad (36)  |  Steam (81)  |  Town (30)  |  Train (118)  |  Triumph (76)  |  Unite (43)  |  Yoke (3)

Let him look at that dazzling light hung aloft as an eternal lamp to lighten the universe; let him behold the earth, a mere dot compared with the vast circuit which that orb describes, and stand amazed to find that the vast circuit itself is but a very fine point compared with the orbit traced by the stars as they roll their course on high. But if our vision halts there, let imagination pass beyond; it will fail to form a conception long before Nature fails to supply material. The whole visible world is but an imperceptible speck in the ample bosom of Nature. No notion comes near it. Though we may extend our thought beyond imaginable space, yet compared with reality we bring to birth mere atoms. Nature is an infinite sphere whereof the centre is everywhere, the circumference nowhere. In short, imagination is brought to silence at the thought, and that is the most perceptible sign of the all-power of God.
Let man reawake and consider what he is compared with the reality of things; regard himself lost in this remote corner of Nature; and from the tiny cell where he lodges, to wit the Universe, weigh at their true worth earth, kingdoms, towns, himself. What is a man face to face with infinity?
Pensées (1670), Section 1, aphorism 43. In H. F. Stewart (ed.), Pascal’s Pensées (1950), 19.
Science quotes on:  |  Aloft (5)  |  Amazement (19)  |  Ample (4)  |  Atom (381)  |  Behold (19)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Birth (154)  |  Bosom (14)  |  Cell (146)  |  Centre (31)  |  Circuit (29)  |  Circumference (23)  |  Comparison (108)  |  Conception (160)  |  Consider (428)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Corner (59)  |  Course (413)  |  Dazzling (13)  |  Describe (132)  |  Dot (18)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Everywhere (98)  |  Extend (129)  |  Face (214)  |  Fail (191)  |  Failure (176)  |  Find (1014)  |  Form (976)  |  God (776)  |  Halt (10)  |  High (370)  |  Himself (461)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Imperceptibility (2)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Infinity (96)  |  Kingdom (80)  |  Lamp (37)  |  Light (635)  |  Lodge (3)  |  Look (584)  |  Lost (34)  |  Man (2252)  |  Material (366)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Notion (120)  |  Nowhere (28)  |  Orb (20)  |  Orbit (85)  |  Pass (241)  |  Perception (97)  |  Point (584)  |  Power (771)  |  Reality (274)  |  Regard (312)  |  Remote (86)  |  Roll (41)  |  Short (200)  |  Sign (63)  |  Silence (62)  |  Space (523)  |  Speck (25)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Stand (284)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Supply (100)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Tiny (74)  |  Town (30)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vast (188)  |  Visibility (6)  |  Visible (87)  |  Vision (127)  |  Weigh (51)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wit (61)  |  World (1850)  |  Worth (172)

Let us now declare the means whereby our understanding can rise to knowledge without fear of error. There are two such means: intuition and deduction. By intuition I mean not the varying testimony of the senses, nor the deductive judgment of imagination naturally extravagant, but the conception of an attentive mind so distinct and so clear that no doubt remains to it with regard to that which it comprehends; or, what amounts to the same thing, the self-evidencing conception of a sound and attentive mind, a conception which springs from the light of reason alone, and is more certain, because more simple, than deduction itself. …
It may perhaps be asked why to intuition we add this other mode of knowing, by deduction, that is to say, the process which, from something of which we have certain knowledge, draws consequences which necessarily follow therefrom. But we are obliged to admit this second step; for there are a great many things which, without being evident of themselves, nevertheless bear the marks of certainty if only they are deduced from true and incontestable principles by a continuous and uninterrupted movement of thought, with distinct intuition of each thing; just as we know that the last link of a long chain holds to the first, although we can not take in with one glance of the eye the intermediate links, provided that, after having run over them in succession, we can recall them all, each as being joined to its fellows, from the first up to the last. Thus we distinguish intuition from deduction, inasmuch as in the latter case there is conceived a certain progress or succession, while it is not so in the former; … whence it follows that primary propositions, derived immediately from principles, may be said to be known, according to the way we view them, now by intuition, now by deduction; although the principles themselves can be known only by intuition, the remote consequences only by deduction.
In Rules for the Direction of the Mind, Philosophy of Descartes. [Torrey] (1892), 64-65.
Science quotes on:  |  Accord (36)  |  According (236)  |  Add (42)  |  Admit (49)  |  Alone (324)  |  Amount (153)  |  Ask (420)  |  Attentive (15)  |  Bear (162)  |  Being (1276)  |  Case (102)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Chain (51)  |  Clear (111)  |  Comprehend (44)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Conception (160)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Declare (48)  |  Deduce (27)  |  Deduction (90)  |  Deductive (13)  |  Derive (70)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Draw (140)  |  Error (339)  |  Evident (92)  |  Extravagant (10)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fear (212)  |  Fellow (88)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Former (138)  |  Glance (36)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hold (96)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Inasmuch (5)  |  Incontestable (3)  |  Intermediate (38)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Join (32)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Last (425)  |  Latter (21)  |  Let (64)  |  Light (635)  |  Link (48)  |  Mark (47)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mode (43)  |  More (2558)  |  Movement (162)  |  Naturally (11)  |  Nature Of Mathematics (80)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Obliged (6)  |  Other (2233)  |  Primary (82)  |  Principle (530)  |  Process (439)  |  Progress (492)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Provide (79)  |  Reason (766)  |  Recall (11)  |  Regard (312)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remote (86)  |  Rise (169)  |  Run (158)  |  Same (166)  |  Say (989)  |  Second (66)  |  Self (268)  |  Sense (785)  |  Simple (426)  |  Something (718)  |  Sound (187)  |  Spring (140)  |  Step (234)  |  Succession (80)  |  Testimony (21)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Therefrom (2)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  True (239)  |  Two (936)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Uninterrupted (7)  |  Vary (27)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whereby (2)  |  Why (491)

Let us only imagine that birds had studied their own development and that it was they in turn who investigated the structure of the adult mammal and of man. Wouldn’t their physiological textbooks teach the following? “Those four and two-legged animals bear many resemblances to embryos, for their cranial bones are separated, and they have no beak, just as we do in the first live or six days of incubation; their extremities are all very much alike, as ours are for about the same period; there is not a single true feather on their body, rather only thin feather-shafts, so that we, as fledglings in the nest, are more advanced than they shall ever be … And these mammals that cannot find their own food for such a long time after their birth, that can never rise freely from the earth, want to consider themselves more highly organized than we?”
Über Entwicklungsgeschichte der Thiere: Beobachtung und Reflexion (1828), 203. Trans. Stephen Jay Gould, Ontogeny and Phylogeny (1977), 54.
Science quotes on:  |  Alike (60)  |  Animal (651)  |  Bear (162)  |  Bird (163)  |  Birth (154)  |  Body (557)  |  Bone (101)  |  Consider (428)  |  Development (441)  |  Do (1905)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Embryo (30)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Food (213)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Incubation (3)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Live (650)  |  Mammal (41)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Nest (26)  |  Never (1089)  |  Period (200)  |  Physiological (64)  |  Resemblance (39)  |  Rise (169)  |  Single (365)  |  Structure (365)  |  Teach (299)  |  Textbook (39)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Turn (454)  |  Two (936)  |  Want (504)

Let us suppose that an ichthyologist is exploring the life of the ocean. He casts a net into the water and brings up a fishy assortment. Surveying his catch, he proceeds in the usual manner of a scientist to systematise what it reveals. He arrives at two generalisations:
(1) No sea-creature is less than two inches long.
(2) All sea-creatures have gills.
These are both true of his catch, and he assumes tentatively that they will remain true however often he repeats it.
In applying this analogy, the catch stands for the body of knowledge which constitutes physical science, and the net for the sensory and intellectual equipment which we use in obtaining it. The casting of the net corresponds to observation; for knowledge which has not been or could not be obtained by observation is not admitted into physical science.
An onlooker may object that the first generalisation is wrong. “There are plenty of sea-creatures under two inches long, only your net is not adapted to catch them.” The icthyologist dismisses this objection contemptuously. “Anything uncatchable by my net is ipso facto outside the scope of icthyological knowledge. In short, what my net can't catch isn't fish.” Or—to translate the analogy—“If you are not simply guessing, you are claiming a knowledge of the physical universe discovered in some other way than by the methods of physical science, and admittedly unverifiable by such methods. You are a metaphysician. Bah!”
In 'Selective Subjectivism', The Philosophy of Physical Science (1938, 2012), 16.
Science quotes on:  |  Adapt (70)  |  Analogy (76)  |  Assortment (5)  |  Body (557)  |  Both (496)  |  Cast (69)  |  Casting (10)  |  Claiming (8)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Creature (242)  |  Discover (571)  |  Equipment (45)  |  First (1302)  |  Fish (130)  |  Ichthyologist (2)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Method (531)  |  Object (438)  |  Objection (34)  |  Observation (593)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outside (141)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Remain (355)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Scope (44)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sensory (16)  |  Short (200)  |  Stand (284)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Surveying (6)  |  Translate (21)  |  Two (936)  |  Universe (900)  |  Use (771)  |  Water (503)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wrong (246)

Life arose as a living molecule or protogene, the progression from this stage to that of the ameba is at least as great as from ameba to man. All the essential problems of living organisms are already solved in the one-celled (or, as many now prefer to say, noncellular) protozoan and these are only elaborated in man or the other multicellular animals. The step from nonlife to life may not have been so complex, after all, and that from cell to multicellular organism is readily comprehensible. The change from protogene to protozoan was probably the most complex that has occurred in evolution, and it may well have taken as long as the change from protozoan to man.
The Meaning of Evolution: A Study of the History of Life and of its Significance for Man (1949), 16
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Amoeba (21)  |  Animal (651)  |  Cell (146)  |  Change (639)  |  Complex (202)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Elaborated (7)  |  Elaboration (11)  |  Essential (210)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Great (1610)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Man (2252)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Most (1728)  |  Multicellular (4)  |  Nonlife (2)  |  Occurrence (53)  |  Organism (231)  |  Other (2233)  |  Problem (731)  |  Progression (23)  |  Protozoan (3)  |  Say (989)  |  Solution (282)  |  Stage (152)  |  Step (234)

Life can be thought of as water kept at the right temperature in the right atmosphere in the right light for a long enough period of time.
You and The Universe (1958), 145.
Science quotes on:  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Enough (341)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Period (200)  |  Right (473)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Water (503)

Life is short, and the Art long; the occasion fleeting; experience fallacious, and judgment difficult. The physician must not only be prepared to do what is right himself, but also to make the patient, the attendants, and externals cooperate.
The Genuine Works of Hippocrates, trans. Francis Adams (1886), Vol. 2, 192.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Do (1905)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fallacious (13)  |  Himself (461)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Life (1870)  |  Must (1525)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Patient (209)  |  Physician (284)  |  Right (473)  |  Short (200)

Life is short, the Art long, opportunity fleeting, experience treacherous, judgment difficult. The physician must be ready, not only to do his duty himself, but also to secure the co-operation of the patient, of the attendants and of externals.
Aphorisms, in Hippocrates, trans. W. H. S. Jones (1931), Vol. 4, 99.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Do (1905)  |  Experience (494)  |  Himself (461)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Life (1870)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nurse (33)  |  Operation (221)  |  Opportunity (95)  |  Patient (209)  |  Physician (284)  |  Short (200)

Life through many long periods has been manifested in a countless host of varying structures, all circumscribed by one general plan, each appointed to a definite place, and limited to an appointed duration. On the whole the earth has been thus more and more covered by the associated life of plants and animals, filling all habitable space with beings capable of enjoying their own existence or ministering to the enjoyment of others; till finally, after long preparation, a being was created capable of the wonderful power of measuring and weighing all the world of matter and space which surrounds him, of treasuring up the past history of all the forms of life, and considering his own relation to the whole. When he surveys this vast and co-ordinated system, and inquires into its history and origin, can he be at a loss to decide whether it be a work of Divine thought and wisdom, or the fortunate offspring of a few atoms of matter, warmed by the anima mundi, a spark of electricity, or an accidental ray of sunshine?
Life on the Earth: Its Origin and Succession (1860), 216-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Accidental (31)  |  Animal (651)  |  Appointment (12)  |  Association (49)  |  Atom (381)  |  Being (1276)  |  Capability (44)  |  Capable (174)  |  Coordination (11)  |  Countless (39)  |  Cover (40)  |  Decision (98)  |  Definite (114)  |  Divine (112)  |  Duration (12)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Enjoyment (37)  |  Existence (481)  |  Fill (67)  |  Form (976)  |  Fortunate (31)  |  Fortune (50)  |  General (521)  |  Habitat (17)  |  History (716)  |  Host (16)  |  Inquire (26)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Life (1870)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limitation (52)  |  Limited (102)  |  Loss (117)  |  Manifestation (61)  |  Matter (821)  |  Measurement (178)  |  More (2558)  |  Offspring (27)  |  Origin (250)  |  Other (2233)  |  Past (355)  |  Period (200)  |  Place (192)  |  Plan (122)  |  Plant (320)  |  Power (771)  |  Preparation (60)  |  Ray (115)  |  Space (523)  |  Spark (32)  |  Structure (365)  |  Sunshine (12)  |  Survey (36)  |  System (545)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Variation (93)  |  Vast (188)  |  Warm (74)  |  Weight (140)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wisdom (235)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

Life thus forms a long, unbroken chain of generations, in which the child becomes the mother, and the effect becomes the cause.
In 'On the Mechanistic Interpretation of Life' (1858), Rudolf Virchow and Lelland J. Rather (trans.) , Disease, Life, and Man: Selected Essays by Rudolf Virchow (1958), 116.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Cause (561)  |  Chain (51)  |  Child (333)  |  Effect (414)  |  Form (976)  |  Generation (256)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mother (116)  |  Unbroken (10)

Life well spent is long.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Life (1870)  |  Spend (97)  |  Spent (85)

Like so many aging college people, Pnin had long ceased to notice the existence of students on the campus.
In Pnin (1957), 53
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Aging (9)  |  Campus (3)  |  Cease (81)  |  College (71)  |  Existence (481)  |  Notice (81)  |  People (1031)  |  Student (317)

Like taxes, radioactivity has long been with us and in increasing amounts; it is not to be hated and feared, but accepted and controlled. Radiation is dangerous, let there be no mistake about that—but the modern world abounds in dangerous substances and situations too numerous to mention. ... Consider radiation as something to be treated with respect, avoided when practicable, and accepted when inevitable.
Recommending the same view towards radiation as the risks of automobile travel.
While in the Office of Naval Research. In Must we Hide? (1949), 44.
Science quotes on:  |  Abound (17)  |  Accept (198)  |  Amount (153)  |  Automobile (23)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Consider (428)  |  Control (182)  |  Danger (127)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Fear (212)  |  Hate (68)  |  Increase (225)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Mention (84)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Modern (402)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Radiation (48)  |  Radioactivity (33)  |  Respect (212)  |  Risk (68)  |  Situation (117)  |  Something (718)  |  Substance (253)  |  Tax (27)  |  Travel (125)  |  View (496)  |  World (1850)

Living is like working out a long addition sum, and if you make a mistake in the first two totals you will never find the right answer. It means involving oneself in a complicated chain of circumstances.
In The Burning Brand: Diaries 1935-1950 (1961), 56.
Science quotes on:  |  Addition (70)  |  Answer (389)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Chain (51)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Correct (95)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Live (650)  |  Living (492)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Never (1089)  |  Oneself (33)  |  Right (473)  |  Sum (103)  |  Total (95)  |  Two (936)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

Logic it is called [referring to Whitehead and Russell’s Principia Mathematica] and logic it is, the logic of propositions and functions and classes and relations, by far the greatest (not merely the biggest) logic that our planet has produced, so much that is new in matter and in manner; but it is also mathematics, a prolegomenon to the science, yet itself mathematics in its most genuine sense, differing from other parts of the science only in the respects that it surpasses these in fundamentally, generality and precision, and lacks traditionality. Few will read it, but all will feel its effect, for behind it is the urgence and push of a magnificent past: two thousand five hundred years of record and yet longer tradition of human endeavor to think aright.
In Science (1912), 35, 110, from his book review on Alfred North Whitehead and Bertrand Russell, Principia Mathematica.
Science quotes on:  |  Aright (3)  |  Class (168)  |  Differ (88)  |  Effect (414)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  Function (235)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Generality (45)  |  Genuine (54)  |  Great (1610)  |  Human (1512)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Lack (127)  |  Logic (311)  |  Magnificent (46)  |  Manner (62)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mathematics And Logic (27)  |  Matter (821)  |  New (1273)  |  Past (355)  |  Planet (402)  |  Precision (72)  |  Principia Mathematica (2)  |  Produce (117)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Push (66)  |  Read (308)  |  Record (161)  |  Relation (166)  |  Bertrand Russell (198)  |  Sense (785)  |  Surpass (33)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Tradition (76)  |  Urgent (15)  |  Alfred North Whitehead (140)  |  Year (963)

Long before I ever saw the desert I was aware of the mystical overtones which the observation of nature made audible to me. But I have never been more frequently or more vividly aware of them than in connection with the desert phenomena.
The Voice of the Desert, a Naturalist’s Interpretation (1955, 1975), 216.
Science quotes on:  |  Audible (4)  |  Connection (171)  |  Desert (59)  |  Frequent (26)  |  More (2558)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Observation (593)  |  Overtone (3)  |  Saw (160)  |  Vivid (25)  |  Vividly (11)

Long intervals frequently elapse between the discovery of new principles in science and their practical application… Those intellectual qualifications, which give birth to new principles or to new methods, are of quite a different order from those which are necessary for their practical application.
Reflections on the Decline of Science in England (1830), 16.
Science quotes on:  |  Application (257)  |  Birth (154)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Different (595)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Invention (400)  |  Method (531)  |  Necessary (370)  |  New (1273)  |  Order (638)  |  Practical (225)  |  Principle (530)  |  Qualification (15)

Long lives are not necessarily pleasurable…. We will be lucky if we can postpone the search for new technologies for a while, until we have discovered some satisfactory things to do with the extra time. Something will surely have to be found to take the place of sitting on the porch re-examining one’s watch.
In 'The Long Habit', The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher (1974), 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Discover (571)  |  Do (1905)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  New (1273)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Porch (2)  |  Postpone (5)  |  Search (175)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Something (718)  |  Surely (101)  |  Technology (281)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Watch (118)  |  Will (2350)

Long may Louis de Broglie continue to inspire those who suspect that what is proved by impossibility proofs is lack of imagination.
In 'On the Impossible Pilot Wave', Foundations of Physics (Oct 1982), 12, No. 10, 989-999. Reprinted in Speakable and Unspeakable in Quantum Mechanics (1987), 167.
Science quotes on:  |  Prince Louis-Victor de Broglie (7)  |  Continue (179)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Impossibility (60)  |  Inspiration (80)  |  Lack (127)  |  Proof (304)  |  Suspect (18)

Looking back … over the long and labyrinthine path which finally led to the discovery [of the quantum theory], I am vividly reminded of Goethe’s saying that men will always be making mistakes as long as they are striving after something.
From Nobel Prize acceptance speech (2 Jun 1920), as quoted and translated by James Murphy in 'Introduction: Max Planck: a Biographical Sketch', in Max Planck and James Murphy (trans.), Where is Science Going (1932), 23. This passage of Planck’s speech is translated very differently for the Nobel Committee. See elsewhere on this web page, beginning, “When I look back…”.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Error (339)  |  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (150)  |  Labyrinth (12)  |  Lead (391)  |  Looking (191)  |  Making (300)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Path (159)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Reminded (2)  |  Something (718)  |  Strive (53)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Vivid (25)  |  Vividly (11)  |  Will (2350)

Looking back across the long cycles of change through which the land has been shaped into its present form, let us realise that these geographical revolutions are not events wholly of the dim past, but that they are still in progress. So slow and measured has been their march, that even from the earliest times of human history they seem hardly to have advanced at all. But none the less are they surely and steadily transpiring around us. In the fall of rain and the flow of rivers, in the bubble of springs and the silence of frost, in the quiet creep of glaciers and the tumultuous rush of ocean waves, in the tremor of the earthquake and the outburst of the volcano, we may recognise the same play of terrestrial forces by which the framework of the continents has been step by step evolved.
Lecture at the Evening Meeting, Royal Geographical Society (24 Mar 1879), 'Discussion on Geographical Evolution', in Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society and Monthly Record (1879), New Monthly Series, 1, 443.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Bubble (23)  |  Change (639)  |  Continent (79)  |  Creep (15)  |  Cycle (42)  |  Earthquake (37)  |  Eruption (10)  |  Event (222)  |  Fall (243)  |  Flow (89)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Framework (33)  |  From The Earliest Times (2)  |  Frost (15)  |  Glacier (17)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Looking (191)  |  March (48)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Past (355)  |  Present (630)  |  Progress (492)  |  Quiet (37)  |  Rain (70)  |  Revolution (133)  |  River (140)  |  Silence (62)  |  Slow (108)  |  Spring (140)  |  Step (234)  |  Step By Step (11)  |  Still (614)  |  Surely (101)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tremor (3)  |  Volcano (46)  |  Wave (112)  |  Wholly (88)

Mammals in general seem to live, at best, as long as it takes their hearts to count a billion. To this general rule, man himself is the most astonishing exception.
(1965). In Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 336.
Science quotes on:  |  Astonishing (29)  |  Best (467)  |  Billion (104)  |  Count (107)  |  Exception (74)  |  General (521)  |  Heart (243)  |  Himself (461)  |  Human (1512)  |  Live (650)  |  Mammal (41)  |  Man (2252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Rule (307)  |  Zoology (38)

Man has too long forgotten that the earth was given to him for usufruct alone, not for consumption, still less for profligate waste.
Man and Nature, (1864), 35. The word usufruct comes from Latin words in Roman law, usus et fructus for use and fruit (enjoyment), now meaning the temporary right to the use and enjoyment of the property of another, without changing the character of the property.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Consumption (16)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Forgotten (53)  |  Man (2252)  |  Still (614)  |  Use (771)  |  Waste (109)

Man is but a perambulating tool-box and workshop or office, fashioned for itself by a piece of very clever slime, as the result of long experience. ... Hence we speak of man's body as his “trunk.”
Samuel Butler, Henry Festing Jones (ed.), The Note-Books of Samuel Butler (1917), 18.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Box (22)  |  Clever (41)  |  Cleverness (15)  |  Definition (238)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fashion (34)  |  Man (2252)  |  Office (71)  |  Result (700)  |  Slime (6)  |  Speak (240)  |  Tool (129)  |  Trunk (23)  |  Workshop (14)

Man, some modern philosophers tell us, is alienated from his world: he is a stranger and afraid in a world he never made. Perhaps he is; yet so are animals, and even plants. They too were born, long ago, into a physico-chemical world, a world they never made.
'A Realist View of Logic Physics', in Wolfgang Yourgrau, et al., Physics, Logic, and History: based on the First International Colloquium held at the University of Denver, May 16-20, 1966 (1970), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Afraid (24)  |  Alienate (3)  |  Animal (651)  |  Birth (154)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Man (2252)  |  Modern (402)  |  Never (1089)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Plant (320)  |  Stranger (16)  |  Tell (344)  |  World (1850)

Man, whose organization is regarded as the highest, departs from the vertebrate archetype; and it is because the study of anatomy is usually commenced from, and often confined to, his structure, that a knowledge of the archetype has been so long hidden from anatomists.
'The Lexington Papers', The Quarterly Review (1851), 89, 450-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Anatomist (24)  |  Anatomy (75)  |  Archetype (5)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Man (2252)  |  Organization (120)  |  Regard (312)  |  Structure (365)  |  Study (701)  |  Usually (176)  |  Vertebrate (22)

Many people are shrinking from the future and from participation in the movement toward a new, expanded reality. And, like homesick travelers abroad, they are focusing their anxieties on home. The reasons are not far to seek. We are at a turning point in human history. … We could turn our attention to the problems that going to the moon certainly will not solve … But I think this would be fatal to our future. … A society that no longer moves forward does not merely stagnate; it begins to die.
In 'Man On the Moon' (1969) collected in Margaret Mead and Robert B. Textor (ed.), The World Ahead: An Anthropologist Anticipates the Future (2005), 248. The original magazine article was written shortly before the first Moon landing for the lay public, in Redbook (Jun 1969). It was later reprinted in the Congressional Record—Senate (30 Jun 1969), 17725-17726.
Science quotes on:  |  Abroad (19)  |  Anxiety (30)  |  Attention (196)  |  Begin (275)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Die (94)  |  Expand (56)  |  Far (158)  |  Fatal (14)  |  Focus (36)  |  Forward (104)  |  Future (467)  |  History (716)  |  Home (184)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human History (7)  |  Merely (315)  |  Moon (252)  |  Move (223)  |  Movement (162)  |  New (1273)  |  Participation (15)  |  People (1031)  |  Point (584)  |  Problem (731)  |  Reality (274)  |  Reason (766)  |  Seek (218)  |  Shrink (23)  |  Society (350)  |  Solve (145)  |  Stagnate (3)  |  Think (1122)  |  Toward (45)  |  Traveler (33)  |  Turn (454)  |  Turning Point (8)  |  Will (2350)

Many scientific theories have, for very long periods of time, stood the test of experience until they had to be discarded owing to man’s decision, not merely to make other experiments, but to have different experiences.
In The Disinherited Mind: Essays in Modern German Literature and Thought (1952), 20.
Science quotes on:  |  Decision (98)  |  Different (595)  |  Discard (32)  |  Experience (494)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Man (2252)  |  Merely (315)  |  Other (2233)  |  Owing (39)  |  Period (200)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Theory (24)  |  Test (221)  |  Time (1911)

Mapping the human genome has been compared with putting a man on the moon, but I believe it is more than that. This is the outstanding achievement not only of our lifetime, but in terms of human history. A few months ago I compared the project to the invention of the wheel. On reflection, it is more than that. I can well imagine technology making the wheel obsolete. But this code is the essence of mankind, and as long as humans exists, this code is going to be important and will be used.
Quoted in the press release 'The first draft of the Book of Humankind has been read', 26 Jun 2000. On the Sanger Institute web site at www.sanger.ac.uk/HGP/draft2000/mainrelease.shtml
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Code (31)  |  Essence (85)  |  Exist (458)  |  Genome (15)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Genome (13)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Invention (400)  |  Making (300)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Month (91)  |  Moon (252)  |  More (2558)  |  Obsolete (15)  |  Outstanding (16)  |  Project (77)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Technology (281)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Wheel (51)  |  Will (2350)

Mars was surprising in its way but not flabbergasting; it was a disappointment not to find evidences of life, and there was some sadness in the pictures sent back to earth from the Mars Lander, that lonely long-legged apparatus poking about with its jointed arm, picking up sample after sample of the barren Mars soil, looking for any flicker of life and finding none; the only sign of life on Mars was the Lander itself, an extension of the human mind all the way from earth to Mars, totally alone.
In Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler’s Ninth Symphony (1984), 22.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Apparatus (70)  |  Arm (82)  |  Back (395)  |  Barren (33)  |  Disappointment (18)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Extension (60)  |  Find (1014)  |  Flicker (2)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Joint (31)  |  Leg (35)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lonely (24)  |  Looking (191)  |  Mars (47)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Pick (16)  |  Picture (148)  |  Poke (5)  |  Sadness (36)  |  Sample (19)  |  Send (23)  |  Sign (63)  |  Soil (98)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Totally (6)  |  Way (1214)

Materialism in its literal sense is long since dead. …It is …belief in the universal dominance of scientific law which is nowadays generally meant by materialism.
Swarthmore Lecture (1929) at Friends’ House, London, printed in Science and the Unseen World (1929), 50-51.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (615)  |  Law (913)  |  Literal (12)  |  Materialism (11)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Sense (785)  |  Universal (198)

Mathematical reasoning is deductive in the sense that it is based upon definitions which, as far as the validity of the reasoning is concerned (apart from any existential import), needs only the test of self-consistency. Thus no external verification of definitions is required in mathematics, as long as it is considered merely as mathematics.
In Universal Algebra (1898), Preface, vi.
Science quotes on:  |  Base (120)  |  Concern (239)  |  Consider (428)  |  Consistency (31)  |  Deductive (13)  |  Definition (238)  |  Existential (3)  |  External (62)  |  Far (158)  |  Import (5)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Merely (315)  |  Nature Of Mathematics (80)  |  Need (320)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Require (229)  |  Required (108)  |  Self (268)  |  Sense (785)  |  Test (221)  |  Validity (50)  |  Verification (32)

Mathematicians have long since regarded it as demeaning to work on problems related to elementary geometry in two or three dimensions, in spite of the fact that it it precisely this sort of mathematics which is of practical value.
As coauthor with and G.C. Shephard, in Handbook of Applicable Mathematics, Volume V, Combinatorics and Geometry (1985), v.
Science quotes on:  |  Demeaning (2)  |  Dimension (64)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Practical (225)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Problem (731)  |  Regard (312)  |  Relate (26)  |  Sort (50)  |  Spite (55)  |  Two (936)  |  Value (393)  |  Work (1402)

Mathematics … above all other subjects, makes the student lust after knowledge, fills him, as it were, with a longing to fathom the cause of things and to employ his own powers independently; it collects his mental forces and concentrates them on a single point and thus awakens the spirit of individual inquiry, self-confidence and the joy of doing; it fascinates because of the view-points which it offers and creates certainty and assurance, owing to the universal validity of its methods. Thus, both what he receives and what he himself contributes toward the proper conception and solution of a problem, combine to mature the student and to make him skillful, to lead him away from the surface of things and to exercise him in the perception of their essence. A student thus prepared thirsts after knowledge and is ready for the university and its sciences. Thus it appears, that higher mathematics is the best guide to philosophy and to the philosophic conception of the world (considered as a self-contained whole) and of one’s own being.
In Die Mathematik die Fackelträgerin einer neuen Zeit (1889), 40. As translated in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-book (1914), 49.
Science quotes on:  |  Appear (122)  |  Assurance (17)  |  Awaken (17)  |  Being (1276)  |  Best (467)  |  Both (496)  |  Cause (561)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Collect (19)  |  Combine (58)  |  Concentrate (28)  |  Conception (160)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Consider (428)  |  Contribute (30)  |  Create (245)  |  Doing (277)  |  Employ (115)  |  Essence (85)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Fascinate (12)  |  Fathom (15)  |  Fill (67)  |  Force (497)  |  Guide (107)  |  Himself (461)  |  Independently (24)  |  Individual (420)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Joy (117)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lead (391)  |  Longing (19)  |  Lust (7)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mature (17)  |  Mental (179)  |  Method (531)  |  Offer (142)  |  Other (2233)  |  Owe (71)  |  Owing (39)  |  Perception (97)  |  Philosophic (6)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Point (584)  |  Power (771)  |  Prepare (44)  |  Problem (731)  |  Proper (150)  |  Ready (43)  |  Receive (117)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Confidence (11)  |  Self-Contained (3)  |  Single (365)  |  Skillful (17)  |  Solution (282)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Student (317)  |  Subject (543)  |  Surface (223)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thirst (11)  |  Universal (198)  |  University (130)  |  Validity (50)  |  Value Of Mathematics (60)  |  View (496)  |  Whole (756)  |  World (1850)

Mathematics gives the young man a clear idea of demonstration and habituates him to form long trains of thought and reasoning methodically connected and sustained by the final certainty of the result; and it has the further advantage, from a purely moral point of view, of inspiring an absolute and fanatical respect for truth. In addition to all this, mathematics, and chiefly algebra and infinitesimal calculus, excite to a high degree the conception of the signs and symbols—necessary instruments to extend the power and reach of the human mind by summarizing an aggregate of relations in a condensed form and in a kind of mechanical way. These auxiliaries are of special value in mathematics because they are there adequate to their definitions, a characteristic which they do not possess to the same degree in the physical and mathematical [natural?] sciences.
There are, in fact, a mass of mental and moral faculties that can be put in full play only by instruction in mathematics; and they would be made still more available if the teaching was directed so as to leave free play to the personal work of the student.
In 'Science as an Instrument of Education', Popular Science Monthly (1897), 253.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Addition (70)  |  Adequate (50)  |  Advantage (144)  |  Aggregate (24)  |  Algebra (117)  |  Auxiliary (11)  |  Available (80)  |  Calculus (65)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Chiefly (47)  |  Clear (111)  |  Conception (160)  |  Condense (15)  |  Connect (126)  |  Definition (238)  |  Degree (277)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Direct (228)  |  Do (1905)  |  Excite (17)  |  Extend (129)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Faculty (76)  |  Fanatical (3)  |  Far (158)  |  Final (121)  |  Form (976)  |  Free (239)  |  Full (68)  |  Give (208)  |  Habituate (3)  |  High (370)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Idea (881)  |  Infinitesimal (30)  |  Inspire (58)  |  Instruction (101)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Kind (564)  |  Leave (138)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mass (160)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Mental (179)  |  Methodically (2)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Moral (203)  |  More (2558)  |  Natural (810)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Personal (75)  |  Physical (518)  |  Play (116)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Possess (157)  |  Power (771)  |  Purely (111)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Relation (166)  |  Respect (212)  |  Result (700)  |  Same (166)  |  Sign (63)  |  Special (188)  |  Still (614)  |  Student (317)  |  Summarize (10)  |  Sustain (52)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Teach (299)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Thought (995)  |  Train (118)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Value (393)  |  Value Of Mathematics (60)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)  |  Work (1402)  |  Young (253)

Mathematics is not a book confined within a cover and bound between brazen clasps, whose contents it needs only patience to ransack; it is not a mine, whose treasures may take long to reduce into possession, but which fill only a limited number of veins and lodes; it is not a soil, whose fertility can be exhausted by the yield of successive harvests; it is not a continent or an ocean, whose area can be mapped out and its contour defined: it is limitless as that space which it finds too narrow for its aspirations; its possibilities are as infinite as the worlds which are forever crowding in and multiplying upon the astronomer’s gaze; it is as incapable of being restricted within assigned boundaries or being reduced to definitions of permanent validity, as the consciousness of life, which seems to slumber in each monad, in every atom of matter, in each leaf and bud cell, and is forever ready to burst forth into new forms of vegetable and animal existence.
From Commemoration Day Address (22 Feb 1877) at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, collected in The Collected Mathematical Papers: (1870-1883) (1909), 77-78.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Area (33)  |  Aspiration (35)  |  Assign (15)  |  Astronomer (97)  |  Atom (381)  |  Being (1276)  |  Bind (26)  |  Book (413)  |  Bound (120)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Brass (5)  |  Bud (6)  |  Burst (41)  |  Cell (146)  |  Confine (26)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Content (75)  |  Continent (79)  |  Contour (3)  |  Cover (40)  |  Crowd (25)  |  Define (53)  |  Definition (238)  |  Exhaust (22)  |  Existence (481)  |  Fertility (23)  |  Fill (67)  |  Find (1014)  |  Forever (111)  |  Form (976)  |  Forth (14)  |  Gaze (23)  |  Harvest (28)  |  Incapable (41)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Leaf (73)  |  Life (1870)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Limitless (14)  |  Lode (2)  |  Map (50)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mine (78)  |  Monad (2)  |  Multiply (40)  |  Narrow (85)  |  Need (320)  |  New (1273)  |  Number (710)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Patience (58)  |  Permanent (67)  |  Possession (68)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Ransack (2)  |  Ready (43)  |  Reduce (100)  |  Restrict (13)  |  Seem (150)  |  Slumber (6)  |  Soil (98)  |  Space (523)  |  Successive (73)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Validity (50)  |  Vegetable (49)  |  Vein (27)  |  World (1850)  |  Yield (86)

Mathematics, from the earliest times to which the history of human reason can reach, has followed, among that wonderful people of the Greeks, the safe way of science. But it must not be supposed that it was as easy for mathematics as for logic, in which reason is concerned with itself alone, to find, or rather to make for itself that royal road. I believe, on the contrary, that there was a long period of tentative work (chiefly still among the Egyptians), and that the change is to be ascribed to a revolution, produced by the happy thought of a single man, whose experiments pointed unmistakably to the path that had to be followed, and opened and traced out for the most distant times the safe way of a science. The history of that intellectual revolution, which was far more important than the passage round the celebrated Cape of Good Hope, and the name of its fortunate author, have not been preserved to us. … A new light flashed on the first man who demonstrated the properties of the isosceles triangle (whether his name was Thales or any other name), for he found that he had not to investigate what he saw in the figure, or the mere concepts of that figure, and thus to learn its properties; but that he had to produce (by construction) what he had himself, according to concepts a priori, placed into that figure and represented in it, so that, in order to know anything with certainty a priori, he must not attribute to that figure anything beyond what necessarily follows from what he has himself placed into it, in accordance with the concept.
In Critique of Pure Reason, Preface to the Second Edition, (1900), 690.
Science quotes on:  |  A Priori (26)  |  Accord (36)  |  Accordance (10)  |  According (236)  |  Alone (324)  |  Ascribe (18)  |  Attribute (65)  |  Author (175)  |  Belief (615)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Celebrate (21)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Change (639)  |  Chiefly (47)  |  Concept (242)  |  Concern (239)  |  Construction (114)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Demonstrate (79)  |  Distant (33)  |  Early (196)  |  Easy (213)  |  Egyptian (5)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Far (158)  |  Figure (162)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Flash (49)  |  Follow (389)  |  Fortunate (31)  |  From The Earliest Times (2)  |  Good (906)  |  Greek (109)  |  Happy (108)  |  Himself (461)  |  History (716)  |  Hope (321)  |  Human (1512)  |  Important (229)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Intellectual Revolution (4)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Isosceles Triangle (3)  |  Know (1538)  |  Learn (672)  |  Light (635)  |  Logic (311)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mere (86)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature Of Mathematics (80)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  New (1273)  |  Open (277)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Passage (52)  |  Path (159)  |  People (1031)  |  Period (200)  |  Place (192)  |  Point (584)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Produce (117)  |  Produced (187)  |  Property (177)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reason (766)  |  Represent (157)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Round (26)  |  Royal (56)  |  Royal Road (4)  |  Safe (61)  |  Saw (160)  |  See (1094)  |  Single (365)  |  Still (614)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Tentative (18)  |  Thales (9)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trace (109)  |  Triangle (20)  |  Unmistakably (2)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  Work (1402)

Men thought dialectically long before they knew what dialectics was, just as they spoke prose long before the term prose existed
In Friedrick Engels and Austin Lewis (trans., ed.), Landmarks of Scientific Socialism: "Anti-Dühring", (1907), 175.
Science quotes on:  |  Before (8)  |  Dialectic (6)  |  Exist (458)  |  Know (1538)  |  Prose (11)  |  Speak (240)  |  Term (357)  |  Thought (995)

Modern tree communities in Amazonia are structured to an important extent by a long history of plant domestication by Amazonian peoples.
As quoted in Robinson Meyer, 'The Amazon Rainforest Was Profoundly Changed by Ancient Humans', The Atlantic (2 Mar 2017).
Science quotes on:  |  Amazon (11)  |  Community (111)  |  Domestication (5)  |  Extent (142)  |  History (716)  |  Important (229)  |  Modern (402)  |  People (1031)  |  Plant (320)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Structure (365)  |  Tree (269)

Mortal as I am, I know that I am born for a day. But when I follow at my pleasure the serried multitude of the stars in their circular course, my feet no longer touch the earth.
Ptolemy
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Bear (162)  |  Circular (19)  |  Course (413)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Follow (389)  |  Foot (65)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mortal (55)  |  Multitude (50)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Touch (146)

Most of the arts, as painting, sculpture, and music, have emotional appeal to the general public. This is because these arts can be experienced by some one or more of our senses. Such is not true of the art of mathematics; this art can be appreciated only by mathematicians, and to become a mathematician requires a long period of intensive training. The community of mathematicians is similar to an imaginary community of musical composers whose only satisfaction is obtained by the interchange among themselves of the musical scores they compose.
In Anton Z. Capri, Quips, Quotes and Quanta: An Anecdotal History of Physics (2007), 151. The author described Lanczos invited up on the platform at the Trieste Conference to celebrate Dirac’s 70th birthday, and gave an impromptu quote by Lanczos speaking about Pauli. The author followed that unrelated topic with another beginning, “Here is a comment by Lanczos…” followed by the subject quote above.
Science quotes on:  |  Appeal (46)  |  Appreciate (67)  |  Art (680)  |  Become (821)  |  Community (111)  |  Compose (20)  |  Composer (7)  |  Emotion (106)  |  Experience (494)  |  General (521)  |  General Public (7)  |  Imaginary (16)  |  Intensive (9)  |  Interchange (4)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Music (133)  |  Musical (10)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Painting (46)  |  Period (200)  |  Require (229)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  Score (8)  |  Sculpture (12)  |  Sense (785)  |  Similar (36)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Training (92)

Most people today still believe, perhaps unconsciously, in the heliocentric universe. ... Every newspaper in the land has a section on astrology, yet few have anything at all on astronomy.
[Realizing that his plasma universe may take a long time to penetrate the popular consciousness. When addressing a number of physicists with the first half of the quote, the groups was at first incredulous, but nodded agreement upon hearing the remainder of the quote.]
Quoted in Anthony L. Peratt, 'Dean of the Plasma Dissidents', Washington Times, supplement: The World and I (May 1988),196.
Science quotes on:  |  Agreement (55)  |  Astrology (46)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Belief (615)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  First (1302)  |  Hearing (50)  |  Heliocentric (4)  |  Most (1728)  |  Newspaper (39)  |  Number (710)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  People (1031)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Plasma (8)  |  Quote (46)  |  Remainder (7)  |  Still (614)  |  Time (1911)  |  Today (321)  |  Unconscious (24)  |  Universe (900)

My father introduced me to three black men who had earned doctorates in chemistry and physics. The best jobs they could find were at the post office. My father said I was taking the long road toward working at the post office.
Recalling how his parents were disappointed that he chose to study physics at university instead of medicine to be a doctor. Quoted in Johns Hopkins University News Release (9 Jan 2003) on jh.edu web site.
Science quotes on:  |  Best (467)  |  Black-American (2)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Doctorate (2)  |  Father (113)  |  Find (1014)  |  Job (86)  |  Office (71)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Post Office (2)

My father’s collection of fossils was practically unnamed, but the appearance of Phillips’ book [Geology of the Yorkshire Coast], in which most of our specimens were figured, enabled us to remedy this defect. Every evening was devoted by us to accomplishing the work. This was my first introduction to true scientific study. … Phillips’ accurate volume initiated an entirely new order of things. Many a time did I mourn over the publication of this book, and the consequences immediately resulting from it. Instead of indulging in the games and idleness to which most lads are prone, my evenings throughout a long winter were devoted to the detested labour of naming these miserable stones. Such is the short-sightedness of boyhood. Pursuing this uncongenial work gave me in my thirteenth year a thorough practical familiarity with the palaeontological treasures of Eastern Yorkshire. This early acquisition happily moulded the entire course of my future life.
In Reminiscences of a Yorkshire naturalist (1896), 12.
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Accurate (88)  |  Acquisition (46)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Autobiography (58)  |  Book (413)  |  Boyhood (4)  |  Coast (13)  |  Collection (68)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Course (413)  |  Defect (31)  |  Detest (5)  |  Devote (45)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Early (196)  |  Evening (12)  |  Familiarity (21)  |  Father (113)  |  First (1302)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Future (467)  |  Game (104)  |  Geology (240)  |  Idleness (15)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Indulge (15)  |  Introduction (37)  |  Labor (200)  |  Life (1870)  |  Miserable (8)  |  Mold (37)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mourn (3)  |  New (1273)  |  Order (638)  |  Paleontology (32)  |  John Phillips (2)  |  Practical (225)  |  Publication (102)  |  Pursuing (27)  |  Remedy (63)  |  Result (700)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Short (200)  |  Specimen (32)  |  Stone (168)  |  Study (701)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thorough (40)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Treasure (59)  |  True (239)  |  Uncongenial (2)  |  Winter (46)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)  |  Yorkshire (2)

My Lord said that he who knew men only in this way [from history] was like one who had got the theory of anatomy perfectly, but who in practice would find himself very awkward and liable to mistakes. That he again who knew men by observation was like one who picked up anatomy by practice, but who like all empirics would for a long time be liable to gross errors.
Science quotes on:  |  Anatomy (75)  |  Awkward (11)  |  Empirical (58)  |  Error (339)  |  Find (1014)  |  Himself (461)  |  History (716)  |  Lord (97)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Observation (593)  |  Practice (212)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)  |  Way (1214)

My method consists in allowing the mind to play freely for a very brief period, until a couple or so of ideas have passed through it, and then, while the traces or echoes of those ideas are still lingering in the brain, to turn the attention upon them with a sudden and complete awakening; to arrest, to scrutinise them, and to record their exact appearance... The general impression they have left upon me is like that which many of us have experienced when the basement of our house happens to be under thorough sanitary repairs, and we realise for the first time the complex system of drains and gas and water pipes, flues, bell-wires, and so forth, upon which our comfort depends, but which are usually hidden out of sight, and with whose existence, so long as they acted well, we had never troubled ourselves.
Inquiries into Human Faculty and its Development (1883),185-6.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Attention (196)  |  Awakening (11)  |  Bell (35)  |  Brain (281)  |  Brief (37)  |  Comfort (64)  |  Complete (209)  |  Complex (202)  |  Consist (223)  |  Depend (238)  |  Drain (12)  |  Existence (481)  |  First (1302)  |  Gas (89)  |  General (521)  |  Happen (282)  |  House (143)  |  Idea (881)  |  Impression (118)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Never (1089)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Pass (241)  |  Period (200)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Record (161)  |  Sight (135)  |  Still (614)  |  Sudden (70)  |  System (545)  |  Thorough (40)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trace (109)  |  Turn (454)  |  Usually (176)  |  Water (503)  |  Wire (36)

My picture of the world is drawn in perspective and not like a model to scale. The foreground is occupied by human beings and the stars are all as small as three-penny bits. I don't really believe in astronomy, except as a complicated description of part of the course of human and possibly animal sensation. I apply my perspective not merely to space but also to time. In time the world will cool and everything will die; but that is a long time off still and its present value at compound discount is almost nothing.
From a paper read to the Apostles, a Cambridge discussion society (1925). In 'The Foundations of Mathematics' (1925), collected in Frank Plumpton Ramsey and D.H. Mellor (ed.), Philosophical Papers (1990), Epilogue, 249. Citation to the paper, in Nils-Eric Sahlin, The Philosophy of F.P. Ramsey (1990), 225.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Application (257)  |  Apply (170)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belief (615)  |  Coin (13)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Complication (30)  |  Compound (117)  |  Cooling (10)  |  Course (413)  |  Death (406)  |  Description (89)  |  Drawing (56)  |  Everything (489)  |  Foreground (3)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Merely (315)  |  Model (106)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Occupation (51)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Part (235)  |  Perspective (28)  |  Picture (148)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Present (630)  |  Scale (122)  |  Sensation (60)  |  Small (489)  |  Space (523)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Still (614)  |  Time (1911)  |  Value (393)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

My soul is an entangled knot,
Upon a liquid vortex wrought
By Intellect in the Unseen residing,
And thine doth like a convict sit,
With marline-spike untwisting it,
Only to find its knottiness abiding;
Since all the tools for its untying
In four-dimensional space are lying,
Wherein they fancy intersperses
Long avenues of universes,
While Klein and Clifford fill the void
With one finite, unbounded homoloid,
And think the Infinite is now at last destroyed. (1878)
A parody of Shelley as 'A Paradoxical Ode', quoted in Lewis Campbell and William Garnett, The Life of James Clerk Maxwell (1882), 649-650.
Science quotes on:  |  Avenue (14)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Dimension (64)  |  Fancy (50)  |  Find (1014)  |  Finite (60)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Knot (11)  |  Last (425)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Lying (55)  |  Poem (104)  |  Soul (235)  |  Space (523)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tool (129)  |  Universe (900)  |  Unseen (23)  |  Void (31)  |  Vortex (10)

Nature bears long with those who wrong her. She is patient under abuse. But when abuse has gone too far, when the time of reckoning finally comes, she is equally slow to be appeased and to turn away her wrath.
'What We Owe to the Trees', Harper's New Monthly Magazine (Apr 1882), 46, No. 383, 686.
Science quotes on:  |  Abuse (25)  |  Appease (6)  |  Bear (162)  |  Climate Change (76)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Environment (239)  |  Equal (88)  |  Equally (129)  |  Final (121)  |  Global Warming (29)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Patient (209)  |  Reckoning (19)  |  Slow (108)  |  Time (1911)  |  Turn (454)  |  Wrath (3)  |  Wrong (246)

Nature has been for me, for as long as I remember a source of solace, inspiration, adventure, and delight; a home, a teacher, a companion.
In Sisters of the Earth: Women’s Prose and Poetry (1991), Preface, xv.
Science quotes on:  |  Adventure (69)  |  Companion (22)  |  Delight (111)  |  Home (184)  |  Inspiration (80)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Remember (189)  |  Solace (7)  |  Source (101)  |  Teacher (154)

Nature vibrates with rhythms, climatic and diastrophic, those finding stratigraphic expression ranging in period from the rapid oscillation of surface waters, recorded in ripple-mark, to those long-deferred stirrings of the deep imprisoned titans which have divided earth history into periods and eras. The flight of time is measured by the weaving of composite rhythms- day and night, calm and storm, summer and winter, birth and death such as these are sensed in the brief life of man. But the career of the earth recedes into a remoteness against which these lesser cycles are as unavailing for the measurement of that abyss of time as would be for human history the beating of an insect's wing. We must seek out, then, the nature of those longer rhythms whose very existence was unknown until man by the light of science sought to understand the earth. The larger of these must be measured in terms of the smaller, and the smaller must be measured in terms of years.
'Rhythm and the Measurement of Geologic Time', Bulletin of the Geological Society of America, 1917, 28,746.
Science quotes on:  |  Abyss (30)  |  Against (332)  |  Birth (154)  |  Brief (37)  |  Calm (32)  |  Career (86)  |  Cycle (42)  |  Death (406)  |  Deep (241)  |  Divided (50)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Era (51)  |  Existence (481)  |  Expression (181)  |  Flight (101)  |  Geology (240)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Imprison (11)  |  Insect (89)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Man (2252)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Oscillation (13)  |  Period (200)  |  Recede (11)  |  Record (161)  |  Remoteness (9)  |  Rhythm (21)  |  Ripple (12)  |  Seek (218)  |  Storm (56)  |  Summer (56)  |  Surface (223)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Time (1911)  |  Understand (648)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Vibrate (7)  |  Water (503)  |  Weaving (6)  |  Wing (79)  |  Winter (46)  |  Year (963)

Never fear big long words.
Big long words name little things.
All big things have little names.
Such as life and death, peace and war.
Or dawn, day, night, hope, love, home.
Learn to use little words in a big way.
It is hard to do,
But they say what you mean.
When you don't know what you mean, use big words.
That often fools little people.
Quoted in Saturday Review (1962), 45, No. 2. It was written (1936) for his son, as advice for young copy writers. - 1995
Science quotes on:  |  Big (55)  |  Dawn (31)  |  Death (406)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fear (212)  |  Fool (121)  |  Hard (246)  |  Home (184)  |  Hope (321)  |  Know (1538)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Love (328)  |  Mean (810)  |  Name (359)  |  Never (1089)  |  Peace (116)  |  People (1031)  |  Poem (104)  |  Publication (102)  |  Say (989)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Use (771)  |  War (233)  |  Way (1214)  |  Word (650)  |  Writing (192)

New ideas seem like frightening ghosts to people at the beginning; they run away from them for a long time, but they get tired of it in the end!
From the play Galileo Galilei (2001) .
Science quotes on:  |  Beginning (312)  |  End (603)  |  Fear (212)  |  Ghost (36)  |  Idea (881)  |  Innovation (49)  |  New (1273)  |  People (1031)  |  Run (158)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tired (13)

Newton made a universe which lasted 300 years. Einstein has made a universe, which I suppose you want me to say will never stop, but I don't know how long it will last.
Speech (28 Oct 1930) at the Savoy Hotel, London in Einstein’s honor sponsored by a committee to help needy Jews in Eastern Europe. In Albert Einstein, Cosmic Religion: With Other Opinions and Aphorisms (1931), 32.
Science quotes on:  |  Einstein (101)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  Existence (481)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Never (1089)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Say (989)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Universe (900)  |  Want (504)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

Next to ignorance of the grammar of one’s native language, nothing betrays want of information so soon as ignorance in matters of geography, without which it is almost impossible to carry on conversation long on any general subject.
In The Statistical Breviary: Shewing, on a Principle Entirely New, the Resources of Every State and Kingdom in Europe (1801), 5.
Science quotes on:  |  Carry (130)  |  Conversation (46)  |  General (521)  |  Geography (39)  |  Grammar (15)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Impossibility (60)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Information (173)  |  Language (308)  |  Matter (821)  |  Native (41)  |  Next (238)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Soon (187)  |  Subject (543)  |  Want (504)

No matter how we twist and turn we shall always come back to the cell. The eternal merit of Schwann does not lie in his cell theory that has occupied the foreground for so long, and perhaps will soon be given up, but in his description of the development of the various tissues, and in his demonstration that this development (hence all physiological activity) is in the end traceable back to the cell. Now if pathology is nothing but physiology with obstacles, and diseased life nothing but healthy life interfered with by all manner of external and internal influences then pathology too must be referred back to the cell.
In 'Cellular-Pathologie', Archiv für pathologische Anatomie und Physiologie und fur klinische Medizin (1855), 8, 13-14, as translated in LellandJ. Rather, 'Cellular Pathology', Disease, Life, and Man: Selected Essays by Rudolf Virchow (1958), 81.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Back (395)  |  Cell (146)  |  Cell Theory (4)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Description (89)  |  Development (441)  |  Disease (340)  |  End (603)  |  Eternal (113)  |  External (62)  |  Foreground (3)  |  Given (5)  |  Health (210)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Influence (231)  |  Interference (22)  |  Internal (69)  |  Lie (370)  |  Life (1870)  |  Matter (821)  |  Merit (51)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Obstacle (42)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Pathology (19)  |  Physiological (64)  |  Physiology (101)  |  Theodor Schwann (12)  |  Soon (187)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Tissue (51)  |  Trace (109)  |  Traceable (5)  |  Turn (454)  |  Twist (10)  |  Various (205)  |  Will (2350)

No more impressive warning can be given to those who would confine knowledge and research to what is apparently useful, than the reflection that conic sections were studied for eighteen hundred years merely as an abstract science, without regard to any utility other than to satisfy the craving for knowledge on the part of mathematicians, and that then at the end of this long period of abstract study, they were found to be the necessary key with which to attain the knowledge of the most important laws of nature.
In Introduction to Mathematics (1911), 136-137.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Apparently (22)  |  Attain (126)  |  Confine (26)  |  Conic Section (8)  |  Crave (10)  |  End (603)  |  Find (1014)  |  Give (208)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Important (229)  |  Impressive (27)  |  Key (56)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Law (913)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Merely (315)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Other (2233)  |  Part (235)  |  Period (200)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Regard (312)  |  Research (753)  |  Satisfy (29)  |  Study (701)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)  |  Useful (260)  |  Utility (52)  |  Warn (7)  |  Warning (18)  |  Year (963)

No physiologist who calmly considers the question in connection with the general truths of his science, can long resist the conviction that different parts of the cerebrum subserve different kinds of mental action. Localization of function is the law of all organization whatever: separateness of duty is universally accompanied with separateness of structure: and it would be marvellous were an exception to exist in the cerebral hemispheres.
The Principles of Psychology (1855), 607.
Science quotes on:  |  Accompany (22)  |  Action (342)  |  Calm (32)  |  Cerebrum (10)  |  Connection (171)  |  Consider (428)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Duty (71)  |  Exception (74)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Function (235)  |  General (521)  |  Hemisphere (5)  |  Kind (564)  |  Law (913)  |  Localization (3)  |  Marvel (37)  |  Marvellous (25)  |  Mental (179)  |  Organization (120)  |  Part (235)  |  Physiologist (31)  |  Question (649)  |  Resistance (41)  |  Separateness (2)  |  Serve (64)  |  Structure (365)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Universality (22)  |  Whatever (234)

No place affords a more striking conviction of the vanity of human hopes than a publick library; for who can see the wall crouded on every side by mighty volumes, the works of laborious meditation, and accurate inquiry, now scarcely known but by the catalogue, and preserved only to encrease the pomp of learning, without considering how many hours have been wasted in vain endeavours, how often imagination has anticipated the praises of futurity, how many statues have risen to the eye of vanity, how many ideal converts have elevated zeal, how often wit has exulted in the eternal infamy of his antagonists, and dogmatism has delighted in the gradual advances of his authority, the immutability of his decrees, and the perpetuity of his power.
Non unquam dedit
Documenta fors majora, quam fragili loco
Starent superbi.

Seneca, Troades, II, 4-6
Insulting chance ne'er call'd with louder voice,
On swelling mortals to be proud no more.
Of the innumerable authors whose performances are thus treasured up in magnificent obscurity, most are forgotten, because they never deserved to be remembered, and owed the honours which they have once obtained, not to judgment or to genius, to labour or to art, but to the prejudice of faction, the stratagem of intrigue, or the servility of adulation.
Nothing is more common than to find men whose works are now totally neglected, mentioned with praises by their contemporaries, as the oracles of their age, and the legislators of science. Curiosity is naturally excited, their volumes after long enquiry are found, but seldom reward the labour of the search. Every period of time has produced these bubbles of artificial fame, which are kept up a while by the breath of fashion and then break at once and are annihilated. The learned often bewail the loss of ancient writers whose characters have survived their works; but perhaps if we could now retrieve them we should find them only the Granvilles, Montagus, Stepneys, and Sheffields of their time, and wonder by what infatuation or caprice they could be raised to notice.
It cannot, however, be denied, that many have sunk into oblivion, whom it were unjust to number with this despicable class. Various kinds of literary fame seem destined to various measures of duration. Some spread into exuberance with a very speedy growth, but soon wither and decay; some rise more slowly, but last long. Parnassus has its flowers of transient fragrance as well as its oaks of towering height, and its laurels of eternal verdure.
The Rambler, Number 106, 23 Mar 1751. In W. J. Bate and Albrecht B. Strauss (eds.), The Rambler (1969), Vol. 2, 200-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Accurate (88)  |  Advance (298)  |  Age (509)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Art (680)  |  Author (175)  |  Authority (99)  |  Break (109)  |  Breath (61)  |  Bubble (23)  |  Call (781)  |  Caprice (10)  |  Chance (244)  |  Character (259)  |  Class (168)  |  Common (447)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Decay (59)  |  Decree (9)  |  Delight (111)  |  Destined (42)  |  Dogmatism (15)  |  Endeavour (63)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Eye (440)  |  Faction (4)  |  Fame (51)  |  Find (1014)  |  Flower (112)  |  Forgotten (53)  |  Genius (301)  |  Growth (200)  |  Honour (58)  |  Hope (321)  |  Hour (192)  |  Human (1512)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Innumerable (56)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Kind (564)  |  Known (453)  |  Labor (200)  |  Laborious (17)  |  Last (425)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Learning (291)  |  Library (53)  |  Loss (117)  |  Magnificent (46)  |  Measure (241)  |  Meditation (19)  |  Mention (84)  |  More (2558)  |  Mortal (55)  |  Most (1728)  |  Neglect (63)  |  Neglected (23)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Notice (81)  |  Number (710)  |  Oak (16)  |  Oblivion (10)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Performance (51)  |  Period (200)  |  Perpetuity (9)  |  Power (771)  |  Prejudice (96)  |  Produced (187)  |  Remember (189)  |  Reward (72)  |  Rise (169)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Search (175)  |  See (1094)  |  Seldom (68)  |  Side (236)  |  Soon (187)  |  Spread (86)  |  Statue (17)  |  Striking (48)  |  Time (1911)  |  Towering (11)  |  Transient (13)  |  Vain (86)  |  Various (205)  |  Wall (71)  |  Wit (61)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Work (1402)  |  Writer (90)

No self is of itself alone. It has a long chain of intellectual ancestors. The ‘I’ is chained to ancestry by many factors ... This is not mere allegory, but an eternal memory.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Allegory (8)  |  Alone (324)  |  Ancestor (63)  |  Ancestry (13)  |  Chain (51)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Factor (47)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Memory (144)  |  Mere (86)  |  Self (268)

No! What we need are not prohibitory marriage laws, but a reformed society, an educated public opinion which will teach individual duty in these matters. And it is to the women of the future that I look for the needed reformation. Educate and train women so that they are rendered independent of marriage as a means of gaining a home and a living, and you will bring about natural selection in marriage, which will operate most beneficially upon humanity. When all women are placed in a position that they are independent of marriage, I am inclined to think that large numbers will elect to remain unmarried—in some cases, for life, in others, until they encounter the man of their ideal. I want to see women the selective agents in marriage; as things are, they have practically little choice. The only basis for marriage should be a disinterested love. I believe that the unfit will be gradually eliminated from the race, and human progress secured, by giving to the pure instincts of women the selective power in marriage. You can never have that so long as women are driven to marry for a livelihood.
In 'Heredity and Pre-Natal Influences. An Interview With Dr. Alfred Russel Wallace', Humanitarian (1894), 4, 87.
Science quotes on:  |  Agent (73)  |  Basis (180)  |  Belief (615)  |  Bring (95)  |  Case (102)  |  Choice (114)  |  Disinterest (8)  |  Driven (4)  |  Duty (71)  |  Educate (14)  |  Educated (12)  |  Elect (5)  |  Encounter (23)  |  Future (467)  |  Gaining (2)  |  Giving (11)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Home (184)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Progress (18)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Inclined (41)  |  Independent (74)  |  Individual (420)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Large (398)  |  Law (913)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Livelihood (13)  |  Living (492)  |  Look (584)  |  Love (328)  |  Man (2252)  |  Marriage (39)  |  Marry (11)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Most (1728)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Selection (98)  |  Need (320)  |  Never (1089)  |  Number (710)  |  Operate (19)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Other (2233)  |  Position (83)  |  Power (771)  |  Practically (10)  |  Progress (492)  |  Public (100)  |  Pure (299)  |  Race (278)  |  Reform (22)  |  Reformation (6)  |  Reformed (4)  |  Remain (355)  |  Render (96)  |  Rendered (2)  |  Secured (18)  |  See (1094)  |  Selection (130)  |  Selective (21)  |  Society (350)  |  Teach (299)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Train (118)  |  Unfit (13)  |  Unmarried (3)  |  Want (504)  |  Will (2350)  |  Woman (160)

Nor need you doubt that Pythagoras, a long time before he found the demonstration for the Hecatomb, had been certain that the square of the side subtending the right angle in a rectangular triangle was equal to the square of the other two sides; the certainty of the conclusion helped not a little in the search for a demonstration. But whatever was the method of Aristotle, and whether his arguing a priori preceded sense a posteriori, or the contrary, it is sufficient that the same Aristotle (as has often been said) put sensible experiences before all discourses. As to the arguments a priori, their force has already been examined.
Dialogue on the Great World Systems (1632). Revised and Annotated by Giorgio De Santillana (1953), 60.
Science quotes on:  |  A Posteriori (2)  |  A Priori (26)  |  Already (226)  |  Argument (145)  |  Aristotle (179)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Experience (494)  |  Force (497)  |  Little (717)  |  Method (531)  |  Observation (593)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pythagoras (38)  |  Right (473)  |  Search (175)  |  Sense (785)  |  Side (236)  |  Square (73)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Time (1911)  |  Triangle (20)  |  Two (936)  |  Whatever (234)

Not long ago the head of what should be a strictly scientific department in one of the major universities commented on the odd (and ominous) phenomenon that persons who can claim to be scientists on the basis of the technical training that won them the degree of Ph.D. are now found certifying the authenticity of the painted rag that is called the “Turin Shroud” or adducing “scientific” arguments to support hoaxes about the “paranormal” or an antiquated religiosity. “You can hire a scientist [sic],” he said, “to prove anything.” He did not adduce himself as proof of his generalization, but he did boast of his cleverness in confining his own research to areas in which the results would not perturb the Establishment or any vociferous gang of shyster-led fanatics. If such is indeed the status of science and scholarship in our darkling age, Send not to ask for whom the bell tolls.
In 'The Price of the Head', Instauration Magazine (Mar 1980).
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Antiquated (3)  |  Area (33)  |  Argument (145)  |  Ask (420)  |  Authenticity (5)  |  Basis (180)  |  Bell (35)  |  Boast (22)  |  Call (781)  |  Certify (2)  |  Claim (154)  |  Cleverness (15)  |  Comment (12)  |  Confine (26)  |  Degree (277)  |  Department (93)  |  Establishment (47)  |  Fanatic (7)  |  Find (1014)  |  Gang (4)  |  Generalization (61)  |  Head (87)  |  Himself (461)  |  Hire (7)  |  Hoax (6)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  Major (88)  |  Odd (15)  |  Ominous (5)  |  Paint (22)  |  Paranormal (3)  |  Person (366)  |  Perturb (2)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Proof (304)  |  Prove (261)  |  Prove Anything (7)  |  Rag (2)  |  Religiosity (2)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Say (989)  |  Scholarship (22)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Send (23)  |  Shroud (2)  |  Status (35)  |  Strictly (13)  |  Support (151)  |  Technical (53)  |  Toll (3)  |  Training (92)  |  Turin (3)  |  University (130)  |  Win (53)

Nothing is so beautiful as spring—
When weeds in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;...
'Spring' (1877), reprinted in Gerard Manley Hopkins and Michael White (ed.) Some Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, (1945), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Lovely (12)  |  Lush (5)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Shoot (21)  |  Spring (140)  |  Weed (19)  |  Wheel (51)

Now having (I know not by what accident) engaged my thoughts upon the Bills of Mortality, and so far succeeded therein, as to have reduced several great confused Volumes into a few perspicuous Tables, and abridged such Observations as naturally flowed from them, into a few succinct Paragraphs, without any long Series of multiloquious Deductions, I have presumed to sacrifice these my small, but first publish'd, Labours unto your Lordship, as unto whose benign acceptance of some other of my Papers even the birth of these is due; hoping (if I may without vanity say it) they may be of as much use to persons in your Lordships place, as they are of none to me, which is no more than fairest Diamonds are to the Journeymen Jeweller that works them, or the poor Labourer that first digg'd them from Earth.
[An early account demonstrating the value of statistical analysis of public health data. Graunt lived in London at the time of the plague epidemics.]
From Graunt's 'Epistle Dedicatory', for Natural and Political Observations Mentioned in a Following Index and Made upon Bills of Mortality (1662). Reproduced in Cornelius Walford, The Insurance Cyclopaedia (1871), Vol. 1, 286. (This text used abbreviations for “Mort.” and “vols.”) The italicized words are given as from other sources. Note: bills of mortality are abstracts from parish registers showing the numbers that have died in each week, month or year.
Science quotes on:  |  Acceptance (56)  |  Accident (92)  |  Account (195)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Birth (154)  |  Data (162)  |  Deduction (90)  |  Diamond (21)  |  Due (143)  |  Early (196)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Epidemic (8)  |  First (1302)  |  Flow (89)  |  Great (1610)  |  Health (210)  |  Journeyman (3)  |  Know (1538)  |  Labor (200)  |  Laborer (9)  |  More (2558)  |  Mortality (16)  |  Observation (593)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paper (192)  |  Person (366)  |  Plague (42)  |  Poor (139)  |  Public Health (12)  |  Sacrifice (58)  |  Say (989)  |  Series (153)  |  Small (489)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Table (105)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Use (771)  |  Value (393)  |  Work (1402)

Now the word-symbols of conceptual ideas have passed so long from hand to hand in the service of the understanding, that they have gradually lost all such fanciful reference.
Science quotes on:  |  Gradually (102)  |  Idea (881)  |  Pass (241)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Service (110)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Word (650)

Now, at Suiattle Pass, Brower was still talking about butterflies. He said he had raised them from time to time and had often watched them emerge from the chrysalis—first a crack in the case, then a feeler, and in an hour a butterfly. He said he had felt that he wanted to help, to speed them through the long and awkward procedure; and he had once tried. The butterflies came out with extended abdomens, and their wings were balled together like miniature clenched fists. Nothing happened. They sat there until they died. ‘I have never gotten over that,’ he said. ‘That kind of information is all over in the country, but it’s not in town.”
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Abdomen (6)  |  Awkward (11)  |  Ball (64)  |  Brower (2)  |  Butterfly (26)  |  Case (102)  |  Clench (3)  |  Country (269)  |  Crack (15)  |  Die (94)  |  Emerge (24)  |  Extend (129)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeler (3)  |  First (1302)  |  Fist (3)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Help (116)  |  Hour (192)  |  Information (173)  |  Kind (564)  |  Miniature (7)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Often (109)  |  Pass (241)  |  Procedure (48)  |  Raise (38)  |  Say (989)  |  Sit (51)  |  Speed (66)  |  Still (614)  |  Talk (108)  |  Talking (76)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Town (30)  |  Try (296)  |  Want (504)  |  Watch (118)  |  Wing (79)

Obviously we biologists should fit our methods to our materials. An interesting response to this challenge has been employed particularly by persons who have entered biology from the physical sciences or who are distressed by the variability in biology; they focus their research on inbred strains of genetically homogeneous laboratory animals from which, to the maximum extent possible, variability has been eliminated. These biologists have changed the nature of the biological system to fit their methods. Such a bold and forthright solution is admirable, but it is not for me. Before I became a professional biologist, I was a boy naturalist, and I prefer a contrasting approach; to change the method to fit the system. This approach requires that one employ procedures which allow direct scientific utilization of the successful long-term evolutionary experiments which are documented by the fascinating diversity and variability of the species of animals which occupy the earth. This is easy to say and hard to do.
In 'Scientific innovation and creativity: a zoologist’s point of view', American Zoologist (1982), 22, 232.
Science quotes on:  |  Admirable (20)  |  Allow (51)  |  Animal (651)  |  Approach (112)  |  Become (821)  |  Biological (137)  |  Biologist (70)  |  Biology (232)  |  Bold (22)  |  Boy (100)  |  Challenge (91)  |  Change (639)  |  Contrast (45)  |  Direct (228)  |  Distress (9)  |  Diversity (75)  |  Do (1905)  |  Document (7)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Easy (213)  |  Eliminate (25)  |  Employ (115)  |  Enter (145)  |  Evolutionary (23)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Extent (142)  |  Fascinating (38)  |  Fit (139)  |  Focus (36)  |  Genetically (2)  |  Hard (246)  |  Homogeneous (17)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Long-Term (11)  |  Material (366)  |  Maximum (16)  |  Method (531)  |  Naturalist (79)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Obviously (11)  |  Occupy (27)  |  Particularly (21)  |  Person (366)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Possible (560)  |  Prefer (27)  |  Procedure (48)  |  Professional (77)  |  Require (229)  |  Research (753)  |  Response (56)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Solution (282)  |  Species (435)  |  Strain (13)  |  Successful (134)  |  System (545)  |  Term (357)  |  Utilization (16)  |  Variability (5)

Of the nucleosides from deoxyribonucleic acids, all that was known with any certainty [in the 1940s] was that they were 2-deoxy-­D-ribosides of the bases adenine, guanine, thymine and cytosine and it was assumed that they were structurally analogous to the ribonucleosides. The chemistry of the nucleotides—the phosphates of the nucleosides—was in a correspondingly primitive state. It may well be asked why the chemistry of these groups of compounds was not further advanced, particularly since we recognize today that they occupy a central place in the history of the living cell. True, their full significance was for a long time unrecognized and emerged only slowly as biochemical research got into its stride but I think a more important reason is to be found in the physical properties of compounds of the nucleotide group. As water-soluble polar compounds with no proper melting points they were extremely difficult to handle by the classic techniques of organic chemistry, and were accordingly very discouraging substances to early workers. It is surely no accident that the major advances in the field have coincided with the appearance of new experimental techniques such as paper and ion-exchange chromatography, paper electrophoresis, and countercurrent distribution, peculiarly appropriate to the compounds of this group.
In 'Synthesis in the Study of Nucleotides', Nobel Lecture, 11 December 1957. In Nobel Lectures: Chemistry 1942-1962 (1964), 524.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Acid (83)  |  Adenine (6)  |  Advance (298)  |  Analogous (7)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Ask (420)  |  Base (120)  |  Biochemistry (50)  |  Cell (146)  |  Central (81)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Compound (117)  |  Cytosine (6)  |  Deoxyribonucleic Acid (3)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Distribution (51)  |  Early (196)  |  Electrophoresis (2)  |  Exchange (38)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Field (378)  |  Guanine (5)  |  Handle (29)  |  History (716)  |  Ion (21)  |  Known (453)  |  Living (492)  |  Major (88)  |  Melting Point (3)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1273)  |  Nucleotide (6)  |  Organic (161)  |  Organic Chemistry (41)  |  Paper (192)  |  Phosphate (6)  |  Physical (518)  |  Point (584)  |  Polar (13)  |  Primitive (79)  |  Proper (150)  |  Reason (766)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Research (753)  |  Significance (114)  |  Soluble (5)  |  State (505)  |  Stride (15)  |  Structure (365)  |  Substance (253)  |  Surely (101)  |  Technique (84)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thymine (6)  |  Time (1911)  |  Today (321)  |  Water (503)  |  Why (491)

Of the Passive Principle, and Material Cause of the Small Pox ... Nature, in the first compounding and forming of us, hath laid into the Substance and Constitution of each something equivalent to Ovula, of various distinct Kinds, productive of all the contagious, venomous Fevers, we can possibly have as long as we live.
Exanthematologia: Or, An Attempt to Give a Rational Account of Eruptive Fevers, Especially of the Measles and SmallPox (1730), Part II, 'Of the Small-Pox', 175. In Ludvig Hektoen, 'Thomas Fuller 1654-1734: Country Physician and Pioneer Exponent of Specificness in Infection and Immunity', read to the Society (8 Nov 1921), published in Bulletin of the Society of Medical History of Chicago (Mar 1922), 2, 329, or in reprint form, p. 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Cause (561)  |  Constitution (78)  |  Disease (340)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Equivalent (46)  |  Fever (34)  |  First (1302)  |  Forming (42)  |  Germ (54)  |  Kind (564)  |  Live (650)  |  Material (366)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Principle (530)  |  Productive (37)  |  Small (489)  |  Smallpox (14)  |  Something (718)  |  Substance (253)  |  Various (205)

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
of sun-split clouds and done a hundred things
you have not dreamed of wheeled and soared and swung
high in the sunlit silence. Hovering there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
my eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I’ve topped the windswept heights with easy grace
where never lark, or even eagle flew
and, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
the high untrespassed sanctity of space,
put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Blue (63)  |  Bond (46)  |  Burn (99)  |  Burning (49)  |  Chase (14)  |  Climb (39)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Craft (11)  |  Dance (35)  |  Delirious (2)  |  Dream (222)  |  Eager (17)  |  Eagle (20)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Easy (213)  |  Face (214)  |  Fling (5)  |  Fly (153)  |  God (776)  |  Grace (31)  |  Hall (5)  |  Hand (149)  |  Height (33)  |  High (370)  |  Hover (8)  |  Hovering (5)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Join (32)  |  Lark (2)  |  Laughter (34)  |  Lift (57)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mirth (3)  |  Never (1089)  |  Sanctity (4)  |  Shout (25)  |  Silence (62)  |  Silent (31)  |  Silver (49)  |  Sky (174)  |  Slip (6)  |  Soar (23)  |  Space (523)  |  Sun (407)  |  Sunlit (2)  |  Sunward (2)  |  Swing (12)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  Top (100)  |  Touch (146)  |  Tread (17)  |  Tumble (3)  |  Tumbling (2)  |  Wheel (51)  |  Wind (141)  |  Wing (79)

Ohm found that the results could be summed up in such a simple law that he who runs may read it, and a schoolboy now can predict what a Faraday then could only guess at roughly. By Ohm's discovery a large part of the domain of electricity became annexed by Coulomb's discovery of the law of inverse squares, and completely annexed by Green's investigations. Poisson attacked the difficult problem of induced magnetisation, and his results, though differently expressed, are still the theory, as a most important first approximation. Ampere brought a multitude of phenomena into theory by his investigations of the mechanical forces between conductors supporting currents and magnets. Then there were the remarkable researches of Faraday, the prince of experimentalists, on electrostatics and electrodynamics and the induction of currents. These were rather long in being brought from the crude experimental state to a compact system, expressing the real essence. Unfortunately, in my opinion, Faraday was not a mathematician. It can scarely be doubted that had he been one, he would have anticipated much later work. He would, for instance, knowing Ampere's theory, by his own results have readily been led to Neumann’s theory, and the connected work of Helmholtz and Thomson. But it is perhaps too much to expect a man to be both the prince of experimentalists and a competent mathematician.
From article 'Electro-magnetic Theory II', in The Electrician (16 Jan 1891), 26, No. 661, 331.
Science quotes on:  |  André-Marie Ampère (11)  |  Approximation (32)  |  Attack (86)  |  Being (1276)  |  Both (496)  |  Compact (13)  |  Completely (137)  |  Conductor (17)  |  Connect (126)  |  Charles-Augustin Coulomb (3)  |  Crude (32)  |  Current (122)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Domain (72)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Electrodynamics (10)  |  Electromagnetism (19)  |  Electrostatic (7)  |  Electrostatics (6)  |  Essence (85)  |  Expect (203)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Experimentalist (20)  |  Express (192)  |  Michael Faraday (91)  |  First (1302)  |  Force (497)  |  Green (65)  |  Guess (67)  |  Hermann von Helmholtz (32)  |  Induction (81)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Large (398)  |  Law (913)  |  Magnet (22)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Most (1728)  |  Multitude (50)  |  Ohm (5)  |  Georg Simon Ohm (3)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Siméon-Denis Poisson (7)  |  Predict (86)  |  Problem (731)  |  Read (308)  |  Result (700)  |  Run (158)  |  Simple (426)  |  Square (73)  |  State (505)  |  Still (614)  |  System (545)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Sir J.J. Thomson (18)  |  Unfortunately (40)  |  Work (1402)

Old King Coal was a merry old soul:
“I’ll move the world,” quoth he;
“My England’s high, and rich, and great,
But greater she shall be !”
And he call’d for the pick, and he call’d for the spade,
And he call’d for his miners bold;
“ And it’s dig,” he said, “in the deep, deep earth;
You’ll find my treasures better worth
Than mines of Indian gold!”

Old King Coal was a merry old soul,
Yet not content was he;
And he said, “I’ve found what I’ve desired,
Though ’tis but one of three.”
And he call’d for water, he call’d for fire,
For smiths and workmen true:
“Come, build me engines great and strong ;
We’ll have,” quoth he, “a change ere long;
We’ll try what Steam can do.”

Old King Coal was a merry old soul:
“’Tis fairly done,” quoth he,
When he saw the myriad wheels at work
O’er all the land and sea.
They spared the bones and strength of men,
They hammer’d, wove, and spun;
There was nought too great, too mean, or small,
The giant Steam had power for all;—
His task was never done.
From song, 'Old King Coal' (1846), collected in The Poetical Works of Charles Mackay: Now for the First Time Collected Complete in One Volume (1876), 565. To the melody of 'Old King Cole'.
Science quotes on:  |  Better (493)  |  Blacksmith (5)  |  Bold (22)  |  Bone (101)  |  Build (211)  |  Call (781)  |  Change (639)  |  Coal (64)  |  Deep (241)  |  Dig (25)  |  Do (1905)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Engine (99)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fire (203)  |  Giant (73)  |  Gold (101)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greater (288)  |  Hammer (26)  |  High (370)  |  Indian (32)  |  Industrial Revolution (10)  |  Loom (20)  |  Machine (271)  |  Mean (810)  |  Mine (78)  |  Miner (9)  |  Move (223)  |  Myriad (32)  |  Never (1089)  |  Old (499)  |  Pick (16)  |  Power (771)  |  Railroad (36)  |  Saw (160)  |  Sea (326)  |  Small (489)  |  Soul (235)  |  Spade (3)  |  Steam (81)  |  Strength (139)  |  Strong (182)  |  Task (152)  |  Transport (31)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Try (296)  |  Water (503)  |  Wheel (51)  |  Work (1402)  |  Workman (13)  |  World (1850)  |  Worth (172)

On the basis of the results recorded in this review, it can be claimed that the average sand grain has taken many hundreds of millions of years to lose 10 per cent. of its weight by abrasion and become subangular. It is a platitude to point to the slowness of geological processes. But much depends on the way things are put. For it can also be said that a sand grain travelling on the bottom of a river loses 10 million molecules each time it rolls over on its side and that representation impresses us with the high rate of this loss. The properties of quartz have led to the concentration of its grains on the continents, where they could now form a layer averaging several hundred metres thick. But to my mind the most astounding numerical estimate that follows from the present evaluations, is that during each and every second of the incredibly long geological past the number of quartz grains on earth has increased by 1,000 million.
'Sand-its Origin, Transportation, Abrasion and Accumulation', The Geological Society of South Africa (1959), Annexure to Volume 62, 31.
Science quotes on:  |  Astounding (9)  |  Average (89)  |  Basis (180)  |  Become (821)  |  Claim (154)  |  Concentration (29)  |  Continent (79)  |  Depend (238)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Estimate (59)  |  Evaluation (10)  |  Follow (389)  |  Form (976)  |  Geology (240)  |  Grain (50)  |  High (370)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Layer (41)  |  Lose (165)  |  Loss (117)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Most (1728)  |  Number (710)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Past (355)  |  Point (584)  |  Present (630)  |  Process (439)  |  Quartz (2)  |  Record (161)  |  Representation (55)  |  Result (700)  |  Review (27)  |  River (140)  |  Roll (41)  |  Sand (63)  |  Side (236)  |  Slowness (6)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Travelling (17)  |  Way (1214)  |  Weight (140)  |  Year (963)

Once established, an original river advances through its long life, manifesting certain peculiarities of youth, maturity and old age, by which its successive stages of growth may be recognized without much difficulty.
'The Rivers and Valleys of Pennsylvania', The National Geographic Magazine, 1889, 1, 203.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Age (509)  |  Certain (557)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Growth (200)  |  Life (1870)  |  Maturity (14)  |  Old (499)  |  Old Age (35)  |  River (140)  |  Stage (152)  |  Successive (73)  |  Through (846)  |  Youth (109)

One doesn’t discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.
In The Counterfeiters: A Novel (1951, 2012), 353. As translated by Dorothy Bussy from the original French, “On ne découvre pas de terre nouvelle sans consentir à perdre de vue, d'abord et longtemps, tout rivage”, in Les Faux Monnayeurs (1925).
Science quotes on:  |  Consent (14)  |  Discover (571)  |  Land (131)  |  Lose (165)  |  New (1273)  |  Shore (25)  |  Sight (135)  |  Time (1911)

One is always a long way from solving a problem until one actually has the answer.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Actually (27)  |  Answer (389)  |  Problem (731)  |  Solve (145)  |  Way (1214)

One must be wary in attributing scientific discovery wholly to any one person. Almost every discovery has a long and precarious history. Someone finds a bit here, another a bit there. A third step succeeds later and thus onward till a genius pieces the bits together and makes the decisive contribution. Science, like the Mississippi, begins in a tiny rivulet in the distant forest. Gradually other streams swell its volume. And the roaring river that bursts the dikes is formed from countless sources.
In 'The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge', Harper’s (Jun/Nov 1939), No. 179, 549
Science quotes on:  |  Attribute (65)  |  Begin (275)  |  Bit (21)  |  Burst (41)  |  Contribution (93)  |  Countless (39)  |  Decisive (25)  |  Dike (2)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Distant (33)  |  Find (1014)  |  Forest (161)  |  Form (976)  |  Genius (301)  |  Gradual (30)  |  Gradually (102)  |  History (716)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Mississippi (7)  |  Must (1525)  |  Other (2233)  |  Person (366)  |  Piece (39)  |  Precarious (6)  |  River (140)  |  Rivulet (5)  |  Roar (6)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Source (101)  |  Step (234)  |  Stream (83)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Swell (4)  |  Tiny (74)  |  Together (392)  |  Volume (25)  |  Wary (3)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wholly (88)

One night we were hauling long lines on the Faroe slope, working with an electric lamp hanging over the side in order to see the line, when like lightning flashes one squid after another shot towards the light; … In October 1902 we were one night steaming outside the slopes of the coast banks of Norway, and for many miles we could see the squids moving in the surface waters like luminous bubbles, resembling large milky white electric lamps being constantly lit and extinguished.
From Sir John Murray and Johan Hyort, The Depths of the Ocean (1912), 649.
Science quotes on:  |  Bank (31)  |  Being (1276)  |  Bubble (23)  |  Electric (76)  |  Extinguish (8)  |  Lamp (37)  |  Large (398)  |  Light (635)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Luminous (19)  |  Order (638)  |  Outside (141)  |  Resemble (65)  |  See (1094)  |  Side (236)  |  Slope (10)  |  Squid (3)  |  Surface (223)  |  Water (503)  |  White (132)

One of the most curious and interesting reptiles which I met with in Borneo was a large tree-frog, which was brought me by one of the Chinese workmen. He assured me that he had seen it come down in a slanting direction from a high tree, as if it flew. On examining it, I found the toes very long and fully webbed to their very extremity, so that when expanded they offered a surface much larger than the body. The forelegs were also bordered by a membrane, and the body was capable of considerable inflation. The back and limbs were of a very deep shining green colour, the undersurface and the inner toes yellow, while the webs were black, rayed with yellow. The body was about four inches long, while the webs of each hind foot, when fully expanded, covered a surface of four square inches, and the webs of all the feet together about twelve square inches. As the extremities of the toes have dilated discs for adhesion, showing the creature to be a true tree frog, it is difficult to imagine that this immense membrane of the toes can be for the purpose of swimming only, and the account of the Chinaman, that it flew down from the tree, becomes more credible. This is, I believe, the first instance known of a “flying frog,” and it is very interesting to Darwinians as showing that the variability of the toes which have been already modified for purposes of swimming and adhesive climbing, have been taken advantage of to enable an allied species to pass through the air like the flying lizard. It would appear to be a new species of the genus Rhacophorus, which consists of several frogs of a much smaller size than this, and having the webs of the toes less developed.
Malay Archipelago
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Adhesion (6)  |  Adhesive (2)  |  Advantage (144)  |  Air (366)  |  Ally (7)  |  Already (226)  |  Appear (122)  |  Assure (16)  |  Back (395)  |  Become (821)  |  Belief (615)  |  Black (46)  |  Body (557)  |  Border (10)  |  Borneo (3)  |  Bring (95)  |  Capable (174)  |  Chinese (22)  |  Climb (39)  |  Color (155)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Consist (223)  |  Cover (40)  |  Creature (242)  |  Credible (3)  |  Curious (95)  |  Darwinian (10)  |  Deep (241)  |  Develop (278)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Direction (185)  |  Disk (3)  |  Down (455)  |  Enable (122)  |  Examine (84)  |  Expand (56)  |  Extremity (7)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Fly (153)  |  Flying (74)  |  Foot (65)  |  Frog (44)  |  Fully (20)  |  Genus (27)  |  Green (65)  |  High (370)  |  Hind (3)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Immense (89)  |  Inch (10)  |  Inflation (6)  |  Inner (72)  |  Instance (33)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Large (398)  |  Less (105)  |  Limb (9)  |  Lizard (7)  |  Meet (36)  |  Membrane (21)  |  Modify (15)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Offer (142)  |  Pass (241)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Ray (115)  |  Reptile (33)  |  See (1094)  |  Several (33)  |  Shine (49)  |  Shining (35)  |  Show (353)  |  Size (62)  |  Small (489)  |  Species (435)  |  Square (73)  |  Surface (223)  |  Swim (32)  |  Swimming (19)  |  Through (846)  |  Toe (8)  |  Together (392)  |  Tree (269)  |  Tree Frog (2)  |  True (239)  |  Underside (2)  |  Variability (5)  |  Web (17)  |  Workman (13)  |  Yellow (31)

One of the strongest motives that lead men to art and science is escape from everyday life with its painful crudity and hopeless dreariness, from the fetters of one's own ever-shifting desires. A finely tempered nature longs to escape from the personal life into the world of objective perception and thought.
Albert Einstein and Walter Shropshire (ed.), The Joys of Research (1981), 40.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Crudity (4)  |  Desire (212)  |  Dreariness (3)  |  Escape (85)  |  Everyday (32)  |  Everyday Life (15)  |  Fetters (7)  |  Hopeless (17)  |  Lead (391)  |  Life (1870)  |  Motive (62)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Objective (96)  |  Pain (144)  |  Perception (97)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Thought (995)  |  World (1850)

One summer day, while I was walking along the country road on the farm where I was born, a section of the stone wall opposite me, and not more than three or four yards distant, suddenly fell down. Amid the general stillness and immobility about me the effect was quite startling. ... It was the sudden summing up of half a century or more of atomic changes in the material of the wall. A grain or two of sand yielded to the pressure of long years, and gravity did the rest.
Under the Apple-Trees (1916), 105.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Century (319)  |  Change (639)  |  Country (269)  |  Down (455)  |  Effect (414)  |  Entropy (46)  |  Fall (243)  |  Farm (28)  |  General (521)  |  Grain (50)  |  Gravity (140)  |  Material (366)  |  More (2558)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Pressure (69)  |  Rest (287)  |  Road (71)  |  Sand (63)  |  Section (11)  |  Startling (15)  |  Stillness (5)  |  Stone (168)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Suddenness (6)  |  Sum (103)  |  Summer (56)  |  Two (936)  |  Walk (138)  |  Wall (71)  |  Year (963)  |  Yield (86)  |  Yielding (2)

One thing I have learned in a long life: that all our science, measured against reality, is primitive and childlike—and yet is the most precious thing we have.
Epigraph in Banesh Hoffmann and Helen Dukas, Albert Einstein: Creator and Rebel (1972, 1973), vii.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Life (1870)  |  Most (1728)  |  Precious (43)  |  Primitive (79)  |  Reality (274)  |  Thing (1914)

One would like to see mankind spend the balance of the century in a total effort to clean up and groom the surface of the globe – wipe out the jungles, turn deserts and swamps into arable land, terrace barren mountains, regulate rivers, eradicate all pests, control the weather, and make the whole land mass a fit habitation for Man. The globe should be our and not nature’s home, and we no longer nature’s guests.
In The Temper of Our Time (1967), 94.
Science quotes on:  |  Balance (82)  |  Barren (33)  |  Century (319)  |  Clean (52)  |  Clean Up (5)  |  Control (182)  |  Desert (59)  |  Effort (243)  |  Eradicate (6)  |  Fit (139)  |  Globe (51)  |  Guest (5)  |  Habitation (7)  |  Home (184)  |  Jungle (24)  |  Land (131)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Mass (160)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Regulate (11)  |  River (140)  |  See (1094)  |  Spend (97)  |  Surface (223)  |  Swamp (9)  |  Terrace (2)  |  Total (95)  |  Turn (454)  |  Weather (49)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wipe Out (3)

Only go on working so long as the brain is quite clear. The moment you feel the ideas getting confused leave off and rest, or your penalty will be that you will never learn Mathematics at all!
From letter to Edith Rix with hints for studying (about Mar 1885), in Stuart Dodgson Collingwood, The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll (1898), 241.
Science quotes on:  |  Brain (281)  |  Clear (111)  |  Confused (13)  |  Feel (371)  |  Idea (881)  |  Learn (672)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Moment (260)  |  Never (1089)  |  Penalty (7)  |  Rest (287)  |  Studying (70)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

Our atom of carbon enters the leaf, colliding with other innumerable (but here useless) molecules of nitrogen and oxygen. It adheres to a large and complicated molecule that activates it, and simultaneously receives the decisive message from the sky, in the flashing form of a packet of solar light; in an instant, like an insect caught by a spider, it is separated from its oxygen, combined with hydrogen and (one thinks) phosphorus, and finally inserted in a chain, whether long or short does not matter, but it is the chain of life. All this happens swiftly, in silence, at the temperature and pressure of the atmosphere, and gratis: dear colleagues, when we learn to do likewise we will be sicut Deus [like God], and we will have also solved the problem of hunger in the world.
Levi Primo and Raymond Rosenthal (trans.), The Periodic Table (1975, 1984), 227-228. In this final section of his book, Levi imagines the life of a carbon atom. He calls this his first “literary dream”. It came to him at Auschwitz.
Science quotes on:  |  Activate (3)  |  Activation (6)  |  Adherence (2)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Atom (381)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Catch (34)  |  Chain (51)  |  Colleague (51)  |  Collision (16)  |  Combination (150)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Decisive (25)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enter (145)  |  Flash (49)  |  Form (976)  |  God (776)  |  Gratis (2)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happening (59)  |  Hunger (23)  |  Hydrogen (80)  |  Innumerable (56)  |  Insect (89)  |  Insertion (2)  |  Instant (46)  |  Large (398)  |  Leaf (73)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Likewise (2)  |  Matter (821)  |  Message (53)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Nitrogen (32)  |  Other (2233)  |  Oxygen (77)  |  Packet (3)  |  Phosphorus (18)  |  Photon (11)  |  Photosynthesis (21)  |  Pressure (69)  |  Problem (731)  |  Receive (117)  |  Separation (60)  |  Short (200)  |  Silence (62)  |  Simultaneity (3)  |  Sky (174)  |  Solar (8)  |  Solution (282)  |  Spider (14)  |  Sun (407)  |  Swiftness (5)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Think (1122)  |  Uselessness (22)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

Our faith in the present dies out long before our faith in the future.
In An Anthropologist at Work (1959, 2011), 125.
Science quotes on:  |  Die (94)  |  Faith (209)  |  Future (467)  |  Present (630)

Our ideas are only intellectual instruments which we use to break into phenomena; we must change them when they have served their purpose, as we change a blunt lancet that we have used long enough.
In An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine (1865).
Science quotes on:  |  Break (109)  |  Change (639)  |  Enough (341)  |  Idea (881)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Must (1525)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Use (771)

Our ultimate task is to find interpretative procedures that will uncover each bias and discredit its claims to universality. When this is done the eighteenth century can be formally closed and a new era that has been here a long time can be officially recognised. The individual human being, stripped of his humanity, is of no use as a conceptual base from which to make a picture of human society. No human exists except steeped in the culture of his time and place. The falsely abstracted individual has been sadly misleading to Western political thought. But now we can start again at a point where major streams of thought converge, at the other end, at the making of culture. Cultural analysis sees the whole tapestry as a whole, the picture and the weaving process, before attending to the individual threads.
As co-author with Baron Isherwood, The World of Goods: Towards an Anthropology of Consumption (1979, 2002), 41-42.
Science quotes on:  |  18th Century (21)  |  Abstract (141)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Base (120)  |  Being (1276)  |  Bias (22)  |  Century (319)  |  Claim (154)  |  Closed (38)  |  Conceptual (11)  |  Converge (10)  |  Culture (157)  |  Discredit (8)  |  End (603)  |  Era (51)  |  Exist (458)  |  Find (1014)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Human Society (14)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Individual (420)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Major (88)  |  Making (300)  |  Misleading (21)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Picture (148)  |  Point (584)  |  Political (124)  |  Procedure (48)  |  Process (439)  |  Recognise (14)  |  See (1094)  |  Society (350)  |  Start (237)  |  Stream (83)  |  Strip (7)  |  Tapestry (5)  |  Task (152)  |  Thought (995)  |  Thread (36)  |  Time (1911)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Uncover (20)  |  Universality (22)  |  Use (771)  |  Weaving (6)  |  Western (45)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)

Our world faces a crisis as yet unperceived by those possessing power to make great decisions for good or evil. The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking and we thus drift toward unparalleled catastrophe. We scientists who released this immense power have an overwhelming responsibility in this world life-and-death struggle to harness the atom for the benefit of mankind and not for humanity’s destruction. … We need two hundred thousand dollars at once for a nation-wide campaign to let people know that a new type of thinking is essential if mankind is to survive and move toward higher levels. This appeal is sent to you only after long consideration of the immense crisis we face. … We ask your help at this fateful moment as a sign that we scientists do not stand alone.
In 'Atomic Education Urged by Einstein', New York Times (25 May 1946), 13. Extract from a telegram (24 May 1946) to “several hundred prominent Americans”, signed by Albert Einstein as Chairman, with other members, of the Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists. It was also signed by the Federation of American Scientists.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Appeal (46)  |  Ask (420)  |  Atom (381)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Campaign (6)  |  Catastrophe (35)  |  Change (639)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Crisis (25)  |  Death (406)  |  Decision (98)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dollar (22)  |  Drift (14)  |  Essential (210)  |  Everything (489)  |  Evil (122)  |  Face (214)  |  Fateful (2)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Harness (25)  |  Help (116)  |  Higher Level (3)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Immense (89)  |  Know (1538)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Moment (260)  |  Move (223)  |  Nation (208)  |  Need (320)  |  New (1273)  |  Overwhelming (30)  |  People (1031)  |  Power (771)  |  Release (31)  |  Responsibility (71)  |  Save (126)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Send (23)  |  Sign (63)  |  Stand (284)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Survive (87)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Two (936)  |  Type (171)  |  Unleash (2)  |  Wide (97)  |  World (1850)

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)  |  Chaos (99)  |  Collision (16)  |  Cross (20)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Eccentric (11)  |  Gap (36)  |  Grow (247)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Influence (231)  |  Jupiter (28)  |  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)

People are very open-minded about new things - as long as they're exactly like the old ones.
Science quotes on:  |  Habit (174)  |  Mind (1377)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)  |  Open (277)  |  People (1031)  |  Thing (1914)

People like you and I, though mortal of course like everyone else, do not grow old no matter how long we live...[We] never cease to stand like curious children before the great mystery into which we were born.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Bear (162)  |  Cease (81)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Course (413)  |  Curious (95)  |  Do (1905)  |  Everyone (35)  |  Great (1610)  |  Grow (247)  |  Live (650)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mortal (55)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Never (1089)  |  Of Course (22)  |  Old (499)  |  People (1031)  |  Stand (284)

People travel to wonder at the height of mountains, at the huge waves of the sea, at the long courses of rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motion of the stars; and they pass by themselves without wondering.
In Circulations: Webster's Quotations, Facts and Phrases, 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Circular (19)  |  Circular Motion (7)  |  Compass (37)  |  Course (413)  |  Height (33)  |  Motion (320)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Pass (241)  |  People (1031)  |  River (140)  |  Sea (326)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Travel (125)  |  Vast (188)  |  Wave (112)  |  Wonder (251)

Perhaps the majority of paleontologists of the present time, who believe in orthogenesis, the irreversibility of evolution and the polyphyletic origin families, will assume that a short molar must keep on getting shorter, that it can never get longer and then again grow relatively shorter and therefore that Propliopithecus with its extremely short third molar and Dryopithecus its long m3 are alike excluded from ancestry of the Gorilla, in which the is a slight retrogression in length of m3. After many years reflection and constant study of the evolution of the vertebrates however, I conclude that 'orthogenesis' should mean solely that structures and races evolve in a certain direction, or toward a certain goal, only until the direction of evolution shifts toward some other goal. I believe that the 'irreversibility of evolution' means only that past changes irreversibly limit and condition future possibilities, and that, as a matter of experience, if an organ is once lost the same (homogenous) organ can be regained, although nature is fertile in substituting imitations. But this not mean, in my judgement, that if one tooth is smaller than its fellows it will in all cases continue to grow smaller.
'Studies on the Evolution of the Primates’, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 1916, 35, 307.
Science quotes on:  |  Alike (60)  |  Ancestry (13)  |  Certain (557)  |  Change (639)  |  Conclude (66)  |  Condition (362)  |  Constant (148)  |  Continue (179)  |  Direction (185)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Fertile (30)  |  Future (467)  |  Goal (155)  |  Gorilla (19)  |  Grow (247)  |  Irreversibility (4)  |  Limit (294)  |  Majority (68)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Organ (118)  |  Origin (250)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paleontologist (19)  |  Past (355)  |  Present (630)  |  Race (278)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Retrogression (6)  |  Shift (45)  |  Short (200)  |  Structure (365)  |  Study (701)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tooth (32)  |  Vertebrate (22)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

Perhaps the most surprising thing about mathematics is that it is so surprising. The rules which we make up at the beginning seem ordinary and inevitable, but it is impossible to foresee their consequences. These have only been found out by long study, extending over many centuries. Much of our knowledge is due to a comparatively few great mathematicians such as Newton, Euler, Gauss, or Riemann; few careers can have been more satisfying than theirs. They have contributed something to human thought even more lasting than great literature, since it is independent of language.
Quoted in a space filler, without citation, in The Pentagon: A Mathematics Magazine for Students (Fall 1951), 11, No. 1, 12. Primary source needed (can you help).
Science quotes on:  |  Beginning (312)  |  Career (86)  |  Century (319)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Contribute (30)  |  Due (143)  |  Leonhard Euler (35)  |  Few (15)  |  Foresee (22)  |  Carl Friedrich Gauss (79)  |  Great (1610)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Thought (7)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Independent (74)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Language (308)  |  Literature (116)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Bernhard Riemann (7)  |  Rule (307)  |  Satisfy (29)  |  Something (718)  |  Study (701)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)

Philosophers no longer write for the intelligent, only for their fellow professionals. The few thousand academic philosophers in the world do not stint themselves: they maintain more than seventy learned journals. But in the handful that cover more than one subdivision of philosophy, any given philosopher can hardly follow more than one or two articles in each issue. This hermetic condition is attributed to “technical problems” in the subject. Since William James, Russell, and Whitehead, philosophy, like history, has been confiscated by scholarship and locked away from the contamination of general use.
In The Culture We Deserve (1989), 9.
Science quotes on:  |  Academic (20)  |  Article (22)  |  Attribute (65)  |  Condition (362)  |  Contamination (4)  |  Cover (40)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Follow (389)  |  General (521)  |  Give (208)  |  Handful (14)  |  Hardly (19)  |  Hermetic (2)  |  History (716)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Issue (46)  |  William James (50)  |  Journal (31)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Lock (14)  |  Maintain (105)  |  More (2558)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Problem (731)  |  Professional (77)  |  Scholarship (22)  |  Seventy (2)  |  Subdivision (2)  |  Subject (543)  |  Technical (53)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Two (936)  |  Use (771)  |  Alfred North Whitehead (140)  |  World (1850)  |  Write (250)

Philosophy dwells aloft in the Temple of Science, the divinity of its inmost shrine; her dictates descend among men, but she herself descends not : whoso would behold her must climb with long and laborious effort, nay, still linger in the forecourt, till manifold trial have proved him worthy of admission into the interior solemnities.
In James Wood, Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources (1893), 347:42.
Science quotes on:  |  Admission (17)  |  Descend (49)  |  Divinity (23)  |  Effort (243)  |  Interior (35)  |  Laborious (17)  |  Linger (14)  |  Manifold (23)  |  Must (1525)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Shrine (8)  |  Still (614)  |  Temple (45)  |  Temple Of Science (8)  |  Trial (59)

Philosophy would long ago have reached a high level if our predecessors and fathers had put this into practice; and we would not waste time on the primary difficulties, which appear now as severe as in the first centuries which noticed them. We would have the experience of assured phenomena, which would serve as principles for a solid reasoning; truth would not be so deeply sunken; nature would have taken off most of her envelopes; one would see the marvels she contains in all her individuals. ...
Les Préludes de l'Harmonie Universelle (1634), 135-139. In Charles Coulston Gillispie (ed.), Dictionary of Scientific Biography (1974), Vol. 9, 316.
Science quotes on:  |  Appearance (145)  |  Century (319)  |  Contain (68)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Envelope (6)  |  Experience (494)  |  Father (113)  |  First (1302)  |  High (370)  |  Individual (420)  |  Marvel (37)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Notice (81)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Practice (212)  |  Predecessor (29)  |  Primary (82)  |  Principle (530)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  See (1094)  |  Severity (6)  |  Sinking (6)  |  Solid (119)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Waste (109)

Physicists are, as a general rule, highbrows. They think and talk in long, Latin words, and when they write anything down they usually include at least one partial differential and three Greek letters.
In 'A Newsman Looks at Physicists', Physics Today (May 1948), 1, No. 1, 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Differential (7)  |  Down (455)  |  General (521)  |  Greek (109)  |  Include (93)  |  Latin (44)  |  Letter (117)  |  Partial (10)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Rule (307)  |  Talk (108)  |  Think (1122)  |  Usually (176)  |  Word (650)  |  Write (250)

Physicists often quote from T. H. White’s epic novel The Once and Future King, where a society of ants declares, “Everything not forbidden is compulsory.” In other words, if there isn't a basic principle of physics forbidding time travel, then time travel is necessarily a physical possibility. (The reason for this is the uncertainty principle. Unless something is forbidden, quantum effects and fluctuations will eventually make it possible if we wait long enough. Thus, unless there is a law forbidding it, it will eventually occur.)
In Parallel Worlds: a Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos (2006), 136.
Science quotes on:  |  Ant (34)  |  Basic (144)  |  Compulsory (8)  |  Declaration (10)  |  Declare (48)  |  Effect (414)  |  Enough (341)  |  Epic (12)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Everything (489)  |  Fluctuation (15)  |  Forbid (14)  |  Forbidden (18)  |  Future (467)  |  Law (913)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Novel (35)  |  Occur (151)  |  Occurrence (53)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physicists (2)  |  Physics (564)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Possible (560)  |  Principle (530)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Quote (46)  |  Reason (766)  |  Society (350)  |  Something (718)  |  Time (1911)  |  Time Travel (4)  |  Travel (125)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Uncertainty Principle (9)  |  Wait (66)  |  White (132)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)

Physics is becoming so unbelievably complex that it is taking longer and longer to train a physicist. It is taking so long, in fact, to train a physicist to the place where he understands the nature of physical problems that he is already too old to solve them.
As quoted by Colin Pittendrigh (1971). In George C. Beakley, Ernest G. Chilton, Introduction to Engineering Design and Graphics (1973), 40
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Already (226)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Complex (202)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Education (423)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Old (499)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physics (564)  |  Problem (731)  |  Solution (282)  |  Solve (145)  |  Train (118)  |  Understand (648)

Post-operatively the transplanted kidney functioned immediately with a dramatic improvement in the patient’s renal and cardiopulmonary status. This spectacular success was a clear demonstration that organ transplantation could be life-saving. In a way, it was spying into the future because we had achieved our long-term goal by bypassing, but not solving, the issue of biological incompatibility.
Referring to the pioneering first kidney transplant. It was well-matched since it was between twins. In Nobel Lecture (8 Dec 1990). Printed in Tore Frängsmyr and Jan Lindsten (eds.), Nobel Lectures, Physiology or Medicine 1981-1990 (1993).
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Biological (137)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Dramatic (19)  |  Function (235)  |  Future (467)  |  Goal (155)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Incompatibility (3)  |  Issue (46)  |  Kidney (19)  |  Life (1870)  |  Long-Term (11)  |  Operation (221)  |  Organ (118)  |  Patient (209)  |  Renal (4)  |  Solving (6)  |  Spectacular (22)  |  Status (35)  |  Success (327)  |  Term (357)  |  Transplant (12)  |  Transplantation (4)  |  Way (1214)

Power politics existed before Machiavelli was ever heard of; it will exist long after his name is only a faint memory. What he did, like Harvey, was to recognize its existence and subject it to scientific study.
The Prince and the Discourses by Niccolò Machiavelli, with an Introduction by Max Lerner (1950), xliii.
Science quotes on:  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  William Harvey (30)  |   Niccolò Machiavelli (6)  |  Memory (144)  |  Name (359)  |  Politics (122)  |  Power (771)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Study (2)  |  Study (701)  |  Subject (543)  |  Will (2350)

Probably the simple facts about health are that all of us form bad dietary habits when we have young stomachs, and continue in them when our stomachs show the natural wear of long use. Stomachs weaken, as do eyes; but we cannot buy spectacles for our stomachs.
In Sinner Sermons: A Selection of the Best Paragraphs of E. W. Howe (1926), 12.
Science quotes on:  |  Bad (185)  |  Buy (21)  |  Continue (179)  |  Do (1905)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Form (976)  |  Habit (174)  |  Health (210)  |  Natural (810)  |  Show (353)  |  Simple (426)  |  Spectacle (35)  |  Spectacles (10)  |  Stomach (40)  |  Use (771)  |  Weaken (5)  |  Wear (20)  |  Young (253)

Progress may have been all right once, but it went on too long;
I think progress began to retrogress when Wilbur and Orville started tinkering around in Dayton and at Kitty Hawk, because I believe that two Wrights made a wrong.
From poem 'Come, Come, Kerouac! My Generation is Beater Than Yours', in magazine New Yorker (4 Apr 1959).
Science quotes on:  |  Kitty Hawk (5)  |  Progress (492)  |  Right (473)  |  Start (237)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tinkering (6)  |  Two (936)  |  Orville Wright (10)  |  Wilbur Wright (14)  |  Wrong (246)

Psychology has a long past, yet its real history is short.
Psychology (1885), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  History (716)  |  Past (355)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Short (200)

Reaching the Moon by three-man vessels in one long bound from Earth is like casting a thin thread across space. The main effort, in the coming decades, will be to strengthen this thread; to make it a cord, a cable, and, finally, a broad highway.
In 'The Coming Decades in Space', Boy’s Life (Jun 1972), 8. Reprinted in The Beginning and the End (1977), 203.
Science quotes on:  |  Across (32)  |  Bound (120)  |  Broad (28)  |  Cable (11)  |  Cast (69)  |  Casting (10)  |  Coming (114)  |  Cord (3)  |  Decade (66)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effort (243)  |  Finally (26)  |  Highway (15)  |  Main (29)  |  Man (2252)  |  Moon (252)  |  Reach (286)  |  Space (523)  |  Strengthen (25)  |  Thin (18)  |  Thread (36)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Will (2350)

Real life is, to most men, a long second-best, a perpetual compromise between the ideal and the possible; but the world of pure reason ;knows no compromise, no practical limitations, no barrier to the creative activity.
Essay, 'The Study of Mathematics' (1902), collected in Philosophical Essays (1910), 73-74. Also collected in Mysticism and Logic: And Other Essays (1919), 60.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Barrier (34)  |  Best (467)  |  Compromise (12)  |  Creative (144)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Know (1538)  |  Life (1870)  |  Limitation (52)  |  Most (1728)  |  Perpetual (59)  |  Possible (560)  |  Practical (225)  |  Pure (299)  |  Real Life (8)  |  Reason (766)  |  Second Best (2)  |  World (1850)

Refining is inevitable in science when you have made measurements of a phenomenon for a long period of time.
From interview with Henry Spall, as in an abridged version of Earthquake Information Bulletin (Jan-Feb 1980), 12, No. 1, that is on the USGS website.
Science quotes on:  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Period (200)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Refining (4)  |  Time (1911)

Science and technology were developing at a prodigious speed, and it seemed natural to assume that they would go on developing. This failed to happen, partly because of the impoverishment caused by a long series of wars and revolutions, partly because scientific and technical progress depended on the empirical habit of thought, which could not survive in a strictly regimented society.
In 1984 (1949), Book 2, Chapter 9.
Science quotes on:  |  Assume (43)  |  Cause (561)  |  Depend (238)  |  Develop (278)  |  Empirical (58)  |  Fail (191)  |  Habit (174)  |  Happen (282)  |  Impoverish (2)  |  Natural (810)  |  Prodigious (20)  |  Progress (492)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Science And Technology (46)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Series (153)  |  Society (350)  |  Speed (66)  |  Survive (87)  |  Technical (53)  |  Technology (281)  |  Thought (995)  |  War (233)

Science can progress on the basis of error as long as it is not trivial.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Basis (180)  |  Error (339)  |  Progress (492)  |  Trivial (59)

Science has gone a long way toward helping man to free himself from the burden of hard labor; yet, science itself is not a liberator. It creates means, not goals. It is up to men to utilize those means to achieve reasonable goals.
In 'I Am an American' (22 Jun 1940), Einstein Archives 29-092. Excerpted in David E. Rowe and Robert J. Schulmann, Einstein on Politics: His Private Thoughts and Public Stands on Nationalism, Zionism, War, Peace, and the Bomb (2007), 470. The British Library Sound Archive holds a recording of this statement by Einstein. It was during a radio broadcast for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, interviewed by a State Department Official. Einstein spoke following an examination on his application for American citizenship in Trenton, New Jersey. The attack on Pearl Harbor and America’s declaration of war on Japan was still over a year in the future.
Science quotes on:  |  Achieve (75)  |  Burden (30)  |  Create (245)  |  Creating (7)  |  Free (239)  |  Freedom (145)  |  Goal (155)  |  Hard (246)  |  Himself (461)  |  Labor (200)  |  Liberator (2)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Reasonable (29)  |  Utilization (16)  |  Way (1214)

Science has now been for a long time—and to an ever-increasing extent—a collective enterprise. Actually, new results are always, in fact, the work of specific individuals; but, save perhaps for rare exceptions, the value of any result depends on such a complex set of interrelations with past discoveries and possible future researches that even the mind of the inventor cannot embrace the whole.
In Oppression and Liberty (1955, 1958), 109.
Science quotes on:  |  Collective (24)  |  Complex (202)  |  Depend (238)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Embrace (47)  |  Enterprise (56)  |  Exception (74)  |  Extent (142)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Future (467)  |  Increase (225)  |  Individual (420)  |  Interrelation (8)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Mind (1377)  |  New (1273)  |  Past (355)  |  Possible (560)  |  Rare (94)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Save (126)  |  Set (400)  |  Specific (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Value (393)  |  Whole (756)  |  Work (1402)

Science in the modern world has many uses, its chief use, however, is to provide long words to cover the errors of the rich. The word “kleptomania” is a vulgar example of what I mean.
From 'Celts and Celtophiles', in Heretics (1905, 1909), 171.
Science quotes on:  |  Chief (99)  |  Cover (40)  |  Error (339)  |  Mean (810)  |  Modern (402)  |  Provision (17)  |  Rich (66)  |  Use (771)  |  Vulgar (33)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)

Science that jumps to measurement too soon is as unsound as science that ignore measurement too long.
From Jacob Morton Braude, Speaker's Desk Book of Quips, Quotes, & Anecdotes (1966), 295. Also in Science Digest (1954), 36, 55.
Science quotes on:  |  Ignore (52)  |  Jump (31)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Soon (187)  |  Unsound (5)

Science, as long as it limits itself to the descriptive study of the laws of nature, has no moral or ethical quality and this applies to the physical as well as the biological sciences.
'Social Responsibility and the Scientist', New Scientist, 22 October 1970, 166.
Science quotes on:  |  Biological (137)  |  Descriptive (18)  |  Ethical (34)  |  Ethics (53)  |  Law (913)  |  Limit (294)  |  Moral (203)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Physical (518)  |  Quality (139)  |  Study (701)

Science, the partisan of no country, but the beneficent patroness of all, has liberally opened a temple where all may meet. Her influence on the mind, like the sun on the chilled earth, has long been preparing it for higher cultivation and further improvement. The philosopher of one country sees not an enemy in the philosopher of another; he takes his seat in the temple of science, and asks not who sits beside him.
In Letter to the Abbé Reynal, on the 'Affairs of North America in which the Mistakes in the Abbé’s Account of the Revolution of America are Corrected and Cleared Up', collected in The Works of Thomas Paine (1797), Vol. 1, 295. Originally published in the Pennsylvania magazine (1775).
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Beneficent (9)  |  Chill (10)  |  Country (269)  |  Cultivation (36)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enemy (86)  |  High (370)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Influence (231)  |  Meet (36)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Open (277)  |  Partisan (5)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Prepare (44)  |  Preparing (21)  |  Seat (7)  |  See (1094)  |  Sit (51)  |  Sun (407)  |  Temple (45)  |  Temple Of Science (8)

Scientific training gives its votaries freedom from the impositions of modern quackery. Those who know nothing of the laws and processes of Nature fall an easy prey to quacks and impostors. Perfectionism in the realm of religion; a score of frauds in the realm of medicine, as electric shoe soles, hair brushes and belts, electropises, oxydonors, insulating bed casters, and the like; Christian science, in the presence of whose unspeakable stillness and self-stultifying idealism a wise man knows not whether to laugh or cry; Prof. Weltmer’s magnetic treatment of disease; divine healing and miracle working by long-haired peripatetics—these and a score of other contagious fads and rank impostures find their followers among those who have no scientific training. Among their deluded victims are thousands of men and women of high character, undoubted piety, good intentions, charitable impulses and literary culture, but none trained to scientific research. Vaccinate the general public with scientific training and these epidemics will become a thing of the past.
As quoted by S.D. Van Meter, Chairman, closing remarks for 'Report of Committee on Public Policy and Legislation', to the Colorado State Medical Society in Denver, printed in Colorado Medicine (Oct 1904), 1, No. 12, 363. Van Meter used the quote following his statement, “In conclusion, allow me to urge once more the necessity of education of the public as well as the profession if we ever expect to correct the evils we are striving to reach by State and Society legislation. Much can be accomplished toward this end by the publication of well edited articles in the secular press upon medical subjects the public is eager to know about.” Prof. Weltmer is presumably Sidney A. Weltmer, founder of The Weltmer Institute of Suggestive Therapeutics, who offered a Course in Magnetic Healing by mail order correspondence (1899). [The word printed as “electropises” in the article is presumably a typo for “electropoises”. —Webmaster]
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Bed (25)  |  Belt (4)  |  Brush (5)  |  Character (259)  |  Charity (13)  |  Christian (44)  |  Christian Science (3)  |  Contagious (5)  |  Cry (30)  |  Culture (157)  |  Deluded (7)  |  Disease (340)  |  Divine (112)  |  Eager (17)  |  Easy (213)  |  Education (423)  |  Electric (76)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Epidemic (8)  |  Fad (10)  |  Fall (243)  |  Find (1014)  |  Follower (11)  |  Fraud (15)  |  Freedom (145)  |  General (521)  |  General Public (7)  |  Good (906)  |  Good Intention (2)  |  Hair (25)  |  Healing (28)  |  High (370)  |  Idealism (4)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Imposition (5)  |  Impostor (4)  |  Imposture (6)  |  Impulse (52)  |  Insulating (3)  |  Intelligent Design (5)  |  Intention (46)  |  Know (1538)  |  Laugh (50)  |  Law (913)  |  Literary (15)  |  Magnetic (44)  |  Man (2252)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Miracle (85)  |  Modern (402)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Other (2233)  |  Past (355)  |  Perfectionism (2)  |  Peripatetic (3)  |  Piety (5)  |  Presence (63)  |  Prey (13)  |  Process (439)  |  Quack (18)  |  Quackery (4)  |  Rank (69)  |  Realm (87)  |  Religion (369)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Self (268)  |  Shoe (12)  |  Sole (50)  |  Stillness (5)  |  Stultify (5)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Train (118)  |  Trained (5)  |  Training (92)  |  Treatment (135)  |  Victim (37)  |  Votary (3)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wise (143)  |  Wise Man (17)  |  Woman (160)  |  Work (1402)

Scientists and particularly the professional students of evolution are often accused of a bias toward mechanism or materialism, even though believers in vitalism and in finalism are not lacking among them. Such bias as may exist is inherent in the method of science. The most successful scientific investigation has generally involved treating phenomena as if they were purely materialistic, rejecting any metaphysical hypothesis as long as a physical hypothesis seems possible. The method works. The restriction is necessary because science is confined to physical means of investigation and so it would stultify its own efforts to postulate that its subject is not physical and so not susceptible to its methods.
The Meaning of Evolution: A Study of the History of Life and of its Significance for Man (1949), 127.
Science quotes on:  |  Accusation (6)  |  Belief (615)  |  Believer (26)  |  Bias (22)  |  Confinement (4)  |  Effort (243)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Exist (458)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Inherent (43)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Involved (90)  |  Lacking (2)  |  Materialism (11)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Metaphysical (38)  |  Metaphysics (53)  |  Method (531)  |  Most (1728)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Physical (518)  |  Possible (560)  |  Postulate (42)  |  Professional (77)  |  Purely (111)  |  Rejection (36)  |  Restriction (14)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Student (317)  |  Stultify (5)  |  Subject (543)  |  Success (327)  |  Successful (134)  |  Treatment (135)  |  Vitalism (5)  |  Work (1402)

Scientists are supposed to make predictions, probably to prove they are human and can be as mistaken as anyone else. Long-range predictions are better to make because the audience to whom the prediction was made is no longer around to ask questions. The alternative... is to make conflicting predictions, so that one prediction may prove right.
'Fossils—The How and Why of Collecting and Storing', Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington (1969), 82, 597.
Science quotes on:  |  Alternative (32)  |  Ask (420)  |  Asking (74)  |  Audience (28)  |  Better (493)  |  Conflict (77)  |  Conflicting (13)  |  Human (1512)  |  Long-Range (3)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Proof (304)  |  Prove (261)  |  Question (649)  |  Range (104)  |  Right (473)  |  Scientist (881)

Scientists can only carry on with their work, addressing legitimate questions as they arise and challenging misinformation. … Scientists work to fill the gaps in human knowledge and to build a theory that can explain observations of the world. Climate sceptics revel in such gaps, sometimes long after they have been filled.
Editorial, Nature (28 Jul 2011), 475, 423-424.
Science quotes on:  |  Arise (162)  |  Build (211)  |  Building (158)  |  Carry (130)  |  Challenging (3)  |  Climate (102)  |  Climate Change (76)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Filling (6)  |  Gap (36)  |  Global Warming (29)  |  Human (1512)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Legitimate (26)  |  Misinformation (3)  |  Observation (593)  |  Question (649)  |  Research (753)  |  Revel (6)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Skeptic (8)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

Scientists have long been baffled by the existence of spontaneous order in the universe. The laws of thermodynamics seem to dictate the opposite, that nature should inexorably degenerate toward a state of greater disorder, greater entropy. Yet all around
John Mitchinson and John Lloyd, If Ignorance Is Bliss, Why Aren't There More Happy People?: Smart Quotes for Dumb Times (2009), 274.
Science quotes on:  |  Baffle (6)  |  Degenerate (14)  |  Dictate (11)  |  Disorder (45)  |  Entropy (46)  |  Existence (481)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greater (288)  |  Inexorably (2)  |  Law (913)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Order (638)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Seem (150)  |  Spontaneous (29)  |  State (505)  |  Thermodynamics (40)  |  Toward (45)  |  Universe (900)

Scientists themselves readily admit that they do not fully understand the consequences of our many-faceted assault upon the interwoven fabric of atmosphere, water, land and life in all its biological diversity. But things could also turn out to be worse than the current scientific best guess. In military affairs, policy has long been based on the dictum that we should be prepared for the worst case. Why should it be so different when the security is that of the planet and our long-term future?
Speech, 'Global Security Lecture' at Cambridge University (28 Apr 1993).
Science quotes on:  |  Admit (49)  |  Assault (12)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Best (467)  |  Biodiversity (25)  |  Biological (137)  |  Biology (232)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Current (122)  |  Dictum (10)  |  Different (595)  |  Diversity (75)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fabric (27)  |  Future (467)  |  Guess (67)  |  Interwoven (10)  |  Land (131)  |  Life (1870)  |  Military (45)  |  Planet (402)  |  Policy (27)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Security (51)  |  Term (357)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Turn (454)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Water (503)  |  Why (491)  |  Worst (57)

Scripture and Nature agree in this, that all things were covered with water; how and when this aspect began, and how long it lasted, Nature says not, Scripture relates. That there was a watery fluid, however, at a time when animals and plants were not yet to be found, and that the fluid covered all things, is proved by the strata of the higher mountains, free from all heterogeneous material. And the form of these strata bears witness to the presence of a fluid, while the substance bears witness to the absence of heterogeneous bodies. But the similarity of matter and form in the strata of mountains which are different and distant from each other, proves that the fluid was universal.
The Prodromus of Nicolaus Steno's Dissertation Concerning a Solid Body enclosed by Process of Nature within a Solid (1669), trans. J. G. Winter (1916), 263-4.
Science quotes on:  |  Absence (21)  |  Agreement (55)  |  Animal (651)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Bear (162)  |  Covering (14)  |  Different (595)  |  Distance (171)  |  Fluid (54)  |  Form (976)  |  Free (239)  |  Heterogeneous (4)  |  Last (425)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Other (2233)  |  Plant (320)  |  Presence (63)  |  Prove (261)  |  Say (989)  |  Scripture (14)  |  Similarity (32)  |  Strata (37)  |  Substance (253)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universal (198)  |  Universality (22)  |  Water (503)  |  Witness (57)

Second Law
All the acquisitions or losses wrought by nature on individuals, through the influence of the environment in which their race has long been placed, and hence through the influence of the predominant use or permanent disuse of any organ; all these are preserved by reproduction to the new individuals which arise, provided that the acquired modifications are common to both sexes, or at least to the individuals which produce the young.
Philosophie Zoologique (1809), Vol. 1, 235, trans. Hugh Elliot (1914), 113.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquired (77)  |  Acquisition (46)  |  Arise (162)  |  Both (496)  |  Common (447)  |  Environment (239)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Individual (420)  |  Influence (231)  |  Law (913)  |  Loss (117)  |  Modification (57)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Organ (118)  |  Permanent (67)  |  Race (278)  |  Reproduction (74)  |  Through (846)  |  Use (771)  |  Young (253)

Several times every day I observed the portions of the polyp with a magnifying glass. On the 4th December, that is to say on the ninth day after having cut the polyp, I seemed in the morning to be able to perceive, on the edges of the anterior end of the second part (the part that had neither head nor arms), three little points arising from those edges. They immediately made me think of the horns that serve as the legs and arms of the polyp. Nevertheless I did not want to decide at once that these were actually arms that were beginning to grow. Throughout the next day I continually observed these points: this excited me extremely, and awaited with impatience the moment when I should know with certainty what they were. At last, on the following day, they were so big that there was no longer any room for doubt that they were actually arms growing at the anterior extremity of this second part. The next day two more arms started to grow out, and a few days later three more. The second part thus had eight of them, and they were all in a short time as long as those of the first part, that is to say as long as those the polyp possessed before it was cut. I then no longer found any difference between the second part and a polyp that had never been cut. I had remarked the same thing about the first part since the day after the operation. When I observed them with the magnifying glass with all the attention of which I was capable, each of the two appeared perceptibly to be a complete polyp, and they performed all the functions that were known to me: they extended, contracted, and walked.
Mémoires, pour servir à l'histoire d'un genre de polyps d'eau douce à bras en forme de cornes (1744), 7-16. Trans. John R. Baker, in Abraham Trembley of Geneva: Scientist and Philosopher 1710-1784 (1952), 32.
Science quotes on:  |  Anterior (4)  |  Appeared (4)  |  Arising (22)  |  Arm (82)  |  Arms (37)  |  Attention (196)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Capable (174)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Complete (209)  |  Cut (116)  |  Difference (355)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Edge (51)  |  End (603)  |  Extend (129)  |  Extremity (7)  |  First (1302)  |  Function (235)  |  Glass (94)  |  Grow (247)  |  Growing (99)  |  Horn (18)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Impatience (13)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Last (425)  |  Leg (35)  |  Little (717)  |  Magnifying (2)  |  Magnifying Glass (3)  |  Moment (260)  |  More (2558)  |  Morning (98)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Next (238)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observed (149)  |  Operation (221)  |  Perceive (46)  |  Perform (123)  |  Performed (3)  |  Point (584)  |  Polyp (4)  |  Portion (86)  |  Possess (157)  |  Remark (28)  |  Room (42)  |  Say (989)  |  Short (200)  |  Start (237)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Walk (138)  |  Want (504)

She is a reflection of comfortable middle-class values that do not take seriously the continuing unemployment. What I particularly regret is that she does not take seriously the intellectual decline. Having given up the Empire and the mass production of industrial goods, Britain's future lay in its scientific and artistic pre-eminence. Mrs Thatcher will be long remembered for the damage she has done.
On Mrs Margaret H. Thatcher.
The Guardian, 15 Oct 1988.
Science quotes on:  |  Artistic (24)  |  Britain (26)  |  Class (168)  |  Damage (38)  |  Decline (28)  |  Do (1905)  |  Eminence (25)  |  Future (467)  |  Good (906)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Mass (160)  |  Mass Production (4)  |  Pre-eminence (4)  |  Production (190)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Regret (31)  |  Remember (189)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Value (393)  |  Will (2350)

Sheppey hath long been noted for producing large quantities of Sheep (whence probably its name is derived) as well as Corn; and exhibits to the Curious Naturalist a most desirable Spot, by affording many rare Plants, and more especially in the of its Northern Cliffs, so great a Quantity and Variety of Fossils, both native and extraneous are scarcely to be paralleled. These Cliffs length about six miles; Minster, Shurland and Warden are the Manors to which they appertain, the more elevated parts whereof reach about thirds of their extension, and are at the very highest of them not less than fifty yards perpendicular height above the Beach and Shore.
Quoted in Augustus A. Daly, History of the Isle of Sheppey (1975), 247.
Science quotes on:  |  Beach (23)  |  Both (496)  |  Cliff (22)  |  Corn (20)  |  Curious (95)  |  Desirable (33)  |  Extension (60)  |  Extraneous (6)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Great (1610)  |  Large (398)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Name (359)  |  Native (41)  |  Naturalist (79)  |  Parallel (46)  |  Plant (320)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Rare (94)  |  Reach (286)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Variety (138)

Since 1849 I have studied incessantly, under all its aspects, a question which was already in my mind [since 1832. I confess that my scheme is still a mere dream, and I do not shut my eyes to the fact that so long as I alone believe it to be possible, it is virtually impossible. ... The scheme in question is the cutting of a canal through the Isthmus of Suez. This has been thought of from the earliest historical times, and for that very reason is looked upon as impracticable. Geographical dictionaries inform us indeed that the project would have been executed long ago but for insurmountable obstacles. [On his inspiration for the Suez Canal.]
Letter to M.S.A. Ruyssenaers, Consul-General for Holland in Egypt, from Paris (8 Jul 1852), seeking support. Collected in Ferdinand de Lesseps, The Suez Canal: Letters and Documents Descriptive of Its Rise and Progress in 1854-1856 (1876), 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Already (226)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Belief (615)  |  Canal (18)  |  Confess (42)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dream (222)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Historical (70)  |  Idea (881)  |  Impossibility (60)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Incessantly (3)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Inform (50)  |  Inspiration (80)  |  Insurmountable (3)  |  Isthmus (2)  |  Look (584)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Obstacle (42)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Possible (560)  |  Project (77)  |  Question (649)  |  Reason (766)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Shut (41)  |  Still (614)  |  Study (701)  |  Suez Canal (2)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)

Since Britain lies far north toward the pole, the nights are short in summer, and at midnight it is hard to tell whether the evening twilight still lingers or whether dawn is approaching, since the sun at night passes not far below the earth in its journey round the north back to the east. Consequently the days are long in summer, as are the nights in winter when the sun withdraws into African regions.
Bede
Science quotes on:  |  Africa (38)  |  African (11)  |  Back (395)  |  Britain (26)  |  Dawn (31)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Hard (246)  |  Journey (48)  |  Lie (370)  |  Linger (14)  |  Midnight (12)  |  Night (133)  |  North (12)  |  Pole (49)  |  Short (200)  |  Still (614)  |  Summer (56)  |  Sun (407)  |  Tell (344)  |  Twilight (6)  |  Winter (46)  |  Withdraw (11)

Since the examination of consistency is a task that cannot be avoided, it appears necessary to axiomatize logic itself and to prove that number theory and set theory are only parts of logic. This method was prepared long ago (not least by Frege’s profound investigations); it has been most successfully explained by the acute mathematician and logician Russell. One could regard the completion of this magnificent Russellian enterprise of the axiomatization of logic as the crowning achievement of the work of axiomatization as a whole.
Address (11 Sep 1917), 'Axiomatisches Denken' delivered before the Swiss Mathematical Society in Zürich. Translated by Ewald as 'Axiomatic Thought', (1918), in William Bragg Ewald, From Kant to Hilbert (1996), Vol. 2, 1113.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Acute (8)  |  Appear (122)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Axiom (65)  |  Completion (23)  |  Consistency (31)  |  Crown (39)  |  Enterprise (56)  |  Examination (102)  |  Explain (334)  |  Gottlob Frege (12)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Least (75)  |  Logic (311)  |  Logician (18)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  Magnificent (46)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Method (531)  |  Most (1728)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Number (710)  |  Number Theory (6)  |  Prepared (5)  |  Profound (105)  |  Prove (261)  |  Regard (312)  |  Bertrand Russell (198)  |  Set (400)  |  Set Theory (6)  |  Successful (134)  |  Task (152)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Whole (756)  |  Work (1402)

Since the world is what it is, it is clear that valid reasoning from sound principles cannot lead to error; but a principle may be so nearly true as to deserve theoretical respect, and yet may lead to practical consequences which we feel to be absurd. There is therefore a justification for common sense in philosophy, but only as showing that our theoretical principles cannot be quite correct so long as their consequences are condemned by an appeal to common sense which we feel to be irresistible.
In A History of Western Philosophy, (1945, 1996), 553.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurd (60)  |  Appeal (46)  |  Common (447)  |  Common Sense (136)  |  Condemn (44)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Correct (95)  |  Deserve (65)  |  Error (339)  |  Feel (371)  |  Irresistible (17)  |  Justification (52)  |  Lead (391)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Practical (225)  |  Principle (530)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Respect (212)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sound (187)  |  Theoretical (27)  |  True (239)  |  Valid (12)  |  World (1850)

So far, the clumsily long name 'quasi-stellar radio sources' is used to describe these objects. Because the nature of these objects is entirely unknown, it is hard to prepare a short, appropriate nomenclature for them so that their essential properties are obvious from their name. For convenience, the abbreviated form 'quasar' will be used throughout this paper.
'Gravitational Collapse', Physics Today, 1964, 17, 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Convenience (54)  |  Describe (132)  |  Essential (210)  |  Form (976)  |  Hard (246)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Object (438)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Paper (192)  |  Quasar (4)  |  Radio (60)  |  Short (200)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Will (2350)

So long as a man remains a gregarious and sociable being, he cannot cut himself off from the gratification of the instinct of imparting what he is learning, of propagating through others the ideas and impressions seething in his own brain, without stunting and atrophying his moral nature and drying up the surest sources of his future intellectual replenishment.
In Address (22 Feb 1877) for Commemoration Day at Johns Hopkins University. Published as a pamphlet, and reprinted in The Collected Mathematical Papers of James Joseph Sylvester: (1870-1883) (1909), Vol. 3, 77.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Brain (281)  |  Cut (116)  |  Dry (65)  |  Future (467)  |  Gratification (22)  |  Gregarious (3)  |  Himself (461)  |  Idea (881)  |  Impart (24)  |  Imparting (6)  |  Impression (118)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Man (2252)  |  Moral (203)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Other (2233)  |  Propagate (5)  |  Remain (355)  |  Seething (3)  |  Sociable (2)  |  Source (101)  |  Through (846)

So long as new ideas are created, sales will continue to reach new highs.
In Forbes (1946), 57, 46.
Science quotes on:  |  Continue (179)  |  High (370)  |  Idea (881)  |  New (1273)  |  Reach (286)  |  Will (2350)

So long as the fur of the beaver was extensively employed as a material for fine hats, it bore a very high price, and the chase of this quadruped was so keen that naturalists feared its speedy consideration. When a Parisian manufacturer invented the silk hat, which soon came into almost universal use, the demand for beavers' fur fell off, and this animal–whose habits, as we have seen, are an important agency in the formation of bogs and other modifications of forest nature–immediately began to increase, reappeared in haunts which we had long abandoned, and can no longer be regarded as rare enough to be in immediate danger of extirpation. Thus the convenience or the caprice of Parisian fashion has unconsciously exercised an influence which may sensibly affect the physical geography of a distant continent.
In Man and Nature, (1864), 84.
Science quotes on:  |  Abandon (73)  |  Animal (651)  |  Beaver (8)  |  Bog (5)  |  Caprice (10)  |  Chase (14)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Continent (79)  |  Convenience (54)  |  Danger (127)  |  Demand (131)  |  Employ (115)  |  Enough (341)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Extirpation (2)  |  Fear (212)  |  Forest (161)  |  Formation (100)  |  Fur (7)  |  Geography (39)  |  Habit (174)  |  Hat (9)  |  High (370)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Increase (225)  |  Influence (231)  |  Material (366)  |  Modification (57)  |  Naturalist (79)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paris (11)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Geography (3)  |  Price (57)  |  Quadruped (4)  |  Rare (94)  |  Regard (312)  |  Silk (14)  |  Soon (187)  |  Universal (198)  |  Use (771)

So long as the mother, Ignorance, lives, it is not safe for Science, the offspring, to divulge the hidden causes of things.
In Somnium (1634).
Science quotes on:  |  Cause (561)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Live (650)  |  Mother (116)  |  Offspring (27)  |  Safe (61)  |  Thing (1914)

So when, by various turns of the Celestial Dance,
In many thousand years,
A Star, so long unknown, appears,
Tho’ Heaven itself more beauteous by it grow,
It troubles and alarms the World below,
Does to the Wise a Star, to Fools a Meteor show.
Science quotes on:  |  Alarm (19)  |  Appear (122)  |  Beauteous (4)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Celestial (53)  |  Dance (35)  |  Fool (121)  |  Grow (247)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Meteor (19)  |  More (2558)  |  Nova (7)  |  Show (353)  |  Star (460)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Turn (454)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Various (205)  |  Wise (143)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

Some guns were fired to give notice that the departure of the balloon was near. ... Means were used, I am told, to prevent the great balloon's rising so high as might endanger its bursting. Several bags of sand were taken on board before the cord that held it down was cut, and the whole weight being then too much to be lifted, such a quantity was discharged as would permit its rising slowly. Thus it would sooner arrive at that region where it would be in equilibrio with the surrounding air, and by discharging more sand afterwards, it might go higher if desired. Between one and two o’clock, all eyes were gratified with seeing it rise majestically from above the trees, and ascend gradually above the buildings, a most beautiful spectacle. When it was about two hundred feet high, the brave adventurers held out and waved a little white pennant, on both sides of their car, to salute the spectators, who returned loud claps of applause. The wind was very little, so that the object though moving to the northward, continued long in view; and it was a great while before the admiring people began to disperse. The persons embarked were Mr. Charles, professor of experimental philosophy, and a zealous promoter of that science; and one of the Messrs Robert, the very ingenious constructors of the machine.
While U.S. ambassador to France, writing about witnessing, from his carriage outside the garden of Tuileries, Paris, the first manned balloon ascent using hydrogen gas on the afternoon of 1 Dec 1783. A few days earlier, he had watched the first manned ascent in Montgolfier's hot-air balloon, on 21 Nov 1783.
Letter to Sir Charles Banks (1 Dec 1783). In The Writings of Benjamin Franklin: 1783-1788 (1906), Vol. 9, 119-120.
Science quotes on:  |  Aeronautics (15)  |  Air (366)  |  Ascend (30)  |  Balloon (16)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Being (1276)  |  Both (496)  |  Brave (16)  |  Building (158)  |  Car (75)  |  Jacques-Alexandre-César Charles (2)  |  Clock (51)  |  Cut (116)  |  Down (455)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Eye (440)  |  First (1302)  |  Garden (64)  |  Gas (89)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Great (1610)  |  High (370)  |  Hot (63)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Hydrogen (80)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Lift (57)  |  Little (717)  |  Machine (271)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Notice (81)  |  Object (438)  |  Outside (141)  |  People (1031)  |  Permit (61)  |  Person (366)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Professor (133)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Return (133)  |  Rise (169)  |  Rising (44)  |  Salute (3)  |  Sand (63)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Side (236)  |  Spectacle (35)  |  Tree (269)  |  Two (936)  |  View (496)  |  Watch (118)  |  Weight (140)  |  White (132)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wind (141)  |  Writing (192)

Some people say there is a God out there. ... but in my travels around the earth all day long, I looked around and didn't see Him ... I saw no God or angels. The rocket was made by our own people. I don't believe in God. I believe in man, in his strength, his possibilities, and his reason.[After his return from a space flight orbitting the earth.]
As quoted, without citation, in H. T. Spence, Confronting Contemporary Christian Music: A Plain Account of Its History, Philosophy, and Future (2002), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Angel (47)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Flight (101)  |  God (776)  |  Look (584)  |  Man (2252)  |  People (1031)  |  Reason (766)  |  Return (133)  |  Rocket (52)  |  Saw (160)  |  Say (989)  |  See (1094)  |  Space (523)  |  Space Flight (26)  |  Strength (139)  |  Travel (125)

Some young folks have wind-fall minds, prematurely detached from the tree of knowledge for a life-long sourness and pettiness.
From chapter 'Jottings from a Note-Book', in Canadian Stories (1918), 181.
Science quotes on:  |  Fall (243)  |  Folk (10)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lifelong (10)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Pettiness (3)  |  Premature (22)  |  Tree (269)  |  Tree Of Knowledge (8)  |  Wind (141)  |  Windfall (2)  |  Young (253)

Something is as little explained by means of a distinctive vital force as the attraction between iron and magnet is explained by means of the name magnetism. We must therefore firmly insist that in the organic natural sciences, and thus also in botany, absolutely nothing has yet been explained and the entire field is still open to investigation as long as we have not succeeded in reducing the phenomena to physical and chemical laws.
Grundzüge der Wissenschaftlichen Botanik nebst einer Methodologischen Einleitung als Anleitung zum Studium der Planze [Principles of Scientific Botany] (1842-3), Vol. 1, 49. Trans. Kenneth L. Caneva, Robert Mayer and the Conservation of Energy (1993), 108.
Science quotes on:  |  Attraction (61)  |  Botany (63)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Distinctive (25)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Field (378)  |  Force (497)  |  Insistence (12)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Iron (99)  |  Law (913)  |  Little (717)  |  Magnet (22)  |  Magnetism (43)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Must (1525)  |  Name (359)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Open (277)  |  Organic (161)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physics (564)  |  Reduction (52)  |  Something (718)  |  Still (614)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Sucess (2)  |  Vital (89)  |  Vital Force (7)

Sometimes an idea hangs on, not because it is good, or even seductive, but because it has been around a long time, or constantly repeated. If one wants to verify something written in the newspaper, should one buy 100 more copies of the paper to check it?
As quoted Gordon Younger Craig and John Hewett Hull, James Hutton: Present and Future (1999), 21
Science quotes on:  |  Check (26)  |  Good (906)  |  Hang (46)  |  Idea (881)  |  More (2558)  |  Newspaper (39)  |  Paper (192)  |  Repeated (5)  |  Seductive (4)  |  Something (718)  |  Time (1911)  |  Verify (24)  |  Want (504)  |  Write (250)

Space … is big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly hugely mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space.
The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (1979, 1981), 76.
Science quotes on:  |  Chemist (169)  |  Down (455)  |  Huge (30)  |  Mean (810)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Space (523)  |  Think (1122)  |  Vast (188)  |  Way (1214)

Spending an evening on the World Wide Web is much like sitting down to a dinner of Cheetos, two hours later your fingers are yellow and you’re no longer hungry, but you haven’t been nourished.
Quoted, without source, in Harmik Vaishnav, Dictionary of Humourous Quotations (2021), 32.
Science quotes on:  |  Dinner (15)  |  Down (455)  |  Finger (48)  |  Hour (192)  |  Hungry (5)  |  Late (119)  |  Nourish (18)  |  Sit (51)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Spend (97)  |  Spending (24)  |  Two (936)  |  Wide (97)  |  World (1850)  |  World Wide Web (4)  |  Yellow (31)

Spong and I had also several fine discourses upon the globes this afternoon, particularly why the fixed stars do not rise and set at the same hour all the year long, which he could not demonstrate nor I neither.
Entry for 19 Aug 1666. In Samuel Pepys and Henry B. Wheatley (ed.), The Diary of Samuel Pepys (1895, 1900), Vol. 5, 382. He spent the day with Mr Reeves and Mr Spong.
Science quotes on:  |  Demonstrate (79)  |  Discourse (19)  |  Do (1905)  |  Explain (334)  |  Fixed (17)  |  Hour (192)  |  Rise (169)  |  Set (400)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Why (491)  |  Year (963)

Strife in nature is but disorder longing for order.
In Kahlil Gibran: The Collected Works (2007), 203.
Science quotes on:  |  Disorder (45)  |  Longing (19)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Order (638)  |  Strife (9)

Suddenly, from behind the rim of the moon, in long, slow-motion moments of immense majesty, there emerges a sparkling blue and white jewel, a light, delicate sky-blue sphere laced with slowly swirling veils of white, rising gradually like a small pearl in a thick sea of black mystery. It takes more than a moment to fully realize this is Earth . . . home.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Behind (139)  |  Black (46)  |  Blue (63)  |  Delicate (45)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Emerge (24)  |  Fully (20)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Home (184)  |  Immense (89)  |  Jewel (10)  |  Lace (2)  |  Light (635)  |  Majesty (21)  |  Moment (260)  |  Moon (252)  |  More (2558)  |  Motion (320)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Pearl (8)  |  Realize (157)  |  Rim (5)  |  Rise (169)  |  Rising (44)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sky (174)  |  Slow (108)  |  Slowly (19)  |  Small (489)  |  Sparkle (8)  |  Sparkling (7)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Swirl (10)  |  Thick (6)  |  Veil (27)  |  White (132)

Suppose [an] imaginary physicist, the student of Niels Bohr, is shown an experiment in which a virus particle enters a bacterial cell and 20 minutes later the bacterial cell is lysed and 100 virus particles are liberated. He will say: “How come, one particle has become 100 particles of the same kind in 20 minutes? That is very interesting. Let us find out how it happens! How does the particle get in to the bacterium? How does it multiply? Does it multiply like a bacterium, growing and dividing, or does it multiply by an entirely different mechanism ? Does it have to be inside the bacterium to do this multiplying, or can we squash the bacterium and have the multiplication go on as before? Is this multiplying a trick of organic chemistry which the organic chemists have not yet discovered ? Let us find out. This is so simple a phenomenon that the answers cannot be hard to find. In a few months we will know. All we have to do is to study how conditions will influence the multiplication. We will do a few experiments at different temperatures, in different media, with different viruses, and we will know. Perhaps we may have to break into the bacteria at intermediate stages between infection and lysis. Anyhow, the experiments only take a few hours each, so the whole problem can not take long to solve.”
[Eight years later] he has not got anywhere in solving the problem he set out to solve. But [he may say to you] “Well, I made a slight mistake. I could not do it in a few months. Perhaps it will take a few decades, and perhaps it will take the help of a few dozen other people. But listen to what I have found, perhaps you will be interested to join me.”
From 'Experiments with Bacterial Viruses (Bacteriophages)', Harvey Lecture (1946), 41, 161-162. As cited in Robert Olby, The Path of the Double Helix: The Discovery of DNA (1974, 1994), 237.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Bacteria (50)  |  Become (821)  |  Break (109)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Condition (362)  |  Decade (66)  |  Different (595)  |  Discover (571)  |  Divide (77)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enter (145)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Find (1014)  |  Grow (247)  |  Growing (99)  |  Happen (282)  |  Hard (246)  |  Hour (192)  |  Infection (27)  |  Influence (231)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Intermediate (38)  |  Kind (564)  |  Know (1538)  |  Listen (81)  |  Lysis (4)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Media (14)  |  Minute (129)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Month (91)  |  Multiplication (46)  |  Multiply (40)  |  Organic (161)  |  Organic Chemistry (41)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  People (1031)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Problem (731)  |  Say (989)  |  Set (400)  |  Simple (426)  |  Solve (145)  |  Squash (4)  |  Stage (152)  |  Student (317)  |  Study (701)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Trick (36)  |  Virus (32)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

Suppose then I want to give myself a little training in the art of reasoning; suppose I want to get out of the region of conjecture and probability, free myself from the difficult task of weighing evidence, and putting instances together to arrive at general propositions, and simply desire to know how to deal with my general propositions when I get them, and how to deduce right inferences from them; it is clear that I shall obtain this sort of discipline best in those departments of thought in which the first principles are unquestionably true. For in all our thinking, if we come to erroneous conclusions, we come to them either by accepting false premises to start with—in which case our reasoning, however good, will not save us from error; or by reasoning badly, in which case the data we start from may be perfectly sound, and yet our conclusions may be false. But in the mathematical or pure sciences,—geometry, arithmetic, algebra, trigonometry, the calculus of variations or of curves,— we know at least that there is not, and cannot be, error in our first principles, and we may therefore fasten our whole attention upon the processes. As mere exercises in logic, therefore, these sciences, based as they all are on primary truths relating to space and number, have always been supposed to furnish the most exact discipline. When Plato wrote over the portal of his school. “Let no one ignorant of geometry enter here,” he did not mean that questions relating to lines and surfaces would be discussed by his disciples. On the contrary, the topics to which he directed their attention were some of the deepest problems,— social, political, moral,—on which the mind could exercise itself. Plato and his followers tried to think out together conclusions respecting the being, the duty, and the destiny of man, and the relation in which he stood to the gods and to the unseen world. What had geometry to do with these things? Simply this: That a man whose mind has not undergone a rigorous training in systematic thinking, and in the art of drawing legitimate inferences from premises, was unfitted to enter on the discussion of these high topics; and that the sort of logical discipline which he needed was most likely to be obtained from geometry—the only mathematical science which in Plato’s time had been formulated and reduced to a system. And we in this country [England] have long acted on the same principle. Our future lawyers, clergy, and statesmen are expected at the University to learn a good deal about curves, and angles, and numbers and proportions; not because these subjects have the smallest relation to the needs of their lives, but because in the very act of learning them they are likely to acquire that habit of steadfast and accurate thinking, which is indispensable to success in all the pursuits of life.
In Lectures on Teaching (1906), 891-92.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Accepting (22)  |  Accurate (88)  |  Acquire (46)  |  Act (278)  |  Algebra (117)  |  Angle (25)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Arrive (40)  |  Art (680)  |  Attention (196)  |  Badly (32)  |  Base (120)  |  Being (1276)  |  Best (467)  |  Calculus (65)  |  Case (102)  |  Clear (111)  |  Clergy (4)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Conjecture (51)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Country (269)  |  Curve (49)  |  Data (162)  |  Deal (192)  |  Deduce (27)  |  Deep (241)  |  Department (93)  |  Desire (212)  |  Destiny (54)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Direct (228)  |  Disciple (8)  |  Discipline (85)  |  Discuss (26)  |  Discussion (78)  |  Do (1905)  |  Draw (140)  |  Drawing (56)  |  Duty (71)  |  England (43)  |  Enter (145)  |  Erroneous (31)  |  Error (339)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Exact (75)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Expect (203)  |  False (105)  |  First (1302)  |  Follower (11)  |  Formulate (16)  |  Free (239)  |  Furnish (97)  |  Future (467)  |  General (521)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Give (208)  |  God (776)  |  Good (906)  |  Habit (174)  |  High (370)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Indispensable (31)  |  Inference (45)  |  Instance (33)  |  Know (1538)  |  Lawyer (27)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Least (75)  |  Legitimate (26)  |  Let (64)  |  Life (1870)  |  Likely (36)  |  Line (100)  |  Little (717)  |  Live (650)  |  Logic (311)  |  Logical (57)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Mere (86)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Moral (203)  |  Most (1728)  |  Myself (211)  |  Need (320)  |  Number (710)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Perfectly (10)  |  Plato (80)  |  Political (124)  |  Portal (9)  |  Premise (40)  |  Primary (82)  |  Principle (530)  |  Probability (135)  |  Problem (731)  |  Process (439)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Science (30)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Question (649)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Reduce (100)  |  Region (40)  |  Relate (26)  |  Relation (166)  |  Respect (212)  |  Right (473)  |  Rigorous (50)  |  Same (166)  |  Save (126)  |  School (227)  |  Simply (53)  |  Small (489)  |  Social (261)  |  Sort (50)  |  Sound (187)  |  Space (523)  |  Stand (284)  |  Start (237)  |  Statesman (20)  |  Steadfast (4)  |  Subject (543)  |  Success (327)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Surface (223)  |  System (545)  |  Systematic (58)  |  Task (152)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Topic (23)  |  Training (92)  |  Trigonometry (7)  |  True (239)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Try (296)  |  Undergo (18)  |  Unfitted (3)  |  University (130)  |  Unquestionably (3)  |  Unseen (23)  |  Value Of Mathematics (60)  |  Variation (93)  |  Want (504)  |  Weigh (51)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)  |  Write (250)

Surely something is wanting in our conception of the universe. We know positive and negative electricity, north and south magnetism, and why not some extra terrestrial matter related to terrestrial matter, as the source is to the sink. … Worlds may have formed of this stuff, with element and compounds possessing identical properties with our own, indistinguishable from them until they are brought into each other’s vicinity. … Astronomy, the oldest and most juvenile of the sciences, may still have some surprises in store. May anti-matter be commended to its care! … Do dreams ever come true?
[Purely whimsical prediction long before the 1932 discovery of the positron, the antiparticle of the electron.]
'Potential Matter—A Holiday Dream', Letter to the Editor, Nature (18 Aug 1898), 58, No. 1503, 367. Quoted in Edward Robert Harrison, Cosmology: the Science of the Universe (2000), 433.
Science quotes on:  |  Anti-Matter (4)  |  Antiparticle (4)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Care (203)  |  Commend (7)  |  Commendation (3)  |  Compound (117)  |  Conception (160)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dream (222)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Electron (96)  |  Element (322)  |  Form (976)  |  Identical (55)  |  Juvenile (4)  |  Know (1538)  |  Magnetism (43)  |  Matter (821)  |  Most (1728)  |  Negative (66)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Oldest (9)  |  Other (2233)  |  Positive (98)  |  Positron (4)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Purely (111)  |  Sink (38)  |  Something (718)  |  Source (101)  |  South (39)  |  Still (614)  |  Store (49)  |  Surely (101)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Universe (900)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)

Surgical knowledge depends on long practice, not from speculations.
'Letter to Borghese' (27 Jul 1689), quoted in H.B. Adelmann (ed.), The Correspondence of Marcello Malpighi (1975), Vol. 4, 1486.
Science quotes on:  |  Depend (238)  |  Dependence (46)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Practice (212)  |  Speculation (137)  |  Surgery (54)

That night I lie out under the stars again. The Pleiades are there winking at me. I am no longer on my way from one place to another. I have changed lives. My life now is as black and white as night and day; a life of fierce struggle under the sun, and peaceful reflection under the night sky. I feel as though I am floating on a raft far, far away from any world I ever knew.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Black And White (3)  |  Change (639)  |  Far (158)  |  Feel (371)  |  Fierce (8)  |  Float (31)  |  Know (1538)  |  Lie (370)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Night (133)  |  Peaceful (6)  |  Place (192)  |  Pleiades (4)  |  Raft (3)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Sky (174)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Sun (407)  |  Way (1214)  |  White (132)  |  Wink (3)  |  World (1850)

That science has long been neglected and declining in England, is not an opinion originating with me, but is shared by many, and has been expressed by higher authority than mine. (1830)
In Reflections on the Decline of Science in England, and on Some of Its Causes (1830), Preface, v.
Science quotes on:  |  Authority (99)  |  Decline (28)  |  England (43)  |  Express (192)  |  Mine (78)  |  Neglect (63)  |  Neglected (23)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Share (82)

That small word “Force,” they make a barber's block,
Ready to put on
Meanings most strange and various, fit to shock
Pupils of Newton....
The phrases of last century in this
Linger to play tricks—
Vis viva and Vis Mortua and Vis Acceleratrix:
Those long-nebbed words that to our text books still
Cling by their titles,
And from them creep, as entozoa will,
Into our vitals.
But see! Tait writes in lucid symbols clear
One small equation;
And Force becomes of Energy a mere
Space-variation.
'Report on Tait's Lecture on Force:— B.A., 1876', reproduced in Bruce Clarke, Energy Forms: Allegory and Science in the Era of Classical Thermodynamics (2001), 19. Maxwell's verse was inspired by a paper delivered at the British Association (B.A.. He was satirizing a “considerable cofusion of nomenclature” at the time, and supported his friend Tait's desire to establish a redefinition of energy on a thermnodynamic basis.
Science quotes on:  |  Barber (5)  |  Become (821)  |  Block (13)  |  Book (413)  |  Century (319)  |  Clarity (49)  |  Clinging (3)  |  Creep (15)  |  Creeping (4)  |  Energy (373)  |  Equation (138)  |  Fit (139)  |  Force (497)  |  Last (425)  |  Linger (14)  |  Lingering (2)  |  Lucid (9)  |  Lucidity (7)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Most (1728)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Phrase (61)  |  Play (116)  |  Poem (104)  |  Pupil (62)  |  See (1094)  |  Shock (38)  |  Small (489)  |  Space (523)  |  Still (614)  |  Strange (160)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Peter Guthrie Tait (11)  |  Textbook (39)  |  Title (20)  |  Trick (36)  |  Variation (93)  |  Various (205)  |  Vital (89)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)  |  Write (250)

The “British Association for the Promotion of Science,” … is almost necessary for the purposes of science. The periodical assemblage of persons, pursuing the same or différent branches of knowledge, always produces an excitement which is favourable to the development of new ideas; whilst the long period of repose which succeeds, is advantageous for the prosecution of the reasonings or the experiments then suggested; and the récurrence of the meeting in the succeeding year, will stimulate the activity of the inquirer, by the hope of being then enabled to produce the successful result of his labours.
In 'Future Prospects', On the Economy of Machinery and Manufactures (1st ed., 1832), chap. 32, 274. Note: The British Association for the Advancement of Science held its first meeting at York in 1831, the year before the first publication of this book in 1832.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Advancement (63)  |  Advantageous (10)  |  Assemblage (17)  |  Assembly (13)  |  Association (49)  |  Being (1276)  |  Branch (155)  |  British (42)  |  Conference (18)  |  Development (441)  |  Different (595)  |  Enable (122)  |  Exchange (38)  |  Excitement (61)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Favourable (3)  |  Hope (321)  |  Idea (881)  |  Information (173)  |  Inquirer (9)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Labor (200)  |  Meeting (22)  |  Necessary (370)  |  New (1273)  |  New Ideas (17)  |  Period (200)  |  Periodic (3)  |  Person (366)  |  Produce (117)  |  Promotion (8)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Pursue (63)  |  Pursuing (27)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Reasonings (2)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Same (166)  |  Society (350)  |  Stimulate (21)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Succeeding (14)  |  Success (327)  |  Successful (134)  |  Suggest (38)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

The arithmetization of mathematics … which began with Weierstrass … had for its object the separation of purely mathematical concepts, such as number and correspondence and aggregate, from intuitional ideas, which mathematics had acquired from long association with geometry and mechanics. These latter, in the opinion of the formalists, are so firmly entrenched in mathematical thought that in spite of the most careful circumspection in the choice of words, the meaning concealed behind these words, may influence our reasoning. For the trouble with human words is that they possess content, whereas the purpose of mathematics is to construct pure thought. But how can we avoid the use of human language? The … symbol. Only by using a symbolic language not yet usurped by those vague ideas of space, time, continuity which have their origin in intuition and tend to obscure pure reason—only thus may we hope to build mathematics on the solid foundation of logic.
In Tobias Dantzig and Joseph Mazur (ed.), Number: The Language of Science (1930, ed. by Joseph Mazur 2007), 99.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquire (46)  |  Acquired (77)  |  Aggregate (24)  |  Association (49)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Begin (275)  |  Behind (139)  |  Build (211)  |  Careful (28)  |  Choice (114)  |  Circumspection (5)  |  Conceal (19)  |  Concealed (25)  |  Concept (242)  |  Construct (129)  |  Content (75)  |  Continuity (39)  |  Correspondence (24)  |  Entrench (2)  |  Firmly (6)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Hope (321)  |  Human (1512)  |  Idea (881)  |  Influence (231)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Language (308)  |  Latter (21)  |  Logic (311)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Most (1728)  |  Number (710)  |  Object (438)  |  Obscure (66)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Origin (250)  |  Possess (157)  |  Pure (299)  |  Purely (111)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Separation (60)  |  Solid (119)  |  Space (523)  |  Spite (55)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Tend (124)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Use (771)  |  Vague (50)  |   Karl Weierstrass, (10)  |  Word (650)

The 4th sort of creatures... which moved through the 3 former sorts, were incredibly small, and so small in my eye that I judged, that if 100 of them lay [stretched out] one by another, they would not equal the length of a grain of course Sand; and according to this estimate, ten hundred thousand of them could not equal the dimensions of a grain of such course Sand. There was discover’d by me a fifth sort, which had near the thickness of the former, but they were almost twice as long.
The first time bacteria were observed.
Letter to H. Oldenburg, 9 Oct 1676. In The Collected Letters of Antoni van Leeuwenhoek (1957), Vol. 2, 95.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Bacteria (50)  |  Course (413)  |  Creature (242)  |  Dimension (64)  |  Discover (571)  |  Estimate (59)  |  Eye (440)  |  First (1302)  |  Former (138)  |  Grain (50)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Microorganism (29)  |  Microscope (85)  |  Observed (149)  |  Sand (63)  |  Small (489)  |  Stretch (39)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)

The advantage which science gained by Gauss’ long-lingering method of publication is this: What he put into print is as true and important today as when first published; his publications are statutes, superior to other human statutes in this, that nowhere and never has a single error been detected in them. This justifies and makes intelligible the pride with which Gauss said in the evening of his life of the first larger work of his youth: “The Disquisitiones arithmeticae belong to history.”
In Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (1878, 8, 435. As cited and translated in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-book (1914), 158.
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (144)  |  Belong (168)  |  Detect (45)  |  Disquisitiones Arithmeticae (2)  |  Error (339)  |  First (1302)  |  Gain (146)  |  Carl Friedrich Gauss (79)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Important (229)  |  Intelligible (35)  |  Justify (26)  |  Larger (14)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lingering (2)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Method (531)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nowhere (28)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pride (84)  |  Print (20)  |  Publication (102)  |  Publish (42)  |  Single (365)  |  Statute (4)  |  Superior (88)  |  Today (321)  |  True (239)  |  Work (1402)  |  Youth (109)

The agreement of this law with nature will be better seen by the repetition of experiments than by a long explanation.
Referring to the magnetic effect of an electric current. Original communication written in Latin, as a pamphlet (21 Jul 1820) distributed privately to scientists and scientific societies, 'Experimenta Circa Effectum Conflictus Electrici in Acum Magneticam'. Published in Annals of Philosophy (Oct 1820), 16, No. 4, 277. Both original text in Latin and English translation by J.E. Kempe, in 'Experiments on the Effect of a Current of Electricity on the Magnetic Needle', Proceedings of the Institution of Electrical Engineers (1877), 5, 459-464. Translation also reprinted in The Science News-Letter (1932), 21, No. 567, 120.
Science quotes on:  |  Agreement (55)  |  Better (493)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Law (913)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Repetition (29)  |  See (1094)  |  Will (2350)

The analogies between science and art are very good as long as you are talking about the creation and the performance. The creation is certainly very analogous. The aesthetic pleasure of the craftsmanship of performance is also very strong in science.
As quoted in Robert S. Root-Bernstein, Michele M. Root-Bernstein, Sparks of Genius: The Thirteen Thinking Tools of the World's Most Creative People (2013), 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Aesthetic (48)  |  Analogy (76)  |  Art (680)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Craftsmanship (4)  |  Creation (350)  |  Good (906)  |  Performance (51)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Strong (182)  |  Talking (76)

The appearance of Professor Benjamin Peirce, whose long gray hair, straggling grizzled beard and unusually bright eyes sparkling under a soft felt hat, as he walked briskly but rather ungracefully across the college yard, fitted very well with the opinion current among us that we were looking upon a real live genius, who had a touch of the prophet in his make-up.
Writing as a Professor Emeritus at Harvard University, a former student of Peirce, in 'Benjamin Peirce: II. Reminiscences', The American Mathematical Monthly (Jan 1925), 32, No. 1, 5.
Science quotes on:  |  Appearance (145)  |  Beard (8)  |  Biography (254)  |  Bright (81)  |  Briskly (2)  |  College (71)  |  Current (122)  |  Eye (440)  |  Genius (301)  |  Gray (9)  |  Hair (25)  |  Hat (9)  |  Live (650)  |  Looking (191)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Benjamin Peirce (11)  |  Professor (133)  |  Prophet (22)  |  Soft (30)  |  Sparkling (7)  |  Touch (146)  |  Walk (138)  |  Yard (10)

The Archetypal idea was manifested in the flesh, under divers such modifications, upon this planet, long prior to the existence of those animal species that actually exemplify it. To what natural laws or secondary causes the orderly succession and progression of such organic phaenomena may have been committed we as yet are ignorant. But if, without derogation of the Divine power, we may conceive the existence of such ministers, and personify them by the term 'Nature,' we learn from the past history of our globe that she has advanced with slow and stately steps, guided by the archetypal light, amidst the wreck of worlds, from the first embodiment of the Vertebrate idea under its old Ichthyic vestment, until it became arrayed in the glorious garb of the Human form.
On the Nature of Limbs (1849), 86.
Science quotes on:  |  Advancement (63)  |  Animal (651)  |  Archetype (5)  |  Array (5)  |  Cause (561)  |  Commitment (28)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Conception (160)  |  Divine (112)  |  Embodiment (9)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Example (98)  |  Existence (481)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Garb (6)  |  Globe (51)  |  Glorious (49)  |  Glory (66)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Idea (881)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Law (913)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Light (635)  |  Manifestation (61)  |  Minister (10)  |  Modification (57)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Law (46)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Old (499)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Organic (161)  |  Past (355)  |  Personification (4)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Planet (402)  |  Power (771)  |  Progression (23)  |  Secondary (15)  |  Slow (108)  |  Species (435)  |  Stately (12)  |  Step (234)  |  Succession (80)  |  Term (357)  |  Vertebrate (22)  |  Vestment (2)  |  World (1850)  |  Wreck (10)

The argument of the ‘long view’ may be correct in some meaninglessly abstract sense, but it represents a fundamental mistake in categories and time scales. Our only legitimate long view extends to our children and our children’s children’s children–hundreds or a few thousands of years down the road. If we let the slaughter continue, they will share a bleak world with rats, dogs, cockroaches, pigeons, and mosquitoes. A potential recovery millions of years later has no meaning at our appropriate scale.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Argument (145)  |  Bleak (2)  |  Category (19)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Cockroach (6)  |  Continue (179)  |  Correct (95)  |  Dog (70)  |  Down (455)  |  Extend (129)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Hundreds (6)  |  Late (119)  |  Legitimate (26)  |  Let (64)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Millions (17)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Pigeon (8)  |  Potential (75)  |  Rat (37)  |  Recovery (24)  |  Represent (157)  |  Road (71)  |  Scale (122)  |  Sense (785)  |  Share (82)  |  Slaughter (8)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Time (1911)  |  View (496)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

The attempted synthesis of paleontology and genetics, an essential part of the present study, may be particularly surprising and possibly hazardous. Not long ago, paleontologists felt that a geneticist was a person who shut himself in a room, pulled down the shades, watched small flies disporting themselves in milk bottles, and thought that he was studying nature. A pursuit so removed from the realities of life, they said, had no significance for the true biologist. On the other hand, the geneticists said that paleontology had no further contributions to make to biology, that its only point had been the completed demonstration of the truth of evolution, and that it was a subject too purely descriptive to merit the name 'science'. The paleontologist, they believed, is like a man who undertakes to study the principles of the internal combustion engine by standing on a street corner and watching the motor cars whiz by.
Tempo and Mode in Evolution (1944), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (266)  |  Biologist (70)  |  Biology (232)  |  Bottle (17)  |  Car (75)  |  Cat (52)  |  Combustion (22)  |  Completed (30)  |  Completion (23)  |  Contribution (93)  |  Corner (59)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Description (89)  |  Descriptive (18)  |  Down (455)  |  Engine (99)  |  Essential (210)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fly (153)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Geneticist (16)  |  Genetics (105)  |  Himself (461)  |  Internal (69)  |  Internal Combustion Engine (4)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Merit (51)  |  Milk (23)  |  Motor (23)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paleontologist (19)  |  Paleontology (32)  |  Person (366)  |  Point (584)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Present (630)  |  Principle (530)  |  Pull (43)  |  Purely (111)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Room (42)  |  Shade (35)  |  Shut (41)  |  Significance (114)  |  Small (489)  |  Standing (11)  |  Street (25)  |  Study (701)  |  Studying (70)  |  Subject (543)  |  Synthesis (58)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thought (995)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Undertake (35)  |  Watch (118)  |  Whiz (2)

The automatic computing engine now being designed at N.P.L. [National Physics Laboratory] is atypical large scale electronic digital computing machine. In a single lecture it will not be possible to give much technical detail of this machine, and most of what I shall say will apply equally to any other machine of this type now being planned. From the point of view of the mathematician the property of being digital should be of greater interest than that of being electronic. That it is electronic is certainly important because these machines owe their high speed to this, and without the speed it is doubtful if financial support for their construction would be forthcoming. But this is virtually all that there is to be said on that subject. That the machine is digital however has more subtle significance. It means firstly that numbers are represented by sequences of digits which can be as long as one wishes. One can therefore work to any desired degree of accuracy. This accuracy is not obtained by more careful machining of parts, control of temperature variations, and such means, but by a slight increase in the amount of equipment in the machine.
Lecture to the London Mathematical Society, 20 February 1947. Quoted in B. E. Carpenter and R. W. Doran (eds.), A. M. Turing's Ace Report of 1946 and Other Papers (1986), 106.
Science quotes on:  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Amount (153)  |  Apply (170)  |  Atypical (2)  |  Automatic (16)  |  Being (1276)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Computer (131)  |  Construction (114)  |  Control (182)  |  Degree (277)  |  Design (203)  |  Designed (2)  |  Desired (5)  |  Detail (150)  |  Digital (10)  |  Doubtful (30)  |  Electronics (21)  |  Engine (99)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Equally (129)  |  Equipment (45)  |  Greater (288)  |  High (370)  |  Increase (225)  |  Interest (416)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Large (398)  |  Lecture (111)  |  Machine (271)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Number (710)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Other (2233)  |  Owe (71)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Possible (560)  |  Property (177)  |  Represent (157)  |  Say (989)  |  Scale (122)  |  Sequence (68)  |  Significance (114)  |  Single (365)  |  Speed (66)  |  Subject (543)  |  Support (151)  |  Technology (281)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Type (171)  |  Variation (93)  |  View (496)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

The best class of scientific mind is the same as the best class of business mind. The great desideratum in either case is to know how much evidence is enough to warrant action. It is as unbusiness-like to want too much evidence before buying or selling as to be content with too little. The same kind of qualities are wanted in either case. The difference is that if the business man makes a mistake, he commonly has to suffer for it, whereas it is rarely that scientific blundering, so long as it is confined to theory, entails loss on the blunderer. On the contrary it very often brings him fame, money and a pension. Hence the business man, if he is a good one, will take greater care not to overdo or underdo things than the scientific man can reasonably be expected to take.
Samuel Butler, Henry Festing Jones (ed.), The Note-Books of Samuel Butler (1917), 217.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Best (467)  |  Blunder (21)  |  Business (156)  |  Care (203)  |  Class (168)  |  Contentment (11)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Desideratum (5)  |  Difference (355)  |  Enough (341)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Expect (203)  |  Expectation (67)  |  Fame (51)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greater (288)  |  Kind (564)  |  Know (1538)  |  Little (717)  |  Loss (117)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Money (178)  |  Overdo (2)  |  Pension (2)  |  Quality (139)  |  Rare (94)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Mind (13)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Selling (6)  |  Suffering (68)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Want (504)  |  Warrant (8)  |  Will (2350)

The big political doings of our time are so disheartening that in our generation one feels quite alone. It is as if people had lost the passion for justice and dignity and no longer treasure what better generations have won by extraordinary sacrifices.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Better (493)  |  Big (55)  |  Dignity (44)  |  Disheartening (2)  |  Doing (277)  |  Doings (2)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  Feel (371)  |  Generation (256)  |  Justice (40)  |  Lose (165)  |  Passion (121)  |  People (1031)  |  Political (124)  |  Sacrifice (58)  |  Time (1911)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Win (53)

The bird which is drawn to the water by its need of finding there the prey on which it lives, separates the digits of its feet in trying to strike the water and move about on the surface. The skin which unites these digits at their base acquires the habit of being stretched by these continually repeated separations of the digits; thus in course of time there are formed large webs which unite the digits of ducks, geese, etc., as we actually find them. In the same way efforts to swim, that is to push against the water so as to move about in it, have stretched the membranes between the digits of frogs, sea-tortoises, the otter, beaver, etc.
On the other hand, a bird which is accustomed to perch on trees and which springs from individuals all of whom had acquired this habit, necessarily has longer digits on its feet and differently shaped from those of the aquatic animals that I have just named. Its claws in time become lengthened, sharpened and curved into hooks, to clasp the branches on which the animal so often rests.
We find in the same way that the bird of the water-side which does not like swimming and yet is in need of going to the water's edge to secure its prey, is continually liable to sink into the mud. Now this bird tries to act in such a way that its body should not be immersed in the liquid, and hence makes its best efforts to stretch and lengthen its legs. The long-established habit acquired by this bird and all its race of continually stretching and lengthening its legs, results in the individuals of this race becoming raised as though on stilts, and gradually obtaining long, bare legs, denuded of feathers up to the thighs and often higher still.
Philosophie Zoologique (1809), Vol. 1, 249-50, trans. Hugh Elliot (1914), 119-20.
Science quotes on:  |  Accustom (52)  |  Accustomed (46)  |  Acquired (77)  |  Act (278)  |  Against (332)  |  Animal (651)  |  Aquatic (5)  |  Bare (33)  |  Base (120)  |  Beaver (8)  |  Become (821)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Being (1276)  |  Best (467)  |  Bird (163)  |  Body (557)  |  Claw (8)  |  Course (413)  |  Duck (3)  |  Edge (51)  |  Effort (243)  |  Find (1014)  |  Foot (65)  |  Form (976)  |  Frog (44)  |  Goose (13)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Habit (174)  |  Individual (420)  |  Large (398)  |  Leg (35)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Live (650)  |  Membrane (21)  |  Move (223)  |  Mud (26)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Other (2233)  |  Otter (2)  |  Perch (7)  |  Push (66)  |  Race (278)  |  Rest (287)  |  Result (700)  |  Sea (326)  |  Separate (151)  |  Separation (60)  |  Sharpen (22)  |  Side (236)  |  Sink (38)  |  Skin (48)  |  Spring (140)  |  Still (614)  |  Stretch (39)  |  Strike (72)  |  Surface (223)  |  Swim (32)  |  Swimming (19)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tortoise (10)  |  Tree (269)  |  Trying (144)  |  Unite (43)  |  Water (503)  |  Way (1214)

The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of meeting the schedule is forgotten.
Anonymous
Science quotes on:  |  Bitter (30)  |  Forget (125)  |  Forgotten (53)  |  Meet (36)  |  Poor (139)  |  Quality (139)  |  Remain (355)  |  Schedule (5)  |  Sweet (40)  |  Sweetness (12)

The breaking up of the terrestrial globe, this it is we witness. It doubtless began a long time ago, and the brevity of human life enables us to contemplate it without dismay. It is not only in the great mountain ranges that the traces of this process are found. Great segments of the earth's crust have sunk hundreds, in some cases, even thousands, of feet deep, and not the slightest inequality of the surface remains to indicate the fracture; the different nature of the rocks and the discoveries made in mining alone reveal its presence. Time has levelled all.
The Face of the Earth (1904), Vol. 1, 604.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Break (109)  |  Brevity (8)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Crust (43)  |  Deep (241)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Dismay (5)  |  Doubtless (8)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enable (122)  |  Enabling (7)  |  Erosion (20)  |  Fracture (7)  |  Globe (51)  |  Great (1610)  |  Human (1512)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Indicate (62)  |  Indication (33)  |  Inequality (9)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mining (22)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Presence (63)  |  Process (439)  |  Range (104)  |  Remain (355)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Revelation (51)  |  Rock (176)  |  Segment (6)  |  Sinking (6)  |  Surface (223)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trace (109)  |  Witness (57)

The brown and charred rags that hung from the sides of it, I presently recognized as the decaying vestiges of books. They had long since dropped to pieces, and every semblance of print had left them. … Had I been a literary man I might, perhaps, have moralized upon the futility of all ambition.
In The Time Machine (1898), 160.
Science quotes on:  |  Ambition (46)  |  Book (413)  |  Brown (23)  |  Decay (59)  |  Dropped (17)  |  Futility (7)  |  Literary (15)  |  Man (2252)  |  Piece (39)  |  Print (20)  |  Rag (2)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Resemblance (39)  |  Semblance (5)  |  Side (236)  |  Vestige (11)

The chemists who uphold dualism are far from being agreed among themselves; nevertheless, all of them in maintaining their opinion, rely upon the phenomena of chemical reactions. For a long time the uncertainty of this method has been pointed out: it has been shown repeatedly, that the atoms put into movement during a reaction take at that time a new arrangement, and that it is impossible to deduce the old arrangement from the new one. It is as if, in the middle of a game of chess, after the disarrangement of all the pieces, one of the players should wish, from the inspection of the new place occupied by each piece, to determine that which it originally occupied.
Chemical Method (1855), 18.
Science quotes on:  |  Arrangement (93)  |  Atom (381)  |  Being (1276)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemical Reaction (17)  |  Chemical Reactions (13)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Chess (27)  |  Determine (152)  |  Dualism (4)  |  Game (104)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Method (531)  |  Movement (162)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  New (1273)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Old (499)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Point (584)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Wish (216)

The Christian church, in its attitude toward science, shows the mind of a more or less enlightened man of the Thirteenth Century. It no longer believes that the earth is flat, but it is still convinced that prayer can cure after medicine fails.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Attitude (84)  |  Belief (615)  |  Century (319)  |  Christian (44)  |  Church (64)  |  Convinced (23)  |  Cure (124)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enlighten (32)  |  Enlightened (25)  |  Fail (191)  |  Flat (34)  |  Man (2252)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  More Or Less (71)  |  Prayer (30)  |  Show (353)  |  Still (614)  |  Thirteenth (2)  |  Toward (45)

The critical mathematician has abandoned the search for truth. He no longer flatters himself that his propositions are or can be known to him or to any other human being to be true; and he contents himself with aiming at the correct, or the consistent. The distinction is not annulled nor even blurred by the reflection that consistency contains immanently a kind of truth. He is not absolutely certain, but he believes profoundly that it is possible to find various sets of a few propositions each such that the propositions of each set are compatible, that the propositions of each such set imply other propositions, and that the latter can be deduced from the former with certainty. That is to say, he believes that there are systems of coherent or consistent propositions, and he regards it his business to discover such systems. Any such system is a branch of mathematics.
In George Edward Martin, The Foundations of Geometry and the Non-Euclidean Plane (1982), 94. Also in Science (1912), New Series, 35, 107.
Science quotes on:  |  Abandon (73)  |  Absolutely (41)  |  Aim (175)  |  Annul (2)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belief (615)  |  Blur (8)  |  Branch (155)  |  Business (156)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Coherent (14)  |  Compatible (4)  |  Consistency (31)  |  Consistent (50)  |  Contain (68)  |  Content (75)  |  Correct (95)  |  Critical (73)  |  Deduce (27)  |  Definitions and Objects of Mathematics (33)  |  Discover (571)  |  Distinction (72)  |  Find (1014)  |  Former (138)  |  Himself (461)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Immanently (2)  |  Imply (20)  |  Kind (564)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Latter (21)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Other (2233)  |  Possible (560)  |  Profoundly (13)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Regard (312)  |  Say (989)  |  Search (175)  |  Set (400)  |  System (545)  |  True (239)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Various (205)

The desire for guidance, love, and support prompts men to form the social or moral conception of God. This is the God of Providence, who protects, disposes, rewards, and punishes; the God who, according to the limits of the believer’s outlook, loves and cherishes the life of the tribe or of the human race, or even or life itself; the comforter in sorrow and unsatisfied longing; he who preserves the souls of the dead. This is the social or moral conception of God.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Accord (36)  |  According (236)  |  Believer (26)  |  Cherish (25)  |  Conception (160)  |  Dead (65)  |  Desire (212)  |  Dispose (10)  |  Form (976)  |  God (776)  |  Guidance (30)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Life (1870)  |  Limit (294)  |  Longing (19)  |  Love (328)  |  Moral (203)  |  Outlook (32)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Prompt (14)  |  Protect (65)  |  Providence (19)  |  Punish (8)  |  Race (278)  |  Reward (72)  |  Social (261)  |  Sorrow (21)  |  Soul (235)  |  Support (151)  |  Tribe (26)

The difference between a good observer and one who is not good is that the former is quick to take a hint from the facts, from his early efforts to develop skill in handling them, and quick to acknowledge the need to revise or alter the conceptual framework of his thinking. The other—the poor observer—continues dogmatically onward with his original thesis, lost in a maze of correlations, long after the facts have shrieked in protest against the interpretation put upon them.
In The Social Problems of an Industrial Civilization (1945).
Science quotes on:  |  Acknowledge (33)  |  Against (332)  |  Alter (64)  |  Continue (179)  |  Correlation (19)  |  Develop (278)  |  Difference (355)  |  Early (196)  |  Effort (243)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Former (138)  |  Framework (33)  |  Good (906)  |  Hint (21)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Other (2233)  |  Poor (139)  |  Protest (9)  |  Skill (116)  |  Thesis (17)  |  Thinking (425)

The difference between an ordinary mind and the mind of Newton consists principally in this, that the one is capable of a more continuous attention than the other,—that a Newton is able, without fatigue, to connect inference with inference in one long series towards a determinate end; while the man of inferior capacity is soon obliged to break or let full the thread which lie had begun to spin.
In Lectures on Metaphysics and Logic (1860), Vol. 1, 178.
Science quotes on:  |  Attention (196)  |  Break (109)  |  Capable (174)  |  Capacity (105)  |  Connect (126)  |  Consist (223)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Difference (355)  |  End (603)  |  Fatigue (13)  |  Inference (45)  |  Inferior (37)  |  Lie (370)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Other (2233)  |  Series (153)  |  Soon (187)  |  Spin (26)  |  Thread (36)

The digestive canal is in its task a complete chemical factory. The raw material passes through a long series of institutions in which it is subjected to certain mechanical and, mainly, chemical processing, and then, through innumerable side-streets, it is brought into the depot of the body. Aside from this basic series of institutions, along which the raw material moves, there is a series of lateral chemical manufactories, which prepare certain reagents for the appropriate processing of the raw material.
Speech to the Society of Russian Physicians (Dec 1874). as translated in Daniel P. Todes, Pavlov’s Physiology Factory: Experiment, Interpretation, Laboratory Enterprise (2002), 155.
Science quotes on:  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Appropriateness (7)  |  Basic (144)  |  Body (557)  |  Canal (18)  |  Certain (557)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Complete (209)  |  Completeness (19)  |  Digestion (29)  |  Factory (20)  |  Innumerable (56)  |  Institution (73)  |  Lateral (3)  |  Manufactory (2)  |  Material (366)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Move (223)  |  Pass (241)  |  Preparation (60)  |  Process (439)  |  Raw (28)  |  Reagent (8)  |  Series (153)  |  Side (236)  |  Subject (543)  |  Task (152)  |  Through (846)

The discovery of the conic sections, attributed to Plato, first threw open the higher species of form to the contemplation of geometers. But for this discovery, which was probably regarded in Plato’s tune and long after him, as the unprofitable amusement of a speculative brain, the whole course of practical philosophy of the present day, of the science of astronomy, of the theory of projectiles, of the art of navigation, might have run in a different channel; and the greatest discovery that has ever been made in the history of the world, the law of universal gravitation, with its innumerable direct and indirect consequences and applications to every department of human research and industry, might never to this hour have been elicited.
In 'A Probationary Lecture on Geometry, Collected Mathematical Papers, Vol. 2 (1908), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Amusement (37)  |  Application (257)  |  Art (680)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Attribute (65)  |  Brain (281)  |  Channel (23)  |  Conic Section (8)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Course (413)  |  Department (93)  |  Different (595)  |  Direct (228)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Elicit (2)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Geometer (24)  |  Gravitation (72)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  High (370)  |  History (716)  |  Hour (192)  |  Human (1512)  |  Indirect (18)  |  Industry (159)  |  Innumerable (56)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Universal Gravitation (3)  |  Navigation (26)  |  Never (1089)  |  Open (277)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Plato (80)  |  Practical (225)  |  Present (630)  |  Present Day (5)  |  Probably (50)  |  Projectile (3)  |  Regard (312)  |  Research (753)  |  Run (158)  |  Species (435)  |  Speculative (12)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Throw (45)  |  Tune (20)  |  Universal (198)  |  Unprofitable (7)  |  Whole (756)  |  World (1850)

The discovery which has been pointed to by theory is always one of profound interest and importance, but it is usually the close and crown of a long and fruitful period, whereas the discovery which comes as a puzzle and surprise usually marks a fresh epoch and opens a new chapter in science.
Becquerel Memorial Lecture, Journal of the Chemical Society, Transactions (1912), 101(2), 2005. Quoted by Simon Flexnor in 'The Scientific Career for Women', a commencement address at Bryn Mawr College (2 Jun 1921), The Scientific Monthly (Aug 1921), 13, 98.
Science quotes on:  |  Crown (39)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Epoch (46)  |  Fresh (69)  |  Fruitful (61)  |  Importance (299)  |  Interest (416)  |  New (1273)  |  Open (277)  |  Period (200)  |  Point (584)  |  Profound (105)  |  Puzzle (46)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Usually (176)

The dog [in Pavlov’s experiments] does not continue to salivate whenever it hears a bell unless sometimes at least an edible offering accompanies the bell. But there are innumerable instances in human life where a single association, never reinforced, results in the establishment of a life-long dynamic system. An experience associated only once with a bereavement, an accident, or a battle, may become the center of a permanent phobia or complex, not in the least dependent on a recurrence of the original shock.
Personality: A Psychological Interpretation(1938), 199.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Association (49)  |  Become (821)  |  Bell (35)  |  Complex (202)  |  Continue (179)  |  Dog (70)  |  Edible (7)  |  Establishment (47)  |  Experience (494)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Hear (144)  |  Human (1512)  |  Innumerable (56)  |  Life (1870)  |  Never (1089)  |  Ivan Petrovich Pavlov (18)  |  Permanent (67)  |  Phobia (3)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Result (700)  |  Shock (38)  |  Single (365)  |  System (545)  |  Whenever (81)

The dream is a little hidden door in the innermost and most secret recesses of the psyche, opening into the cosmic night which was psyche long before there was any ego-consciousness, and which will remain psyche no matter how far our ego-consciousness may extend.
Carl Jung
In Civilization in Transition (1964), 144.
Science quotes on:  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Cosmic (74)  |  Door (94)  |  Dream (222)  |  Ego (17)  |  Extend (129)  |  Hidden (43)  |  Little (717)  |  Matter (821)  |  Most (1728)  |  Night (133)  |  Opening (15)  |  Psyche (9)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Recess (8)  |  Remain (355)  |  Secret (216)  |  Will (2350)

The edge of the sea is a strange and beautiful place. All through the long history of Earth it has been an area of unrest where waves have broken heavily against the land, where the tides have pressed forward over the continents, receded, and then returned. For no two successive days is the shore line precisely the same. Not only do the tides advance and retreat in their eternal rhythms, but the level of the sea itself is never at rest. It rises or falls as the glaciers melt or grow, as the floor of the deep ocean basins shifts under its increasing load of sediments, or as the Earth’s crust along the continental margins warps up or down in adjustment to strain and tension. Today a little more land may belong to the sea, tomorrow a little less. Always the edge of the sea remains an elusive and indefinable boundary.
Opening paragraph in The Edge of the Sea (1955), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Adjustment (21)  |  Advance (298)  |  Against (332)  |  Area (33)  |  Basin (2)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Belong (168)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Break (109)  |  Broken (56)  |  Continent (79)  |  Continental (2)  |  Crust (43)  |  Deep (241)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Edge (51)  |  Elusive (8)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Fall (243)  |  Floor (21)  |  Forward (104)  |  Glacier (17)  |  Grow (247)  |  Heavily (14)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Earth (2)  |  Increase (225)  |  Indefinable (5)  |  Land (131)  |  Less (105)  |  Level (69)  |  Line (100)  |  Little (717)  |  Load (12)  |  Margin (6)  |  Melt (16)  |  More (2558)  |  Never (1089)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Place (192)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Press (21)  |  Recede (11)  |  Remain (355)  |  Rest (287)  |  Retreat (13)  |  Return (133)  |  Rhythm (21)  |  Rise (169)  |  Same (166)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sediment (9)  |  Shift (45)  |  Shore (25)  |  Strain (13)  |  Strange (160)  |  Successive (73)  |  Tension (24)  |  Through (846)  |  Tide (37)  |  Today (321)  |  Tomorrow (63)  |  Two (936)  |  Unrest (2)  |  Warp (7)  |  Wave (112)

The enthusiasm of Sylvester for his own work, which manifests itself here as always, indicates one of his characteristic qualities: a high degree of subjectivity in his productions and publications. Sylvester was so fully possessed by the matter which for the time being engaged his attention, that it appeared to him and was designated by him as the summit of all that is important, remarkable and full of future promise. It would excite his phantasy and power of imagination in even a greater measure than his power of reflection, so much so that he could never marshal the ability to master his subject-matter, much less to present it in an orderly manner.
Considering that he was also somewhat of a poet, it will be easier to overlook the poetic flights which pervade his writing, often bombastic, sometimes furnishing apt illustrations; more damaging is the complete lack of form and orderliness of his publications and their sketchlike character, … which must be accredited at least as much to lack of objectivity as to a superfluity of ideas. Again, the text is permeated with associated emotional expressions, bizarre utterances and paradoxes and is everywhere accompanied by notes, which constitute an essential part of Sylvester’s method of presentation, embodying relations, whether proximate or remote, which momentarily suggested themselves. These notes, full of inspiration and occasional flashes of genius, are the more stimulating owing to their incompleteness. But none of his works manifest a desire to penetrate the subject from all sides and to allow it to mature; each mere surmise, conceptions which arose during publication, immature thoughts and even errors were ushered into publicity at the moment of their inception, with utmost carelessness, and always with complete unfamiliarity of the literature of the subject. Nowhere is there the least trace of self-criticism. No one can be expected to read the treatises entire, for in the form in which they are available they fail to give a clear view of the matter under contemplation.
Sylvester’s was not a harmoniously gifted or well-balanced mind, but rather an instinctively active and creative mind, free from egotism. His reasoning moved in generalizations, was frequently influenced by analysis and at times was guided even by mystical numerical relations. His reasoning consists less frequently of pure intelligible conclusions than of inductions, or rather conjectures incited by individual observations and verifications. In this he was guided by an algebraic sense, developed through long occupation with processes of forms, and this led him luckily to general fundamental truths which in some instances remain veiled. His lack of system is here offset by the advantage of freedom from purely mechanical logical activity.
The exponents of his essential characteristics are an intuitive talent and a faculty of invention to which we owe a series of ideas of lasting value and bearing the germs of fruitful methods. To no one more fittingly than to Sylvester can be applied one of the mottos of the Philosophic Magazine:
“Admiratio generat quaestionem, quaestio investigationem investigatio inventionem.”
In Mathematische Annalen (1898), 50, 155-160. As translated in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-book (1914), 176-178.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Active (80)  |  Activity (218)  |  Advantage (144)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Applied (176)  |  Attention (196)  |  Available (80)  |  Being (1276)  |  Carelessness (7)  |  Character (259)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Complete (209)  |  Conception (160)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Conjecture (51)  |  Consist (223)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Creative (144)  |  Criticism (85)  |  Degree (277)  |  Desire (212)  |  Develop (278)  |  Easier (53)  |  Enthusiasm (59)  |  Error (339)  |  Essential (210)  |  Everywhere (98)  |  Expect (203)  |  Exponent (6)  |  Expression (181)  |  Fail (191)  |  Flight (101)  |  Form (976)  |  Free (239)  |  Freedom (145)  |  Fruitful (61)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Future (467)  |  General (521)  |  Generalization (61)  |  Genius (301)  |  Germ (54)  |  Gift (105)  |  Gifted (25)  |  Greater (288)  |  High (370)  |  Idea (881)  |  Illustration (51)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Inception (3)  |  Indicate (62)  |  Individual (420)  |  Induction (81)  |  Inspiration (80)  |  Intelligible (35)  |  Invention (400)  |  Lack (127)  |  Literature (116)  |  Master (182)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mature (17)  |  Measure (241)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Moment (260)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Objectivity (17)  |  Observation (593)  |  Occasional (23)  |  Occupation (51)  |  Orderliness (9)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Overlook (33)  |  Owe (71)  |  Owing (39)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  Possess (157)  |  Power (771)  |  Present (630)  |  Presentation (24)  |  Production (190)  |  Promise (72)  |  Proximate (4)  |  Publication (102)  |  Pure (299)  |  Purely (111)  |  Read (308)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remote (86)  |  Self (268)  |  Sense (785)  |  Series (153)  |  Side (236)  |  Subject (543)  |  Subject-Matter (8)  |  Summit (27)  |  Surmise (7)  |  James Joseph Sylvester (58)  |  System (545)  |  Talent (99)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trace (109)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Unfamiliarity (5)  |  Utterance (11)  |  Value (393)  |  Veil (27)  |  Verification (32)  |  View (496)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)  |  Writing (192)

The epoch of intense cold which preceded the present creation has been only a temporary oscillation of the earth’s temperature, more important than the century-long phases of cooling undergone by the Alpine valleys. It was associated with the disappearance of the animals of the diluvial epoch of the geologists, as still demonstrated by the Siberian mammoths; it preceded the uplifting of the Alps and the appearance of the present-day living organisms, as demonstrated by the moraines and the existence of fishes in our lakes. Consequently, there is complete separation between the present creation and the preceding ones, and if living species are sometimes almost identical to those buried inside the earth, we nevertheless cannot assume that the former are direct descendants of the latter or, in other words, that they represent identical species.
From Discours de Neuchâtel (1837), as translated by Albert V. Carozzi in Studies on Glaciers: Preceded by the Discourse of Neuchâtel (1967), lviii.
Science quotes on:  |  Alp (9)  |  Alps (9)  |  Animal (651)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Century (319)  |  Cold (115)  |  Complete (209)  |  Cooling (10)  |  Creation (350)  |  Descendant (18)  |  Direct (228)  |  Disappearance (28)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Epoch (46)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Existence (481)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Former (138)  |  Geologist (82)  |  Geology (240)  |  Ice Age (10)  |  Identical (55)  |  Lake (36)  |  Living (492)  |  Mammoth (9)  |  More (2558)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Organism (231)  |  Oscillation (13)  |  Other (2233)  |  Phase (37)  |  Present (630)  |  Represent (157)  |  Separation (60)  |  Species (435)  |  Still (614)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Temporary (24)  |  Valley (37)  |  Word (650)

The establishment of the periodic law may truly be said to mark a line in chemical science, and we anticipate that its application and and extension will be fraught With the most important consequences. It reminds us how important above all things is the correct determination of the fundamental constants of our science—the atomic weights of the elements, about which in many cases great uncertainty prevails; it is much to be desired that this may not long remain the case. It also affords the strongest encouragement to the chemist to persevere in the search for new elements.
In The Encyclopaedia Britannica: Ninth Edition (1877), Vol. 5, 714.
Science quotes on:  |  Anticipate (20)  |  Application (257)  |  Atomic Weight (6)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Constant (148)  |  Correct (95)  |  Determination (80)  |  Element (322)  |  Encouragement (27)  |  Establishment (47)  |  Extension (60)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Great (1610)  |  Importance (299)  |  Law (913)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Periodic Law (6)  |  Persevere (5)  |  Prevail (47)  |  Remain (355)  |  Search (175)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Truly (118)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Weight (140)  |  Will (2350)

The estimate we form of the intellectual capacity of our race, is founded on an examination of those productions which have resulted from the loftiest flights of individual genius, or from the accumulated labors of generations of men, by whose long-continued exertions a body of science has been raised up, surpassing in its extent the creative powers of any individual, and demanding for its development a length of time, to which no single life extends.
In The Ninth Bridgewater Treatise: A Fragment (1838), 30.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Capacity (105)  |  Creative (144)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Development (441)  |  Estimate (59)  |  Examination (102)  |  Extend (129)  |  Extent (142)  |  Flight (101)  |  Form (976)  |  Generation (256)  |  Genius (301)  |  Individual (420)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Labor (200)  |  Life (1870)  |  Power (771)  |  Production (190)  |  Race (278)  |  Result (700)  |  Single (365)  |  Surpassing (12)  |  Time (1911)

The evolution of higher and of lower forms of life is as well and as soundly established as the eternal hills. It has long since ceased to be a theory; it is a law of Nature as universal in living things as is the law of gravitation in material things and in the motions of the heavenly spheres.
Evolution and Religion in Education (1926), 118.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Cessation (13)  |  Establishment (47)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Form (976)  |  Gravitation (72)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Hill (23)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Gravitation (23)  |  Law Of Nature (80)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Material (366)  |  Motion (320)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Universal (198)

The explosion of the Alamogordo bomb ended the initial phase of the MED project: the major technical goal had been achieved …. The feat will stand as a great monument of human endeavor for a long time to come.
In Enrico Fermi: Physicist (1970), 148-149. (MED = Manhattan Engineering District, code name for the atomic bomb development project.)
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Alamogordo (2)  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  End (603)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  Explosion (51)  |  Feat (11)  |  Goal (155)  |  Great (1610)  |  Human (1512)  |  Major (88)  |  Monument (45)  |  Phase (37)  |  Project (77)  |  Stand (284)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trinity (9)  |  Will (2350)

The extraordinary development of mathematics in the last century is quite unparalleled in the long history of this most ancient of sciences. Not only have those branches of mathematics which were taken over from the eighteenth century steadily grown, but entirely new ones have sprung up in almost bewildering profusion, and many of them have promptly assumed proportions of vast extent.
In The History of Mathematics in the Nineteenth Century', Congress of Arts and Sciences (1905), Vol. 1, 474. As cited and wuoted in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-book (1914), 110.
Science quotes on:  |  18th Century (21)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Bewildering (5)  |  Branch (155)  |  Century (319)  |  Development (441)  |  Extent (142)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  History (716)  |  Last (425)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Modern Mathematics (50)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Profusion (3)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Spring (140)  |  Vast (188)

The fact is generally known that nearly all liquids contain a variety of minute living animals, though in some they are too small for observation, even with a microscope. In others, especially in water that has been long stagnant, these animals appear not only in hideous forms, but with malignant and voracious propensities. … we cheerfully and heartily recommend the adoption of filters by all who use this water, from either the public or private hydrants.
In 'Animalculae in Water', Scientific American (10 Oct 1846), 2, No. 3, 22.
Science quotes on:  |  Adoption (7)  |  Animal (651)  |  Animalcule (12)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Filter (10)  |  Form (976)  |  Hideous (5)  |  Known (453)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Living (492)  |  Malignant (3)  |  Microscope (85)  |  Minute (129)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Observation (593)  |  Other (2233)  |  Private (29)  |  Propensity (9)  |  Public (100)  |  Recommend (27)  |  Recommendation (12)  |  Small (489)  |  Stagnant (4)  |  Use (771)  |  Variety (138)  |  Water (503)

The fact that death from cancer is on the increase is not only a problem of medicine, but its at the same time testifies to the wonderful efficiency of medical science... [as it] enables more persons top live long enough to develop some kind of cancer in old and less resistant tissues.
Charles H. Mayo and William A. Hendricks, 'Carcinoma of the Right Segment of the Colon', presented to Southern Surgical Assoc. (15 Dec 1925). In Annals of Surgery (Mar 1926), 83, 357.
Science quotes on:  |  Cancer (61)  |  Death (406)  |  Develop (278)  |  Development (441)  |  Efficiency (46)  |  Enable (122)  |  Enough (341)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Increase (225)  |  Kind (564)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Medical Science (19)  |  Medicine (392)  |  More (2558)  |  Old (499)  |  Old Age (35)  |  Person (366)  |  Problem (731)  |  Resistance (41)  |  Testimony (21)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tissue (51)  |  Top (100)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Wonderful (155)

The frontiers of science are separated now by long years of study, by specialized vocabularies, arts, techniques, and knowledge from the common heritage even of a most civilized society; and anyone working at the frontier of such science is in that sense a very long way from home, a long way too from the practical arts that were its matrix and origin, as indeed they were of what we today call art.
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:  |  Art (680)  |  Call (781)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Common (447)  |  Frontier (41)  |  Heritage (22)  |  Home (184)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Matrix (14)  |  Most (1728)  |  Origin (250)  |  Practical (225)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Sense (785)  |  Separation (60)  |  Society (350)  |  Specialization (24)  |  Study (701)  |  Technique (84)  |  Today (321)  |  Vocabulary (10)  |  Way (1214)  |  Year (963)

The general knowledge of our author [Leonhard Euler] was more extensive than could well be expected, in one who had pursued, with such unremitting ardor, mathematics and astronomy as his favorite studies. He had made a very considerable progress in medical, botanical, and chemical science. What was still more extraordinary, he was an excellent scholar, and possessed in a high degree what is generally called erudition. He had attentively read the most eminent writers of ancient Rome; the civil and literary history of all ages and all nations was familiar to him; and foreigners, who were only acquainted with his works, were astonished to find in the conversation of a man, whose long life seemed solely occupied in mathematical and physical researches and discoveries, such an extensive acquaintance with the most interesting branches of literature. In this respect, no doubt, he was much indebted to an uncommon memory, which seemed to retain every idea that was conveyed to it, either from reading or from meditation.
In Philosophical and Mathematical Dictionary (1815), 493-494.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquaint (11)  |  Acquaintance (38)  |  Age (509)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Ardor (5)  |  Astonish (39)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Attentive (15)  |  Author (175)  |  Botany (63)  |  Branch (155)  |  Call (781)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Civil (26)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Conversation (46)  |  Convey (17)  |  Degree (277)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Eminent (20)  |  Erudition (7)  |  Leonhard Euler (35)  |  Excellent (29)  |  Expect (203)  |  Extensive (34)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  Familiar (47)  |  Favorite (37)  |  Find (1014)  |  Foreigner (3)  |  General (521)  |  Generally (15)  |  High (370)  |  History (716)  |  Idea (881)  |  Indebted (8)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Literary (15)  |  Literature (116)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Meditation (19)  |  Memory (144)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nation (208)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Physical (518)  |  Possess (157)  |  Progress (492)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Research (753)  |  Respect (212)  |  Retain (57)  |  Rome (19)  |  Scholar (52)  |  Still (614)  |  Study (701)  |  Uncommon (14)  |  Work (1402)  |  Writer (90)

The general public has long been divided into two parts those who think science can do anything, and those who are afraid it will.
From interview with Graham Chedd, 'The Lady Gets Her Way', New Scientist (5 Jul 1973), 59, No. 853, 15-16.
Science quotes on:  |  Afraid (24)  |  Divide (77)  |  Divided (50)  |  Do (1905)  |  General (521)  |  General Public (7)  |  Part (235)  |  Think (1122)  |  Two (936)  |  Will (2350)

The greatest enemy, however, to true arithmetic work is found in so-called practical or illustrative problems, which are freely given to our pupils, of a degree of difficulty and complexity altogether unsuited to their age and mental development. … I am, myself, no bad mathematician, and all the reasoning powers with which nature endowed me have long been as fully developed as they are ever likely to be; but I have, not infrequently, been puzzled, and at times foiled, by the subtle logical difficulty running through one of these problems, given to my own children. The head-master of one of our Boston high schools confessed to me that he had sometimes been unable to unravel one of these tangled skeins, in trying to help his own daughter through her evening’s work. During this summer, Dr. Fairbairn, the distinguished head of one of the colleges of Oxford, England, told me that not only had he himself encountered a similar difficulty, in the case of his own children, but that, on one occasion, having as his guest one of the first mathematicians of England, the two together had been completely puzzled by one of these arithmetical conundrums.
Address before the Grammar-School Section of the Massachusetts Teachers’ Association (25 Nov 1887), 'The Teaching of Arithmetic in the Boston Schools', printed The Academy (Jan 1888). Collected in Francis Amasa Walker, Discussions in Education (1899), 253.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Bad (185)  |  Boston (7)  |  Call (781)  |  Children (201)  |  College (71)  |  Completely (137)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Confess (42)  |  Conundrum (3)  |  Daughter (30)  |  Degree (277)  |  Develop (278)  |  Development (441)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Endowed (52)  |  Enemy (86)  |  First (1302)  |  Greatest (330)  |  High (370)  |  Himself (461)  |  Master (182)  |  Mental (179)  |  Myself (211)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Oxford (16)  |  Power (771)  |  Practical (225)  |  Problem (731)  |  Pupil (62)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Running (61)  |  School (227)  |  So-Called (71)  |  Summer (56)  |  Teaching of Mathematics (39)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  True (239)  |  Trying (144)  |  Two (936)  |  Unravel (16)  |  Work (1402)

The history of a species, or any natural phenomenon that requires unbroken continuity in a world of trouble, works like a batting streak. All are games of a gambler playing with a limited stake against a house with infinite resources. The gambler must eventually go bust. His aim can only be to stick around as long as possible, to have some fun while he’s at it, and, if he happens to be a moral agent as well, to worry about staying the course with honor.
In Bully for Brontosaurus: Reflections in Natural History (1991), 471-472.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Agent (73)  |  Aim (175)  |  Bat (10)  |  Bust (2)  |  Continuity (39)  |  Course (413)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Fun (42)  |  Gambler (7)  |  Game (104)  |  Happen (282)  |  History (716)  |  Honor (57)  |  House (143)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Moral (203)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Play (116)  |  Playing (42)  |  Possible (560)  |  Require (229)  |  Resource (74)  |  Species (435)  |  Stake (20)  |  Stay (26)  |  Stick (27)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Unbroken (10)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)  |  Worry (34)

The History of Evolution of Organisms consists of two kindred and closely connected parts: Ontogeny, which is the history of the evolution of individual organisms, and Phylogeny, which is the history of the evolution of organic tribes. Ontogency is a brief and rapid recapitulation of Phylogeny, dependent on the physiological functions of Heredity (reproduction) and Adaptation (nutrition). The individual organism reproduces in the rapid and short course of its own evolution the most important of the changes in form through which its ancestors, according to laws of Heredity and Adaptation, have passed in the slow and long course of their palaeontological evolution.
Translated from his Generelle Morphologie (1866) as an epigraph to Chap. 1, The Evolution of Man, (1886), Vol 1, 1-2.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Adaptation (59)  |  Ancestor (63)  |  Brief (37)  |  Change (639)  |  Connect (126)  |  Consist (223)  |  Course (413)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Form (976)  |  Function (235)  |  Heredity (62)  |  History (716)  |  Individual (420)  |  Kindred (12)  |  Law (913)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nutrition (25)  |  Ontogeny (10)  |  Organic (161)  |  Organism (231)  |  Pass (241)  |  Phylogeny (10)  |  Physiological (64)  |  Recapitulation (6)  |  Reproduction (74)  |  Short (200)  |  Slow (108)  |  Through (846)  |  Tribe (26)  |  Two (936)

The history of mathematics may be instructive as well as agreeable; it may not only remind us of what we have, but may also teach us to increase our store. Says De Morgan, “The early history of the mind of men with regards to mathematics leads us to point out our own errors; and in this respect it is well to pay attention to the history of mathematics.” It warns us against hasty conclusions; it points out the importance of a good notation upon the progress of the science; it discourages excessive specialization on the part of the investigator, by showing how apparently distinct branches have been found to possess unexpected connecting links; it saves the student from wasting time and energy upon problems which were, perhaps, solved long since; it discourages him from attacking an unsolved problem by the same method which has led other mathematicians to failure; it teaches that fortifications can be taken by other ways than by direct attack, that when repulsed from a direct assault it is well to reconnoiter and occupy the surrounding ground and to discover the secret paths by which the apparently unconquerable position can be taken.
In History of Mathematics (1897), 1-2.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Agreeable (20)  |  Apparently (22)  |  Assault (12)  |  Attack (86)  |  Attention (196)  |  Branch (155)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Connect (126)  |  Augustus De Morgan (45)  |  Direct (228)  |  Discourage (14)  |  Discover (571)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Early (196)  |  Energy (373)  |  Error (339)  |  Excessive (24)  |  Failure (176)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fortification (6)  |  Good (906)  |  Ground (222)  |  Hasty (7)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Mathematics (7)  |  Importance (299)  |  Increase (225)  |  Instruction (101)  |  Investigator (71)  |  Lead (391)  |  Link (48)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Notation (28)  |  Occupy (27)  |  Other (2233)  |  Part (235)  |  Path (159)  |  Pay (45)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Out (9)  |  Position (83)  |  Possess (157)  |  Problem (731)  |  Progress (492)  |  Reconnoitre (2)  |  Regard (312)  |  Remind (16)  |  Repulse (2)  |  Respect (212)  |  Save (126)  |  Say (989)  |  Secret (216)  |  Show (353)  |  Solve (145)  |  Specialization (24)  |  Store (49)  |  Student (317)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)  |  Surround (33)  |  Teach (299)  |  Time (1911)  |  Unconquerable (3)  |  Unexpected (55)  |  Unsolved (15)  |  Warn (7)  |  Waste (109)  |  Way (1214)

The history of the knowledge of the phenomena of life and of the organized world can be divided into two main periods. For a long time anatomy, and particularly the anatomy of the human body, was the α and ω of scientific knowledge. Further progress only became possible with the discovery of the microscope. A long time had yet to pass until through Schwann the cell was established as the final biological unit. It would mean bringing coals to Newcastle were I to describe here the immeasurable progress which biology in all its branches owes to the introduction of this concept of the cell concept. For this concept is the axis around which the whole of the modern science of life revolves.
Nobel Lecture (11 Dec 1908) 'Partial Cell Functions.' Collected in Nobel Lectures: Physiology or Medicine 1901-1921 (1967), 304.
Science quotes on:  |  Anatomy (75)  |  Biological (137)  |  Biology (232)  |  Body (557)  |  Cell (146)  |  Coal (64)  |  Concept (242)  |  Describe (132)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Divided (50)  |  Final (121)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Introduction (37)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mean (810)  |  Microscope (85)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Science (55)  |  Owe (71)  |  Pass (241)  |  Period (200)  |  Possible (560)  |  Progress (492)  |  Revolve (26)  |  Theodor Schwann (12)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Whole (756)  |  World (1850)

The idea that the bumps or depressions on a man's head indicate the presence or absence of certain moral characteristics in his mental equipment is one of the absurdities developed from studies in this field that has long since been discarded by science. The ideas of the phrenologist Gall, however ridiculous they may now seem in the light of a century's progress, were nevertheless destined to become metamorphosed into the modern principles of cerebral localization.
From 'Looking for "The Face Within the Face" in Man', in the New York Times, 4 Mar 1906, SM page 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurdity (34)  |  Become (821)  |  Bump (2)  |  Century (319)  |  Cerebrum (10)  |  Certain (557)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Depression (26)  |  Destined (42)  |  Develop (278)  |  Development (441)  |  Discard (32)  |  Equipment (45)  |  Field (378)  |  Franz Joseph Gall (4)  |  Head (87)  |  Idea (881)  |  Indicate (62)  |  Light (635)  |  Localization (3)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mental (179)  |  Metamorphosis (5)  |  Modern (402)  |  Moral (203)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Phrenology (5)  |  Presence (63)  |  Principle (530)  |  Progress (492)  |  Ridicule (23)  |  Ridiculous (24)  |  Study (701)

The individual on his own is stable only so long as he is possessed of self-esteem. The maintenance of self-esteem is a continuous task which taxes all of the individual’s powers and inner resources. We have to prove our worth and justify our existence anew each day. When, for whatever reason, self-esteem is unattainable, the autonomous individual becomes a highly explosive entity. He turns away from an unpromising self and plunges into the pursuit of pride—the explosive substitute for self-esteem. All social disturbances and upheavals have their roots in crises of individual self-esteem, and the great endeavor in which the masses most readily unite is basically a search for pride.
In The Passionate State of Mind (1955), 18
Science quotes on:  |  Anew (19)  |  Autonomous (3)  |  Basically (4)  |  Become (821)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Crisis (25)  |  Disturbance (34)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  Entity (37)  |  Existence (481)  |  Explosive (24)  |  Great (1610)  |  Highly (16)  |  Individual (420)  |  Inner (72)  |  Justify (26)  |  Maintenance (21)  |  Mass (160)  |  Most (1728)  |  Plunge (11)  |  Possess (157)  |  Power (771)  |  Pride (84)  |  Prove (261)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Readily (10)  |  Reason (766)  |  Resource (74)  |  Root (121)  |  Search (175)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Esteem (7)  |  Social (261)  |  Stable (32)  |  Substitute (47)  |  Task (152)  |  Tax (27)  |  Turn (454)  |  Unattainable (6)  |  Unite (43)  |  Unpromising (2)  |  Upheaval (4)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Worth (172)

The landed classes neglected technical education, taking refuge in classical studies; as late as 1930, for example, long after Ernest Rutherford at Cambridge had discovered the atomic nucleus and begun transmuting elements, the physics laboratory at Oxford had not been wired for electricity. Intellectuals neglect technical education to this day.
Describing C.P. Snow’s observations on the neglect of technical education in Visions of Technology (1999), 23.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Cambridge (17)  |  Class (168)  |  Classical (49)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Education (423)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Element (322)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Late (119)  |  Neglect (63)  |  Neglected (23)  |  Nucleus (54)  |  Observation (593)  |  Oxford (16)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Refuge (15)  |  Snow (39)  |  Baron C.P. Snow (21)  |  Technical Education (3)  |  Transmutation (24)

The last few meters up to the summit no longer seem so hard. On reaching the top, I sit down and let my legs dangle into space. I don’t have to climb anymore. I pull my camera from my rucksack and, in my down mittens, fumble a long time with the batteries before I have it working properly. Then I film Peter. Now, after the hours of torment, which indeed I didn’t recognize as torment, now, when the monotonous motion of plodding upwards is at an end, and I have nothing more to do than breathe, a great peace floods my whole being. I breathe like someone who has run the race of his life and knows that he may now rest forever. I keep looking all around, because the first time I didn’t see anything of the panorama I had expected from Everest, neither indeed did I notice how the wind was continually chasing snow across the summit. In my state of spiritual abstraction, I no longer belong to myself and to my eyesight. I am nothing more than a single, narrow, gasping lung, floating over the mists and the summits.
In Everest: Expedition to the Ultimate (1979), 180.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstraction (48)  |  Across (32)  |  Anymore (5)  |  Battery (12)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belong (168)  |  Breathe (49)  |  Camera (7)  |  Chase (14)  |  Climb (39)  |  Continually (17)  |  Dangle (2)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  End (603)  |  Everest (10)  |  Expect (203)  |  Eyesight (5)  |  Film (12)  |  First (1302)  |  First Time (14)  |  Float (31)  |  Flood (52)  |  Forever (111)  |  Gasp (6)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hard (246)  |  Hour (192)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Keep (104)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Leg (35)  |  Let (64)  |  Life (1870)  |  Looking (191)  |  Lung (37)  |  Meter (9)  |  Mist (17)  |  Monotonous (3)  |  More (2558)  |  Motion (320)  |  Myself (211)  |  Narrow (85)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Notice (81)  |  Panorama (5)  |  Peace (116)  |  Plod (3)  |  Properly (21)  |  Pull (43)  |  Race (278)  |  Reach (286)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Rest (287)  |  Rucksack (3)  |  Run (158)  |  See (1094)  |  Seem (150)  |  Single (365)  |  Sit (51)  |  Snow (39)  |  Someone (24)  |  Space (523)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  State (505)  |  Summit (27)  |  Time (1911)  |  Top (100)  |  Torment (18)  |  Upward (44)  |  Upwards (6)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wind (141)  |  Work (1402)

The least thing contains something of the unknown. Let us find it. To describe a fire that flames and a tree in a field, we must remain facing that fire and that tree until they no longer resemble, to us, any other tree, or fire. This is the way we become original.
From 'Le Roman', Pierre et Jean (1888), as translated by Alexina Loranger in 'Introduction: The Novel', Pierre et Jean (Peter and John) (1890), 39. The opening words are quoted from Gustave Flaubert. From the original French, “La moindre chose contient un peu d’inconnu. Trouvons-le. Pour décrire un feu qui flambe et un arbre dans une plaine, demeurons en face de ce feu et de cet arbre jusqu’à ce 'qu’ils ne ressemblent plus, pour nous, à aucun autre arbre et à aucun autre feu. C’est de cette façon qu’on devient original.” [Because “devient” is present tense, where the original text gave “became”, the present tense “become” has been substituted in the above quote by Webmaster.]
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Contain (68)  |  Describe (132)  |  Face (214)  |  Field (378)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fire (203)  |  Flame (44)  |  Least (75)  |  Must (1525)  |  Observation (593)  |  Original (61)  |  Originality (21)  |  Other (2233)  |  Remain (355)  |  Research (753)  |  Resemble (65)  |  Something (718)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Tree (269)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Way (1214)

The letter e may now no longer be used to denote anything other than this positive universal constant.
In Differential and Integral Calculus (1951), 44. This is Landau’s comment after he writes “Definition 13: “e is the solution of log y= 1”.
Science quotes on:  |  Constant (148)  |  Denote (6)  |  Letter (117)  |  Other (2233)  |  Positive (98)  |  Universal (198)

The links between ecosystem and human health are many and obvious: the value in wetlands of filtering pollutants out of groundwater aquifers; the potential future medical use of different plants’ genetic material; the human health effects of heavy metal accumulation in fish and shellfish. It is clear that healthy ecosystems provide the underpinnings for the long-term health of economics and societies.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulation (51)  |  Aquifer (3)  |  Clear (111)  |  Different (595)  |  Economic (84)  |  Economics (44)  |  Ecosystem (33)  |  Effect (414)  |  Filter (10)  |  Fish (130)  |  Future (467)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Groundwater (2)  |  Health (210)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Heavy (24)  |  Human (1512)  |  Link (48)  |  Long-Term (11)  |  Material (366)  |  Medical (31)  |  Metal (88)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Plant (320)  |  Pollutant (2)  |  Potential (75)  |  Provide (79)  |  Society (350)  |  Term (357)  |  Underpinning (2)  |  Use (771)  |  Value (393)  |  Wetland (5)

The literature [Nobel] laureate of this year has said that an author can do anything as long as his readers believe him.
A scientist cannot do anything that is not checked and rechecked by scientists of this network before it is accepted.
Banquet speech accepting Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (10 Dec 1982). In Wilhelm Odelberg (editor) Les Prix Nobel. The Nobel Prizes 1982 (1983)
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Acceptance (56)  |  Anything (9)  |  Author (175)  |  Belief (615)  |  Check (26)  |  Do (1905)  |  Laureate (2)  |  Literature (116)  |  Network (21)  |  Reader (42)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Year (963)

The long fight to save wild beauty represents democracy at its best. It requires citizens to practice the hardest of virtues — self-restraint.
In Circle of the Seasons: The Journal of a Naturalist's Year (1953), 24.
Science quotes on:  |  Beauty (313)  |  Best (467)  |  Citizen (52)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Democracy (36)  |  Fight (49)  |  Hard (246)  |  Practice (212)  |  Represent (157)  |  Require (229)  |  Restraint (16)  |  Save (126)  |  Self (268)  |  Virtue (117)  |  Wild (96)

The long summer was over. For ages a tropical climate had prevailed over a great part of the earth, and animals whose home is now beneath the Equator roamed over the world from the far South to the very borders of the Arctics ... But their reign was over. A sudden intense winter, that was also to last for ages, fell upon our globe.
Geological Sketches (1866), 208.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Animal (651)  |  Arctic (10)  |  Beneath (68)  |  Climate (102)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Equator (6)  |  Great (1610)  |  Home (184)  |  Ice Age (10)  |  Last (425)  |  Prevail (47)  |  Reign (24)  |  South (39)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Summer (56)  |  Winter (46)  |  World (1850)

The long-range trend toward federal regulation, which found its beginnings in the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 and the Sherman Act of 1890, which was quickened by a large number of measures in the Progressive era, and which has found its consummation in our time, was thus at first the response of a predominantly individualistic public to the uncontrolled and starkly original collectivism of big business. In America the growth of the national state and its regulative power has never been accepted with complacency by any large part of the middle-class public, which has not relaxed its suspicion of authority, and which even now gives repeated evidence of its intense dislike of statism. In our time this growth has been possible only under the stress of great national emergencies, domestic or military, and even then only in the face of continuous resistance from a substantial part of the public. In the Progressive era it was possible only because of widespread and urgent fear of business consolidation and private business authority. Since it has become common in recent years for ideologists of the extreme right to portray the growth of statism as the result of a sinister conspiracy of collectivists inspired by foreign ideologies, it is perhaps worth emphasizing that the first important steps toward the modern organization of society were taken by arch-individualists—the tycoons of the Gilded Age—and that the primitive beginning of modern statism was largely the work of men who were trying to save what they could of the eminently native Yankee values of individualism and enterprise.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Act (278)  |  Age (509)  |  America (143)  |  Arch (12)  |  Authority (99)  |  Become (821)  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Beginnings (5)  |  Big Business (2)  |  Business (156)  |  Class (168)  |  Collectivism (2)  |  Commerce (23)  |  Common (447)  |  Consolidation (4)  |  Conspiracy (6)  |  Consummation (7)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Dislike (16)  |  Domestic (27)  |  Emergency (10)  |  Eminent (20)  |  Emphasize (25)  |  Enterprise (56)  |  Era (51)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Extreme (78)  |  Face (214)  |  Fear (212)  |  Federal (6)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Foreign (45)  |  Gilded (3)  |  Give (208)  |  Great (1610)  |  Growth (200)  |  Ideology (15)  |  Important (229)  |  Individualism (3)  |  Inspire (58)  |  Intense (22)  |  Large (398)  |  Largely (14)  |  Long-Range (3)  |  Measure (241)  |  Middle-Class (2)  |  Military (45)  |  Modern (402)  |  National (29)  |  Native (41)  |  Never (1089)  |  Number (710)  |  Organization (120)  |  Original (61)  |  Part (235)  |  Portray (6)  |  Possible (560)  |  Power (771)  |  Predominantly (4)  |  Primitive (79)  |  Private (29)  |  Progressive (21)  |  Public (100)  |  Quicken (7)  |  Range (104)  |  Recent (78)  |  Regulation (25)  |  Relax (3)  |  Repeat (44)  |  Resistance (41)  |  Response (56)  |  Result (700)  |  Right (473)  |  Save (126)  |  Sinister (8)  |  Society (350)  |  State (505)  |  Step (234)  |  Stress (22)  |  Substantial (24)  |  Suspicion (36)  |  Time (1911)  |  Toward (45)  |  Trend (23)  |  Try (296)  |  Trying (144)  |  Uncontrolled (2)  |  Urgent (15)  |  Value (393)  |  Widespread (23)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worth (172)  |  Yankee (2)  |  Year (963)

The major credit I think Jim and I deserve … is for selecting the right problem and sticking to it. It’s true that by blundering about we stumbled on gold, but the fact remains that we were looking for gold. Both of us had decided, quite independently of each other, that the central problem in molecular biology was the chemical structure of the gene. … We could not see what the answer was, but we considered it so important that we were determined to think about it long and hard, from any relevant point of view.
In What Mad Pursuit (1990), 74-75.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Autobiography (58)  |  Biology (232)  |  Both (496)  |  Central (81)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Consider (428)  |  Credit (24)  |  Deserve (65)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Gene (105)  |  Gold (101)  |  Hard (246)  |  Importance (299)  |  Independently (24)  |  Looking (191)  |  Major (88)  |  Molecular Biology (27)  |  Other (2233)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Problem (731)  |  Remain (355)  |  Right (473)  |  See (1094)  |  Structure (365)  |  Structure Of DNA (5)  |  Stumble (19)  |  Think (1122)  |  View (496)  |  James Watson (33)

The majority of mathematical truths now possessed by us presuppose the intellectual toil of many centuries. A mathematician, therefore, who wishes today to acquire a thorough understanding of modern research in this department, must think over again in quickened tempo the mathematical labors of several centuries. This constant dependence of new truths on old ones stamps mathematics as a science of uncommon exclusiveness and renders it generally impossible to lay open to uninitiated readers a speedy path to the apprehension of the higher mathematical truths. For this reason, too, the theories and results of mathematics are rarely adapted for popular presentation … This same inaccessibility of mathematics, although it secures for it a lofty and aristocratic place among the sciences, also renders it odious to those who have never learned it, and who dread the great labor involved in acquiring an understanding of the questions of modern mathematics. Neither in the languages nor in the natural sciences are the investigations and results so closely interdependent as to make it impossible to acquaint the uninitiated student with single branches or with particular results of these sciences, without causing him to go through a long course of preliminary study.
In Mathematical Essays and Recreations (1898), 32.
Science quotes on:  |  Adapt (70)  |  Apprehension (26)  |  Branch (155)  |  Century (319)  |  Constant (148)  |  Course (413)  |  Department (93)  |  Dependence (46)  |  Dependent (26)  |  Dread (13)  |  Great (1610)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Inaccessible (18)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Involved (90)  |  Labor (200)  |  Language (308)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Lofty (16)  |  Majority (68)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Mathematics (50)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Never (1089)  |  New (1273)  |  Odious (3)  |  Old (499)  |  Open (277)  |  Path (159)  |  Popular (34)  |  Possess (157)  |  Preliminary (6)  |  Presentation (24)  |  Presuppose (15)  |  Question (649)  |  Reader (42)  |  Reason (766)  |  Render (96)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Single (365)  |  Speedy (2)  |  Stamp (36)  |  Student (317)  |  Study (701)  |  Tempo (3)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thorough (40)  |  Through (846)  |  Today (321)  |  Toil (29)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Uncommon (14)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Uninitiated (2)

The man in the street will, therefore, twist the statement that the scientist has come to the end of meaning into the statement that the scientist has penetrated as far as he can with the tools at his command, and that there is something beyond the ken of the scientist. This imagined beyond, which the scientist has proved he cannot penetrate, will become the playground of the imagination of every mystic and dreamer. The existence of such a domain will be made the basis of an orgy of rationalizing. It will be made the substance of the soul; the spirits of the dead will populate it; God will lurk in its shadows; the principle of vital processes will have its seat here; and it will be the medium of telepathic communication. One group will find in the failure of the physical law of cause and effect the solution of the age-long problem of the freedom of the will; and on the other hand the atheist will find the justification of his contention that chance rules the universe.
Reflections of a Physicist (1950),102-3.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Atheist (16)  |  Basis (180)  |  Become (821)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Cause (561)  |  Cause And Effect (21)  |  Chance (244)  |  Command (60)  |  Communication (101)  |  Contention (14)  |  Domain (72)  |  Dreamer (14)  |  Effect (414)  |  End (603)  |  Existence (481)  |  Failure (176)  |  Find (1014)  |  Freedom (145)  |  God (776)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Justification (52)  |  Law (913)  |  Man (2252)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Mystic (23)  |  Other (2233)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Law (15)  |  Playground (6)  |  Principle (530)  |  Problem (731)  |  Rule (307)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Shadow (73)  |  Solution (282)  |  Something (718)  |  Soul (235)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Statement (148)  |  Substance (253)  |  Tool (129)  |  Twist (10)  |  Universe (900)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Vital (89)  |  Will (2350)

The man of true genius never lives before his time, he never undertakes impossibilities, and always embarks on his enterprise at the suitable place and period. Though he may catch a glimpse of the coming light as it gilds the mountain top long before it reaches the eyes of his contemporaries, and he may hazard a prediction as to the future, he acts with the present.
Closing Address (19 Mar 1858) at the Exhibition of the Metropolitan Mechanics' Institute, of Washington. Published as a pamphlet by the M.M. Institute (1853). Collected in Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, Vol. 30.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Coming (114)  |  Contemporary (33)  |  Embark (7)  |  Enterprise (56)  |  Eye (440)  |  Future (467)  |  Genius (301)  |  Glimpse (16)  |  Hazard (21)  |  Impossibility (60)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Live (650)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Never (1089)  |  Period (200)  |  Place (192)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Present (630)  |  Suitability (11)  |  Time (1911)  |  Top (100)  |  True (239)  |  Undertake (35)

The mathematical facts worthy of being studied are those which, by their analogy with other facts, are capable of leading us to the knowledge of a physical law. They reveal the kinship between other facts, long known, but wrongly believed to be strangers to one another.
From Lecture to the Psychological Society, Paris, 'Mathematical Creation', translation collected in James Roy Newman The World of Mathematics (1956), Vol. 4, 2043.
Science quotes on:  |  Analogy (76)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belief (615)  |  Capable (174)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Kinship (5)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Law (913)  |  Lead (391)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Law (15)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Stranger (16)  |  Study (701)  |  Worthy (35)  |  Wrongly (2)

The mathematician may be compared to a designer of garments, who is utterly oblivious of the creatures whom his garments may fit. To be sure, his art originated in the necessity for clothing such creatures, but this was long ago; to this day a shape will occasionally appear which will fit into the garment as if the garment had been made for it. Then there is no end of surprise and delight.
Number: the Language of Science (1930), 231.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Creature (242)  |  Delight (111)  |  Designer (7)  |  End (603)  |  Fit (139)  |  Garment (13)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Oblivious (9)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Usefulness (92)  |  Will (2350)

The meaning of human life and the destiny of man cannot be separable from the meaning and destiny of life in general. 'What is man?' is a special case of 'What is life?' Probably the human species is not intelligent enough to answer either question fully, but even such glimmerings as are within our powers must be precious to us. The extent to which we can hope to understand ourselves and to plan our future depends in some measure on our ability to read the riddles of the past. The present, for all its awesome importance to us who chance to dwell in it, is only a random point in the long flow of time. Terrestrial life is one and continuous in space and time. Any true comprehension of it requires the attempt to view it whole and not in the artificial limits of any one place or epoch. The processes of life can be adequately displayed only in the course of life throughout the long ages of its existence.
The Meaning of Evolution: A Study of the History of Life and of its Significance for Man (1949), 9.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Age (509)  |  Answer (389)  |  Artificiality (2)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Awesome (15)  |  Chance (244)  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Course (413)  |  Depend (238)  |  Dependence (46)  |  Destiny (54)  |  Display (59)  |  Enough (341)  |  Epoch (46)  |  Existence (481)  |  Extent (142)  |  Flow (89)  |  Future (467)  |  General (521)  |  Glimmering (2)  |  Hope (321)  |  Human (1512)  |  Importance (299)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Life (1870)  |  Limit (294)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Measure (241)  |  Must (1525)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Past (355)  |  Place (192)  |  Plan (122)  |  Point (584)  |  Power (771)  |  Precious (43)  |  Present (630)  |  Process (439)  |  Question (649)  |  Random (42)  |  Read (308)  |  Require (229)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Riddle (28)  |  Separation (60)  |  Space (523)  |  Space And Time (38)  |  Special (188)  |  Special Case (9)  |  Species (435)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  View (496)  |  Whole (756)

The message from the Moon which we have flashed to the far corners of this planet is that no problem need any longer be considered insoluble.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Consider (428)  |  Corner (59)  |  Far (158)  |  Flash (49)  |  Insoluble (15)  |  Message (53)  |  Moon (252)  |  Need (320)  |  Planet (402)  |  Problem (731)

The method I take to do this is not yet very usual; for instead of using only comparative and superlative Words, and intellectual Arguments, I have taken the course (as a Specimen of the Political Arithmetic I have long aimed at) to express myself in Terms of Number, Weight, or Measure; to use only Arguments of Sense, and to consider only such Causes, as have visible Foundations in Nature.
From Essays in Political Arithmetic (1679, 1755), 98.
Science quotes on:  |  Aim (175)  |  Argument (145)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Cause (561)  |  Comparative (14)  |  Consider (428)  |  Considering (6)  |  Course (413)  |  Do (1905)  |  Express (192)  |  Expressing (3)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Measure (241)  |  Method (531)  |  Myself (211)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Number (710)  |  Political (124)  |  Political Arithmetic (3)  |  Sense (785)  |  Specimen (32)  |  Superlative (4)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Use (771)  |  Visible (87)  |  Weight (140)  |  Word (650)

The microbial global brain—gifted with long-range transport, data trading, genetic variants … and the ability to reinvent genomes—began its operations some 91 trillion bacterial generations before the birth of the Internet. Ancient bacteria, if they functioned like those today, had mastered the art of worldwide information exchange. … The earliest microorganisms would have used planet-sweeping currents of wind and water to carry the scraps of genetic code…
In 'Creative Nets in the Precambrian Era', Global Brain: The Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big Bang to the 21st Century (2000), 18-19.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Art (680)  |  Bacteria (50)  |  Begin (275)  |  Birth (154)  |  Brain (281)  |  Carry (130)  |  Code (31)  |  Current (122)  |  Data (162)  |  Early (196)  |  Exchange (38)  |  Function (235)  |  Generation (256)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genome (15)  |  Gift (105)  |  Gifted (25)  |  Global (39)  |  Information (173)  |  Internet (24)  |  Master (182)  |  Microbe (30)  |  Microorganism (29)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Planet (402)  |  Range (104)  |  Scrap (3)  |  Today (321)  |  Trade (34)  |  Transport (31)  |  Trillion (4)  |  Variant (9)  |  Water (503)  |  Wind (141)  |  Worldwide (19)

The modern airplane creates a new geographical dimension. A navigable ocean of air blankets the whole surface of the globe. There are no distant places any longer: the world is small and the world is one.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Airplane (43)  |  Blanket (10)  |  Create (245)  |  Dimension (64)  |  Distant (33)  |  Geographical (6)  |  Globe (51)  |  Modern (402)  |  New (1273)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Place (192)  |  Small (489)  |  Surface (223)  |  Whole (756)  |  World (1850)

The moral attitudes of a people that is supported by religion need always aim at preserving and promoting the sanity and vitality of the community and its individuals, since otherwise this community is bound to perish. A people that were to honor falsehood, defamation, fraud, and murder would be unable, indeed, to subsist for very long.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Aim (175)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Bind (26)  |  Bound (120)  |  Community (111)  |  Defamation (2)  |  Falsehood (30)  |  Fraud (15)  |  Honor (57)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Individual (420)  |  Moral (203)  |  Murder (16)  |  Need (320)  |  Otherwise (26)  |  People (1031)  |  Perish (56)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Preserving (18)  |  Promote (32)  |  Religion (369)  |  Sanity (9)  |  Subsist (5)  |  Support (151)  |  Unable (25)  |  Vitality (24)

The more you’re in this business, the more conservative you get. I’ve been in it long enough to be very conservative, to want to improve what we’ve got rather than begin by building what we haven’t.
Expressing being wary of unproved new ideas. Quoted in 'Reach For The Stars', Time (17 Feb 1958), 71, 25.
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Building (158)  |  Business (156)  |  Conservative (16)  |  Enough (341)  |  Improve (64)  |  More (2558)  |  Want (504)

The narrow slit through which the scientist, if he wants to be successful, must view nature constructs, if this goes on for a long time, his entire character; and, more often than not, he ends up becoming what the German language so appropriately calls a Fachidiot (professional idiot).
Heraclitean Fire: Sketches from a Life before Nature (1978), 33.
Science quotes on:  |  Becoming (96)  |  Call (781)  |  Character (259)  |  Construct (129)  |  End (603)  |  German (37)  |  Idiot (22)  |  Language (308)  |  Men Of Science (147)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Narrow (85)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Professional (77)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Successful (134)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  View (496)  |  Want (504)

The novelties in the fish line this week are two—brook trout and California salmon. … Long Island cultivated trout, alive, sell for $1.50 a pound; killed $1 a pound; trout from other portions of the state, 75 cents; wild trout from the Adirondacks, 50 cents; Canada trout 25 to 35 cents. … Certainly ten times as many trout are eaten in New-York as in former years. California salmon … brought 45 cents a pound. … This is rather a high price for California fish, but the catch is very light, caused by overfishing. (1879)
In 'Features of the Markets', New York Times (6 Apr 1879), 9.
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (97)  |  Brook (6)  |  California (9)  |  Canada (6)  |  Catch (34)  |  Cause (561)  |  Cent (5)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Cultivated (7)  |  Eat (108)  |  Fish (130)  |  Former (138)  |  High (370)  |  Island (49)  |  Kill (100)  |  Killed (2)  |  Light (635)  |  New (1273)  |  New York (17)  |  Novelty (31)  |  Other (2233)  |  Overfishing (27)  |  Portion (86)  |  Price (57)  |  Salmon (7)  |  Sell (15)  |  State (505)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trout (4)  |  Two (936)  |  Week (73)  |  Wild (96)  |  Year (963)

The number of humble-bees in any district depends in a great degree on the number of field-mice, which destroy their combs and nests; and Mr. H. Newman, who has long attended to the habits of humble-bees, ... says “Near villages and small towns I have found the nests of humble-bees more numerous than elsewhere, which I attribute to the number of cats that destroy the mice.” Hence it is quite credible that the presence of a feline animal in large numbers in a district might determine, through the intervention first of mice and then of bees, the frequency of certain flowers in that district!
From On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection; or, The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (1861), 72.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Attend (67)  |  Attribute (65)  |  Bee (44)  |  Cat (52)  |  Certain (557)  |  Credible (3)  |  Degree (277)  |  Depend (238)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Determine (152)  |  District (11)  |  Elsewhere (10)  |  Field (378)  |  First (1302)  |  Flower (112)  |  Food Chain (7)  |  Found (11)  |  Frequency (25)  |  Great (1610)  |  Habit (174)  |  Humble (54)  |  Intervention (18)  |  Large (398)  |  More (2558)  |  Mouse (33)  |  Nest (26)  |  Number (710)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Presence (63)  |  Say (989)  |  Small (489)  |  Through (846)  |  Town (30)  |  Village (13)

The one who stays in my mind as the ideal man of science is, not Huxley or Tyndall, Hooker or Lubbock, still less my friend, philosopher and guide Herbert Spencer, but Francis Galton, whom I used to observe and listen to—I regret to add, without the least reciprocity—with rapt attention. Even to-day. I can conjure up, from memory’s misty deep, that tall figure with its attitude of perfect physical and mental poise; the clean-shaven face, the thin, compressed mouth with its enigmatical smile; the long upper lip and firm chin, and, as if presiding over the whole personality of the man, the prominent dark eyebrows from beneath which gleamed, with penetrating humour, contemplative grey eyes. Fascinating to me was Francis Galton’s all-embracing but apparently impersonal beneficence. But, to a recent and enthusiastic convert to the scientific method, the most relevant of Galton’s many gifts was the unique contribution of three separate and distinct processes of the intellect; a continuous curiosity about, and rapid apprehension of individual facts, whether common or uncommon; the faculty for ingenious trains of reasoning; and, more admirable than either of these, because the talent was wholly beyond my reach, the capacity for correcting and verifying his own hypotheses, by the statistical handling of masses of data, whether collected by himself or supplied by other students of the problem.
In My Apprenticeship (1926), 134-135.
Science quotes on:  |  Admirable (20)  |  Apprehension (26)  |  Attention (196)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Beneath (68)  |  Beneficence (3)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Capacity (105)  |  Chin (2)  |  Clean (52)  |  Collected (2)  |  Common (447)  |  Compressed (3)  |  Conjuring (3)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Contribution (93)  |  Convert (22)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Dark (145)  |  Data (162)  |  Deep (241)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Enigma (16)  |  Enthusiastic (7)  |  Eye (440)  |  Eyebrow (2)  |  Face (214)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Faculty (76)  |  Fascinating (38)  |  Figure (162)  |  Firm (47)  |  Friend (180)  |  Sir Francis Galton (18)  |  Gift (105)  |  Grey (10)  |  Guide (107)  |  Handling (7)  |  Himself (461)  |  Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker (12)  |  Humour (116)  |  Thomas Henry Huxley (132)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Impersonal (5)  |  Individual (420)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Lip (4)  |  Listen (81)  |  John Lubbock (Lord Avebury) (26)  |  Man (2252)  |  Memory (144)  |  Men Of Science (147)  |  Mental (179)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Misty (6)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mouth (54)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observe (179)  |  Other (2233)  |  Penetrating (3)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Personality (66)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Physical (518)  |  Poise (4)  |  Problem (731)  |  Process (439)  |  Prominent (6)  |  Rapid (37)  |  Rapt (5)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Recent (78)  |  Reciprocity (2)  |  Regret (31)  |  Relevant (5)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Separate (151)  |  Smile (34)  |  Herbert Spencer (37)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Still (614)  |  Student (317)  |  Talent (99)  |  Tall (11)  |  Thin (18)  |  Train (118)  |  Uncommon (14)  |  Unique (72)  |  Upper (4)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wholly (88)

The opinion of Bacon on this subject [geometry] was diametrically opposed to that of the ancient philosophers. He valued geometry chiefly, if not solely, on account of those uses, which to Plato appeared so base. And it is remarkable that the longer Bacon lived the stronger this feeling became. When in 1605 he wrote the two books on the Advancement of Learning, he dwelt on the advantages which mankind derived from mixed mathematics; but he at the same time admitted that the beneficial effect produced by mathematical study on the intellect, though a collateral advantage, was “no less worthy than that which was principal and intended.” But it is evident that his views underwent a change. When near twenty years later, he published the De Augmentis, which is the Treatise on the Advancement of Learning, greatly expanded and carefully corrected, he made important alterations in the part which related to mathematics. He condemned with severity the pretensions of the mathematicians, “delidas et faslum mathematicorum.” Assuming the well-being of the human race to be the end of knowledge, he pronounced that mathematical science could claim no higher rank than that of an appendage or an auxiliary to other sciences. Mathematical science, he says, is the handmaid of natural philosophy; she ought to demean herself as such; and he declares that he cannot conceive by what ill chance it has happened that she presumes to claim precedence over her mistress.
In 'Lord Bacon', Edinburgh Review (Jul 1837). Collected in Critical and Miscellaneous Essays: Contributed to the Edinburgh Review (1857), Vol. 1, 395.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Admit (49)  |  Advancement (63)  |  Advantage (144)  |  Alteration (31)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Appear (122)  |  Appendage (2)  |  Assume (43)  |  Auxiliary (11)  |  Bacon (4)  |  Base (120)  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Beneficial (16)  |  Book (413)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Chance (244)  |  Change (639)  |  Chiefly (47)  |  Claim (154)  |  Collateral (4)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Condemn (44)  |  Correct (95)  |  Declare (48)  |  Derive (70)  |  Diametrically (6)  |  Dwell (19)  |  Effect (414)  |  End (603)  |  Evident (92)  |  Expand (56)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Greatly (12)  |  Handmaid (6)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  High (370)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Important (229)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intend (18)  |  It Is Evident (6)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Late (119)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Less (105)  |  Live (650)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mistress (7)  |  Mix (24)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Philosophy (52)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Oppose (27)  |  Other (2233)  |  Part (235)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Plato (80)  |  Precedence (4)  |  Presume (9)  |  Pretension (6)  |  Principal (69)  |  Produce (117)  |  Produced (187)  |  Pronounce (11)  |  Publish (42)  |  Race (278)  |  Rank (69)  |  Relate (26)  |  Remarkable (50)  |  Same (166)  |  Say (989)  |  Severity (6)  |  Solely (9)  |  Strong (182)  |  Stronger (36)  |  Study (701)  |  Subject (543)  |  Time (1911)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Two (936)  |  Undergo (18)  |  Use (771)  |  Value (393)  |  View (496)  |  Well-Being (5)  |  Worthy (35)  |  Write (250)  |  Year (963)

The organism, as we have long been saying, is a little world (microcosm) in the great universe (macrocosm).
Science quotes on:  |  Great (1610)  |  Little (717)  |  Macrocosm (2)  |  Microcosm (10)  |  Organism (231)  |  Universe (900)  |  World (1850)

The origin of volcanic energy is one of the blankest mysteries of science, and it is strange indeed, that a class of phenomena so long familiar to the human race and so zealously studied through all the ages should be so utterly without explanation. (1880)
In Report on the Geology of the High Plateaus of Utah (1880), 113.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Class (168)  |  Energy (373)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Familiar (47)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Origin (250)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Race (278)  |  Strange (160)  |  Study (701)  |  Through (846)  |  Volcano (46)

The other book you may have heard of and perhaps read, but it is not one perusal which will enable any man to appreciate it. I have read it through five or six times, each time with increasing admiration. It will live as long as the ‘Principia’ of Newton. It shows that nature is, as I before remarked to you, a study that yields to none in grandeur and immensity. The cycles of astronomy or even the periods of geology will alone enable us to appreciate the vast depths of time we have to contemplate in the endeavour to understand the slow growth of life upon the earth. The most intricate effects of the law of gravitation, the mutual disturbances of all the bodies of the solar system, are simplicity itself compared with the intricate relations and complicated struggle which have determined what forms of life shall exist and in what proportions. Mr. Darwin has given the world a new science, and his name should, in my opinion, stand above that of every philosopher of ancient or modem times. The force of admiration can no further go!!!
Letter to George Silk (1 Sep 1860), in My Life (1905), Vol. I, 372-373.
Science quotes on:  |  Admiration (61)  |  Alone (324)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Appreciate (67)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Book (413)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Cycle (42)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Depth (97)  |  Disturbance (34)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effect (414)  |  Enable (122)  |  Endeavour (63)  |  Exist (458)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Geology (240)  |  Grandeur (35)  |  Gravitation (72)  |  Growth (200)  |  Immensity (30)  |  Intricate (29)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Gravitation (23)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Man (2252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mutual (54)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Other (2233)  |  Period (200)  |  Perusal (2)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Principia (14)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Read (308)  |  Show (353)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Slow (108)  |  Solar (8)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Stand (284)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Study (701)  |  System (545)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Understand (648)  |  Vast (188)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)  |  Yield (86)

The other experiment (which I shall hardly, I confess, make again, because it was cruel) was with a dog, which, by means of a pair of bellows, wherewith I filled his lungs, and suffered them to empty again, I was able to preserve alive as long as I could desire, after I had wholly opened the thorax, and cut off all the ribs, and opened the belly. Nay, I kept him alive above an hour after I had cut off the pericardium and the mediastinum, and had handled and turned his lungs and heart and all the other parts of its body, as I pleased. My design was to make some enquiries into the nature of respiration. But though I made some considerable discovery of the necessity of fresh air, and the motion of the lungs for the continuance of the animal life, yet I could not make the least discovery in this of what I longed for, which was, to see, if I could by any means discover a passage of the air of the lungs into either the vessels or the heart; and I shall hardly be induced to make any further trials of this kind, because of the torture of this creature: but certainly the enquiry would be very noble, if we could any way find a way so to stupify the creature, as that it might not be sensible.
Letter from Robert Hooke to Robert Boyle (10 Nov 1664). In M. Hunter, A. Clericuzio and L. M. Principe (eds.), The Correspondence of Robert Boyle (2001), Vol. 2, 399.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Alive (97)  |  Animal (651)  |  Animal Life (21)  |  Bellows (5)  |  Body (557)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Confess (42)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Creature (242)  |  Cruel (25)  |  Cut (116)  |  Design (203)  |  Desire (212)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Dog (70)  |  Empty (82)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fresh (69)  |  Heart (243)  |  Hour (192)  |  Kind (564)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lung (37)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Motion (320)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Noble (93)  |  Open (277)  |  Other (2233)  |  Passage (52)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Respiration (14)  |  Rib (6)  |  See (1094)  |  Torture (30)  |  Trial (59)  |  Turn (454)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Vivisection (7)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wholly (88)

The path towards sustainable energy sources will be long and sometimes difficult. But America cannot resist this transition, we must lead it. We cannot cede to other nations the technology that will power new jobs and new industries, we must claim its promise. That’s how we will maintain our economic vitality and our national treasure—our forests and waterways, our crop lands and snow-capped peaks. That is how we will preserve our planet, commanded to our care by God. That’s what will lend meaning to the creed our fathers once declared.
In Second Inaugural Address (21 Jan 2013) at the United States Capitol.
Science quotes on:  |  America (143)  |  Care (203)  |  Cede (2)  |  Claim (154)  |  Command (60)  |  Creed (28)  |  Crop (26)  |  Declare (48)  |  Declared (24)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Economic (84)  |  Energy (373)  |  Father (113)  |  Forest (161)  |  God (776)  |  Industry (159)  |  Job (86)  |  Lead (391)  |  Maintain (105)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nation (208)  |  National (29)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Path (159)  |  Peak (20)  |  Planet (402)  |  Power (771)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Promise (72)  |  Resist (15)  |  Snow (39)  |  Source (101)  |  Sustainable (14)  |  Sustainable Energy (3)  |  Technology (281)  |  Transition (28)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Vitality (24)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wind (141)  |  Wind Power (10)

The personal adventures of a geologist would form an amusing narrative. He is trudging along, dusty and weather­beaten, with his wallet at his back, and his hammer on his shoulder, and he is taken for a stone-mason travelling in search of work. In mining-countries, he is supposed to be in quest of mines, and receives many tempting offers of shares in the ‘Wheel Dream’, or the ‘Golden Venture’;—he has been watched as a smuggler; it is well if he has not been committed as a vagrant, or apprehended as a spy, for he has been refused admittance to an inn, or has been ushered into the room appropriated to ostlers and postilions. When his fame has spread among the more enlightened part of the community of a district which he has been exploring, and inquiries are made of the peasantry as to the habits and pursuits of the great philosopher who has been among them, and with whom they have become familiar, it is found that the importance attached by him to shells and stones, and such like trumpery, is looked upon as a species of derangement, but they speak with delight of his affability, sprightliness, and good-humour. They respect the strength of his arm, and the weight of his hammer, as they point to marks which he inflicted on the rocks, and they recount with wonder his pedestrian performances, and the voracious appetite with which, at the close of a long day’s work he would devour the coarsest food that was set before him.
In Practical Geology and Mineralogy: With Instructions for the Qualitative Analysis of Minerals (1841), 31-2.
Science quotes on:  |  Adventure (69)  |  Affability (2)  |  Appetite (20)  |  Arm (82)  |  Attach (57)  |  Attached (36)  |  Back (395)  |  Become (821)  |  Community (111)  |  Delight (111)  |  Derangement (2)  |  Devour (29)  |  Dream (222)  |  Enlighten (32)  |  Enlightened (25)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Fame (51)  |  Food (213)  |  Form (976)  |  Geologist (82)  |  Golden (47)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Habit (174)  |  Hammer (26)  |  Humour (116)  |  Importance (299)  |  Look (584)  |  Mine (78)  |  Mining (22)  |  More (2558)  |  Offer (142)  |  Performance (51)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Point (584)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Quest (39)  |  Receive (117)  |  Respect (212)  |  Rock (176)  |  Search (175)  |  Set (400)  |  Share (82)  |  Shell (69)  |  Shoulder (33)  |  Speak (240)  |  Species (435)  |  Spread (86)  |  Spy (9)  |  Stone (168)  |  Strength (139)  |  Tempting (10)  |  Travelling (17)  |  Vagrant (5)  |  Venture (19)  |  Watch (118)  |  Weather (49)  |  Weight (140)  |  Wheel (51)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Work (1402)

The philosopher has no objections to a physicist’s beliefs, so long as they are not advanced in the form of a philosophy.
From 'Philosophie der Raum-Zeit-Lehre' (1927). English version in 'The Philosophical Significance of Relativity' in P.A. Schilpp (ed.), Albert Einstein, Philosopher-Scientist (1949), 293. Readings in Philosophy of Science: Introduction to the Foundations ... https://books.google.com/books?id=BnwGAQAAIAAJ Philip Paul Wiener - 1953
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (615)  |  Form (976)  |  Objection (34)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Philosophy Of Science (5)  |  Physicist (270)

The phosphorous smell which is developed when electricity (to speak the profane language) is passing from the points of a conductor into air, or when lightning happens to fall upon some terrestrial object, or when water is electrolysed, has been engaging my attention the last couple of years, and induced me to make many attempts at clearing up that mysterious phenomenon. Though baffled for a long time, at last, I think, I have succeeded so far as to have got the clue which will lead to the discovery of the true cause of the smell in question.
[His first reference to investigating ozone, for which he is remembered.]
Letter to Michael Faraday (4 Apr 1840), The Letters of Faraday and Schoenbein, 1836-1862 (1899), 73. This letter was communicated to the Royal Society on 7 May, and an abstract published in the Philosophical Magazine.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Attention (196)  |  Baffle (6)  |  Cause (561)  |  Clue (20)  |  Conductor (17)  |  Develop (278)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Electrolysis (8)  |  Fall (243)  |  First (1302)  |  Happen (282)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Language (308)  |  Last (425)  |  Lead (391)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Mysterious (83)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Object (438)  |  Ozone (7)  |  Passing (76)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Phosphorus (18)  |  Point (584)  |  Profane (6)  |  Question (649)  |  Remember (189)  |  Research (753)  |  Smell (29)  |  Speak (240)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Success (327)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Water (503)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

The physicist is like someone who’s watching people playing chess and, after watching a few games, he may have worked out what the moves in the game are. But understanding the rules is just a trivial preliminary on the long route from being a novice to being a grand master. So even if we understand all the laws of physics, then exploring their consequences in the everyday world where complex structures can exist is a far more daunting task, and that’s an inexhaustible one I'm sure.
In Lewis Wolpert and Alison Richards, A Passion For Science (1988), 37.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Chess (27)  |  Complex (202)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Daunting (3)  |  Everyday (32)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Game (104)  |  Inexhaustible (26)  |  Law (913)  |  Master (182)  |  More (2558)  |  Move (223)  |  Novice (2)  |  Observation (593)  |  People (1031)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physics (564)  |  Playing (42)  |  Route (16)  |  Rule (307)  |  Structure (365)  |  Task (152)  |  Trivial (59)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Watching (11)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

The point of mathematics is that in it we have always got rid of the particular instance, and even of any particular sorts of entities. So that for example, no mathematical truths apply merely to fish, or merely to stones, or merely to colours. So long as you are dealing with pure mathematics, you are in the realm of complete and absolute abstraction. … Mathematics is thought moving in the sphere of complete abstraction from any particular instance of what it is talking about.
In Science and the Modern World: Lowell Lectures, 1925 (1925), 31.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Abstraction (48)  |  Application (257)  |  Apply (170)  |  Color (155)  |  Complete (209)  |  Dealing (11)  |  Entity (37)  |  Fish (130)  |  Instance (33)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Merely (315)  |  Moving (11)  |  Particular (80)  |  Point (584)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Mathematics (72)  |  Realm (87)  |  Rid (14)  |  Sort (50)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Stone (168)  |  Talking (76)  |  Thought (995)  |  Truth (1109)

The position of the anthropologist of to-day resembles in some sort the position of classical scholars at the revival of learning. To these men the rediscovery of ancient literature came like a revelation, disclosing to their wondering eyes a splendid vision of the antique world, such as the cloistered of the Middle Ages never dreamed of under the gloomy shadow of the minster and within the sound of its solemn bells. To us moderns a still wider vista is vouchsafed, a greater panorama is unrolled by the study which aims at bringing home to us the faith and the practice, the hopes and the ideals, not of two highly gifted races only, but of all mankind, and thus at enabling us to follow the long march, the slow and toilsome ascent, of humanity from savagery to civilization. And as the scholar of the Renaissance found not merely fresh food for thought but a new field of labour in the dusty and faded manuscripts of Greece and Rome, so in the mass of materials that is steadily pouring in from many sides—from buried cities of remotest antiquity as well as from the rudest savages of the desert and the jungle—we of to-day must recognise a new province of knowledge which will task the energies of generations of students to master.
'Author’s Introduction' (1900). In Dr Theodor H. Gaster (ed.), The New Golden Bough (1959), xxv-xxvi.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Aim (175)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Anthropology (61)  |  Antiquity (34)  |  Bell (35)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Classical (49)  |  Desert (59)  |  Dream (222)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fad (10)  |  Faith (209)  |  Field (378)  |  Follow (389)  |  Food (213)  |  Fresh (69)  |  Generation (256)  |  Gift (105)  |  Gifted (25)  |  Greater (288)  |  Home (184)  |  Hope (321)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Jungle (24)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Labor (200)  |  Learning (291)  |  Literature (116)  |  Mankind (356)  |  March (48)  |  Mass (160)  |  Master (182)  |  Material (366)  |  Merely (315)  |  Middle Age (19)  |  Middle Ages (12)  |  Modern (402)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  New (1273)  |  Panorama (5)  |  Practice (212)  |  Province (37)  |  Race (278)  |  Rediscovery (2)  |  Renaissance (16)  |  Resemble (65)  |  Revelation (51)  |  Rome (19)  |  Scholar (52)  |  Shadow (73)  |  Side (236)  |  Slow (108)  |  Solemn (20)  |  Sound (187)  |  Splendid (23)  |  Still (614)  |  Student (317)  |  Study (701)  |  Task (152)  |  Thought (995)  |  Two (936)  |  Vision (127)  |  Vista (12)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

The present state of the earth and of the organisms now inhabiting it, is but the last stage of a long and uninterrupted series of changes which it has undergone, and consequently, that to endeavour to explain and account for its present condition without any reference to those changes (as has frequently been done) must lead to very imperfect and erroneous conclusions.
In 'On the Law which has regulated the Introduction of New Species', The Annals and Magazine of Natural History (1855), 16, No. 93, 184.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Change (639)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Condition (362)  |  Consequent (19)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  Endeavour (63)  |  Erroneous (31)  |  Error (339)  |  Explain (334)  |  Frequent (26)  |  Imperfect (46)  |  Inhabit (18)  |  Last (425)  |  Lead (391)  |  Must (1525)  |  Organism (231)  |  Present (630)  |  Reference (33)  |  Series (153)  |  Stage (152)  |  State (505)  |  Undergo (18)  |  Uninterrupted (7)

The problem [with genetic research] is, we're just starting down this path, feeling our way in the dark. We have a small lantern in the form of a gene, but the lantern doesn't penetrate more than a couple of hundred feet. We don't know whether we're going to encounter chasms, rock walls or mountain ranges along the way. We don't even know how long the path is.
Quoted in J. Madeleine Nash, et al., 'Tracking Down Killer Genes', Time magazine (17 Sep 1990).
Science quotes on:  |  Chasm (9)  |  Dark (145)  |  Down (455)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Form (976)  |  Gene (105)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genetics (105)  |  Human Genome (13)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Know (1538)  |  Lantern (8)  |  More (2558)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Path (159)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  Problem (731)  |  Range (104)  |  Research (753)  |  Rock (176)  |  Small (489)  |  Wall (71)  |  Way (1214)

The publication of a long list of authors’ names after the title is a little like having all a vessel’s ballast hanging from the masthead, as if to counterbalance the barnacles.
Anonymous
New England Journal of Medicine (1964), 271, 1068.
Science quotes on:  |  Author (175)  |  Counterbalance (4)  |  Little (717)  |  Name (359)  |  Publication (102)  |  Vessel (63)

The required techniques of effective reasoning are pretty formal, but as long as programming is done by people that don’t master them, the software crisis will remain with us and will be considered an incurable disease. And you know what incurable diseases do: they invite the quacks and charlatans in, who in this case take the form of Software Engineering gurus.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Case (102)  |  Charlatan (8)  |  Consider (428)  |  Crisis (25)  |  Disease (340)  |  Do (1905)  |  Effective (68)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Form (976)  |  Formal (37)  |  Incurable (10)  |  Invite (10)  |  Know (1538)  |  Master (182)  |  People (1031)  |  Pretty (21)  |  Program (57)  |  Quack (18)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Remain (355)  |  Require (229)  |  Required (108)  |  Software (14)  |  Technique (84)  |  Will (2350)

The ridge of the Lammer-muir hills... consists of primary micaceous schistus, and extends from St Abb's head westward... The sea-coast affords a transverse section of this alpine tract at its eastern extremity, and exhibits the change from the primary to the secondary strata... Dr HUTTON wished particularly to examine the latter of these, and on this occasion Sir JAMES HALL and I had the pleasure to accompany him. We sailed in a boat from Dunglass ... We made for a high rocky point or head-land, the SICCAR ... On landing at this point, we found that we actually trode [sic] on the primeval rock... It is here a micaceous schistus, in beds nearly vertical, highly indurated, and stretching from S.E. to N. W. The surface of this rock... has thin covering of red horizontal sandstone laid over it, ... Here, therefore, the immediate contact of the two rocks is not only visible, but is curiously dissected and laid open by the action of the waves... On us who saw these phenomena for the first time, the impression will not easily be forgotten. The palpable evidence presented to us, of one of the most extraordinary and important facts in the natural history of the earth, gave a reality and substance to those theoretical speculations, which, however probable had never till now been directly authenticated by the testimony of the senses... What clearer evidence could we have had of the different formation of these rocks, and of the long interval which separated their formation, had we actually seen them emerging from the bosom of the deep? ... The mind seemed to grow giddy by looking so far into the abyss of time; and while we listened with earnestness and admiration to the philosopher who was now unfolding to us the order and series of these wonderful events, we became sensible how much farther reason may sometimes go than imagination can venture to follow.
'Biographical Account of the Late Dr James Hutton, F.R.S. Edin.' (read 1803), Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (1805), 5, 71-3.
Science quotes on:  |  Abyss (30)  |  Accompany (22)  |  Action (342)  |  Admiration (61)  |  Bosom (14)  |  Change (639)  |  Consist (223)  |  Contact (66)  |  Covering (14)  |  Deep (241)  |  Different (595)  |  Earnestness (3)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Event (222)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Examine (84)  |  Extend (129)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  Extremity (7)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Farther (51)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Forgotten (53)  |  Formation (100)  |  Grow (247)  |  High (370)  |  History (716)  |  Horizontal (9)  |  James Hutton (22)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Impression (118)  |  Listen (81)  |  Looking (191)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Never (1089)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Open (277)  |  Order (638)  |  Palpable (8)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Point (584)  |  Present (630)  |  Primary (82)  |  Primeval (15)  |  Reality (274)  |  Reason (766)  |  Rock (176)  |  Sail (37)  |  Sandstone (3)  |  Saw (160)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sense (785)  |  Series (153)  |  Speculation (137)  |  Strata (37)  |  Stratum (11)  |  Substance (253)  |  Surface (223)  |  Testimony (21)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Unfolding (16)  |  Visible (87)  |  Wave (112)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wish (216)  |  Wonderful (155)

The routine produces. But each day, nevertheless, when you try to get started you have to transmogrify, transpose yourself; you have to go through some kind of change from being a normal human being, into becoming some kind of slave.
I simply don’t want to break through that membrane. I’d do anything to avoid it. You have to get there and you don’t want to go there because there’s so much pressure and so much strain and you just want to stay on the outside and be yourself. And so the day is a constant struggle to get going.
And if somebody says to me, You’re a prolific writer—it seems so odd. It’s like the difference between geological time and human time. On a certain scale, it does look like I do a lot. But that’s my day, all day long, sitting there wondering when I’m going to be able to get started. And the routine of doing this six days a week puts a little drop in a bucket each day, and that’s the key. Because if you put a drop in a bucket every day, after three hundred and sixty-five days, the bucket’s going to have some water in it.
https://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/5997/john-mcphee-the-art-of-nonfiction-no-3-john-mcphee
Science quotes on:  |  Avoid (123)  |  Become (821)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Being (1276)  |  Break (109)  |  Bucket (4)  |  Certain (557)  |  Change (639)  |  Constant (148)  |  Difference (355)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Drop (77)  |  Geological (11)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Key (56)  |  Kind (564)  |  Little (717)  |  Look (584)  |  Lot (151)  |  Membrane (21)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Normal (29)  |  Odd (15)  |  Outside (141)  |  Pressure (69)  |  Produce (117)  |  Prolific (5)  |  Routine (26)  |  Say (989)  |  Scale (122)  |  Seem (150)  |  Simply (53)  |  Sit (51)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Slave (40)  |  Somebody (8)  |  Start (237)  |  Stay (26)  |  Strain (13)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Transpose (2)  |  Try (296)  |  Want (504)  |  Water (503)  |  Week (73)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Writer (90)

The ruthless destruction of their forests by the Chinese is one of the reasons why famine and plague today hold this nation in their sinister grasp. Denudation, wherever practiced, leaves naked soil; floods and erosion follow, and when the soil is gone men must also go—and the process does not take long. The great plains of Eastern China were centuries ago transformed from forest into agricultural land. The mountain plateau of Central China have also within a few hundred years been utterly devastated of tree growth, and no attempt made at either natural or artificial reforestation. As a result, the water rushes off the naked slopes in veritable floods, gullying away the mountain sides, causing rivers to run muddy with yellow soil, and carrying enormous masses of fertile earth to the sea. Water courses have also changed; rivers become uncontrollable, and the water level of the country is lowered perceptibly. In consequence, the unfortunate people see their crops wither and die for lack of water when it is most needed.
Statement (11 May 1921) by United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) concerning the famine in China in seven out of every ten years. Reported in 'Blames Deforestation: Department of Agriculture Ascribes Chinese Famine to it', New York Times (12 May 1921), 12.
Science quotes on:  |  Agriculture (78)  |  Artificial (38)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Become (821)  |  Central (81)  |  Century (319)  |  Changed (2)  |  China (27)  |  Chinese (22)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Country (269)  |  Course (413)  |  Crop (26)  |  Deforestation (50)  |  Denudation (2)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Die (94)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Erosion (20)  |  Famine (18)  |  Fertile (30)  |  Flood (52)  |  Follow (389)  |  Forest (161)  |  Grasp (65)  |  Great (1610)  |  Growth (200)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Lack (127)  |  Land (131)  |  Level (69)  |  Lowered (2)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Muddy (3)  |  Must (1525)  |  Naked (10)  |  Nation (208)  |  Natural (810)  |  Need (320)  |  People (1031)  |  Perceptibly (2)  |  Plague (42)  |  Plain (34)  |  Plateau (8)  |  Process (439)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reforestation (6)  |  Result (700)  |  River (140)  |  Run (158)  |  Ruthless (12)  |  Sea (326)  |  See (1094)  |  Side (236)  |  Sinister (8)  |  Slope (10)  |  Soil (98)  |  Today (321)  |  Transform (74)  |  Tree (269)  |  Uncontrollable (5)  |  Unfortunate (19)  |  Utterly (15)  |  Water (503)  |  Wherever (51)  |  Why (491)  |  Wither (9)  |  Year (963)  |  Yellow (31)

The science fair has long been a favorite educational tool in the American school system, and for a good reason: Your teachers hate you.
'Science: It’s just not fair', Miami Herald (22 Mar 1998)
Science quotes on:  |  American (56)  |  Competition (45)  |  Education (423)  |  Favorite (37)  |  Good (906)  |  Hate (68)  |  Reason (766)  |  School (227)  |  Science Fair (7)  |  System (545)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Tool (129)

The science of life is a superb and dazzlingly lighted hall which may be reached only by passing through a long and ghastly kitchen.
From Introduction à l'Étude de la Médecine Expérimentale (1865), translated by Henry Copley Greene, in An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine (1927, 1957), 15. As extracted in John Bartlett and Emily Morison Beck (ed.), Familiar Quotations (1980, 15th ed.), 551.
Science quotes on:  |  Ghastly (5)  |  Hall (5)  |  Kitchen (14)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Pass (241)  |  Passing (76)  |  Reach (286)  |  Superb (3)  |  Through (846)

The science of systematics has long been affected by profound philosophical preconceptions, which have been all the more influential for being usually covert, even subconscious.
The Major Features of Evolution (1953), 340.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Influence (231)  |  More (2558)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Preconception (13)  |  Profound (105)  |  Subconscious (4)  |  Systematic (58)  |  Systematics (4)  |  Usually (176)

The secrets of evolution are death and time—the deaths of enormous numbers of lifeforms that were imperfectly adapted to the environment; and time for a long succession of small mutations.
Cosmos (1980, 1985), 20.
Science quotes on:  |  Adapt (70)  |  Adaptation (59)  |  Death (406)  |  Environment (239)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Lifeform (2)  |  Mutation (40)  |  Number (710)  |  Secret (216)  |  Small (489)  |  Succession (80)  |  Time (1911)

The specific goals we set for ourselves are almost always subsidiary to our long range intentions. A good parent, a good neighbour, a good citizen, is not good because his specific goals are acceptable, but because his successive goals are ordered to a dependable and socially desirable set of values. (1947)
Presidential Address to the first annual Meeting of the American Psychological Asssociation (1947). As cited by Charles Abraham and Paschal Sheeran, 'Implications of Goal Theories for the Theories of Reasoned Action and Planned Behavior' in Christopher J. Armitage and Julie Christian (eds.), Planned Behavior: The Relationship Between Human Thought and Action (2004), 101.
Science quotes on:  |  Acceptable (14)  |  Citizen (52)  |  Desirable (33)  |  Goal (155)  |  Good (906)  |  Intention (46)  |  Neighbour (7)  |  Order (638)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Parent (80)  |  Range (104)  |  Set (400)  |  Society (350)  |  Specific (98)  |  Subsidiary (5)  |  Successive (73)  |  Value (393)

The stone age did not end for lack of stone, and the oil age will end long before the world runs out of oil.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  End (603)  |  Lack (127)  |  Oil (67)  |  Run (158)  |  Stone (168)  |  Stone Age (14)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

The stories of Whitney’s love for experimenting are legion. At one time he received a letter asking if insects could live in a vacuum. Whitney took the letter to one of the members of his staff and asked the man if he cared to run an experiment on the subject. The man replied that there was no point in it, since it was well established that life could not exist without a supply of oxygen. Whitney, who was an inveterate student of wild life, replied that on his farm he had seen turtles bury themselves in mud each fall, and, although the mud was covered with ice and snow for months, emerge again in the spring. The man exclaimed, “Oh, you mean hibernation!” Whitney answered, “I don’t know what I mean, but I want to know if bugs can live in a vacuum.”
He proceeded down the hall and broached the subject to another member of the staff. Faced with the same lack of enthusiasm for pursuing the matter further, Whitney tried another illustration. “I’ve been told that you can freeze a goldfish solidly in a cake of ice, where he certainly can’t get much oxygen, and can keep him there for a month or two. But if you thaw him out carefully he seems none the worse for his experience.” The second scientist replied, “Oh, you mean suspended animation.” Whitney once again explained that his interest was not in the terms but in finding an answer to the question.
Finally Whitney returned to his own laboratory and set to work. He placed a fly and a cockroach in a bell jar and removed the air. The two insects promptly keeled over. After approximately two hours, however, when he gradually admitted air again, the cockroach waved its feelers and staggered to its feet. Before long, both the cockroach and the fly were back in action.
'Willis Rodney Whitney', National Academy of Sciences, Biographical Memoirs (1960), 357-358.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Air (366)  |  Animation (6)  |  Answer (389)  |  Ask (420)  |  Asking (74)  |  Back (395)  |  Bell (35)  |  Both (496)  |  Burial (8)  |  Car (75)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Cockroach (6)  |  Down (455)  |  Emergence (35)  |  Enthusiasm (59)  |  Exclaim (15)  |  Exist (458)  |  Experience (494)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Explain (334)  |  Fall (243)  |  Farm (28)  |  Feeler (3)  |  Fly (153)  |  Freeze (6)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Hibernation (3)  |  Hour (192)  |  Ice (58)  |  Illustration (51)  |  Insect (89)  |  Interest (416)  |  Know (1538)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Lack (127)  |  Legion (4)  |  Letter (117)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Love (328)  |  Man (2252)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Month (91)  |  Mud (26)  |  Oxygen (77)  |  Point (584)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Pursuing (27)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Question (649)  |  Removal (12)  |  Return (133)  |  Run (158)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Set (400)  |  Snow (39)  |  Spring (140)  |  Student (317)  |  Subject (543)  |  Supply (100)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thaw (2)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Turtle (8)  |  Two (936)  |  Vacuum (41)  |  Want (504)  |  Willis R. Whitney (17)  |  Wild (96)  |  Work (1402)

The story of civilization is, in a sense, the story of engineering—that long and arduous struggle to make the forces of nature work for man’s good.
In The Ancient Engineers (1963), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Civilization (220)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Force (497)  |  Good (906)  |  Man (2252)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Sense (785)  |  Story (122)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Work (1402)

The story of scientific discovery has its own epic unity—a unity of purpose and endeavour—the single torch passing from hand to hand through the centuries; and the great moments of science when, after long labour, the pioneers saw their accumulated facts falling into a significant order—sometimes in the form of a law that revolutionised the whole world of thought—have an intense human interest, and belong essentially to the creative imagination of poetry.
In Prefactory Note, Watchers of the Sky (1922), v.
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulated (2)  |  Belong (168)  |  Belonging (36)  |  Century (319)  |  Creative (144)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  Endeavour (63)  |  Epic (12)  |  Essential (210)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Falling (6)  |  Form (976)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hand (149)  |  Human (1512)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Intense (22)  |  Interest (416)  |  Labor (200)  |  Law (913)  |  Moment (260)  |  Order (638)  |  Passing (76)  |  Pioneer (37)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Saw (160)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Significant (78)  |  Single (365)  |  Story (122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Torch (13)  |  Unity (81)  |  Whole (756)  |  Whole World (29)  |  World (1850)

The stream of thought flows on but most of its segments fall into the bottomless abyss of oblivion. Of some, no memory survives the instant of their passage. Of others, it is confined to a few moments, hours or days. Others, again, leave vestiges which are indestructible, and by means of which they may be recalled as long as life endures.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Abyss (30)  |  Bottomless (7)  |  Confine (26)  |  Endure (21)  |  Fall (243)  |  Flow (89)  |  Hour (192)  |  Indestructible (12)  |  Instant (46)  |  Leave (138)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Memory (144)  |  Moment (260)  |  Most (1728)  |  Oblivion (10)  |  Other (2233)  |  Passage (52)  |  Recall (11)  |  Segment (6)  |  Stream (83)  |  Survive (87)  |  Thought (995)  |  Vestige (11)

The strongest arguments prove nothing so long as the conclusions are not verified by experience. Experimental science is the queen of sciences and the goal of all speculation.
Opus Tertium. Translation as stated in Popular Science (Aug 1901), 337.
Science quotes on:  |  Argument (145)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Experience (494)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Goal (155)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Proof (304)  |  Prove (261)  |  Queen (14)  |  Speculation (137)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Verify (24)

The structure known, but not yet accessible by synthesis, is to the chemist what the unclimbed mountain, the uncharted sea, the untilled field, the unreached planet, are to other men … The unique challenge which chemical synthesis provides for the creative imagination and the skilled hand ensures that it will endure as long as men write books, paint pictures, and fashion things which are beautiful, or practical, or both.
In 'Art and Science in the Synthesis of Organic Compounds: Retrospect and Prospect', in Maeve O'Connor (ed.), Pointers and Pathways in Research (1963), 41.
Science quotes on:  |  Accessible (27)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Book (413)  |  Both (496)  |  Challenge (91)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Climbing (9)  |  Creative (144)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Ensure (27)  |  Field (378)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Known (453)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Other (2233)  |  Picture (148)  |  Planet (402)  |  Practical (225)  |  Practicality (7)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Sea (326)  |  Skill (116)  |  Structure (365)  |  Synthesis (58)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Uncharted (10)  |  Unique (72)  |  Will (2350)  |  Write (250)

The student should read his author with the most sustained attention, in order to discover the meaning of every sentence. If the book is well written, it will endure and repay his close attention: the text ought to be fairly intelligible, even without illustrative examples. Often, far too often, a reader hurries over the text without any sincere and vigorous effort to understand it; and rushes to some example to clear up what ought not to have been obscure, if it had been adequately considered. The habit of scrupulously investigating the text seems to me important on several grounds. The close scrutiny of language is a very valuable exercise both for studious and practical life. In the higher departments of mathematics the habit is indispensable: in the long investigations which occur there it would be impossible to interpose illustrative examples at every stage, the student must therefore encounter and master, sentence by sentence, an extensive and complicated argument.
In 'Private Study of Mathematics', Conflict of Studies and other Essays (1873), 67.
Science quotes on:  |  Adequately (4)  |  Argument (145)  |  Attention (196)  |  Author (175)  |  Book (413)  |  Both (496)  |  Clear (111)  |  Close (77)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Consider (428)  |  Department (93)  |  Discover (571)  |  Effort (243)  |  Encounter (23)  |  Endure (21)  |  Example (98)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Extensive (34)  |  Fairly (4)  |  Far (158)  |  Ground (222)  |  Habit (174)  |  High (370)  |  Hurry (16)  |  Important (229)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Indispensable (31)  |  Intelligible (35)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Language (308)  |  Life (1870)  |  Master (182)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Obscure (66)  |  Occur (151)  |  Often (109)  |  Order (638)  |  Practical (225)  |  Read (308)  |  Reader (42)  |  Repay (3)  |  Rush (18)  |  Scrupulous (7)  |  Scrutiny (15)  |  Seem (150)  |  Sentence (35)  |  Several (33)  |  Sincere (4)  |  Stage (152)  |  Student (317)  |  Studious (5)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)  |  Sustain (52)  |  Text (16)  |  Understand (648)  |  Value (393)  |  Vigorous (21)  |  Will (2350)  |  Write (250)

The sun and the moon and the stars would have disappeared long ago—as even their infinitely more numerous analogues on the earth beneath are likely to disappear—had they happened to be within the reach of predatory human hands.
In The Dance of Life (1923), 352.
Science quotes on:  |  Analogue (7)  |  Beneath (68)  |  Disappear (84)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Environment (239)  |  Hand (149)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Human (1512)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Likely (36)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  Moon (252)  |  More (2558)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Reach (286)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Sun (407)

The symbol A is not the counterpart of anything in familiar life. To the child the letter A would seem horribly abstract; so we give him a familiar conception along with it. “A was an Archer who shot at a frog.” This tides over his immediate difficulty; but he cannot make serious progress with word-building so long as Archers, Butchers, Captains, dance round the letters. The letters are abstract, and sooner or later he has to realise it. In physics we have outgrown archer and apple-pie definitions of the fundamental symbols. To a request to explain what an electron really is supposed to be we can only answer, “It is part of the A B C of physics”.
In Introduction to The Nature of the Physical World (1928), xiv.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Answer (389)  |  Apple (46)  |  Building (158)  |  Butcher (9)  |  Captain (16)  |  Child (333)  |  Conception (160)  |  Counterpart (11)  |  Dance (35)  |  Definition (238)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Electron (96)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Familiar (47)  |  Frog (44)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Letter (117)  |  Life (1870)  |  Outgrow (4)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Progress (492)  |  Realize (157)  |  Serious (98)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Tide (37)  |  Word (650)

The teacher manages to get along still with the cumbersome algebraic analysis, in spite of its difficulties and imperfections, and avoids the smooth infinitesimal calculus, although the eighteenth century shyness toward it had long lost all point.
Elementary Mathematics From an Advanced Standpoint (1908). 3rd edition (1924), trans. E. R. Hedrick and C. A. Noble (1932), Vol. 1, 155.
Science quotes on:  |  18th Century (21)  |  Algebra (117)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Calculus (65)  |  Century (319)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Imperfection (32)  |  Infinitesimal (30)  |  Manage (26)  |  Point (584)  |  Smooth (34)  |  Spite (55)  |  Still (614)  |  Teacher (154)

The telegraph is a kind of very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and he is mewing in Los Angeles. Radio operates in exactly the same way, except there is no cat.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Angeles (4)  |  Cat (52)  |  Exactly (14)  |  Kind (564)  |  Los (4)  |  Mew (2)  |  New (1273)  |  New York (17)  |  Operate (19)  |  Pull (43)  |  Radio (60)  |  Same (166)  |  Tail (21)  |  Telegraph (45)  |  Way (1214)

The tendency of the sciences has long been an increasing proclivity of separation and dismemberment … The mathematician turns away from the chemist; the chemist from the naturalist; the mathematician, left to himself divides himself into a pure mathematician and a mixed mathematician, who soon part company … And thus science, even mere physical science, loses all traces of unity. A curious illustration of this result may be observed in the want of any name by which we can designate the students of the knowledge of the material world collectively. We are informed that this difficulty was felt very oppressively by the members of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, at their meetings at York, Oxford and Cambridge, in the last three summers. There was no general term by which these gentlemen could describe themselves with reference to their pursuits … some ingenious gentleman [William Whewell] proposed that, by analogy with artist, they might form Scientist, and added that there could be no scruple … when we have words such as sciolist, economist, and atheist—but this was not generally palatable.
In Review of Mrs Somerville, 'On the Connexion of the Physical Sciences', The Quarterly Review (1834), 51, 58-61.
Science quotes on:  |  Advancement (63)  |  Analogy (76)  |  Artist (97)  |  Association (49)  |  Atheist (16)  |  British (42)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Company (63)  |  Curious (95)  |  Describe (132)  |  Description (89)  |  Designation (13)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Dismemberment (3)  |  Divide (77)  |  Division (67)  |  Economist (20)  |  Form (976)  |  General (521)  |  Gentleman (26)  |  Himself (461)  |  Illustration (51)  |  Inform (50)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Last (425)  |  Lose (165)  |  Material (366)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Name (359)  |  Naturalist (79)  |  Observed (149)  |  Oxford (16)  |  Palatable (3)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Proposal (21)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Result (700)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Sciolist (2)  |  Separation (60)  |  Soon (187)  |  Student (317)  |  Summer (56)  |  Tendency (110)  |  Term (357)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Trace (109)  |  Turn (454)  |  Unity (81)  |  Want (504)  |  William Whewell (70)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)

The theory of punctuated equilibrium, proposed by Niles Eldredge and myself, is not, as so often misunderstood, a radical claim for truly sudden change, but a recognition that ordinary processes of speciation, properly conceived as glacially slow by the standard of our own life-span, do not resolve into geological time as long sequences of insensibly graded intermediates (the traditional, or gradualistic, view), but as geologically ‘sudden’ origins at single bedding planes.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Bed (25)  |  Change (639)  |  Claim (154)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Do (1905)  |  Equilibrium (34)  |  Geological (11)  |  Grade (12)  |  Intermediate (38)  |  Life (1870)  |  Misunderstand (3)  |  Myself (211)  |  Often (109)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Origin (250)  |  Plane (22)  |  Process (439)  |  Properly (21)  |  Propose (24)  |  Punctuated Equilibrium (2)  |  Radical (28)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Resolve (43)  |  Sequence (68)  |  Single (365)  |  Slow (108)  |  Standard (64)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)  |  Traditional (16)  |  Truly (118)  |  View (496)

The theory that gravitational attraction is inversely proportional to the square of the distance leads by remorseless logic to the conclusion that the path of a planet should be an ellipse, … It is this logical thinking that is the real meat of the physical sciences. The social scientist keeps the skin and throws away the meat. … His theorems no more follow from his postulates than the hunches of a horse player follow logically from the latest racing news. The result is guesswork clad in long flowing robes of gobbledygook.
In Science is a Sacred Cow (1950), 149-150.
Science quotes on:  |  Attraction (61)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Distance (171)  |  Ellipse (8)  |  Follow (389)  |  Gambler (7)  |  Gravitation (72)  |  Guesswork (4)  |  Horse (78)  |  Hunch (5)  |  Inversely Proportional (7)  |  Lead (391)  |  Logic (311)  |  Meat (19)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1273)  |  News (36)  |  Path (159)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Planet (402)  |  Postulate (42)  |  Result (700)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Skin (48)  |  Social (261)  |  Social Science (37)  |  Square (73)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thinking (425)

The tragedy of deforestation in Amazonia as well as elsewhere in the tropics is that its costs, in... economic, social, cultural, and aesthetic terms, far outweigh its benefits. In many cases, destruction of the region’s rainforests is motivated by short-term gains rather than the long-term productive capacity of the land. And, as a result, deforestation usually leaves behind landscapes that are economically as well as ecologically impoverished.
From Anthony Bennett Anderson (ed.), Alternatives to Deforestation: Steps Toward Sustainable Use of the Amazon Rain Forest (1990), xi. As cited in Lykke E. Andersen (ed.), The Dynamics of Deforestation and Economic Growth in the Brazilian Amazon (2002), 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Aesthetic (48)  |  Amazon (11)  |  Behind (139)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Capacity (105)  |  Cost (94)  |  Cultural (26)  |  Deforestation (50)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Ecology (81)  |  Economic (84)  |  Economy (59)  |  Gain (146)  |  Impoverished (3)  |  Landscape (46)  |  Long-Term (11)  |  Motivate (8)  |  Motivated (14)  |  Outweigh (2)  |  Productive (37)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Result (700)  |  Short (200)  |  Short-Term (3)  |  Social (261)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Tragedy (31)  |  Tropic (2)  |  Usually (176)

The truth is, the Science of Nature has been already too long made only a work of the Brain and the Fancy: It is now high time that it should return to the plainness and soundness of Observations on material and obvious things.
Micrographia (1665). In Extracts from Micrographia (1906), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Brain (281)  |  Fancy (50)  |  High (370)  |  Material (366)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Observation (593)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Plainness (2)  |  Return (133)  |  Soundness (4)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Work (1402)

The United States is the most powerful technically advanced country in the world to-day. Its influence on the shaping of international relations is absolutely incalculable. But America is a large country and its people have so far not shown much interest in great international problems, among which the problem of disarmament occupies first place today. This must be changed, if only in the essential interests of the Americans. The last war has shown that there are no longer any barriers between the continents and that the destinies of all countries are closely interwoven. The people of this country must realize that they have a great responsibility in the sphere of international politics. The part of passive spectator is unworthy of this country and is bound in the end to lead to disaster all round.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Absolutely (41)  |  Advance (298)  |  America (143)  |  American (56)  |  Barrier (34)  |  Bind (26)  |  Bound (120)  |  Change (639)  |  Closely (12)  |  Continent (79)  |  Country (269)  |  Destiny (54)  |  Disarmament (6)  |  Disaster (58)  |  End (603)  |  Essential (210)  |  Far (158)  |  First (1302)  |  Great (1610)  |  Incalculable (4)  |  Influence (231)  |  Interest (416)  |  International (40)  |  Interwoven (10)  |  Large (398)  |  Last (425)  |  Lead (391)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Occupy (27)  |  Part (235)  |  Passive (8)  |  People (1031)  |  Place (192)  |  Politics (122)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Problem (731)  |  Realize (157)  |  Relation (166)  |  Responsibility (71)  |  Round (26)  |  Shape (77)  |  Show (353)  |  Spectator (11)  |  Sphere (118)  |  State (505)  |  Technically (5)  |  To-Day (6)  |  Today (321)  |  Unworthy (18)  |  United States (31)  |  War (233)  |  World (1850)

The value the world sets upon motives is often grossly unjust and inaccurate. Consider, for example, two of them: mere insatiable curiosity and the desire to do good. The latter is put high above the former, and yet it is the former that moves some of the greatest men the human race has yet produced: the scientific investigators. What animates a great pathologist? Is it the desire to cure disease, to save life? Surely not, save perhaps as an afterthought. He is too intelligent, deep down in his soul, to see anything praiseworthy in such a desire. He knows by life-long observation that his discoveries will do quite as much harm as good, that a thousand scoundrels will profit to every honest man, that the folks who most deserve to be saved will probably be the last to be saved. No man of self-respect could devote himself to pathology on such terms. What actually moves him is his unquenchable curiosity–his boundless, almost pathological thirst to penetrate the unknown, to uncover the secret, to find out what has not been found out before. His prototype is not the liberator releasing slaves, the good Samaritan lifting up the fallen, but the dog sniffing tremendously at an infinite series of rat-holes.
In 'Types of Men: The Scientist', Prejudices (1923), 269-70.
Science quotes on:  |  Afterthought (6)  |  Boundless (28)  |  Consider (428)  |  Cure (124)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Deep (241)  |  Deserve (65)  |  Desire (212)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Disease (340)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dog (70)  |  Down (455)  |  Find (1014)  |  Former (138)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Harm (43)  |  High (370)  |  Himself (461)  |  Honest (53)  |  Honesty (29)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Inaccurate (4)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Infinite Series (8)  |  Insatiable (7)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Investigator (71)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Liberator (2)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motive (62)  |  Move (223)  |  Observation (593)  |  Pathological (21)  |  Pathologist (6)  |  Pathology (19)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  Praise (28)  |  Produced (187)  |  Profit (56)  |  Prototype (9)  |  Race (278)  |  Rat (37)  |  Rat-Hole (2)  |  Respect (212)  |  Save (126)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scoundrel (8)  |  Secret (216)  |  See (1094)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Respect (3)  |  Series (153)  |  Set (400)  |  Slave (40)  |  Society (350)  |  Soul (235)  |  Surely (101)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thirst (11)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Two (936)  |  Uncover (20)  |  Unjust (6)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Value (393)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

The word “electromagnetic” which is used to characterize the phenomena produced by the conducting wires of the voltaic pile, … were those which M. Oersted discovered, exhibited by an electric current and a magnet. I have determined to use the word electrodynamic in order to unite under a common name all these phenomena, and particularly to designate those which I have observed between two voltaic conductors. It expresses their true character, that of being produced by electricity in motion: while the electric attractions and repulsions, which have been known for a long time, are electrostatic phenomena produced by the unequal distribution of electricity at rest in the bodies in which they are observed.
New terminology introduced in 'Experiments on the New Electrodynamical Phenomena', Annales de Chemie et de Physique (1822), Series 2, Vol. 20, 60. As translated in Dagobert David Runes (ed.), A Treasury of World Science (1962), 5.
Science quotes on:  |  Attraction (61)  |  Being (1276)  |  Character (259)  |  Common (447)  |  Conductor (17)  |  Current (122)  |  Discover (571)  |  Distribution (51)  |  Electric (76)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Electrodynamics (10)  |  Electromagnetic (2)  |  Electrostatic (7)  |  Known (453)  |  Magnet (22)  |  Motion (320)  |  Name (359)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Observed (149)  |  Hans Christian Oersted (5)  |  Order (638)  |  Produced (187)  |  Repulsion (7)  |  Rest (287)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Unequal (12)  |  Unite (43)  |  Use (771)  |  Voltaic (9)  |  Voltaic Pile (2)  |  Wire (36)  |  Word (650)

The world is not as it was when it came from its Maker’s hands. It has been modified by many great revolutions, brought about by an inner mechanism of which we very imperfectly comprehend the movements; but of which we gain a glimpse by studying their effects: and their many causes still acting on the surface of our globe with undiminished power, which are changing, and will continue to change it, as long as it shall last.
Letter 1 to William Wordsworth. Quoted in the appendix to W. Wordsworth, A Complete Guide to the Lakes, Comprising Minute Direction for the Tourist, with Mr Wordsworth's Description of the Scenery of the County and Three Letters upon the Geology of the Lake District (1841), 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Cause (561)  |  Change (639)  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Continue (179)  |  Effect (414)  |  Gain (146)  |  Globe (51)  |  Great (1610)  |  Imperfection (32)  |  Inner (72)  |  Last (425)  |  Maker (34)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Modification (57)  |  Movement (162)  |  Power (771)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Still (614)  |  Study (701)  |  Studying (70)  |  Surface (223)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

The world, I think, will wait a long time for Nikola Tesla's equal in achievement and imagination.
Attributed.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Nikola Tesla (39)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

Then if the first argument remains secure (for nobody will produce a neater one, than the length of the periodic time is a measure of the size of the spheres), the order of the orbits follows this sequence, beginning from the highest: The first and highest of all is the sphere of the fixed stars, which contains itself and all things, and is therefore motionless. It is the location of the universe, to which the motion and position of all the remaining stars is referred. For though some consider that it also changes in some respect, we shall assign another cause for its appearing to do so in our deduction of the Earth’s motion. There follows Saturn, the first of the wandering stars, which completes its circuit in thirty years. After it comes Jupiter which moves in a twelve-year long revolution. Next is Mars, which goes round biennially. An annual revolution holds the fourth place, in which as we have said is contained the Earth along with the lunar sphere which is like an epicycle. In fifth place Venus returns every nine months. Lastly, Mercury holds the sixth place, making a circuit in the space of eighty days. In the middle of all is the seat of the Sun. For who in this most beautiful of temples would put this lamp in any other or better place than the one from which it can illuminate everything at the same time? Aptly indeed is he named by some the lantern of the universe, by others the mind, by others the ruler. Trismegistus called him the visible God, Sophocles' Electra, the watcher over all things. Thus indeed the Sun as if seated on a royal throne governs his household of Stars as they circle around him. Earth also is by no means cheated of the Moon’s attendance, but as Aristotle says in his book On Animals the Moon has the closest affinity with the Earth. Meanwhile the Earth conceives from the Sun, and is made pregnant with annual offspring. We find, then, in this arrangement the marvellous symmetry of the universe, and a sure linking together in harmony of the motion and size of the spheres, such as could be perceived in no other way. For here one may understand, by attentive observation, why Jupiter appears to have a larger progression and retrogression than Saturn, and smaller than Mars, and again why Venus has larger ones than Mercury; why such a doubling back appears more frequently in Saturn than in Jupiter, and still more rarely in Mars and Venus than in Mercury; and furthermore why Saturn, Jupiter and Mars are nearer to the Earth when in opposition than in the region of their occultation by the Sun and re-appearance. Indeed Mars in particular at the time when it is visible throughout the night seems to equal Jupiter in size, though marked out by its reddish colour; yet it is scarcely distinguishable among stars of the second magnitude, though recognized by those who track it with careful attention. All these phenomena proceed from the same course, which lies in the motion of the Earth. But the fact that none of these phenomena appears in the fixed stars shows their immense elevation, which makes even the circle of their annual motion, or apparent motion, vanish from our eyes.
'Book One. Chapter X. The Order of the Heavenly Spheres', in Copernicus: On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres (1543), trans. A. M. Duncan (1976), 49-51.
Science quotes on:  |  Affinity (27)  |  Animal (651)  |  Apparent (85)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Argument (145)  |  Arrangement (93)  |  Attention (196)  |  Attentive (15)  |  Back (395)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Better (493)  |  Book (413)  |  Call (781)  |  Cause (561)  |  Change (639)  |  Cheat (13)  |  Circle (117)  |  Circuit (29)  |  Complete (209)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Consider (428)  |  Course (413)  |  Deduction (90)  |  Do (1905)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Elevation (13)  |  Everything (489)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  God (776)  |  Govern (66)  |  Harmony (105)  |  Immense (89)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Jupiter (28)  |  Lamp (37)  |  Lantern (8)  |  Lie (370)  |  Linking (8)  |  Location (15)  |  Magnitude (88)  |  Making (300)  |  Marked (55)  |  Mars (47)  |  Marvellous (25)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Measure (241)  |  Mercury (54)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Month (91)  |  Moon (252)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motion (320)  |  Move (223)  |  Nearer (45)  |  Next (238)  |  Nobody (103)  |  Observation (593)  |  Offspring (27)  |  Opposition (49)  |  Orbit (85)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Progression (23)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remaining (45)  |  Respect (212)  |  Retrogression (6)  |  Return (133)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Royal (56)  |  Ruler (21)  |  Saturn (15)  |  Say (989)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Sequence (68)  |  Show (353)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Space (523)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Still (614)  |  Sun (407)  |  Symmetry (44)  |  Temple (45)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Track (42)  |  Understand (648)  |  Universe (900)  |  Venus (21)  |  Visible (87)  |  Way (1214)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

There are children playing in the street who could solve some of my top problems in physics, because they have modes of sensory perception that I lost long ago.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  Lose (165)  |  Mode (43)  |  Perception (97)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Play (116)  |  Playing (42)  |  Problem (731)  |  Sensory (16)  |  Solve (145)  |  Street (25)  |  Top (100)

There are now several women astronauts who have a test pilot background, and that was not true for a long time. For quite some time, women at NASA only had scientific backgrounds. So it would’ve been impossible to have an all-women crew because there weren’t women pilots. But now it would be very possible!
Interview conducted on Scholastic website (20 Nov 1998).
Science quotes on:  |  Astronaut (34)  |  Background (44)  |  Crew (10)  |  Impossible (263)  |  NASA (12)  |  Possible (560)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Test (221)  |  Time (1911)  |  Woman (160)

There are science teachers who actually claim that they teach “a healthy skepticism.” They do not. They teach a profound gullibility, and their dupes, trained not to think for themselves, will swallow any egregious rot, provided it is dressed up with long words and an affectation of objectivity to make it sound scientific.
In Science is a Sacred Cow (1950), 189.
Science quotes on:  |  Affectation (4)  |  Claim (154)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dupe (5)  |  Gullibility (3)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Objectivity (17)  |  Profound (105)  |  Rot (9)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Skepticism (31)  |  Sound (187)  |  Swallow (32)  |  Teach (299)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Train (118)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)

There are something like ten million million million million million million million million million million million million million million (1 with eighty zeroes after it) particles in the region of the universe that we can observe. Where did they all come from? The answer is that, in quantum theory, particles can be created out of energy in the form of particle/antiparticle pairs. But that just raises the question of where the energy came from. The answer is that the total energy of the universe is exactly zero. The matter in the universe is made out of positive energy. However, the matter is all attracting itself by gravity. Two pieces of matter that are close to each other have less energy than the same two pieces a long way apart, because you have to expend energy to separate them against the gravitational force that is pulling them together. Thus, in a sense, the gravitational field has negative energy. In the case of a universe that is approximately uniform in space, one can show that this negative gravitational energy exactly cancels the positive energy represented by the matter. So the total energy of the universe is zero.
A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes (1988), 129.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Answer (389)  |  Antiparticle (4)  |  Energy (373)  |  Field (378)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Gravity (140)  |  Matter (821)  |  Negative (66)  |  Nuclear Particle (2)  |  Observe (179)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  Positive (98)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Question (649)  |  Represent (157)  |  Sense (785)  |  Separate (151)  |  Show (353)  |  Something (718)  |  Space (523)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Together (392)  |  Total (95)  |  Two (936)  |  Universe (900)  |  Way (1214)  |  Zero (38)

There are still psychologists who, in a basic misunderstanding, think that gestalt theory tends to underestimate the role of past experience. Gestalt theory tries to differentiate between and-summative aggregates, on the one hand, and gestalten, structures, on the other, both in sub-wholes and in the total field, and to develop appropriate scientific tools for investigating the latter. It opposes the dogmatic application to all cases of what is adequate only for piecemeal aggregates. The question is whether an approach in piecemeal terms, through blind connections, is or is not adequate to interpret actual thought processes and the role of the past experience as well. Past experience has to be considered thoroughly, but it is ambiguous in itself; so long as it is taken in piecemeal, blind terms it is not the magic key to solve all problems.
In Productive Thinking (1959), 65.
Science quotes on:  |  Actual (118)  |  Adequate (50)  |  Aggregate (24)  |  Ambiguous (14)  |  Application (257)  |  Approach (112)  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Basic (144)  |  Blind (98)  |  Both (496)  |  Connection (171)  |  Consider (428)  |  Develop (278)  |  Differentiate (19)  |  Dogmatic (8)  |  Experience (494)  |  Field (378)  |  Gestalt (3)  |  Interpret (25)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Key (56)  |  Magic (92)  |  Misunderstanding (13)  |  Oppose (27)  |  Other (2233)  |  Past (355)  |  Piecemeal (3)  |  Problem (731)  |  Process (439)  |  Psychologist (26)  |  Question (649)  |  Role (86)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Solve (145)  |  Still (614)  |  Structure (365)  |  Tend (124)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thoroughly (67)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Tool (129)  |  Total (95)  |  Try (296)  |  Underestimate (7)  |  Whole (756)

There are three side effects of acid. Enhanced long term memory, decreased short term memory, and I forgot the third.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Acid (83)  |  Decrease (16)  |  Effect (414)  |  Enhance (17)  |  Forget (125)  |  Long Term (4)  |  Memory (144)  |  Short (200)  |  Side (236)  |  Term (357)  |  Third (17)

There are, and always have been, destructive pseudo-scientific notions linked to race and religion; these are the most widespread and damaging. Hopefully, educated people can succeed in shedding light into these areas of prejudice and ignorance, for as Voltaire once said: “Men will commit atrocities as long as they believe absurdities.”
From an article in a periodical of Miami-Dade Junior College by Bernard Sussman, 'Exclusive Interview with Martin Gardner', Southwind (Fall 1968), 3, No. 1, 7-11. As quoted and cited in Dana Richards, 'Martin Gardner: A “Documentary”', collected in Elwyn R. Berlekamp and Tom Rodgers (ed.) The Mathemagician and Pied Puzzler: A Collection in Tribute to Martin Gardner (1999), 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurdity (34)  |  Atrocity (6)  |  Belief (615)  |  Commit (43)  |  Damage (38)  |  Destructive (10)  |  Educated (12)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Light (635)  |  Link (48)  |  Most (1728)  |  Notion (120)  |  People (1031)  |  Prejudice (96)  |  Pseudoscience (17)  |  Race (278)  |  Religion (369)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Shedding (3)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Widespread (23)  |  Will (2350)

There is a story that once, not long after he came to Berlin, Planck forgot which room had been assigned to him for a lecture and stopped at the entrance office of the university to find out. Please tell me, he asked the elderly man in charge, “In which room does Professor Planck lecture today?” The old man patted him on the shoulder “Don't go there, young fellow,” he said “You are much too young to understand the lectures of our learned Professor Planck.”
Anonymous
In Barbara Lovett Cline, Men Who Made a New Physics: Physicists and the Quantum Theory (1987), 46.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Asking (74)  |  Assignment (12)  |  Berlin (10)  |  Charge (63)  |  Entrance (16)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Find (1014)  |  Forgetting (13)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Learning (291)  |  Lecture (111)  |  Man (2252)  |  Office (71)  |  Old (499)  |  Max Planck (83)  |  Please (68)  |  Professor (133)  |  Room (42)  |  Shoulder (33)  |  Story (122)  |  Tell (344)  |  Today (321)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  University (130)  |  Young (253)

There is no doubt but men of genius and leisure may carry our method to greater perfection, but, having had long experience, we have found none equal to it for the commodiousness it affords in working with the Understanding.
In 'Scala Intellectus', The Works of Francis Bacon (1815), Vol. 11, 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Carry (130)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Experience (494)  |  Genius (301)  |  Greater (288)  |  Leisure (25)  |  Method (531)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Understanding (527)

There is no doubt that human survival will continue to depend more and more on human intellect and technology. It is idle to argue whether this is good or bad. The point of no return was passed long ago, before anyone knew it was happening.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Anyone (38)  |  Argue (25)  |  Bad (185)  |  Continue (179)  |  Depend (238)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Good (906)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happening (59)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Intellect (32)  |  Idle (34)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Know (1538)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  More (2558)  |  Pass (241)  |  Point (584)  |  Return (133)  |  Survival (105)  |  Technology (281)  |  Will (2350)

There is no doubt that many expensive national projects may add to our prestige or serve science. But none of them must take precedence over human needs. As long as Congress does not revise its priorities, our crisis is not just material, it is a crisis of the spirit.
Considering the city of New York's financial shortfall.
Letter as governor of New York to Mayor John V. Lindsay (24 Apr 1971), New York Times (25 Apr 1971), 69
Science quotes on:  |  City (87)  |  Congress (20)  |  Crisis (25)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Government (116)  |  Human (1512)  |  Material (366)  |  Must (1525)  |  New (1273)  |  Prestige (16)  |  Project (77)  |  Spirit (278)

There is no question but that man’s heart outperforms all other hearts in existence. (The tortoise’s heart may last longer but it lives nowhere near as intensely.) Why man should be so long-lived is not known, but man, being what he is, is far more interested in asking why he does not live still longer.
In The Human Body: Its Structure and Operation (1963), 321. Also in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 216.
Science quotes on:  |  Asking (74)  |  Being (1276)  |  Existence (481)  |  Heart (243)  |  Human (1512)  |  Intensity (34)  |  Interest (416)  |  Known (453)  |  Last (425)  |  Live (650)  |  Long-Lived (2)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Other (2233)  |  Question (649)  |  Still (614)  |  Tortoise (10)  |  Why (491)

There is no short cut, nor “royal road” to the attainment of medical knowledge. The path which we have to pursue is long, difficult, and unsafe. In our progress, we must frequently take up our abode with death and corruption, we must adopt loathsome diseases for our familiar associates, or we shall never be acquainted with their nature and dispositions ; we must risk, nay, even injure our own health, in order to be able to preserve, or restore that of others.
Hunterian Oration (1819). Quoted in Clement Carlyon, Early Years and Late Reflections (1856), 110-111.
Science quotes on:  |  Associate (25)  |  Attainment (48)  |  Corruption (17)  |  Cut (116)  |  Death (406)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Disease (340)  |  Disposition (44)  |  Education (423)  |  Health (210)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Path (159)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Progress (492)  |  Pursue (63)  |  Risk (68)  |  Royal (56)  |  Short (200)

There is not a soul on Earth who can read the deluge of physics publications in its entirety. As a result, it is sad but true that physics has irretrievably fallen apart from a cohesive to a fragmented discipline. … It was not that long ago that people were complaining about two cultures. If we only had it that good today.
In 'The Physical Review Then and Now', in H. Henry Stroke, Physical Review: The First Hundred Years: a Selection of Seminal Papers and Commentaries, Vol. 1, 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Cohesive (4)  |  Complaint (13)  |  Culture (157)  |  Deluge (14)  |  Discipline (85)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Entirety (6)  |  Fragment (58)  |  Good (906)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  People (1031)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Publication (102)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Result (700)  |  Soul (235)  |  Today (321)  |  Two (936)

There is now a feeling that the pieces of physics are falling into place, not because of any single revolutionary idea or because of the efforts of any one physicist, but because of a flowering of many seeds of theory, most of them planted long ago.
In 'The Forces of Nature', Bulletin of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (Jan 1976), 29:4, 14.
Science quotes on:  |  Effort (243)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Flowering (2)  |  Idea (881)  |  Most (1728)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physics (564)  |  Piece (39)  |  Plant (320)  |  Revolutionary (31)  |  Seed (97)  |  Single (365)  |  Theory (1015)

There is one great difficulty with a good hypothesis. When it is completed and rounded, the corners smooth and the content cohesive and coherent, it is likely to become a thing in itself, a work of art. It is then like a finished sonnet or a painting completed. One hates to disturb it. Even if subsequent information should shoot a hole in it, one hates to tear it down because it once was beautiful and whole. One of our leading scientists, having reasoned a reef in the Pacific, was unable for a long time to reconcile the lack of a reef, indicated by soundings, with the reef his mind told him was there.
In John Steinbeck and Edward Flanders Ricketts Sea of Cortez: a Leisurely Journal of Travel and Research (1941), 179-80.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Become (821)  |  Coherence (13)  |  Cohesion (7)  |  Cohesive (4)  |  Completed (30)  |  Completeness (19)  |  Completion (23)  |  Content (75)  |  Corner (59)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Disturb (31)  |  Disturbance (34)  |  Down (455)  |  Finish (62)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hate (68)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Information (173)  |  Lack (127)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Painting (46)  |  Proof (304)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reconcile (19)  |  Reef (7)  |  Rounded (2)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Smooth (34)  |  Smoothness (3)  |  Sonnet (5)  |  Sounding (2)  |  Subsequent (34)  |  Tear (48)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Whole (756)  |  Work (1402)

There is thus a possibility that the ancient dream of philosophers to connect all Nature with the properties of whole numbers will some day be realized. To do so physics will have to develop a long way to establish the details of how the correspondence is to be made. One hint for this development seems pretty obvious, namely, the study of whole numbers in modern mathematics is inextricably bound up with the theory of functions of a complex variable, which theory we have already seen has a good chance of forming the basis of the physics of the future. The working out of this idea would lead to a connection between atomic theory and cosmology.
From Lecture delivered on presentation of the James Scott prize, (6 Feb 1939), 'The Relation Between Mathematics And Physics', printed in Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (1938-1939), 59, Part 2, 129.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Atomic Theory (16)  |  Basis (180)  |  Bound (120)  |  Chance (244)  |  Complex (202)  |  Connect (126)  |  Connection (171)  |  Correspondence (24)  |  Cosmology (26)  |  Detail (150)  |  Develop (278)  |  Development (441)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dream (222)  |  Establish (63)  |  Forming (42)  |  Function (235)  |  Future (467)  |  Good (906)  |  Hint (21)  |  Idea (881)  |  Lead (391)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Mathematics (50)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Number (710)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Property (177)  |  Realize (157)  |  Study (701)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Variable (37)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whole (756)  |  Whole Number (2)  |  Will (2350)

There must be no barriers to freedom of inquiry. There is no place for dogma in science. The scientist is free, and must be free to ask any question, to doubt any assertion, to seek for any evidence, to correct any errors. ... Our political life is also predicated on openness. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it and that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire. And we know that as long as men are free to ask what they must, free to say what they think, free to think what they will, freedom can never be lost, and science can never regress.
Life (10 Oct 1949), 136.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Barrier (34)  |  Detect (45)  |  Dogma (49)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Error (339)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Free (239)  |  Freedom (145)  |  Inquire (26)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Know (1538)  |  Life (1870)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  Openness (8)  |  Political (124)  |  Politics (122)  |  Question (649)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Seek (218)  |  Think (1122)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

There rolls the deep where grew the tree.
O earth, what changes hast thou seen!
There where the long street roars, hath been
The stillness of the central sea.
The hills are shadows, and they flow
From form to form, and nothing stands;
They melt like mist, the solid lands,
Like clouds they shape themselves and go.
In Memoriam A. H. H. (1850), canto 123. Collected in Alfred Tennyson and William James Rolfe (ed.) The Poetic and Dramatic works of Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1898), 194.
Science quotes on:  |  Central (81)  |  Change (639)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Deep (241)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Flow (89)  |  Form (976)  |  Hill (23)  |  Land (131)  |  Melting (6)  |  Mist (17)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Roar (6)  |  Roll (41)  |  Sea (326)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Shadow (73)  |  Shape (77)  |  Solid (119)  |  Stand (284)  |  Stillness (5)  |  Street (25)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Tree (269)

There were tides in the new earth, long before there was an ocean.
In The Sea Around Us (1951), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Earth (1076)  |  New (1273)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Oceanography (17)  |  Tide (37)

There’s a touch of the priesthood in the academic world, a sense that a scholar should not be distracted by the mundane tasks of day-to-day living. I used to have great stretches of time to work. Now I have research thoughts while making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Sure it’s impossible to write down ideas while reading “Curious George” to a two-year-old. On the other hand, as my husband was leaving graduate school for his first job, his thesis advisor told him, “You may wonder how a professor gets any research done when one has to teach, advise students, serve on committees, referee papers, write letters of recommendation, interview prospective faculty. Well, I take long showers.”
In 'In Her Own Words: Six Mathematicians Comment on Their Lives and Careers: Susan Landau', Notices of the AMS (Sep 1991), 38, No. 7, 704.
Science quotes on:  |  Advise (7)  |  Advisor (3)  |  Butter (8)  |  Child (333)  |  Committee (16)  |  Curious (95)  |  Distract (6)  |  Down (455)  |  Faculty (76)  |  First (1302)  |  Graduate (32)  |  Great (1610)  |  Husband (13)  |  Idea (881)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Interview (5)  |  Jelly (6)  |  Job (86)  |  Letter (117)  |  Living (492)  |  Making (300)  |  Mundane (2)  |  Old (499)  |  On The Other Hand (40)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paper (192)  |  Priesthood (3)  |  Professor (133)  |  Prospective (7)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Recommendation (12)  |  Referee (8)  |  Research (753)  |  Scholar (52)  |  School (227)  |  Sense (785)  |  Serve (64)  |  Shower (7)  |  Student (317)  |  Task (152)  |  Teach (299)  |  Thesis (17)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Touch (146)  |  Two (936)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)  |  Write (250)  |  Year (963)

Therefore it is by no means an idle game if we become practiced in analysing long-held commonplace concepts and showing the circumstances on which their justification and usefulness depend, and how they have grown up, individually, out of the givens of experience. Thus their excessive authority will be broken.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Analyse (4)  |  Authority (99)  |  Become (821)  |  Break (109)  |  Broken (56)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Commonplace (24)  |  Concept (242)  |  Depend (238)  |  Excessive (24)  |  Experience (494)  |  Game (104)  |  Givens (2)  |  Grow (247)  |  Idle (34)  |  Individually (2)  |  Justification (52)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Practice (212)  |  Show (353)  |  Usefulness (92)  |  Will (2350)

Therefore on long pondering this uncertainty of mathematical traditions on the deduction of the motions of the system of the spheres, I began to feel disgusted that no more certain theory of the motions of the mechanisms of the universe, which has been established for us by the best and most systematic craftsman of all, was agreed by the philosophers, who otherwise theorised so minutely with most careful attention to the details of this system. I therefore set myself the task of reading again the books of all philosophers which were available to me, to search out whether anyone had ever believed that the motions of the spheres of the, universe were other than was supposed by those who professed mathematics in the schools.
'To His Holiness Pope Paul III', in Copernicus: On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres (1543), trans. A. M. Duncan (1976), 25.
Science quotes on:  |  Attention (196)  |  Available (80)  |  Best (467)  |  Book (413)  |  Certain (557)  |  Craftsman (5)  |  Deduction (90)  |  Detail (150)  |  Disgust (10)  |  Feel (371)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motion (320)  |  Myself (211)  |  Other (2233)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Profess (21)  |  Reading (136)  |  School (227)  |  Search (175)  |  Set (400)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Sphere (118)  |  System (545)  |  Systematic (58)  |  Task (152)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Tradition (76)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Universe (900)

They have come a long way, those replicators. Now they go by the name of genes, and we are their survival machines.
Concluding sentences, Ch. 2, The Selfish Gene: 30th Anniversary Edition (1976, 2006), 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Gene (105)  |  Machine (271)  |  Name (359)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Replicator (3)  |  Survival (105)

They say it doesn’t matter how long one washes one’s hands, because there will still be organisms in the sweat glands and hair follicles, so I rub my hands with Vaseline.
Reginald Pound and Michael Joseph, Harley Street (1967), 31.
Science quotes on:  |  Gland (14)  |  Hygiene (13)  |  Matter (821)  |  Organism (231)  |  Say (989)  |  Still (614)  |  Will (2350)

Think of the image of the world in a convex mirror. ... A well-made convex mirror of moderate aperture represents the objects in front of it as apparently solid and in fixed positions behind its surface. But the images of the distant horizon and of the sun in the sky lie behind the mirror at a limited distance, equal to its focal length. Between these and the surface of the mirror are found the images of all the other objects before it, but the images are diminished and flattened in proportion to the distance of their objects from the mirror. ... Yet every straight line or plane in the outer world is represented by a straight line or plane in the image. The image of a man measuring with a rule a straight line from the mirror, would contract more and more the farther he went, but with his shrunken rule the man in the image would count out exactly the same results as in the outer world, all lines of sight in the mirror would be represented by straight lines of sight in the mirror. In short, I do not see how men in the mirror are to discover that their bodies are not rigid solids and their experiences good examples of the correctness of Euclidean axioms. But if they could look out upon our world as we look into theirs without overstepping the boundary, they must declare it to be a picture in a spherical mirror, and would speak of us just as we speak of them; and if two inhabitants of the different worlds could communicate with one another, neither, as far as I can see, would be able to convince the other that he had the true, the other the distorted, relation. Indeed I cannot see that such a question would have any meaning at all, so long as mechanical considerations are not mixed up with it.
In 'On the Origin and Significance of Geometrical Axioms,' Popular Scientific Lectures< Second Series (1881), 57-59. In Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica (1914), 357-358.
Science quotes on:  |  Aperture (5)  |  Axiom (65)  |  Behind (139)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Communicate (39)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Convex (6)  |  Convince (43)  |  Count (107)  |  Declare (48)  |  Different (595)  |  Discover (571)  |  Distance (171)  |  Distort (22)  |  Distortion (13)  |  Do (1905)  |  Euclid (60)  |  Experience (494)  |  Farther (51)  |  Focal Length (2)  |  Good (906)  |  Horizon (47)  |  Image (97)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Inhabitant (50)  |  Lie (370)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Line (100)  |  Look (584)  |  Man (2252)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Mirror (43)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Object (438)  |  Other (2233)  |  Picture (148)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Question (649)  |  Represent (157)  |  Result (700)  |  Rigid (24)  |  Rule (307)  |  See (1094)  |  Short (200)  |  Sight (135)  |  Sky (174)  |  Solid (119)  |  Speak (240)  |  Straight (75)  |  Straight Line (34)  |  Sun (407)  |  Surface (223)  |  Think (1122)  |  Two (936)  |  World (1850)

This [the fact that the pursuit of mathematics brings into harmonious action all the faculties of the human mind] accounts for the extraordinary longevity of all the greatest masters of the Analytic art, the Dii Majores of the mathematical Pantheon. Leibnitz lived to the age of 70; Euler to 76; Lagrange to 77; Laplace to 78; Gauss to 78; Plato, the supposed inventor of the conic sections, who made mathematics his study and delight, who called them the handles or aids to philosophy, the medicine of the soul, and is said never to have let a day go by without inventing some new theorems, lived to 82; Newton, the crown and glory of his race, to 85; Archimedes, the nearest akin, probably, to Newton in genius, was 75, and might have lived on to be 100, for aught we can guess to the contrary, when he was slain by the impatient and ill mannered sergeant, sent to bring him before the Roman general, in the full vigour of his faculties, and in the very act of working out a problem; Pythagoras, in whose school, I believe, the word mathematician (used, however, in a somewhat wider than its present sense) originated, the second founder of geometry, the inventor of the matchless theorem which goes by his name, the pre-cognizer of the undoubtedly mis-called Copernican theory, the discoverer of the regular solids and the musical canon who stands at the very apex of this pyramid of fame, (if we may credit the tradition) after spending 22 years studying in Egypt, and 12 in Babylon, opened school when 56 or 57 years old in Magna Græcia, married a young wife when past 60, and died, carrying on his work with energy unspent to the last, at the age of 99. The mathematician lives long and lives young; the wings of his soul do not early drop off, nor do its pores become clogged with the earthy particles blown from the dusty highways of vulgar life.
In Presidential Address to the British Association, Collected Mathematical Papers, Vol. 2 (1908), 658.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Act (278)  |  Action (342)  |  Age (509)  |  Aid (101)  |  Akin (5)  |  Analytic (11)  |  Apex (6)  |  Archimedes (63)  |  Art (680)  |  Aught (6)  |  Babylon (7)  |  Become (821)  |  Belief (615)  |  Blow (45)  |  Bring (95)  |  Call (781)  |  Called (9)  |  Canon (3)  |  Carry (130)  |  Clog (5)  |  Conic Section (8)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Copernican Theory (3)  |  Credit (24)  |  Crown (39)  |  Delight (111)  |  Die (94)  |  Discoverer (43)  |  Do (1905)  |  Drop (77)  |  Dusty (8)  |  Early (196)  |  Egypt (31)  |  Energy (373)  |  Leonhard Euler (35)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Faculty (76)  |  Fame (51)  |  Founder (26)  |  Full (68)  |  Carl Friedrich Gauss (79)  |  General (521)  |  Genius (301)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Glory (66)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Guess (67)  |  Handle (29)  |  Harmonious (18)  |  Highway (15)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Impatient (4)  |  Invent (57)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Count Joseph-Louis de Lagrange (26)  |  Pierre-Simon Laplace (63)  |  Last (425)  |  Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (51)  |  Let (64)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Longevity (6)  |  Manner (62)  |  Marry (11)  |  Master (182)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Musical (10)  |  Name (359)  |  Never (1089)  |  New (1273)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Old (499)  |  Open (277)  |  Originate (39)  |  Pantheon (2)  |  Particle (200)  |  Past (355)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Plato (80)  |  Pore (7)  |  Present (630)  |  Probably (50)  |  Problem (731)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Pyramid (9)  |  Pythagoras (38)  |  Race (278)  |  Regular (48)  |  Roman (39)  |  Say (989)  |  School (227)  |  Second (66)  |  Send (23)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sergeant (2)  |  Solid (119)  |  Soul (235)  |  Spend (97)  |  Spending (24)  |  Stand (284)  |  Study (701)  |  Studying (70)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Tradition (76)  |  Undoubtedly (3)  |  Vigour (18)  |  Vulgar (33)  |  Wide (97)  |  Wife (41)  |  Wing (79)  |  Word (650)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)  |  Young (253)

This Academy [at Lagado] is not an entire single Building, but a Continuation of several Houses on both Sides of a Street; which growing waste, was purchased and applied to that Use.
I was received very kindly by the Warden, and went for many Days to the Academy. Every Room hath in it ' one or more Projectors; and I believe I could not be in fewer than five Hundred Rooms.
The first Man I saw was of a meagre Aspect, with sooty Hands and Face, his Hair and Beard long, ragged and singed in several Places. His Clothes, Shirt, and Skin were all of the same Colour. He had been Eight Years upon a Project for extracting Sun-Beams out of Cucumbers, which were to be put into Vials hermetically sealed, and let out to warm the Air in raw inclement Summers. He told me, he did not doubt in Eight Years more, that he should be able to supply the Governor's Gardens with Sunshine at a reasonable Rate; but he complained that his Stock was low, and interested me to give him something as an Encouragement to Ingenuity, especially since this had been a very dear Season for Cucumbers. I made him a small Present, for my Lord had furnished me with Money on purpose, because he knew their Practice of begging from all who go to see them.
I saw another at work to calcine Ice into Gunpowder; who likewise shewed me a Treatise he had written concerning the Malleability of Fire, which he intended to publish.
There was a most ingenious Architect who had contrived a new Method for building Houses, by beginning at the Roof, and working downwards to the Foundation; which he justified to me by the life Practice of those two prudent Insects the Bee and the Spider.
In another Apartment I was highly pleased with a Projector, who had found a device of plowing the Ground with Hogs, to save the Charges of Plows, Cattle, and Labour. The Method is this: In an Acre of Ground you bury at six Inches Distance, and eight deep, a quantity of Acorns, Dates, Chestnuts, and other Masts or Vegetables whereof these Animals are fondest; then you drive six Hundred or more of them into the Field, where in a few Days they will root up the whole Ground in search of their Food, and make it fit for sowing, at the same time manuring it with their Dung. It is true, upon Experiment they found the Charge and Trouble very great, and they had little or no Crop. However, it is not doubted that this Invention may be capable of great Improvement.
I had hitherto seen only one Side of the Academy, the other being appropriated to the Advancers of speculative Learning.
Some were condensing Air into a dry tangible Substance, by extracting the Nitre, and letting the acqueous or fluid Particles percolate: Others softening Marble for Pillows and Pin-cushions. Another was, by a certain Composition of Gums, Minerals, and Vegetables outwardly applied, to prevent the Growth of Wool upon two young lambs; and he hoped in a reasonable Time to propagate the Breed of naked Sheep all over the Kingdom.
Gulliver's Travels (1726, Penguin ed. 1967), Part III, Chap. 5, 223.
Science quotes on:  |  Academy (37)  |  Acorn (5)  |  Acre (13)  |  Air (366)  |  Animal (651)  |  Applied (176)  |  Architect (32)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Beam (26)  |  Bee (44)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Being (1276)  |  Both (496)  |  Breed (26)  |  Building (158)  |  Capable (174)  |  Cattle (18)  |  Certain (557)  |  Charge (63)  |  Chestnut (2)  |  Composition (86)  |  Continuation (20)  |  Crop (26)  |  Cucumber (4)  |  Date (14)  |  Deep (241)  |  Device (71)  |  Distance (171)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Dry (65)  |  Dung (10)  |  Encouragement (27)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Face (214)  |  Field (378)  |  Fire (203)  |  First (1302)  |  Fit (139)  |  Fluid (54)  |  Food (213)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Furnish (97)  |  Garden (64)  |  Governor (13)  |  Great (1610)  |  Ground (222)  |  Growing (99)  |  Growth (200)  |  Gunpowder (18)  |  Hermetic Seal (2)  |  Hog (4)  |  House (143)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Ice (58)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Ingenuity (42)  |  Insect (89)  |  Interest (416)  |  Invention (400)  |  Kingdom (80)  |  Labor (200)  |  Lamb (6)  |  Learning (291)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Lord (97)  |  Low (86)  |  Man (2252)  |  Marble (21)  |  Mast (3)  |  Method (531)  |  Mineral (66)  |  Money (178)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  Pillow (4)  |  Pin (20)  |  Plow (7)  |  Practice (212)  |  Present (630)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Project (77)  |  Projector (3)  |  Publish (42)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Raw (28)  |  Root (121)  |  Save (126)  |  Saw (160)  |  Seal (19)  |  Search (175)  |  Season (47)  |  See (1094)  |  Sheep (13)  |  Side (236)  |  Single (365)  |  Skin (48)  |  Small (489)  |  Something (718)  |  Soot (11)  |  Sowing (9)  |  Spider (14)  |  Substance (253)  |  Summer (56)  |  Sun (407)  |  Sunbeam (3)  |  Supply (100)  |  Tangible (15)  |  Time (1911)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Two (936)  |  Use (771)  |  Vegetable (49)  |  Vial (4)  |  Warm (74)  |  Warmth (21)  |  Waste (109)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wool (4)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)  |  Young (253)

This compassion, or sympathy with the pains of others, ought also to extend to the brute creation, as far as our necessities will admit; for we cannot exist long without the destruction of other animal or vegetable beings either in their mature or embryon state. Such is the condition of mortality, that the first law of nature is “eat, or be eaten.” Hence for the preservation of our existence we may be supposed to have a natural right to kill those brute creatures, which we want to eat, or which want to eat us; but to destroy even insects wantonly shows an unreflecting mind, or a depraved heart.
In A Plan for the Conduct of Female Education in Boarding Schools (1797), 48.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Being (1276)  |  Brute (30)  |  Compassion (12)  |  Condition (362)  |  Creation (350)  |  Creature (242)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Eat (108)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Extend (129)  |  First (1302)  |  Heart (243)  |  Insect (89)  |  Kill (100)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Nature (80)  |  Mature (17)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pain (144)  |  Right (473)  |  Show (353)  |  State (505)  |  Sympathy (35)  |  Vegetable (49)  |  Want (504)  |  Will (2350)

This long disease, my life.
'Epistle to Dr Arbuthnot' (1735). In John Butt (ed.), The Poems of Alexander Pope (1965), 602.
Science quotes on:  |  Disease (340)  |  Life (1870)

This part of optics [perspectiva], when well understood, shows us how we may make things a very long way off appear to be placed very close, and large near things appear very small, and how we may make small things placed at a distance appear as large as we want, so that it is possible for us to read the smallest letters at an incredible distance, or to count sand, or grain, or seeds, or any sort of minute objects.
Describing the use of a lens for magnification.
De iride, in Baur, Die philosophischen Werke, 74.
Science quotes on:  |  Count (107)  |  Distance (171)  |  Grain (50)  |  Incredible (43)  |  Large (398)  |  Lens (15)  |  Letter (117)  |  Magnification (10)  |  Minute (129)  |  Object (438)  |  Optics (24)  |  Possible (560)  |  Read (308)  |  Sand (63)  |  Seed (97)  |  Show (353)  |  Small (489)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Understood (155)  |  Use (771)  |  Want (504)  |  Way (1214)

This whole theory of electrostatics constitutes a group of abstract ideas and general propositions, formulated in the clear and precise language of geometry and algebra, and connected with one another by the rules of strict logic. This whole fully satisfies the reason of a French physicist and his taste for clarity, simplicity and order. The same does not hold for the Englishman. These abstract notions of material points, force, line of force, and equipotential surface do not satisfy his need to imagine concrete, material, visible, and tangible things. 'So long as we cling to this mode of representation,' says an English physicist, 'we cannot form a mental representation of the phenomena which are really happening.' It is to satisfy the need that he goes and creates a model.
The French or German physicist conceives, in the space separating two conductors, abstract lines of force having no thickness or real existence; the English physicist materializes these lines and thickens them to the dimensions of a tube which he will fill with vulcanised rubber. In place of a family of lines of ideal forces, conceivable only by reason, he will have a bundle of elastic strings, visible and tangible, firmly glued at both ends to the surfaces of the two conductors, and, when stretched, trying both to contact and to expand. When the two conductors approach each other, he sees the elastic strings drawing closer together; then he sees each of them bunch up and grow large. Such is the famous model of electrostatic action imagined by Faraday and admired as a work of genius by Maxwell and the whole English school.
The employment of similar mechanical models, recalling by certain more or less rough analogies the particular features of the theory being expounded, is a regular feature of the English treatises on physics. Here is a book* [by Oliver Lodge] intended to expound the modern theories of electricity and to expound a new theory. In it are nothing but strings which move around pulleys, which roll around drums, which go through pearl beads, which carry weights; and tubes which pump water while others swell and contract; toothed wheels which are geared to one another and engage hooks. We thought we were entering the tranquil and neatly ordered abode of reason, but we find ourselves in a factory.
*Footnote: O. Lodge, Les Théories Modernes (Modern Views on Electricity) (1889), 16.
The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (1906), 2nd edition (1914), trans. Philip P. Wiener (1954), 70-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Action (342)  |  Algebra (117)  |  Approach (112)  |  Being (1276)  |  Book (413)  |  Both (496)  |  Carry (130)  |  Certain (557)  |  Clarity (49)  |  Closer (43)  |  Conceivable (28)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Concrete (55)  |  Conductor (17)  |  Connect (126)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Contact (66)  |  Create (245)  |  Dimension (64)  |  Do (1905)  |  Drawing (56)  |  Drum (8)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Electrostatic (7)  |  Electrostatics (6)  |  Employment (34)  |  End (603)  |  Engage (41)  |  Existence (481)  |  Expand (56)  |  Factory (20)  |  Family (101)  |  Find (1014)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  General (521)  |  Genius (301)  |  Geometry (271)  |  German (37)  |  Grow (247)  |  Happening (59)  |  Idea (881)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Language (308)  |  Large (398)  |  Sir Oliver Joseph Lodge (13)  |  Logic (311)  |  Material (366)  |  Materialize (2)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  James Clerk Maxwell (91)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Mental (179)  |  Model (106)  |  Modern (402)  |  More (2558)  |  More Or Less (71)  |  Move (223)  |  New (1273)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Notion (120)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physics (564)  |  Point (584)  |  Precise (71)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Reason (766)  |  Regular (48)  |  Representation (55)  |  Roll (41)  |  Rubber (11)  |  Rule (307)  |  Say (989)  |  School (227)  |  See (1094)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Small (489)  |  Space (523)  |  Stretch (39)  |  Surface (223)  |  Tangible (15)  |  Taste (93)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Together (392)  |  Tooth (32)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Trying (144)  |  Two (936)  |  View (496)  |  Visible (87)  |  Water (503)  |  Weight (140)  |  Wheel (51)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

Those of us who were familiar with the state of inorganic chemistry in universities twenty to thirty years ago will recall that at that time it was widely regarded as a dull and uninteresting part of the undergraduate course. Usually, it was taught almost entirely in the early years of the course and then chiefly as a collection of largely unconnected facts. On the whole, students concluded that, apart from some relationships dependent upon the Periodic table, there was no system in inorganic chemistry comparable with that to be found in organic chemistry, and none of the rigour and logic which characterised physical chemistry. It was widely believed that the opportunities for research in inorganic chemistry were few, and that in any case the problems were dull and uninspiring; as a result, relatively few people specialized in the subject... So long as inorganic chemistry is regarded as, in years gone by, as consisting simply of the preparations and analysis of elements and compounds, its lack of appeal is only to be expected. The stage is now past and for the purpose of our discussion we shall define inorganic chemistry today as the integrated study of the formation, composition, structure and reactions of the chemical elements and compounds, excepting most of those of carbon.
Inaugural Lecture delivered at University College, London (1 Mar 1956). In The Renaissance of Inorganic Chemistry (1956), 4-5.
Science quotes on:  |  Analysis (244)  |  Appeal (46)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Chiefly (47)  |  Collection (68)  |  Composition (86)  |  Compound (117)  |  Course (413)  |  Discussion (78)  |  Dull (58)  |  Early (196)  |  Element (322)  |  Expect (203)  |  Expectation (67)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Few (15)  |  Formation (100)  |  Inorganic Chemistry (4)  |  Integrated (10)  |  Lack (127)  |  Logic (311)  |  Most (1728)  |  Opportunity (95)  |  Organic (161)  |  Organic Chemistry (41)  |  Past (355)  |  People (1031)  |  Periodic Table (19)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Chemistry (6)  |  Preparation (60)  |  Problem (731)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Recall (11)  |  Regard (312)  |  Relationship (114)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Rigour (21)  |  Specialization (24)  |  Stage (152)  |  State (505)  |  Structure (365)  |  Student (317)  |  Study (701)  |  Subject (543)  |  System (545)  |  Table (105)  |  Time (1911)  |  Today (321)  |  Unconnected (10)  |  Undergraduate (17)  |  Uninteresting (9)  |  University (130)  |  Usually (176)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

Those who dwell as scientists … among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life. Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts.
In The Sense of Wonder (1956, 1965), 88-89.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Contemplate (29)  |  Dwell (19)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Endure (21)  |  Find (1014)  |  Last (425)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Never (1089)  |  Reserve (26)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Strength (139)  |  Weary (11)  |  Will (2350)

Those who have long and carefully studied the Grand Cañon of the Colorado do not hesitate for a moment to pronounce it by far the most sublime of all earthly spectacles. If its sublimity consisted only in its dimensions, it could be sufficiently set forth in a single sentence. It is more than 200 miles long, from 5 to 12 miles wide, and from 5,000 to 6,000 feet deep. There are in the world valleys which are longer and a few which are deeper. There are valleys flanked by summits loftier than the palisades of the Kaibab. Still the Grand Cañon is the sublimest thing on earth. It is so not alone by virtue of its magnitudes, but by virtue of the whole—its ensemble.
In Tertiary History of the Grand Cañon District: With Atlas (1882), Vol. 2, 142-143.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Careful (28)  |  Colorado (5)  |  Deep (241)  |  Dimension (64)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Ensemble (8)  |  Far (158)  |  Grand Canyon (11)  |  Hesitate (24)  |  Lofty (16)  |  Magnitude (88)  |  Mile (43)  |  Pronounce (11)  |  Sentence (35)  |  Single (365)  |  Spectacle (35)  |  Study (701)  |  Sublime (50)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Summit (27)  |  Valley (37)  |  Virtue (117)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wide (97)  |  World (1850)

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:  |  Assert (69)  |  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)  |  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)

Those who work standing ... carpenters, sawyers, carvers, blacksmiths, masons ... are liable to varicose veins ... [because] the strain on the muscles is such that the circulation of the blood is retarded. Standing even for a short time proves exhausting compared with walking and running though it be for a long time ... Nature delights and is restored by alternating and varied actions.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Blood (144)  |  Circulation (27)  |  Delight (111)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Health (210)  |  Muscle (47)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Prove (261)  |  Running (61)  |  Short (200)  |  Time (1911)  |  Vein (27)  |  Work (1402)

Though the theories of plate tectonics now provide us with a modus operandi, they still seem to me to be a periodic phenomenon. Nothing is world-wide, but everything is episodic. In other words, the history of any one part of the earth, like the life of a soldier, consists of long periods of boredom and short periods of terror.
In The Nature of the Stratigraphical Record (1973), 100.
Science quotes on:  |  Boredom (11)  |  Consist (223)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Everything (489)  |  History (716)  |  Life (1870)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Other (2233)  |  Period (200)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Plate Tectonics (22)  |  Short (200)  |  Soldier (28)  |  Still (614)  |  Terror (32)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Wide (97)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)

Thought is only a gleam in the midst of a long night. But it is this gleam which is everything.
Concluding sentences from La Valeur de la Science (1904), 276, as translated by George Bruce Halsted (trans.), in The Value of Science (1907), 77. From the French, “La pensée n’est qu’un écliar au milieu d’une longue nuit. Mais c’est cet éclair qui est tout”. Also given as “Thought is only a flash between two long nights. But this flash is everything”, in Edwin Emery Slosson, Major Prophets of To-day (1914), 138, citing the oration given by Paul Painlevé, of the Academy of Sciences, at the Montparnasse cemetery after the funeral for Poincaré.
Science quotes on:  |  Everything (489)  |  Flash (49)  |  Gleam (13)  |  Night (133)  |  Thought (995)

Thought-economy is most highly developed in mathematics, that science which has reached the highest formal development, and on which natural science so frequently calls for assistance. Strange as it may seem, the strength of mathematics lies in the avoidance of all unnecessary thoughts, in the utmost economy of thought-operations. The symbols of order, which we call numbers, form already a system of wonderful simplicity and economy. When in the multiplication of a number with several digits we employ the multiplication table and thus make use of previously accomplished results rather than to repeat them each time, when by the use of tables of logarithms we avoid new numerical calculations by replacing them by others long since performed, when we employ determinants instead of carrying through from the beginning the solution of a system of equations, when we decompose new integral expressions into others that are familiar,—we see in all this but a faint reflection of the intellectual activity of a Lagrange or Cauchy, who with the keen discernment of a military commander marshalls a whole troop of completed operations in the execution of a new one.
In Populär-wissenschafliche Vorlesungen (1903), 224-225.
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Activity (218)  |  Already (226)  |  Assistance (23)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Avoidance (11)  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Call (781)  |  Carry (130)  |  Baron Augustin-Louis Cauchy (11)  |  Complete (209)  |  Completed (30)  |  Decompose (10)  |  Develop (278)  |  Development (441)  |  Digit (4)  |  Discernment (4)  |  Economy (59)  |  Employ (115)  |  Equation (138)  |  Execution (25)  |  Expression (181)  |  Faint (10)  |  Familiar (47)  |  Form (976)  |  Formal (37)  |  Frequently (21)  |  High (370)  |  Highly (16)  |  Instead (23)  |  Integral (26)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Keen (10)  |  Count Joseph-Louis de Lagrange (26)  |  Lie (370)  |  Logarithm (12)  |  Marshal (4)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Military (45)  |  Most (1728)  |  Multiplication (46)  |  Multiplication Table (16)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Nature Of Mathematics (80)  |  New (1273)  |  Number (710)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perform (123)  |  Previously (12)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Repeat (44)  |  Replace (32)  |  Result (700)  |  See (1094)  |  Seem (150)  |  Several (33)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Solution (282)  |  Strange (160)  |  Strength (139)  |  Symbol (100)  |  System (545)  |  Table (105)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Troop (4)  |  Unnecessary (23)  |  Use (771)  |  Utmost (12)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wonderful (155)

Three thousand stadia from the earth to the moon,—the first station. From thence to the sun about five hundred parasangs. ... Marvel not, my comrade, if I appear talking to you on super-terrestrial and aerial topics. The long and the short of the matter is that I am running over the order of a Journey I have lately made. ... I have travelled in the stars.
One of the earliest examples of what might be regarded as science fiction.
Icaromennipus, or the Aerial Jaunt in Ainsworth Rand Spofford (ed.), Rufus Edmonds Shapley (ed.) The Library of Wit and Humor, Prose and Poetry, Selected from the Literature of all Times and Nations (1894), vol. 4, 282-283. A shortened quote is on the title page of H. G. Wells, The First Men in the Moon (1901).
Science quotes on:  |  Aerial (11)  |  Earth (1076)  |  First (1302)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Journey (48)  |  Marvel (37)  |  Matter (821)  |  Moon (252)  |  Order (638)  |  Regard (312)  |  Running (61)  |  Science Fiction (35)  |  Short (200)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Station (30)  |  Sun (407)  |  Talking (76)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Topic (23)

Through our sentences and paragraphs long-gone ghosts still have their say within the collective mind.
In 'Reality is a Shared Hallucination', Global Brain: The Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big Bang to the 21st Century (2000), 80.
Science quotes on:  |  Collective (24)  |  Ghost (36)  |  Linguistics (39)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Paragraph (5)  |  Say (989)  |  Sentence (35)  |  Still (614)  |  Through (846)

Time stays long enough for anyone who will use it.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Anyone (38)  |  Enough (341)  |  Stay (26)  |  Time (1911)  |  Use (771)  |  Will (2350)

To be anthropocentric is to remain unaware of the limits of human nature, the significance of biological processes underlying human behavior, and the deeper meaning of long-term genetic evolution.
Tanner Lecture on Human Values, University of Michigan, 'Comparative Social Theory' (30 Mar 1979).
Science quotes on:  |  Anthropocentric (2)  |  Behavior (95)  |  Biological (137)  |  Biology (232)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genetics (105)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Behavior (10)  |  Human Nature (71)  |  Limit (294)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Process (439)  |  Remain (355)  |  Significance (114)  |  Term (357)  |  Unaware (6)  |  Underlying (33)

To day we made the grand experiment of burning the diamond and certainly the phenomena presented were extremely beautiful and interesting… The Duke’s burning glass was the instrument used to apply heat to the diamond. It consists of two double convex lenses … The instrument was placed in an upper room of the museum and having arranged it at the window the diamond was placed in the focus and anxiously watched. The heat was thus continued for 3/4 of an hour (it being necessary to cool the globe at times) and during that time it was thought that the diamond was slowly diminishing and becoming opaque … On a sudden Sir H Davy observed the diamond to burn visibly, and when removed from the focus it was found to be in a state of active and rapid combustion. The diamond glowed brilliantly with a scarlet light, inclining to purple and, when placed in the dark, continued to burn for about four minutes. After cooling the glass heat was again applied to the diamond and it burned again though not for nearly so long as before. This was repeated twice more and soon after the diamond became all consumed. This phenomenon of actual and vivid combustion, which has never been observed before, was attributed by Sir H Davy to be the free access of air; it became more dull as carbonic acid gas formed and did not last so long.
Entry (Florence, 27 Mar 1814) in his foreign journal kept whilst on a continental tour with Sir Humphry Davy. In Michael Faraday, Bence Jones (ed.), The Life and Letters of Faraday (1870), Vol. 1, 119. Silvanus Phillips Thompson identifies the Duke as the Grand Duke of Tuscany, in Michael Faraday, His Life and Work (1901), 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Access (21)  |  Acid (83)  |  Active (80)  |  Actual (118)  |  Air (366)  |  Applied (176)  |  Apply (170)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Being (1276)  |  Burn (99)  |  Burning (49)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Combustion (22)  |  Consist (223)  |  Convex (6)  |  Cooling (10)  |  Dark (145)  |  Sir Humphry Davy (49)  |  Diamond (21)  |  Dull (58)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Focus (36)  |  Form (976)  |  Free (239)  |  Gas (89)  |  Glass (94)  |  Heat (180)  |  Hour (192)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Last (425)  |  Light (635)  |  Minute (129)  |  More (2558)  |  Museum (40)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Never (1089)  |  Observed (149)  |  Opaque (7)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Present (630)  |  Soon (187)  |  State (505)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Vivid (25)  |  Watch (118)  |  Window (59)

To me, it [the 1962 space flight of Friendship 7] is not something that happened a long time ago. It seems like a couple of days ago, really. It’s a rare day I don’t think about it, relive it in my mind. I can remember every switch I flipped, every move I made, every word I spoke and every word spoken to me. Clear as a bell.
As reported by Howard Wilkinson in 'John Glenn Had the Stuff U.S. Heroes are Made of', The Cincinnati Enquirer (20 Feb 2002).
Science quotes on:  |  Bell (35)  |  Flight (101)  |  Friendship (18)  |  Friendship 7 (3)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Move (223)  |  Rare (94)  |  Relive (2)  |  Remember (189)  |  Something (718)  |  Space (523)  |  Space Flight (26)  |  Switch (10)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Word (650)

To solve a problem is to create new problems, new knowledge immediately reveals new areas of ignorance, and the need for new experiments. At least, in the field of fast reactions, the experiments do not take very long to perform.
From Nobel Lecture (11 Dec 1967), 'Flash Photolysis and Some of its Applications.' In Nobel Lectures: Chemistry 1963-1970 (1972), 261.
Science quotes on:  |  Create (245)  |  Do (1905)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fast (49)  |  Field (378)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  New (1273)  |  Perform (123)  |  Performance (51)  |  Problem (731)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Solution (282)  |  Solve (145)

Today, nothing is unusual about a scientific discovery's being followed soon after by a technical application: The discovery of electrons led to electronics; fission led to nuclear energy. But before the 1880's, science played almost no role in the advances of technology. For example, James Watt developed the first efficient steam engine long before science established the equivalence between mechanical heat and energy.
Edward Teller with Judith L. Shoolery, Memoirs: A Twentieth-Century Journey in Science and Politics (2001), 42.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Application (257)  |  Being (1276)  |  Develop (278)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Electron (96)  |  Electronics (21)  |  Energy (373)  |  Engine (99)  |  Equivalence (7)  |  First (1302)  |  Fission (10)  |  Follow (389)  |  Heat (180)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Nuclear Energy (18)  |  Role (86)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Soon (187)  |  Steam (81)  |  Steam Engine (47)  |  Technology (281)  |  Today (321)  |  Unusual (37)

Touch is the most fundamental sense. A baby experiences it, all over, before he is born and long before he learns to use sight, hearing, or taste, and no human ever ceases to need it.
In Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 366.
Science quotes on:  |  Baby (29)  |  Birth (154)  |  Cease (81)  |  Ceasing (2)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Hearing (50)  |  Human (1512)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Most (1728)  |  Need (320)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sight (135)  |  Taste (93)  |  Touch (146)  |  Use (771)

Truly the gods have not from the beginning revealed all things to mortals, but by long seeking, mortals discover what is better.
Fragment B18, from Diels and Kranz Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, as translated by Kathleen Freeman in Ancilla to the Pre-Socratic Philosophers (1948, 1983), 22.
Science quotes on:  |  Beginning (312)  |  Better (493)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  God (776)  |  Mortal (55)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Revealed (59)  |  Revealing (4)  |  Seeking (31)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Truly (118)

University politics make me long for the simplicity of the Middle East.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Middle East (3)  |  Politics (122)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  University (130)

Upon viewing the milt or semen Masculinum of a living Codfish with a Microscope, such Numbers of Animalcules with long Tails were found therein, that at least ten thousand of them were supposed to exist in the quantity of a Grain of Sand.
Science quotes on:  |  Animalcule (12)  |  Cod (2)  |  Exist (458)  |  Fish (130)  |  Grain (50)  |  Living (492)  |  Microbiology (11)  |  Microscope (85)  |  Number (710)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Sand (63)  |  Semen (5)  |  Thousand (340)

Vous avez trouve par de long ennuis
Ce que Newton trouva sans sortir de chez lui.
In Letter to La Condamine, whose surveying expedition (after Newton’s death) had measured the arc at the equator. As Newton had calculated, the Earth was a flattened sphere, due to the effects of rotation and gravitational pull. Roughly translates as, “You have found by prolonged difficulty / What Newton found without leaving home.” In The Royal Society Newton Tercentenary Celebrations: 15-19 July 1946 (1946), 15. [Newton was born in 1642; the tercentenary celebration was delayed by WW II —Webmaster.]
Science quotes on:  |  Arc (14)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Equator (6)  |  Gravitation (72)  |  Home (184)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Survey (36)  |  Theory (1015)

We agreed then on the good things we have in common. On the advantage of being able to test yourself, not depending on others in the test, reflecting yourself in your work. On the pleasure of seeing your creature grow, beam after beam, bolt after bolt, solid, necessary, symmetrical, suited to its purpose; and when it’s finished, you look at it and you think that perhaps it will live longer than you, and perhaps it will be of use to someone you don’t know, who doesn’t know you. Maybe, as an old man you’ll be able to come back and look at it, and it will seem beautiful, and it doesn’t really matter so much that it will seem beautiful only to you, and you can say to yourself “maybe another man wouldn’t have brought it off.”
In The Monkey’s Wrench: A Novel (1986, 2017), 54-55. Originally published in Italian (1978).
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (144)  |  Beam (26)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Bolt (11)  |  Creature (242)  |  Depend (238)  |  Finish (62)  |  Grow (247)  |  Live (650)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Old Man (6)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Reflect (39)  |  See (1094)  |  Seem (150)  |  Solid (119)  |  Suit (12)  |  Symmetrical (3)  |  Test (221)  |  Think (1122)  |  Work (1402)

We are going through the body-snatching phase right now, and there are all these Burke and Hare attitudes towards geneticists-that they are playing God and that DNA is sacred. No, it’s not. It’s no more sacred than your toenails. Basically, we are not going to make long-term medical progress without understanding how the genes work.
[Referring to the similarity of fears and superstitions in genetics as once were associated with anatomy ]
Quoted by Sean O’Hagan, in 'End of sperm report', The Observer (14 Sep 2002).
Science quotes on:  |  Anatomy (75)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Body (557)  |  DNA (81)  |  Fear (212)  |  Gene (105)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Geneticist (16)  |  God (776)  |  Long-Term (11)  |  Medicine (392)  |  More (2558)  |  Phase (37)  |  Play (116)  |  Playing (42)  |  Progress (492)  |  Right (473)  |  Sacred (48)  |  Similarity (32)  |  Superstition (70)  |  Term (357)  |  Through (846)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Work (1402)

We are like the inhabitants of an isolated valley in New Guinea who communicate with societies in neighboring valleys (quite different societies, I might add) by runner and by drum. When asked how a very advanced society will communicate, they might guess by an extremely rapid runner or by an improbably large drum. They might not guess a technology beyond their ken. And yet, all the while, a vast international cable and radio traffic passes over them, around them, and through them... We will listen for the interstellar drums, but we will miss the interstellar cables. We are likely to receive our first messages from the drummers of the neighboring galactic valleys - from civilizations only somewhat in our future. The civilizations vastly more advanced than we, will be, for a long time, remote both in distance and in accessibility. At a future time of vigorous interstellar radio traffic, the very advanced civilizations may be, for us, still insubstantial legends.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Accessibility (3)  |  Add (42)  |  Advance (298)  |  Ask (420)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Both (496)  |  Cable (11)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Communicate (39)  |  Different (595)  |  Distance (171)  |  Drum (8)  |  Drummer (3)  |  Extremely (17)  |  First (1302)  |  Future (467)  |  Galactic (6)  |  Guess (67)  |  Improbable (15)  |  Inhabitant (50)  |  International (40)  |  Interstellar (8)  |  Isolate (24)  |  Ken (2)  |  Large (398)  |  Legend (18)  |  Likely (36)  |  Listen (81)  |  Message (53)  |  Miss (51)  |  More (2558)  |  Neighboring (5)  |  New (1273)  |  New Guinea (4)  |  Pass (241)  |  Radio (60)  |  Rapid (37)  |  Receive (117)  |  Remote (86)  |  Runner (2)  |  Society (350)  |  Still (614)  |  Technology (281)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Traffic (10)  |  Valley (37)  |  Vast (188)  |  Vastly (8)  |  Vigorous (21)  |  Will (2350)

We are the children of a technological age. We have found streamlined ways of doing much of our routine work. Printing is no longer the only way of reproducing books. Reading them, however, has not changed...
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Book (413)  |  Change (639)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Doing (277)  |  Find (1014)  |  Print (20)  |  Printing (25)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Reproduce (12)  |  Routine (26)  |  Technological (62)  |  Way (1214)  |  Work (1402)

We divorced ourselves from the materials of the earth, the rock, the wood, the iron ore; we looked to new materials which were cooked in vats, long complex derivatives of urine which we called plastic. They had no odor of the living, ... their touch was alien to nature. ... [They proliferated] like the matastases of cancer cells.
The Idol and the Octopus: political writings (1968), 83 and 118.
Science quotes on:  |  Alien (35)  |  Call (781)  |  Cancer (61)  |  Complex (202)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Cook (20)  |  Derivative (6)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Iron (99)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Look (584)  |  Material (366)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Odor (11)  |  Ore (14)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Plastic (30)  |  Rock (176)  |  Touch (146)  |  Urine (18)  |  Vat (2)  |  Wood (97)

We do not dwell in the Palace of Truth. But, as was mentioned to me not long since, “There is a time coming when all things shall be found out.” I am not so sanguine myself, believing that the well in which Truth is said to reside is really a bottomless pit.
From 'Electromagnetic Theory, I' in The Electrician (2 Jan 1891), 26, 257.
Science quotes on:  |  Bottomless (7)  |  Coming (114)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dwelling (12)  |  Mention (84)  |  Myself (211)  |  Palace (8)  |  Pit (20)  |  Reside (25)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Well (14)

We do not live in a time when knowledge can be extended along a pathway smooth and free from obstacles, as at the time of the discovery of the infinitesimal calculus, and in a measure also when in the development of projective geometry obstacles were suddenly removed which, having hemmed progress for a long time, permitted a stream of investigators to pour in upon virgin soil. There is no longer any browsing along the beaten paths; and into the primeval forest only those may venture who are equipped with the sharpest tools.
In 'Mathematisches und wissenschaftliches Denken', Jahresbericht der Deutschen Mathematiker Vereinigung, Bd. 11, 55. In Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-book (1914), 91.
Science quotes on:  |  Browse (2)  |  Calculus (65)  |  Development (441)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Equipped (17)  |  Extend (129)  |  Forest (161)  |  Free (239)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Infinitesimal (30)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Investigator (71)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Live (650)  |  Measure (241)  |  Obstacle (42)  |  Path (159)  |  Pathway (15)  |  Primeval (15)  |  Progress (492)  |  Projective Geometry (3)  |  Research (753)  |  Sharp (17)  |  Smooth (34)  |  Soil (98)  |  Stream (83)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tool (129)  |  Venture (19)  |  Virgin (11)

We do not worry about being respected in towns through which we pass. But if we are going to remain in one for a certain time, we do worry. How long does this time have to be?
In Pensées (1670), Section 2, No. 7. As translated in in W.H. Auden and L. Kronenberger (eds.) The Viking Book of Aphorisms (1966), 135. Also translated as “We do not trouble ourselves about being esteemed in the towns through which we pass. But if we are to remain a little while there, we are so concerned. How long is necessary? A time commensurate with our vain and paltry life,” in Blaise Pascal and W.F. Trotter (trans.), 'Thoughts', No. 149, collected in Charles W. Eliot (ed.), The Harvard Classics (1910), Vol. 48, 60. From the original French, “Les villes par où on passe, on ne se soucie pas d’y être estimé. Mais, quand on y doit demeurer un peu de temps, on s’en soucie. Combien de temps faut-il? Un temps proportionné à notre durée vaine et chétive,” in Ernest Havet (ed.), Pensées de Pascal (1892), 123.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Certain (557)  |  Do (1905)  |  Esteem (18)  |  Pass (241)  |  Remain (355)  |  Respect (212)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Town (30)  |  Worry (34)

We ever long for visions of beauty,
We ever dream of unknown worlds.
Quoted in Carl Sagan, Broca’s Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science (1979, 1986), 269.
Science quotes on:  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Dream (222)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Vision (127)  |  World (1850)

We grow great by dreams. All big men are dreamers. They see things in the soft haze of a spring day or in the red fire of a long winter’s evening. Some of us let these great dreams die, but others nourish and protect them; nurse them through bad days till they bring them to the sunshine and light which comes always to those who sincerely hope that their dreams will come true.
Quoted, for example, in The American Exporter (1930), Vol. 106, 158. Webmaster has found this quote in numerous texts, but as yet has not identified the original. (Can you help?)
Science quotes on:  |  Bad (185)  |  Big (55)  |  Bring (95)  |  Die (94)  |  Dream (222)  |  Dreamer (14)  |  Fire (203)  |  Great (1610)  |  Grow (247)  |  Haze (3)  |  Hope (321)  |  Let (64)  |  Light (635)  |  Nourish (18)  |  Nurse (33)  |  Other (2233)  |  Protect (65)  |  Red (38)  |  See (1094)  |  Sincerely (3)  |  Soft (30)  |  Spring (140)  |  Sunshine (12)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  True (239)  |  Will (2350)  |  Winter (46)

We have also here an acting cause to account for that balance so often observed in nature,—a deficiency in one set of organs always being compensated by an increased development of some others—powerful wings accompanying weak feet, or great velocity making up for the absence of defensive weapons; for it has been shown that all varieties in which an unbalanced deficiency occurred could not long continue their existen The action of this principle is exactly like that of the centrifugal governor of the steam engine, which checks and corrects any irregularities almost before they become evident; and in like manner no unbalanced deficiency in the animal kingdom can ever reach any conspicuous magnitude, because it would make itself felt at the very first step, by rendering existence difficult and extinction almost sure soon to follow.
In 'On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type', Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society, Zoology (1858), 3, 61-62.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Action (342)  |  Animal (651)  |  Animal Kingdom (21)  |  Balance (82)  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Cause (561)  |  Centrifugal (3)  |  Compensation (8)  |  Conspicuous (13)  |  Continue (179)  |  Correct (95)  |  Defense (26)  |  Deficiency (15)  |  Development (441)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Engine (99)  |  Evident (92)  |  Existence (481)  |  Extinction (80)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Foot (65)  |  Governor (13)  |  Great (1610)  |  Increased (3)  |  Irregularity (12)  |  Kingdom (80)  |  Magnitude (88)  |  Making (300)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observed (149)  |  Organ (118)  |  Other (2233)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Principle (530)  |  Reach (286)  |  Set (400)  |  Soon (187)  |  Steam (81)  |  Steam Engine (47)  |  Step (234)  |  Variety (138)  |  Velocity (51)  |  Weak (73)  |  Weapon (98)  |  Weapons (57)  |  Wing (79)

We have come a long way on that old molecule [DNA].
In The Medusa and the Snail: More Notes of a Biology Watcher (1974, 1979), 28.
Science quotes on:  |  Coming (114)  |  DNA (81)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Old (499)  |  Way (1214)

We have gone a long way towards solving a problem when we are able to formulate it.
In Le Phénomène Humain (1955) as translated by Bernard Wall in 'The Expansion of Life',The Phenomenon of Man (1959, 2008), 115.
Science quotes on:  |  Formulate (16)  |  Problem (731)  |  Solution (282)  |  Way (1214)

We have long been seeking a different kind of evolutionary process and have now found one; namely, the change within the pattern of the chromosomes. ... The neo-Darwinian theory of the geneticists is no longer tenable.
The Material Basis of Evolution (1940), 397.
Science quotes on:  |  Change (639)  |  Chromosome (23)  |  Chromosomes (17)  |  Different (595)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Geneticist (16)  |  Kind (564)  |  Pattern (116)  |  Process (439)  |  Tenable (4)  |  Theory (1015)

We have made many glass vessels... with tubes two cubits long. These were filled with mercury, the open end was closed with the finger, and the tubes were then inverted in a vessel where there was mercury. We saw that an empty space was formed and that nothing happened in the vessel where this space was formed ... I claim that the force which keeps the mercury from falling is external and that the force comes from outside the tube. On the surface of the mercury which is in the bowl rests the weight of a column of fifty miles of air. Is it a surprise that into the vessel, in which the mercury has no inclination and no repugnance, not even the slightest, to being there, it should enter and should rise in a column high enough to make equilibrium with the weight of the external air which forces it up?
Quoted in Archana Srinivasan, Great Inventors (2007), 27-28.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Barometer (7)  |  Being (1276)  |  Claim (154)  |  Closed (38)  |  Empty (82)  |  End (603)  |  Enough (341)  |  Enter (145)  |  Equilibrium (34)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Glass (94)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  High (370)  |  Inclination (36)  |  Mercury (54)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Open (277)  |  Outside (141)  |  Rest (287)  |  Rise (169)  |  Saw (160)  |  Space (523)  |  Surface (223)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Two (936)  |  Vacuum (41)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Weight (140)

We have never had another man like him [Charles Kettering] in America. He is the most willing man to do things I have ever seen. Benjamin Franklin was a little like him. Both had horse sense and love of fun. If a fellow goes to school long enough he gets frozen in his thinking. He is not free any more. But Ket has always been free.
In book review, T.A. Boyd, 'Charles F. Kettering: Prophet of Progress', Science (30 Jan 1959), 256.
Science quotes on:  |  America (143)  |  Both (496)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enough (341)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Benjamin Franklin (95)  |  Free (239)  |  Freeze (6)  |  Fun (42)  |  Horse (78)  |  Horse Sense (4)  |  Charles F. Kettering (70)  |  Little (717)  |  Love (328)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Never (1089)  |  School (227)  |  Sense (785)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Willing (44)

We have seen that a proton of energy corresponding to 30,000 volts can effect the transformation of lithium into two fast α-particles, which together have an energy equivalent of more than 16 million volts. Considering the individual process, the output of energy in the transmutation is more than 500 times greater than the energy carried by the proton. There is thus a great gain of energy in the single transmutation, but we must not forget that on an average more than 1000 million protons of equal energy must be fired into the lithium before one happens to hit and enter the lithium nucleus. It is clear in this case that on the whole the energy derived from transmutation of the atom is small compared with the energy of the bombarding particles. There thus seems to be little prospect that we can hope to obtain a new source of power by these processes. It has sometimes been suggested, from analogy with ordinary explosives, that the transmutation of one atom might cause the transmutation of a neighbouring nucleus, so that the explosion would spread throughout all the material. If this were true, we should long ago have had a gigantic explosion in our laboratories with no one remaining to tell the tale. The absence of these accidents indicates, as we should expect, that the explosion is confined to the individual nucleus and does not spread to the neighbouring nuclei, which may be regarded as relatively far removed from the centre of the explosion.
The Transmutation of the Atom (1933), 23-4
Science quotes on:  |  Absence (21)  |  Accident (92)  |  Alpha Particle (5)  |  Analogy (76)  |  Atom (381)  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  Average (89)  |  Bombardment (3)  |  Cause (561)  |  Centre (31)  |  Chain Reaction (2)  |  Confinement (4)  |  Effect (414)  |  Energy (373)  |  Enter (145)  |  Equivalent (46)  |  Expect (203)  |  Explosion (51)  |  Explosive (24)  |  Forget (125)  |  Gain (146)  |  Gigantic (40)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greater (288)  |  Happen (282)  |  Hope (321)  |  Indicate (62)  |  Indication (33)  |  Individual (420)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Lithium (3)  |  Little (717)  |  Material (366)  |  Million (124)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Neighbor (14)  |  New (1273)  |  Nucleus (54)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Output (12)  |  Particle (200)  |  Power (771)  |  Process (439)  |  Prospect (31)  |  Proton (23)  |  Regard (312)  |  Remaining (45)  |  Single (365)  |  Small (489)  |  Source (101)  |  Spread (86)  |  Suggestion (49)  |  Tell (344)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Transformation (72)  |  Transmutation (24)  |  Two (936)  |  Whole (756)

We have spent the best part of the past century enthusiastically testing the world to utter destruction; not looking closely enough at the long-term impact our actions will have.
Speech, awards ceremony for green entrepreneurs, Buckingham Palace (30 Jan 2014). As quoted in Benn Quinn, 'Climate Change Sceptics are ‘Headless Chickens’, Says Prince Charles', The Guardian (31 Jan 2014).
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Best (467)  |  Century (319)  |  Climate Change (76)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Enough (341)  |  Enthusiasm (59)  |  Impact (45)  |  Looking (191)  |  Past (355)  |  Spent (85)  |  Term (357)  |  Testing (5)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

We know by experience itself, that … we find out but a short way, by long wandering.
The Scholemaster (1570), Book 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Experience (494)  |  Find (1014)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Learning (291)  |  Short (200)  |  Way (1214)

We know only a single science, the science of history. History can be contemplated from two sides, it can be divided into the history of nature and the history of mankind. However, the two sides are not to be divided off; as long as men exist the history of nature and the history of men are mutually conditioned.
Karl Marx
Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, The German Ideology (1845-6), Vol. 1, 28. English translation 1965.
Science quotes on:  |  Condition (362)  |  Divided (50)  |  Exist (458)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Mankind (15)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Side (236)  |  Single (365)  |  Two (936)

We lift ourselves by our thought. We climb upon our vision of ourselves. If you want to enlarge your life, you must first enlarge your thought of it and of yourself. Hold the ideal of yourself as you long to be, always everywhere.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Climb (39)  |  Enlarge (37)  |  Everywhere (98)  |  First (1302)  |  Hold (96)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lift (57)  |  Must (1525)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Thought (995)  |  Vision (127)  |  Want (504)

We may, perhaps, imagine that the creation was finished long ago. But that would be quite wrong. It continues still more magnificently, and at the highest levels of the world.
In The Divine Milieu (1927, 1968), 62.
Science quotes on:  |  Continue (179)  |  Creation (350)  |  Finish (62)  |  Finished (4)  |  Highest (19)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Level (69)  |  Magnificently (2)  |  More (2558)  |  Still (614)  |  World (1850)  |  Wrong (246)

We must be part not only of the human community, but of the whole community; we must acknowledge some sort of oneness not only with our neighbors, our countrymen and our civilization but also some respect for the natural as well as for the man-made community. Ours is not only “one world” in the sense usually implied by that term. It is also “one earth”. Without some acknowledgement of that fact, men can no more live successfully than they can if they refuse to admit the political and economic interdependency of the various sections of the civilized world. It is not a sentimental but a grimly literal fact that unless we share this terrestrial globe with creatures other than ourselves, we shall not be able to live on it for long.
The Voice of the Desert (1956), 194-5.
Science quotes on:  |  Acknowledge (33)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Community (111)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Creature (242)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Economic (84)  |  Environment (239)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Human (1512)  |  Literal (12)  |  Live (650)  |  Man (2252)  |  Man-Made (10)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Oneness (6)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Political (124)  |  Refuse (45)  |  Respect (212)  |  Sense (785)  |  Share (82)  |  Term (357)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Usually (176)  |  Various (205)  |  Whole (756)  |  World (1850)

We must make the following remark: a proof, that after a certain time t1, the spheres must necessarily be mixed uniformly, whatever may be the initial distribution of states, cannot be given. This is in fact a consequence of probability theory, for any non-uniform distribution of states, no matter how improbable it may be, is still not absolutely impossible. Indeed it is clear that any individual uniform distribution, which might arise after a certain time from some particular initial state, is just as improbable as an individual non-uniform distribution; just as in the game of Lotto, any individual set of five numbers is as improbable as the set 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. It is only because there are many more uniform distributions than non-uniform ones that the distribution of states will become uniform in the course of time. One therefore cannot prove that, whatever may be the positions and velocities of the spheres at the beginning, the distributions must become uniform after a long time; rather one can only prove that infinitely many more initial states will lead to a uniform one after a definite length of time than to a non-uniform one. Loschmidt's theorem tells us only about initial states which actually lead to a very non-uniform distribution of states after a certain time t1; but it does not prove that there are not infinitely many more initial conditions that will lead to a uniform distribution after the same time. On the contrary, it follows from the theorem itself that, since there are infinitely many more uniform distributions, the number of states which lead to uniform distributions after a certain time t1, is much greater than the number that leads to non-uniform ones, and the latter are the ones that must be chosen, according to Loschmidt, in order to obtain a non-uniform distribution at t1.
From 'On the Relation of a General Mechanical Theorem to the Second Law of Thermodynamics' (1877), in Stephen G. Brush (ed.), Selected Readings in Physics (1966), Vol. 2, Irreversible Processes, 191-2.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Arise (162)  |  Become (821)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Certain (557)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Condition (362)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Course (413)  |  Definite (114)  |  Distribution (51)  |  Entropy (46)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Follow (389)  |  Game (104)  |  Gas (89)  |  Greater (288)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Individual (420)  |  Kinetic Theory (7)  |  Lead (391)  |  Matter (821)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Number (710)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Order (638)  |  Probability (135)  |  Proof (304)  |  Prove (261)  |  Set (400)  |  Sphere (118)  |  State (505)  |  Still (614)  |  Tell (344)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Will (2350)

We sign treaties with all nations agreeing to give up war as an instrument of national policy, and then relax as if war had been made unlikely. The premises and the reasoning are very much like those underlying magical rain-making. That is, we want it to rain, therefore it should rain, therefore it will rain. We have discovered the invalidity of this reasoning in the case of rain, and our schools for the most part no longer teach magical methods of influencing physical events.
In 'Education in a Scientific Age', Can Science Save Us? (1947, 2nd ed. 1961), 68.
Science quotes on:  |  Agree (31)  |  Case (102)  |  Discover (571)  |  Event (222)  |  Give Up (10)  |  Influence (231)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Invalid (3)  |  Magic (92)  |  Method (531)  |  Nation (208)  |  Part (235)  |  Physical (518)  |  Premise (40)  |  Rain (70)  |  Reason (766)  |  Relax (3)  |  School (227)  |  Sign (63)  |  Teach (299)  |  Treaty (3)  |  Underlying (33)  |  Unlikely (15)  |  Want (504)  |  War (233)

We sound the future, and learn that after a period, long compared with the divisions of time open to our investigation, the energies of our system will decay, the glory of the sun will be dimmed and the earth, tideless and inert, will no longer tolerate the race which has for a moment disturbed its solitude. Man will go down into the pit, and all his thoughts will perish.
The Foundations of Belief: Being Notes Introductory to the Study of Theology (1895), 30-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Decay (59)  |  Disturb (31)  |  Disturbed (15)  |  Division (67)  |  Down (455)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Entropy (46)  |  Future (467)  |  Inert (14)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Learn (672)  |  Man (2252)  |  Moment (260)  |  Open (277)  |  Period (200)  |  Perish (56)  |  Pit (20)  |  Race (278)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Solitude (20)  |  Sound (187)  |  Sun (407)  |  System (545)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Will (2350)

We spend long hours discussing the curious situation that the two great bodies of biological knowledge, genetics and embryology, which were obviously intimately interrelated in development, had never been brought together in any revealing way. An obvious difficulty was that the most favorable organisms for genetics, Drosophila as a prime example, were not well suited for embryological study, and the classical objects of embryological study, sea urchins and frogs as examples, were not easily investigated genetically. What might we do about it? There were two obvious approaches: one to learn more about the genetics of an embryologically favourable organism, the other to better understand the development of Drosophila. We resolved to gamble up to a year of our lives on the latter approach, this in Ephrussi’s laboratory in Paris which was admirably equipped for tissue culture, tissue or organ transplantation, and related techniques.
In 'Recollections', Annual Review of Biochemistry, 1974, 43, 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Approach (112)  |  Better (493)  |  Biological (137)  |  Classical (49)  |  Culture (157)  |  Curious (95)  |  Development (441)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Do (1905)  |  Drosophila (10)  |  Embryology (18)  |  Boris Ephrussi (4)  |  Equipped (17)  |  Favorable (24)  |  Frog (44)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genetics (105)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hour (192)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Learn (672)  |  Live (650)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Never (1089)  |  Object (438)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Organ (118)  |  Organism (231)  |  Other (2233)  |  Research (753)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sea Urchin (3)  |  Situation (117)  |  Spend (97)  |  Study (701)  |  Technique (84)  |  Tissue (51)  |  Together (392)  |  Two (936)  |  Understand (648)  |  Way (1214)  |  Year (963)

We were able to see the plankton blooms resulting from the upwelling off the coast of Chile. The plankton itself extended along the coastline and had some long tenuous arms reaching out to sea. The arms or lines of plankton were pushed around in a random direction, fairly well-defined yet somewhat weak in color, in contrast with the dark blue ocean. The fishing ought to be good down there.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Arm (82)  |  Arms (37)  |  Bloom (11)  |  Blue (63)  |  Coast (13)  |  Coastline (2)  |  Color (155)  |  Contrast (45)  |  Dark (145)  |  Direction (185)  |  Down (455)  |  Extend (129)  |  Fairly (4)  |  Fish (130)  |  Fishing (20)  |  Good (906)  |  Line (100)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Plankton (3)  |  Push (66)  |  Random (42)  |  Reach (286)  |  Result (700)  |  Sea (326)  |  See (1094)  |  Tenuous (3)  |  Weak (73)  |  Well-Defined (9)

We will be able to depart this life with the quiet peace-giving notion, that we were permitted to contribute to the happiness of many who will live after us. In our long lives we endeavored to unfold the collective consciousness. In our lives we have known hell and heaven; the final balance, however, is that we helped pave the way to dynamic harmony in this earthly house. That, I believe, is the meaning of this life.
Letter to old unnamed friend (Jul 1981), quoted in Willem J. M. van der Linden, 'In Memoriam: R. W. van Bemmelen', Netherlands Journal of Geosciences, Geologie en Mijnbouw (1984), 63, No. 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Balance (82)  |  Belief (615)  |  Collective (24)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Contribution (93)  |  Depart (5)  |  Earthly (8)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  Final (121)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Harmony (105)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Hell (32)  |  Help (116)  |  House (143)  |  Known (453)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Notion (120)  |  Pave (8)  |  Peace (116)  |  Quiet (37)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

We’ve come a long way, we’ve come a long way and we never even left L.A.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Leave (138)  |  Never (1089)  |  Way (1214)

What a deep faith in the rationality of the structure of the world and what a longing to understand even a small glimpse of the reason revealed in the world there must have been in Kepler and Newton to enable them to unravel the mechanism of the heavens in long years of lonely work!
'Religion and Science', The New York Times (9 Nov 1930), Sunday Magazine, 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Deep (241)  |  Enable (122)  |  Faith (209)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Johannes Kepler (95)  |  Lonely (24)  |  Longing (19)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Must (1525)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Rationality (25)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Revealed (59)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Small (489)  |  Structure (365)  |  Understand (648)  |  Universe (900)  |  Unravel (16)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

What an amateur is, is a lover of a subject. I’m a lover of facts. The fact is the savior, as long as you don’t jam it into some preconceived pattern.
From interview, Carol Krucoff, 'The 6 O’Clock Scholar: Librarian of Congress Daniel Boorstin And His Love Affair With Books', The Washington Post (29 Jan 1984), K8.
Science quotes on:  |  Amateur (22)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Great (1610)  |  Lover (11)  |  Pattern (116)  |  Preconceived (3)  |  Savior (6)  |  Subject (543)

What animates a great pathologist? Is it the desire to cure disease, to save life? Surely not, save perhaps as an afterthought. He is too intelligent, deep in his soul, to see anything praiseworthy in such a desire. He knows from life-long observation that his discoveries will do quite as much harm as good, that a thousand scoundrels will profit to every honest man, that the folks who most deserve to be saved will probably be the last to be saved. ... What actually moves him is his unquenchable curiosity—his boundless, almost pathological thirst to penetrate the unknown, to uncover the secret, to find out what has not been found out before. ... [like] the dog sniffing tremendously at an infinite series of rat-holes. ... And yet he stands in the very front rank of the race
In 'The Scientist', Prejudices: third series (1922), 269-70.
Science quotes on:  |  Afterthought (6)  |  Boundless (28)  |  Cure (124)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Deep (241)  |  Deserve (65)  |  Desire (212)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Disease (340)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dog (70)  |  Find (1014)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Harm (43)  |  Honest (53)  |  Honesty (29)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Infinite Series (8)  |  Infinity (96)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Last (425)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motivation (28)  |  Move (223)  |  Observation (593)  |  Pathological (21)  |  Pathologist (6)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  Penetration (18)  |  Praiseworthy (2)  |  Profit (56)  |  Race (278)  |  Rank (69)  |  Rat (37)  |  Rat-Hole (2)  |  Save (126)  |  Saving (20)  |  Scoundrel (8)  |  Secret (216)  |  See (1094)  |  Series (153)  |  Soul (235)  |  Stand (284)  |  Surely (101)  |  Thirst (11)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Uncover (20)  |  Uncovering (2)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Will (2350)

What clearer evidence could we have had of the different formation of these rocks, and of the long interval which separated their formation, had we actually seen them emerging from the bosom of the deep? … The mind seemed to grow giddy by looking so far into the abyss of time.
As quoted in Dennis R. Dean, James Hutton and the History of Geology (1992), 122.
Science quotes on:  |  Abyss (30)  |  Bosom (14)  |  Clear (111)  |  Deep (241)  |  Different (595)  |  Emerge (24)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Far (158)  |  Formation (100)  |  Geology (240)  |  Giddy (3)  |  Grow (247)  |  Interval (14)  |  Looking (191)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Rock (176)  |  Seem (150)  |  Separate (151)  |  Time (1911)

What is mathematics? What is it for? What are mathematicians doing nowadays? Wasn't it all finished long ago? How many new numbers can you invent anyway? Is today’s mathematics just a matter of huge calculations, with the mathematician as a kind of zookeeper, making sure the precious computers are fed and watered? If it’s not, what is it other than the incomprehensible outpourings of superpowered brainboxes with their heads in the clouds and their feet dangling from the lofty balconies of their ivory towers?
Mathematics is all of these, and none. Mostly, it’s just different. It’s not what you expect it to be, you turn your back for a moment and it's changed. It's certainly not just a fixed body of knowledge, its growth is not confined to inventing new numbers, and its hidden tendrils pervade every aspect of modern life.
Opening paragraphs of 'Preface', From Here to Infinity (1996), vii.
Science quotes on:  |  Aspect (129)  |  Back (395)  |  Balcony (2)  |  Body (557)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Change (639)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Computer (131)  |  Confine (26)  |  Dangle (2)  |  Different (595)  |  Doing (277)  |  Expect (203)  |  Finish (62)  |  Finished (4)  |  Fixed (17)  |  Foot (65)  |  Growth (200)  |  Head (87)  |  Hidden (43)  |  Huge (30)  |  Incomprehensible (31)  |  Invent (57)  |  Ivory Tower (5)  |  Kind (564)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lofty (16)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  Making (300)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Matter (821)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Life (3)  |  Moment (260)  |  New (1273)  |  Nowadays (6)  |  Number (710)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pervade (10)  |  Precious (43)  |  Today (321)  |  Tower (45)  |  Turn (454)  |  Water (503)  |  Zookeeper (2)

What nature does in the course of long periods we do every day when we suddenly change the environment in which some species of living plant is situated.
Philosophie Zoologique (1809), Vol. 1, 226, trans. Hugh Elliot (1914), 109.
Science quotes on:  |  Change (639)  |  Course (413)  |  Do (1905)  |  Environment (239)  |  Living (492)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Period (200)  |  Plant (320)  |  Species (435)  |  Suddenly (91)

What scientist would not long to go on living, if only to see how the little truths he has brought to light will grow up?
Pensées d'un Biologiste (1939). Translated in The Substance of Man (1962), 254.
Science quotes on:  |  Bringing (10)  |  Grow (247)  |  Growth (200)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Living (492)  |  Scientist (881)  |  See (1094)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Will (2350)

What was at first merely by-the-way may become the very heart of a matter. Flints were long flaked into knives, arrowheads, spears. Incidentally it was found that they struck fire; to-day that is their one use.
From chapter 'Jottings from a Note-book', in Canadian Stories (1918), 178.
Science quotes on:  |  Arrowhead (4)  |  Become (821)  |  By The Way (3)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fire (203)  |  First (1302)  |  Flake (7)  |  Flint (7)  |  Heart (243)  |  Incidental (15)  |  Knife (24)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mere (86)  |  Merely (315)  |  Spear (8)  |  Strike (72)  |  Today (321)  |  Use (771)  |  Way (1214)

What would the world be, once bereft
Of Wet and Wilderness? Let them be left,
O let them be left, wilderness and wet;
Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet.
'Inversnaid' (1881), reprinted in Gerard Manley Hopkins and Michael White (ed.) Some Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, (1945), 16, stanza 4.
Science quotes on:  |  Bereft (2)  |  Left (15)  |  Live (650)  |  Weed (19)  |  Wet (6)  |  Wilderness (57)  |  World (1850)

Wheeler’s First Moral Principle: Never make a calculation until you know the answer. Make an estimate before every calculation, try a simple physical argument (symmetry! invariance! conservation!) before every derivation, guess the answer to every paradox and puzzle. Courage: No one else needs to know what the guess is. Therefore make it quickly, by instinct. A right guess reinforces this instinct. A wrong guess brings the refreshment of surprise. In either case life as a spacetime expert, however long, is more fun!
In E.F. Taylor and J.A. Wheeler, Spacetime Physics (1992), 20.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Argument (145)  |  Bring (95)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Case (102)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Courage (82)  |  Derivation (15)  |  Estimate (59)  |  Expert (67)  |  First (1302)  |  Fun (42)  |  Guess (67)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Invariance (4)  |  Know (1538)  |  Know The Answer (9)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Moral (203)  |  More (2558)  |  Need (320)  |  Never (1089)  |  Paradox (54)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physics (564)  |  Principle (530)  |  Puzzle (46)  |  Quickly (21)  |  Refreshment (3)  |  Reinforce (5)  |  Reinforcement (2)  |  Right (473)  |  Simple (426)  |  Spacetime (4)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Symmetry (44)  |  Try (296)  |  Wrong (246)

When autumn returns with its long anticipated holidays, and preparations are made for a scamper in some distant locality, hammer and notebook will not occupy much room in the portmanteau, and will certainly be found most entertaining company.
In The Story of a Boulder: or, Gleanings from the Note-book of a Field Geologist (1858), viii.
Science quotes on:  |  Anticipation (18)  |  Autumn (11)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Company (63)  |  Distance (171)  |  Entertaining (9)  |  Entertainment (19)  |  Geology (240)  |  Hammer (26)  |  Holiday (12)  |  Locality (8)  |  Most (1728)  |  Notebook (4)  |  Portmanteau (2)  |  Preparation (60)  |  Return (133)  |  Will (2350)

When I touch that flower, I am not merely touching that flower. I am touching infinity. That little flower existed long before there were human beings on this earth. It will continue to exist for thousands, yes millions of years to come.
As quoted from a first-person conversation with the author, in Glenn Clark, The Man Who Talked With the Flowers: The Intimate Life Story of Dr. George Washington Carver (1939), 39.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Continue (179)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Exist (458)  |  Flower (112)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Infinity (96)  |  Little (717)  |  Mere (86)  |  Merely (315)  |  Million (124)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Touch (146)  |  Touching (16)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Close (77)  |  Closed (38)  |  Do (1905)  |  Door (94)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Look (584)  |  Often (109)  |  Open (277)  |  See (1094)

When one longs for a drink, it seems as though one could drink a whole ocean—that is faith; but when one begins to drink, one can only drink altogether two glasses—that is science.
In Anton Chekhov, S. S. Koteliansky (trans.) and Leonard Woolf (trans.), Note-Book of Anton Chekhov (1921), 104.
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Drink (56)  |  Faith (209)  |  Glass (94)  |  Longing (19)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Two (936)  |  Whole (756)

When Richard Dawkins first published his idea of a meme, he made it clear he was speaking of “a unit of imitation” … Memes were supposed to be exclusive triumphs of humanity. But memes come in two different kinds—behavioral and verbal. … behavioral memes began brain-hopping long before there were such things as human minds.
In 'Threading a New Tapestry', Global Brain: The Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big Bang to the 21st Century (2000), 62.
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Behavioral (6)  |  Brain (281)  |  Richard Dawkins (49)  |  Different (595)  |  Exclusive (29)  |  First (1302)  |  Hop (3)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Idea (881)  |  Imitation (24)  |  Kind (564)  |  Meme (2)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Publish (42)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Triumph (76)  |  Two (936)  |  Unit (36)  |  Verbal (10)

When the movement of the comets is considered and we reflect on the laws of gravity, it will be readily perceived that their approach to Earth might there cause the most woeful events, bring back the deluge, or make it perish in a deluge of fire, shatter it into small dust, or at least turn it from its orbit, drive away its Moon, or, still worse, the Earth itself outside the orbit of Saturn, and inflict upon us a winter several centuries long, which neither men nor animals would be able to bear. The tails even of comets would not be unimportant phenomena, if in taking their departure left them in whole or part in our atmosphere
From Cosmologische Briefe über die Einrichtung des Weltbaues (1761). As quoted in Carl Sagan, Broca’s Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science (1986), 95.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Approach (112)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Back (395)  |  Bear (162)  |  Cause (561)  |  Comet (65)  |  Consider (428)  |  Deluge (14)  |  Dust (68)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Event (222)  |  Fire (203)  |  Flood (52)  |  Gravity (140)  |  Law (913)  |  Man (2252)  |  Moon (252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Movement (162)  |  Orbit (85)  |  Outside (141)  |  Perish (56)  |  Saturn (15)  |  Small (489)  |  Still (614)  |  Turn (454)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Winter (46)

When we look back beyond one hundred years over the long trails of history, we see immediately why the age we live in differs from all other ages in human annals. … It remained stationary in India and in China for thousands of years. But now it is moving very fast. … A priest from Thebes would probably have felt more at home at the council of Trent, two thousand years after Thebes had vanished, than Sir Isaac Newton at a modern undergraduate physical society, or George Stephenson in the Institute of Electrical Engineers. The changes have have been so sudden and so gigantic, that no period in history can be compared with the last century. The past no longer enables us even dimly to measure the future.
From 'Fifty Years Hence', Strand Magazine (Dec 1931). Reprinted in Popular Mechanics (Mar 1932), 57, No. 3, 393.
Science quotes on:  |  19th Century (41)  |  20th Century (40)  |  Age (509)  |  Annal (3)  |  Back (395)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Century (319)  |  Change (639)  |  China (27)  |  Compared (8)  |  Council (9)  |  Differ (88)  |  Dimly (6)  |  Electrical (57)  |  Electrical Engineer (5)  |  Electrical Engineering (12)  |  Enable (122)  |  Engineer (136)  |  Fast (49)  |  Future (467)  |  Gigantic (40)  |  History (716)  |  Home (184)  |  Human (1512)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Immediately (115)  |  India (23)  |  Institute (8)  |  Last (425)  |  Live (650)  |  Look (584)  |  Measure (241)  |  Modern (402)  |  More (2558)  |  Moving (11)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Other (2233)  |  Past (355)  |  Period (200)  |  Physical (518)  |  Priest (29)  |  Probably (50)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remained (2)  |  See (1094)  |  Society (350)  |  Stationary (11)  |  George Stephenson (10)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Trail (11)  |  Two (936)  |  Undergraduate (17)  |  Vanished (3)  |  Why (491)  |  Year (963)

When we no longer look at an organic being as a savage looks at a ship, as something wholly beyond his comprehension; when we regard every production of nature as one which has had a long history; when we contemplate every complex structure and instinct as the summing up of many contrivances, each useful to the possessor, in the same way as any great mechanical invention is the summing up of the labour, the experience, the reason, and even the blunders of numerous workmen; when we thus view each organic being, how far more interesting, I speak from experience, does the study of natural history become!
From the Conclusion of Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (3rd. ed., 1861), 521.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Blunder (21)  |  Complex (202)  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Contemplate (29)  |  Contrivance (12)  |  Experience (494)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Invention (400)  |  Labor (200)  |  Look (584)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  More (2558)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Organic (161)  |  Organism (231)  |  Production (190)  |  Reason (766)  |  Regard (312)  |  Savage (33)  |  Ship (69)  |  Something (718)  |  Speak (240)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Structure (365)  |  Study (701)  |  Summation (3)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wholly (88)  |  Workman (13)

When we take a slight survey of the surface of our globe a thousand objects offer themselves which, though long known, yet still demand our curiosity.
In History of the Earth and Animated Nature (1774, 1847), Vol. 1, 67.
Science quotes on:  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Demand (131)  |  Globe (51)  |  Known (453)  |  Object (438)  |  Offer (142)  |  Still (614)  |  Surface (223)  |  Survey (36)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thousand (340)

When you have made a thorough and reasonably long effort, to understand a thing, and still feel puzzled by it, stop, you will only hurt yourself by going on. Put it aside till the next morning; and if then you can’t make it out, and have no one to explain it to you, put it aside entirely, and go back to that part of the subject which you do understand.
From letter to Edith Rix with hints for studying (about Mar 1885), in Stuart Dodgson Collingwood, The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll (1898), 240.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Can�t (16)  |  Do (1905)  |  Effort (243)  |  Explain (334)  |  Feel (371)  |  Learning (291)  |  Morning (98)  |  Next (238)  |  Puzzled (2)  |  Still (614)  |  Stop (89)  |  Studying (70)  |  Subject (543)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thorough (40)  |  Understand (648)  |  Will (2350)

When you make a mistake, don’t look back at it long. Take the reason of the thing into your mind, and then look forward. Mistakes are lessons of wisdom. The past cannot be changed. The future is yet in your power.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Change (639)  |  Forward (104)  |  Future (467)  |  Lesson (58)  |  Look (584)  |  Look Back (5)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Past (355)  |  Power (771)  |  Reason (766)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Wisdom (235)

Whoopie! Man, that may have been a small one for Neil but that’s a long one for me.
(Commenting as the third man to step on the lunar surface, though of smaller stature, 5' 6", than Neil Armstrong.)
Spoken as Commander of the Apollo 12 lunar landing (1969). In British Broadcasting Corporation, The Listener (1969), 82, 729. On the previous Apollo 11 landing, Armstrong's famous remark had been "one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind." At 5' 6", Conrad was six inches shorter than Armstrong.
Science quotes on:  |  Neil Armstrong (17)  |  Man (2252)  |  Moon (252)  |  Small (489)  |  Step (234)  |  Surface (223)

Why is the world five—or ten or twenty—billion years old?
Because it took that long to find that out.
Anonymous
Reflecting on the time before the man existed, and have consciousness of the the world to answer the question. Unattributed joke given by George Wald in lecture, 'Life and Mind in the Universe', versions of which he delivered throughout the 1980s. On the website of his son, Elijah Wald, who states it was the last of his father's major lectures.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Billion (104)  |  Find (1014)  |  Joke (90)  |  Old (499)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

Why, then, are we surprised that comets, such a rare spectacle in the universe, are not known, when their return is at vast intervals?. … The time will come when diligent research over long periods will bring to light things which now lie hidden. A single lifetime, even though entirely devoted to the sky, would not be enough for the investigation of so vast a subject … And so this knowledge will be unfolded only through long successive ages. There will come a time when our descendants will be amazed that we did not know things that are so plain to them …. Many discoveries are reserved for ages still to come, when memory of us will have been effaced. Our universe is a sorry little affair unless it has in it something for every age to investigate … Nature does not reveal her mysteries once and for all. Someday there will be a man who will show in what regions comets have their orbit, why they travel so remote from other celestial bodies, how large they are and what sort they are.
Natural Questions, Book 7. As translated by Thomas H. Corcoran in Seneca in Ten Volumes: Naturales Quaestiones II (1972), 279 and 293.
Science quotes on:  |  Affair (29)  |  Age (509)  |  Amaze (5)  |  Celestial (53)  |  Comet (65)  |  Descendant (18)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Diligent (19)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Efface (6)  |  Enough (341)  |  Entirely (36)  |  Hidden (43)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Large (398)  |  Lie (370)  |  Lifetime (40)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Man (2252)  |  Memory (144)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Orbit (85)  |  Other (2233)  |  Period (200)  |  Plain (34)  |  Rare (94)  |  Remote (86)  |  Research (753)  |  Reserve (26)  |  Return (133)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Show (353)  |  Single (365)  |  Sky (174)  |  Someday (15)  |  Something (718)  |  Sorry (31)  |  Spectacle (35)  |  Still (614)  |  Subject (543)  |  Successive (73)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Travel (125)  |  Unfold (15)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vast (188)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)

Widespread intellectual and moral docility may be convenient for leaders in the short term, but it is suicidal for nations in the long term. One of the criteria for national leadership should therefore be a talent for understanding, encouraging, and making constructive use of vigorous criticism.
Billions and Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millenium (1998), 189.
Science quotes on:  |  Constructive (15)  |  Criteria (6)  |  Criticism (85)  |  Encouragement (27)  |  Encouraging (12)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Leader (51)  |  Leadership (13)  |  Making (300)  |  Moral (203)  |  Morality (55)  |  Nation (208)  |  Short (200)  |  Talent (99)  |  Term (357)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Use (771)  |  Widespread (23)

Wisdom does not inspect, but behold. We must look a long time before we can see.
In 'Natural history of Massachusetts', The Dial: A Magazine for Literature, Philosophy, and Religion (Jul 1842), 3, No. 1, 39.
Science quotes on:  |  Behold (19)  |  Inspect (3)  |  Look (584)  |  Must (1525)  |  See (1094)  |  Time (1911)  |  Wisdom (235)

With respect to Committees as you would perceive I am very jealous of their formation. I mean working committees. I think business is always better done by few than by many. I think also the working few ought not to be embarrassed by the idle many and further I think the idle many ought not to be honoured by association with the working few.—I do not think that my patience has ever come nearer to an end than when compelled to hear … long rambling malapropros enquiries of members who still have nothing in consequence to propose that shall advance the business.
Letter to John William Lubbock (6 Dec 1833). In Frank A.J.L. James (ed.), The Correspondence of Michael Faraday: Volume 2, 1832-1840 (1993), 160. The original text spelling of “embarrased” has been edited for ease of reading in the above quote.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Association (49)  |  Better (493)  |  Business (156)  |  Committee (16)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Do (1905)  |  End (603)  |  Formation (100)  |  Hear (144)  |  Honour (58)  |  Idle (34)  |  Mean (810)  |  Nearer (45)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Patience (58)  |  Respect (212)  |  Still (614)  |  Think (1122)  |  Work (1402)

With the introduction of agriculture mankind entered upon a long period of meanness, misery, and madness, from which they are only now being freed by the beneficent operation of the machine.
In The Conquest of Happiness (1930), 152.
Science quotes on:  |  Agriculture (78)  |  Being (1276)  |  Beneficent (9)  |  Enter (145)  |  Free (239)  |  Introduction (37)  |  Machine (271)  |  Madness (33)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Meanness (5)  |  Misery (31)  |  Operation (221)  |  Period (200)

Without tracing back to the Tower of Babel, one can observe that the very idea of building a very tall tower has long haunted human imagination. That kind of victory over the formidable law of gravity that tethers man to the ground has always appeared to him a symbol of the force and the challenges overcome.
From the original French, “Sans remonter à la Tour de Babel, on peut observer que l’idée même de la construction d’une tour de très grande hauteur a depuis longtemps hanté l'imagination des hommes. Celle sorte de victoire sur cette terrible loi de la pesanteur qui attache l’homme au sol lui a toujours paru un symbole de la force et des difficultés vaincues.” First sentences of Chap. 1, in Travaux Scientifiques Exécutés à la Tour de 300 Mètres de 1889 à 1900 (1900), 1. English translation by Webmaster using online resources.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Build (211)  |  Building (158)  |  Challenge (91)  |  Eiffel Tower (13)  |  Force (497)  |  Gravity (140)  |  Ground (222)  |  Haunt (6)  |  Human (1512)  |  Idea (881)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Kind (564)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Gravity (16)  |  Man (2252)  |  Observe (179)  |  Overcome (40)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Tall (11)  |  Tower (45)  |  Tower Of Babel (2)  |  Victory (40)

Words are to the Anthropologist what rolled pebbles are to the Geologist—Battered relics of past ages often containing within them indelible records capable of intelligible interpretion—and when we see what amount of change 2000 years has been able to produce in the languages of Greece & Italy or 1000 in those of Germany, France & Spain we naturally begin to ask how long a period must have lapsed since the Chinese, the Hebrew, the Delaware & the Malesass had a point in common with the German & Italian & each other.—Time! Time! Time!—we must not impugn the Scripture Chronology, but we must interpret it in accordance with whatever shall appear on fair enquiry to be the truth for there cannot be two truths. And really there is scope enough: for the lives of the Patriarchs may as reasonably be extended to 5000 or 50000 years apiece as the days of Creation to as many thousand millions of years.
Letter to Charles Lyell, 20 Feb 1836, In Walter F. Cannon, 'The Impact of Uniformitarianism', Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, 1961, 105, 308.
Science quotes on:  |  2000 (15)  |  Age (509)  |  Age Of The Earth (12)  |  Amount (153)  |  Ask (420)  |  Begin (275)  |  Capable (174)  |  Change (639)  |  Chinese (22)  |  Chronology (9)  |  Common (447)  |  Creation (350)  |  Enough (341)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Extend (129)  |  Geologist (82)  |  German (37)  |  Hebrew (10)  |  Impugn (2)  |  Intelligible (35)  |  Italian (13)  |  Language (308)  |  Live (650)  |  Must (1525)  |  Other (2233)  |  Past (355)  |  Patriarch (4)  |  Pebble (27)  |  Period (200)  |  Point (584)  |  Record (161)  |  Roll (41)  |  Scope (44)  |  See (1094)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Two (936)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Word (650)  |  Year (963)

Wouldst thou enjoy a long Life, a healthy Body, and a vigorous Mind, and be acquainted also with the wonderful Works of God? labour in the first place to bring thy Appetite into Subjection to Reason.
In Poor Richard's Almanack (1742).
Science quotes on:  |  Acquaintance (38)  |  Appetite (20)  |  Body (557)  |  Diet (56)  |  Enjoyment (37)  |  First (1302)  |  God (776)  |  Health (210)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Labor (200)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Reason (766)  |  Subjection (2)  |  Vigour (18)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  Work (1402)

Xenophanes of Kolophon ... believes that once the earth was mingled with the sea, but in the course of time it became freed from moisture; and his proofs are such as these: that shells are found in the midst of the land and among the mountains, that in the quarries of Syracuse the imprints of a fish and of seals had been found, and in Paros the imprint of an anchovy at some depth in the stone, and in Melite shallow impressions of all sorts of sea products. He says that these imprints were made when everything long ago was covered with mud, and then the imprint dried in the mud.
Doxographists, Zeller, Vorsokr. Phil. 543, n. 1. Quoted in Arthur Fairbanks (ed. And trans.), The First Philosophers of Greece (1898), 83.
Science quotes on:  |  Course (413)  |  Depth (97)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Everything (489)  |  Fish (130)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Impression (118)  |  Moisture (21)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Mud (26)  |  Paleontology (32)  |  Product (166)  |  Proof (304)  |  Say (989)  |  Sea (326)  |  Seal (19)  |  Shell (69)  |  Stone (168)  |  Time (1911)  |  Xenophanes (13)

You do what you can for as long as you can, and when you finally can’t, you do the next best thing. You back up but you don’t give up.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Best (467)  |  Do (1905)  |  Give (208)  |  Next (238)  |  Thing (1914)

You find FACTS as things given; I get them only by a long process of excavating (so to say), and so regard them as the very antipodes of things given.
In Letter, collected in Adolf Meyer and Edward Bradford Titchener, Defining American Psychology: The Correspondence Between Adolf Meyer and Edward Bradford Titchener (1990), 259.
Science quotes on:  |  Antipodes (3)  |  Excavate (4)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Find (1014)  |  Give (208)  |  Process (439)  |  Regard (312)  |  Say (989)  |  Thing (1914)

You live and learn. Or you don’t live long.
In 'From the Notebooks of Lazarus Long', Time Enough for Love: The Lives of Lazarus Long (1973), 269.
Science quotes on:  |  Learn (672)  |  Live (650)  |  Natural Selection (98)  |  Survival (105)

You may know the intractability of a disease by its long list of remedies.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Disease (340)  |  Know (1538)  |  List (10)  |  Remedy (63)

You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat.
When asked to describe radio
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Angeles (4)  |  Ask (420)  |  Cat (52)  |  Describe (132)  |  Difference (355)  |  Do (1905)  |  Exactly (14)  |  Head (87)  |  Kind (564)  |  Los (4)  |  New (1273)  |  New York (17)  |  Operate (19)  |  Pull (43)  |  Radio (60)  |  Receive (117)  |  Same (166)  |  See (1094)  |  Send (23)  |  Signal (29)  |  Tail (21)  |  Telegraph (45)  |  Understand (648)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wire (36)

You’re aware the boy failed my grade school math class, I take it? And not that many years later he’s teaching college. Now I ask you: Is that the sorriest indictment of the American educational system you ever heard? [pauses to light cigarette.] No aptitude at all for long division, but never mind. It’s him they ask to split the atom. How he talked his way into the Nobel prize is beyond me. But then, I suppose it’s like the man says, it’s not what you know...
Karl Arbeiter (former teacher of Albert Einstein)
Science quotes on:  |  American (56)  |  Aptitude (19)  |  Ask (420)  |  Atom (381)  |  Aware (36)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Boy (100)  |  Cigarette (26)  |  Class (168)  |  College (71)  |  Division (67)  |  Educational (7)  |  Fail (191)  |  Grade (12)  |  Hear (144)  |  Indictment (2)  |  Know (1538)  |  Late (119)  |  Light (635)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nobel Prize (42)  |  Pause (6)  |  Say (989)  |  School (227)  |  Sorry (31)  |  Split (15)  |  Suppose (158)  |  System (545)  |  Talk (108)  |  Teach (299)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Way (1214)  |  Year (963)


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.