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: “A change in motion is proportional to the motive force impressed and takes place along the straight line in which that force is impressed.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index N > Category: Negro

Negro Quotes (8 quotes)

I am not merely satisfied in making money for myself, for I am endeavoring to provide employment for hundreds of women of my race. ... I want to say to every Negro woman present, don't sit down and wait for the opportunities to come. Get up and make them!
Address at the annual convention of the National Negro Business League (1914). As cited in Marshall Cavendish Corporation, America in the 20th Century (2003), Vol. 12, 273.
Science quotes on:  |  Down (455)  |  Employment (34)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Initiative (17)  |  Making (300)  |  Merely (315)  |  Money (178)  |  Myself (211)  |  Present (630)  |  Race (278)  |  Role Model (9)  |  Say (989)  |  Want (504)  |  Woman (160)

Perseverance is my motto. It laid the Atlantic cable; it gave us the telegraph, telephone, and wireless. It gave to the world an Abraham Lincoln, and to a race freedom. It gave to the negro Booker T. Washington and Tuskegee Institute. It made Frederick Douglass the great orator that he was, and it gave to the race Paul Laurence Dunbar, and to poetry a new song.
In 'Wealthiest Negro Woman's Suburban Mansion: Estate at Irvington, Overlooking Hudson and Containing All the Attractions That A Big Fortune Commands', New York Times Sunday Magazine (4 Nov 1917), 4.
Science quotes on:  |  Frederick Douglass (14)  |  Freedom (145)  |  Abraham Lincoln (13)  |  Motto (29)  |  Orator (3)  |  Perseverance (24)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Race (278)  |  Telegraph (45)  |  Telephone (31)  |  Tuskegee Institute (2)  |  Wireless (7)

Segregationalists will even argue that God was the first segregationalist. “Red birds and blue birds don't fly together”, they contend. … They turn to some pseudo-scientific writing and argue that the Negro’s brain is smaller than the white man’s brain. They do not know, or they refuse to know that the idea of an inferior or superior race has been refuted by the best evidence of the science of anthropology. Great anthropologists, like Ruth Benedict, Margaret Mead, and Melville J. Herskovits, agree that, although there may be inferior and superior individuals within all races, there is no superior or inferior race. And segregationalists refuse to acknowledge that there are four types of blood, and these four types are found within every racial group.
'Love in Action', Strength To Love (1963, 1981), 45-46.
Science quotes on:  |  Acknowledge (33)  |  Anthropology (61)  |  Best (467)  |  Bigotry (4)  |  Bird (163)  |  Blood (144)  |  Brain (281)  |  Do (1905)  |  Evidence (267)  |  First (1302)  |  Fly (153)  |  God (776)  |  Great (1610)  |  Idea (881)  |  Individual (420)  |  Inferior (37)  |  Know (1538)  |  Man (2252)  |  Pseudoscience (17)  |  Race (278)  |  Refuse (45)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Sociology (46)  |  Superior (88)  |  Together (392)  |  Turn (454)  |  Type (171)  |  White (132)  |  Will (2350)  |  Writing (192)

Slavery in America was perpetuated not merely by human badness but also by human blindness. … Men convinced themselves that a system that was so economically profitable must be morally justifiable. … Science was commandeered to prove the biological inferiority of the Negro. Even philosophical logic was manipulated [exemplified by] an Aristotlian syllogism:
All men are made in the image of God;
God, as everyone knows, is not a Negro;
Therefore, the Negro is not a man.
'Love in Action', Strength To Love (1963, 1981), 44.
Science quotes on:  |  America (143)  |  Aristotle (179)  |  Biological (137)  |  Blindness (11)  |  God (776)  |  Human (1512)  |  Image (97)  |  Know (1538)  |  Logic (311)  |  Man (2252)  |  Merely (315)  |  Money (178)  |  Must (1525)  |  Profitable (29)  |  Prove (261)  |  Slavery (13)  |  Syllogism (8)  |  System (545)  |  Themselves (433)

The attitude of the intellectual community toward America is shaped not by the creative few but by the many who for one reason or another cannot transmute their dissatisfaction into a creative impulse, and cannot acquire a sense of uniqueness and of growth by developing and expressing their capacities and talents. There is nothing in contemporary America that can cure or alleviate their chronic frustration. They want power, lordship, and opportunities for imposing action. Even if we should banish poverty from the land, lift up the Negro to true equality, withdraw from Vietnam, and give half of the national income as foreign aid, they will still see America as an air-conditioned nightmare unfit for them to live in.
In 'Some Thoughts on the Present', The Temper of Our Time (1967), 107.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquire (46)  |  Action (342)  |  Aid (101)  |  Air (366)  |  Alleviate (4)  |  America (143)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Banish (11)  |  Capacity (105)  |  Chronic (5)  |  Community (111)  |  Condition (362)  |  Contemporary (33)  |  Creative (144)  |  Cure (124)  |  Develop (278)  |  Dissatisfaction (13)  |  Equality (34)  |  Express (192)  |  Foreign (45)  |  Frustration (14)  |  Give (208)  |  Growth (200)  |  Half (63)  |  Impose (22)  |  Impulse (52)  |  Income (18)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Land (131)  |  Lift (57)  |  Live (650)  |  National (29)  |  Nightmare (4)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Opportunity (95)  |  Poverty (40)  |  Power (771)  |  Reason (766)  |  See (1094)  |  Sense (785)  |  Shape (77)  |  Still (614)  |  Talent (99)  |  Toward (45)  |  Transmute (6)  |  True (239)  |  Unfit (13)  |  Uniqueness (11)  |  Want (504)  |  Will (2350)  |  Withdraw (11)

Thus died Negro Tom [Thomas Fuller], this untaught arithmetician, this untutored scholar. Had his opportunities of improvement been equal to those of thousands of his fellow-men, neither the Royal Society of London, the Academy of Science at Paris, nor even a Newton himself need have been ashamed to acknowledge him a brother in science.
[Thomas Fuller (1710-1790), although enslaved from Africa at age 14, was an arithmetical prodigy. He was known as the Virginia Calculator because of his exceptional ability with arithmetic calculations. His intellectual accomplishments were related by Dr. Benjamin Rush in a letter read to the Pennsylvania Society for the Abolition of Slavery.]
Obituary
From obituary in the Boston Columbian Centinal (29 Dec 1790), 14, No. 31. In George Washington Williams, History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880 (1882), Vol. 1, 400
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Academy (37)  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Acknowledge (33)  |  Africa (38)  |  African American (8)  |  Age (509)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Brother (47)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Calculator (9)  |  Equal (88)  |  Exceptional (19)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Himself (461)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Known (453)  |  Letter (117)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Opportunity (95)  |  Prodigy (5)  |  Read (308)  |  Royal (56)  |  Royal Society (17)  |  Scholar (52)  |  Shame (15)  |  Slave (40)  |  Slavery (13)  |  Society (350)  |  Thousand (340)

George Washington Carver quote: When our thoughts—which bring actions—are filled with hate against anyone, Negro or white
Image credit: Fugue cc-by-2.0 (source)
When our thoughts—which bring actions—are filled with hate against anyone, Negro or white, we are in a living hell. That is as real as hell will ever be.
While hate for our fellow man puts us in a living hell, holding good thoughts for them brings us an opposite state of living, one of happiness, success, peace. We are then in heaven.
In Alvin D. Smith, George Washington Carver: Man of God (1954), 27-28. 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:  |  Action (342)  |  Against (332)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Good (906)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Hate (68)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Hell (32)  |  Living (492)  |  Man (2252)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Peace (116)  |  State (505)  |  Success (327)  |  Thought (995)  |  White (132)  |  Will (2350)

Why do they [Americans] quarrel, why do they hate Negroes, Indians, even Germans, why do they not have science and poetry commensurate with themselves, why are there so many frauds and so much nonsense? I cannot soon give a solution to these questions ... It was clear that in the United States there was a development not of the best, but of the middle and worst sides of European civilization; the notorious general voting, the tendency to politics... all the same as in Europe. A new dawn is not to be seen on this side of the ocean.
The Oil Industry in the North American State of Pennsylvania and in the Caucasus (1877). Translated by H. M. Leicester, from the original in Russian, in 'Mendeleev's Visit to America', Journal of Chemical Education (1957), 34, 333.
Science quotes on:  |  America (143)  |  Best (467)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Commensurate (2)  |  Dawn (31)  |  Development (441)  |  Do (1905)  |  Europe (50)  |  Fraud (15)  |  General (521)  |  German (37)  |  Germany (16)  |  Hate (68)  |  India (23)  |  Indian (32)  |  Middle (19)  |  New (1273)  |  Nonsense (48)  |  Notorious (8)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Politics (122)  |  Question (649)  |  Science And Poetry (17)  |  Side (236)  |  Solution (282)  |  Soon (187)  |  State (505)  |  Tendency (110)  |  Themselves (433)  |  United States (31)  |  Vote (16)  |  Why (491)  |  Worst (57)


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.