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: “The path towards sustainable energy sources will be long and sometimes difficult. But America cannot resist this transition, we must lead it... 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.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index P > Category: Posture

Posture Quotes (7 quotes)

Deductivism in mathematical literature and inductivism in scientific papers are simply the postures we choose to be seen in when the curtain goes up and the public sees us. The theatrical illusion is shattered if we ask what goes on behind the scenes. In real life discovery and justification are almost always different processes.
Induction and Intuition in Scientific Thought (1969), 26.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Behind (139)  |  Choice (114)  |  Choose (116)  |  Curtain (4)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Illusion (68)  |  Justification (52)  |  Life (1870)  |  Literature (116)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Paper (192)  |  Process (439)  |  Public (100)  |  Publication (102)  |  Real Life (8)  |  Scene (36)  |  Scientific (955)  |  See (1094)  |  Shatter (8)  |  Shattered (8)  |  Theatre (5)

In the mathematics I can report no deficience, except that it be that men do not sufficiently understand the excellent use of the pure mathematics, in that they do remedy and cure many defects in the wit and faculties intellectual. For if the wit be too dull, they sharpen it; if too wandering, they fix it; if too inherent in the sense, they abstract it. So that as tennis is a game of no use in itself, but of great use in respect it maketh a quick eye and a body ready to put itself into all postures; so in the mathematics, that use which is collateral and intervenient is no less worthy than that which is principal and intended.
As translated in John Fauvel and Jeremy Gray (eds.) A History of Mathematics: A Reader (1987), 290-291. From De Augmentis, Book 3, The Advancement of Learning (1605), Book 2. Reprinted in The Two Books of Francis Bacon: Of the Proficience and Advancement of Learning, Divine and Human (2009), 97.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Body (557)  |  Cure (124)  |  Defect (31)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dull (58)  |  Eye (440)  |  Faculty (76)  |  Game (104)  |  Great (1610)  |  Inherent (43)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Principal (69)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Mathematics (72)  |  Quick (13)  |  Remedy (63)  |  Respect (212)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sharpen (22)  |  Tennis (8)  |  Understand (648)  |  Use (771)  |  Value Of Mathematics (60)  |  Wit (61)

Our methods of communication with our fellow men take many forms. We share with other animals the ability to transmit information by such diverse means as the posture of our bodies, by the movements of our eyes, head, arms, and hands, and by our utterances of non-specific sounds. But we go far beyond any other species on earth in that we have evolved sophisticated forms of pictorial representation, elaborate spoken and written languages, ingenious methods of recording music and language on discs, on magnetic tape and in a variety of other kinds of code.
As quoted in epigraph before title page in John Wolfenden, Hermann Bondi, et al., The Languages of Science: A Survey of Techniques of Communication (1963), i.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Animal (651)  |  Arm (82)  |  Arms (37)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Code (31)  |  Communication (101)  |  Diverse (20)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Elaborate (31)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Form (976)  |  Hand (149)  |  Head (87)  |  Information (173)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Kind (564)  |  Language (308)  |  Magnetic (44)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Method (531)  |  Movement (162)  |  Music (133)  |  Other (2233)  |  Picture (148)  |  Record (161)  |  Recording (13)  |  Representation (55)  |  Share (82)  |  Sophisticated (16)  |  Sound (187)  |  Species (435)  |  Specific (98)  |  Spoken (3)  |  Tape (5)  |  Utterance (11)  |  Variety (138)  |  Written (6)

Our posturing, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Challenge (91)  |  Cosmic (74)  |  Dark (145)  |  Delusion (26)  |  Elsewhere (10)  |  Envelop (5)  |  Great (1610)  |  Help (116)  |  Hint (21)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Importance (299)  |  Light (635)  |  Lonely (24)  |  Obscurity (28)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Pale (9)  |  Planet (402)  |  Point (584)  |  Position (83)  |  Privilege (41)  |  Save (126)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Importance (3)  |  Speck (25)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vastness (15)  |  Will (2350)

Secondly, the study of mathematics would show them the necessity there is in reasoning, to separate all the distinct ideas, and to see the habitudes that all those concerned in the present inquiry have to one another, and to lay by those which relate not to the proposition in hand, and wholly to leave them out of the reckoning. This is that which, in other respects besides quantity is absolutely requisite to just reasoning, though in them it is not so easily observed and so carefully practised. In those parts of knowledge where it is thought demonstration has nothing to do, men reason as it were in a lump; and if upon a summary and confused view, or upon a partial consideration, they can raise the appearance of a probability, they usually rest content; especially if it be in a dispute where every little straw is laid hold on, and everything that can but be drawn in any way to give color to the argument is advanced with ostentation. But that mind is not in a posture to find truth that does not distinctly take all the parts asunder, and, omitting what is not at all to the point, draws a conclusion from the result of all the particulars which in any way influence it.
In Conduct of the Understanding, Sect. 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolutely (41)  |  Advance (298)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Argument (145)  |  Asunder (4)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Color (155)  |  Concern (239)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Confused (13)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Content (75)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Dispute (36)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Distinctly (5)  |  Do (1905)  |  Draw (140)  |  Easily (36)  |  Especially (31)  |  Everything (489)  |  Find (1014)  |  Give (208)  |  Habit (174)  |  Hold (96)  |  Idea (881)  |  Influence (231)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Laid (7)  |  Little (717)  |  Lump (5)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Observe (179)  |  Observed (149)  |  Omit (12)  |  Other (2233)  |  Part (235)  |  Partial (10)  |  Particular (80)  |  Point (584)  |  Practise (7)  |  Present (630)  |  Probability (135)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Raise (38)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Reckon (31)  |  Reckoning (19)  |  Requisite (12)  |  Respect (212)  |  Rest (287)  |  Result (700)  |  See (1094)  |  Separate (151)  |  Show (353)  |  Straw (7)  |  Study (701)  |  Summary (11)  |  Thought (995)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Usually (176)  |  Value Of Mathematics (60)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wholly (88)

The entire human body is disposed for a vertical posture.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Body (34)  |  Physiology (101)  |  Vertical (4)

We must in imagination sweep off the drifted matter that clogs the surface of the ground; we must suppose all the covering of moss and heath and wood to be torn away from the sides of the mountains, and the green mantle that lies near their feet to be lifted up; we may then see the muscular integuments, and sinews, and bones of our mother Earth, and so judge of the part played by each of them during those old convulsive movements whereby her limbs were contorted and drawn up into their present posture.
Letter 2 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 (1842), 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Bone (101)  |  Clog (5)  |  Convulsion (5)  |  Covering (14)  |  Drift (14)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Feet (5)  |  Green (65)  |  Ground (222)  |  Heath (5)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Integument (4)  |  Judge (114)  |  Lie (370)  |  Lift (57)  |  Limb (9)  |  Mantle (4)  |  Matter (821)  |  Moss (14)  |  Mother (116)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Movement (162)  |  Muscle (47)  |  Must (1525)  |  Old (499)  |  Part (235)  |  Play (116)  |  Present (630)  |  See (1094)  |  Side (236)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Supposition (50)  |  Surface (223)  |  Sweep (22)  |  Torn (17)  |  Wood (97)


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.