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 was going to record talking... the foil was put on; I then shouted 'Mary had a little lamb',... and the machine reproduced it perfectly.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index R > Category: Rain

Rain Quotes (70 quotes)

Burned deforestation photo+quote Destroying rain forest for economic gain is like burning a Renaissance painting to cook a meal
Lacandon jungle burned for agriculture in Chiapas, Mexico (by Jami Dwyer) (source)
[Destroying rain forest for economic gain] is like burning a Renaissance painting to cook a meal.
Quoted in R.Z. Sheppard, 'Nature: Splendor in The Grass', Time (3 Sep 1990)
Science quotes on:  |  Burn (99)  |  Burning (49)  |  Cook (20)  |  Deforestation (50)  |  Economic (84)  |  Economics (44)  |  Forest (161)  |  Gain (146)  |  Meal (19)  |  Painting (46)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Renaissance (16)

[Describing the effects of over-indulgence in wine:]
But most too passive, when the blood runs low
Too weakly indolent to strive with pain,
And bravely by resisting conquer fate,
Try Circe's arts; and in the tempting bowl
Of poisoned nectar sweet oblivion swill.
Struck by the powerful charm, the gloom dissolves
In empty air; Elysium opens round,
A pleasing frenzy buoys the lightened soul,
And sanguine hopes dispel your fleeting care;
And what was difficult, and what was dire,
Yields to your prowess and superior stars:
The happiest you of all that e'er were mad,
Or are, or shall be, could this folly last.
But soon your heaven is gone: a heavier gloom
Shuts o'er your head; and, as the thundering stream,
Swollen o'er its banks with sudden mountain rain,
Sinks from its tumult to a silent brook,
So, when the frantic raptures in your breast
Subside, you languish into mortal man;
You sleep, and waking find yourself undone,
For, prodigal of life, in one rash night
You lavished more than might support three days.
A heavy morning comes; your cares return
With tenfold rage. An anxious stomach well
May be endured; so may the throbbing head;
But such a dim delirium, such a dream,
Involves you; such a dastardly despair
Unmans your soul, as maddening Pentheus felt,
When, baited round Citheron's cruel sides,
He saw two suns, and double Thebes ascend.
The Art of Preserving Health: a Poem in Four Books (2nd. ed., 1745), Book IV, 108-110.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Art (680)  |  Ascend (30)  |  Bank (31)  |  Blood (144)  |  Care (203)  |  Charm (54)  |  Conquer (39)  |  Cruel (25)  |  Delirium (3)  |  Despair (40)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Dire (6)  |  Dissolve (22)  |  Dream (222)  |  Drunk (10)  |  Effect (414)  |  Empty (82)  |  Fate (76)  |  Find (1014)  |  Folly (44)  |  Frenzy (6)  |  Gloom (11)  |  Headache (5)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Hope (321)  |  Indulgence (6)  |  Involve (93)  |  Last (425)  |  Life (1870)  |  Low (86)  |  Mad (54)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Morning (98)  |  Mortal (55)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Night (133)  |  Open (277)  |  Pain (144)  |  Poison (46)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Prodigal (2)  |  Rapture (8)  |  Rash (15)  |  Return (133)  |  Run (158)  |  Saw (160)  |  Shut (41)  |  Side (236)  |  Sink (38)  |  Sleep (81)  |  Soon (187)  |  Soul (235)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Stomach (40)  |  Stream (83)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Sun (407)  |  Superior (88)  |  Support (151)  |  Sweet (40)  |  Tempting (10)  |  Try (296)  |  Two (936)  |  Waking (17)  |  Wine (39)  |  Yield (86)

A single tree by itself is dependent upon all the adverse chances of shifting circumstances. The wind stunts it: the variations in temperature check its foliage: the rains denude its soil: its leaves are blown away and are lost for the purpose of fertilisation. You may obtain individual specimens of line trees either in exceptional circumstances, or where human cultivation had intervened. But in nature the normal way in which trees flourish is by their association in a forest. Each tree may lose something of its individual perfection of growth, but they mutually assist each other in preserving the conditions of survival. The soil is preserved and shaded; and the microbes necessary for its fertility are neither scorched, nor frozen, nor washed away. A forest is the triumph of the organisation of mutually dependent species.
In Science and the Modern World (1926), 296-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Assistance (23)  |  Association (49)  |  Chance (244)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Condition (362)  |  Cultivation (36)  |  Dependence (46)  |  Ecology (81)  |  Exceptional (19)  |  Fertility (23)  |  Flourish (34)  |  Foliage (6)  |  Forest (161)  |  Freezing (16)  |  Growth (200)  |  Human (1512)  |  Individual (420)  |  Lose (165)  |  Microbe (30)  |  Microbes (14)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Organization (120)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Preservation (39)  |  Preserving (18)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Shift (45)  |  Single (365)  |  Soil (98)  |  Something (718)  |  Species (435)  |  Specimen (32)  |  Stunt (7)  |  Survival (105)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Tree (269)  |  Triumph (76)  |  Variation (93)  |  Wash (23)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wind (141)

According to the historian D. B. McIntyre (1963), James Hutton, often known as the father of geology, said in a lecture before the Royal Society of Edinburgh in the 1790s that he thought of the Earth as a superorganism and that its proper study would be by physiology. Hutton went on to make the analogy between the circulation of the blood, discovered by Harvey, and the circulation of the nutrient elements of the Earth and of the way that sunlight distills water from the oceans so that it may later fall as rain and so refresh the earth.
In 'The Earth as a Living Organism', Essay collected in E. O. Wilson and F. M. Peter (eds.), Biodiversity (1988), Chap. 56, 488. [Notes: Donald Bertram McIntyre (1923–2009) was a geologist. Hutton had medical training early in his life. According to Mirriam-Webster’s dictionary, the first known use of the word “superorganism” was “circa 1899”—so Hutton did not use that word. However, McIntyre did adopt that sophisticated word to describe Hutton’s thought, twice, in Philosophy of Geology (1963), 7 & 10. Thus, McIntyre and Lovelock freely embroidered whatever Hutton actually wrote, perhaps over-stepping. Cándido Manuel García Cruz criticizes that these “assertions are merely a misinterpretation” although “Hutton has nevertheless an holistic view which is closer to the Alfred N. Whitehead’s organic mechanicism than the James Lovelock’s Gaia Hypothesis,” as quoted from the abstract of his article 'From James Hutton’s «Theory of the Earth» to James Lovelock’s «Gaia Hypothesis»', Asclepio; Archivo Iberoamericano de Historia de la Medicina y Antropología Médica (Jun 2007), 59, No. 1, 65-100. Thus, it is best to read his own words in James Hutton, Theory of the Earth, which at length describes the “terrestrial system” as a “machine of a peculiar construction.” —Webmaster]
Science quotes on:  |  Analogy (76)  |  Blood (144)  |  Circulation (27)  |  Discover (571)  |  Distill (3)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Element (322)  |  William Harvey (30)  |  James Hutton (22)  |  Lecture (111)  |  Nutrient (8)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Physiology (101)  |  Proper (150)  |  Refresh (5)  |  Study (701)  |  Sunlight (29)  |  Thought (995)  |  Water (503)

After an orange cloud—formed as a result of a dust storm over the Sahara and caught up by air currents—reached the Philippines and settled there with rain, I understood that we are all sailing in the same boat.
In Jack Hassard and Julie Weisberg , Environmental Science on the Net: The Global Thinking Project (1999), 40.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Boat (17)  |  Catch (34)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Current (122)  |  Dust (68)  |  Dust Storm (2)  |  Form (976)  |  Orange (15)  |  Philippines (3)  |  Reach (286)  |  Result (700)  |  Sahara (2)  |  Sail (37)  |  Sailing (14)  |  Same (166)  |  Settle (23)  |  Settled (34)  |  Storm (56)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understood (155)

All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again.
Bible
King James Version, Ecclesiastes 1:7.
Science quotes on:  |  Cloud (111)  |  River (140)  |  Sea (326)  |  Water Cycle (5)

As every circumstance relating to so capital a discovery as this (the greatest, perhaps, that has been made in the whole compass of philosophy, since the time of Sir Isaac Newton) cannot but give pleasure to all my readers, I shall endeavour to gratify them with the communication of a few particulars which I have from the best authority. The Doctor [Benjamin Franklin], after having published his method of verifying his hypothesis concerning the sameness of electricity with the matter lightning, was waiting for the erection of a spire in Philadelphia to carry his views into execution; not imagining that a pointed rod, of a moderate height, could answer the purpose; when it occurred to him, that, by means of a common kite, he could have a readier and better access to the regions of thunder than by any spire whatever. Preparing, therefore, a large silk handkerchief, and two cross sticks, of a proper length, on which to extend it, he took the opportunity of the first approaching thunder storm to take a walk into a field, in which there was a shed convenient for his purpose. But dreading the ridicule which too commonly attends unsuccessful attempts in science, he communicated his intended experiment to no body but his son, who assisted him in raising the kite.
The kite being raised, a considerable time elapsed before there was any appearance of its being electrified. One very promising cloud passed over it without any effect; when, at length, just as he was beginning to despair of his contrivance, he observed some loose threads of the hempen string to stand erect, and to avoid one another, just as if they had been suspended on a common conductor. Struck with this promising appearance, he inmmediately presented his knuckle to the key, and (let the reader judge of the exquisite pleasure he must have felt at that moment) the discovery was complete. He perceived a very evident electric spark. Others succeeded, even before the string was wet, so as to put the matter past all dispute, and when the rain had wetted the string, he collected electric fire very copiously. This happened in June 1752, a month after the electricians in France had verified the same theory, but before he had heard of any thing that they had done.
The History and Present State of Electricity, with Original Experiments (1767, 3rd ed. 1775), Vol. 1, 216-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Access (21)  |  Answer (389)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Attend (67)  |  Authority (99)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Being (1276)  |  Best (467)  |  Better (493)  |  Body (557)  |  Carry (130)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Common (447)  |  Communication (101)  |  Compass (37)  |  Complete (209)  |  Conductor (17)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Despair (40)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Dispute (36)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Effect (414)  |  Electric (76)  |  Electrician (6)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Endeavour (63)  |  Evident (92)  |  Execution (25)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Exquisite (27)  |  Extend (129)  |  Field (378)  |  Fire (203)  |  First (1302)  |  France (29)  |  Benjamin Franklin (95)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Judge (114)  |  Key (56)  |  Kite (4)  |  Large (398)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Method (531)  |  Moment (260)  |  Month (91)  |  Must (1525)  |  Observed (149)  |  Opportunity (95)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pass (241)  |  Past (355)  |  Philadelphia (3)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Point (584)  |  Preparing (21)  |  Present (630)  |  Proper (150)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Ridicule (23)  |  Sameness (3)  |  Silk (14)  |  Spark (32)  |  Spire (5)  |  Stand (284)  |  Storm (56)  |  String (22)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thread (36)  |  Thunder (21)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Verification (32)  |  View (496)  |  Waiting (42)  |  Walk (138)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Whole (756)

Astronomy affords the most extensive example of the connection of physical sciences. In it are combined the sciences of number and quantity, or rest and motion. In it we perceive the operation of a force which is mixed up with everything that exists in the heavens or on earth; which pervades every atom, rules the motion of animate and inanimate beings, and is a sensible in the descent of the rain-drop as in the falls of Niagara; in the weight of the air, as in the periods of the moon.
On the Connexion of the Physical Sciences (1858), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Animate (8)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Atom (381)  |  Being (1276)  |  Combination (150)  |  Connection (171)  |  Descent (30)  |  Drop (77)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Everything (489)  |  Example (98)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Extensive (34)  |  Fall (243)  |  Force (497)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Inanimate (18)  |  Mix (24)  |  Moon (252)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motion (320)  |  Niagara (8)  |  Number (710)  |  Operation (221)  |  Perception (97)  |  Period (200)  |  Pervade (10)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Raindrop (4)  |  Rest (287)  |  Rule (307)  |  Sensible (28)  |  Weight (140)

Eratosthenes declares that it is no longer necessary to inquire as to the cause of the overflow of the Nile, since we know definitely that men have come to the sources of the Nile and have observed the rains there.
Proclus on Plato Timaeus, Vol. 1, 121.8-11 (Diehl). Quoted in Morris R. Cohen and I. E. Drabkin, A Sourcebook in Greek Science (1948), 383.
Science quotes on:  |  Cause (561)  |  Declare (48)  |  Flood (52)  |  Inquire (26)  |  Know (1538)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observed (149)  |  Overflow (10)  |  River (140)

Every dew-drop and rain-drop had a whole heaven within it.
In 'Hyperion', The Prose Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1851), 137.
Science quotes on:  |  Dew (10)  |  Dewdrop (2)  |  Drop (77)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Meteorology (36)  |  Raindrop (4)  |  Whole (756)

For I took an Earthen Vessel, in which I put 200 pounds of Earth that had been dried in a Furnace, which I moystened with Rain-water, and I implanted therein the Trunk or Stem of a Willow Tree, weighing five pounds: and about three ounces: But I moystened the Earthen Vessel with Rain-water, or distilled water (alwayes when there was need) and it was large, and implanted into the Earth, and leaft of the Vessel, with an Iron-Plate covered with Tin, and easily passable with many holes. I computed not the weight of the leaves that fell off in the four Autumnes. At length, I again dried the Earth of the Vessel, and there were found the same 200 pounds, wanting about two ounces. Therefore 164 pounds of Wood, Barks, and Roots, arose out of water onely.
Oriatrike: Or, Physick Refined, trans. john Chandler (1662), 109.
Science quotes on:  |  Bark (19)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Growth (200)  |  Iron (99)  |  Large (398)  |  Photosynthesis (21)  |  Plant (320)  |  Root (121)  |  Stem (31)  |  Tin (18)  |  Tree (269)  |  Trunk (23)  |  Two (936)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Water (503)  |  Weight (140)  |  Wood (97)

For keenest enjoyment, I visit when the dew is on them, or in cloudy weather, or when the rain is falling: and I must be alone or with someone who cares for them as I do.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Care (203)  |  Dew (10)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enjoyment (37)  |  Horticulture (10)  |  Must (1525)  |  Weather (49)

Groves hated the weather, and the weathermen; they represented chaos and the messengers of chaos. Weather violated boundaries, ignored walls and gates, failed to adhere to deadlines, disobeyed orders. Weather caused delays. The weather forecasters had opposed the [atomic bomb] test date for months—it was set within a window of unfavorable conditions: thunderstorms, rain, high winds, inversion layers. Groves had overridden them. … Groves saw it as a matter of insubordination when the weather forecasters refused to forecast good weather for the test.
In Atomic Spaces: Living on the Manhattan Project (1999), 312. For the attitude of Groves toward the weather see his, 'Some Recollections of July 16, 1945', Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (Jun 1970), 26, No. 6, 27.
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Chaos (99)  |  Condition (362)  |  Delay (21)  |  Disobedience (4)  |  Fail (191)  |  Forecast (15)  |  Gate (33)  |  Good (906)  |  Leslie Richard Groves (13)  |  High (370)  |  Layer (41)  |  Matter (821)  |  Month (91)  |  Order (638)  |  Represent (157)  |  Saw (160)  |  Schedule (5)  |  Set (400)  |  Test (221)  |  Thunderstorm (7)  |  Trinity (9)  |  Wall (71)  |  Weather (49)  |  Wind (141)  |  Window (59)

I am the daughter of earth and water, And the nursling of the sky;
I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores;
I change, but I cannot die.
For after the rain when with never a stain,
The pavilion of Heaven is bare,
And the winds and sunbeams with their convex gleams,
Build up the blue dome of air,
I silently laugh at my own cenotaph, And out of the caverns of rain,
Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb,
I arise and unbuild it again.
The Cloud (1820). In K. Raine (ed.), Shelley (1974), 289.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Arise (162)  |  Bare (33)  |  Build (211)  |  Cavern (9)  |  Cenotaph (2)  |  Change (639)  |  Child (333)  |  Convex (6)  |  Daughter (30)  |  Die (94)  |  Dome (9)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Ghost (36)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Laugh (50)  |  Never (1089)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Pass (241)  |  Pore (7)  |  Shore (25)  |  Sky (174)  |  Stain (10)  |  Through (846)  |  Tomb (15)  |  Water (503)  |  Wind (141)  |  Womb (25)

I finally saw that the blood, forced by the action of the left ventricle into the arteries, was distributed to the body at large, and its several parts, in the same manner as it is sent through the lungs, impelled by the right ventricle into the pulmonary artery, and that it then passed through the veins and along the vena cava, and so round to the left ventricle in the manner already indicated. Which motion we may be allowed to call circular, in the same way as Aristotle says that the air and the rain emulate the circular motion of the superior bodies; for the moist earth, warmed by the sun, evaporates; the vapours drawn upwards are condensed, and descending in the form of rain, moisten the earth again; and by this arrangement are generations of living things produced.
From William Harvey and Robert Willis (trans.), The Works of William Harvey, M.D. (1847), 46.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Air (366)  |  Already (226)  |  Aristotle (179)  |  Arrangement (93)  |  Artery (10)  |  Blood (144)  |  Body (557)  |  Call (781)  |  Circular (19)  |  Circular Motion (7)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Emulate (2)  |  Evaporate (5)  |  Form (976)  |  Generation (256)  |  Impelled (2)  |  Large (398)  |  Living (492)  |  Lung (37)  |  Moist (13)  |  Moisten (2)  |  Motion (320)  |  Pass (241)  |  Produced (187)  |  Pulmonary (3)  |  Right (473)  |  Saw (160)  |  Say (989)  |  Sun (407)  |  Superior (88)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  Upward (44)  |  Upwards (6)  |  Vapour (16)  |  Vein (27)  |  Ventricle (7)  |  Warm (74)  |  Way (1214)

I have always liked horticulturists, people who make their living from orchards and gardens, whose hands are familiar with the feel of the bark, whose eyes are trained to distinguish the different varieties, who have a form memory. Their brains are not forever dealing with vague abstractions; they are satisfied with the romance which the seasons bring with them, and have the patience and fortitude to gamble their lives and fortunes in an industry which requires infinite patience, which raise hopes each spring and too often dashes them to pieces in fall. They are always conscious of sun and wind and rain; must always be alert lest they lose the chance of ploughing at the right moment, pruning at the right time, circumventing the attacks of insects and fungus diseases by quick decision and prompt action. They are manufacturers of a high order, whose business requires not only intelligence of a practical character, but necessitates an instinct for industry which is different from that required by the city dweller always within sight of other people and the sound of their voices. The successful horticulturist spends much time alone among his trees, away from the constant chatter of human beings.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstraction (48)  |  Action (342)  |  Alert (13)  |  Alone (324)  |  Attack (86)  |  Bark (19)  |  Being (1276)  |  Brain (281)  |  Business (156)  |  Chance (244)  |  Character (259)  |  City (87)  |  Constant (148)  |  Decision (98)  |  Different (595)  |  Disease (340)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fall (243)  |  Feel (371)  |  Forever (111)  |  Form (976)  |  Fortune (50)  |  Fungus (8)  |  Garden (64)  |  High (370)  |  Hope (321)  |  Horticulture (10)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Industry (159)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Insect (89)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Live (650)  |  Living (492)  |  Lose (165)  |  Memory (144)  |  Moment (260)  |  Must (1525)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Patience (58)  |  People (1031)  |  Practical (225)  |  Prompt (14)  |  Pruning (7)  |  Require (229)  |  Required (108)  |  Right (473)  |  Romance (18)  |  Season (47)  |  Sight (135)  |  Sound (187)  |  Spend (97)  |  Spring (140)  |  Successful (134)  |  Sun (407)  |  Time (1911)  |  Train (118)  |  Tree (269)  |  Vague (50)  |  Wind (141)

I think that I shall never see
A poem as lovely as a tree.
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;
A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in Summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.
Trees and Other Poems (1914), 19.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Arm (82)  |  Arms (37)  |  Bosom (14)  |  Branch (155)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Fool (121)  |  God (776)  |  Leaf (73)  |  Lift (57)  |  Live (650)  |  Look (584)  |  Mouth (54)  |  Nest (26)  |  Never (1089)  |  Poem (104)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Robin (4)  |  See (1094)  |  Snow (39)  |  Summer (56)  |  Sweet (40)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tree (269)

I used to get so depressed about the environment. … But I feel much better since I joined my Environmental Grief Counseling Group, which is a wonderful New Age approach to gaining the personal serenity you need in a world of melting ice caps, shrinking rain forests, and toxic lakes.
In 'Stop Beaching, Think Positive', Mother Jones Magazine (Oct 1988), 14, No. 8, 8.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Approach (112)  |  Better (493)  |  Depressed (3)  |  Environment (239)  |  Feel (371)  |  Forest (161)  |  Grief (20)  |  Ice (58)  |  Join (32)  |  Lake (36)  |  Melting (6)  |  New (1273)  |  New Age (6)  |  Personal (75)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Serenity (11)  |  Toxic (3)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  World (1850)

I’ve learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way he/she handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights.
Second stanza of poem 'On Turning 70'. The poem is printed in Michigan Office of Services to the Aging, Annual Report 2004 (2005), no page number.
Science quotes on:  |  Christmas (13)  |  Handle (29)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Light (635)  |  Lose (165)  |  Lot (151)  |  Luggage (5)  |  Person (366)  |  Tangle (8)  |  Tell (344)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Tree (269)  |  Way (1214)

If [in a rain forest] the traveler notices a particular species and wishes to find more like it, he must often turn his eyes in vain in every direction. Trees of varied forms, dimensions, and colors are around him, but he rarely sees any of them repeated. Time after time he goes towards a tree which looks like the one he seeks, but a closer examination proves it to be distinct.
In 'Equitorial Vegetation', Natural Selection and Tropical Nature Essays on Descriptive and Theoretical Biology (1891), 267.
Science quotes on:  |  Close (77)  |  Closer (43)  |  Color (155)  |  Dimension (64)  |  Direction (185)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Examination (102)  |  Eye (440)  |  Find (1014)  |  Forest (161)  |  Forestry (17)  |  Form (976)  |  Look (584)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Notice (81)  |  Prove (261)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Repeat (44)  |  See (1094)  |  Seek (218)  |  Species (435)  |  Time (1911)  |  Traveler (33)  |  Tree (269)  |  Turn (454)  |  Vain (86)  |  Wish (216)

IN MEMORIAM: FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE
She whom we love, our Lady of Compassion,
Can never die, for Love forbids her death.
Love has bent down in his old kindly fashion,
And breathed upon her his immortal breath.
On wounded soldiers, in their anguish lying,
Her gentle spirit shall descend like rain.
Where the white flag with the red cross is flying,
There shall she dwell, the vanquisher of pain.
[In remembrance of 'The Lady of the Lamp' who died 13 Aug 1910.]
In New York Times (29 Aug 1910), 6. Collected in Summer of Love (1911), 72.
Science quotes on:  |  Breath (61)  |  Compassion (12)  |  Death (406)  |  Descend (49)  |  Down (455)  |  Flag (12)  |  Flying (74)  |  Forbid (14)  |  Immortal (35)  |  In Memoriam (2)  |  Lamp (37)  |  Love (328)  |  Lying (55)  |  Never (1089)  |  Florence Nightingale (34)  |  Nurse (33)  |  Old (499)  |  Pain (144)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Remembrance (5)  |  Soldier (28)  |  Spirit (278)  |  White (132)  |  Wound (26)

Increasingly, our leaders must deal with dangers that threaten the entire world, where an understanding of those dangers and the possible solutions depend on a good grasp of science. The ozone layer, the greenhouse effect, acid rain, questions of diet and of heredity--all require scientific literacy. Can Americans choose the proper leaders and support the proper programs if they are scientifically illiterate?
articles.latimes.com/1989-03-31/news/vw-543_1_scientific-literacy
Science quotes on:  |  Acid (83)  |  Acid Rain (2)  |  Choose (116)  |  Danger (127)  |  Deal (192)  |  Depend (238)  |  Diet (56)  |  Effect (414)  |  Good (906)  |  Greenhouse Effect (5)  |  Heredity (62)  |  Illiteracy (8)  |  Illiterate (6)  |  Layer (41)  |  Leader (51)  |  Literacy (10)  |  Must (1525)  |  Ozone (7)  |  Ozone Layer (3)  |  Possible (560)  |  Program (57)  |  Proper (150)  |  Question (649)  |  Require (229)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Solution (282)  |  Solution. (53)  |  Support (151)  |  Threat (36)  |  Threaten (33)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  United States (31)  |  World (1850)

Increasingly, our leaders must deal with dangers that threaten the entire world, where an understanding of those dangers and the possible solutions depends on a good grasp of science. The ozone layer, the greenhouse effect, acid rain, questions of diet and heredity. All require scientific literacy. Can Americans choose the proper leaders and support the proper programs if they themselves are scientifically illiterate? The whole premise of democracy is that it is safe to leave important questions to the court of public opinion—but is it safe to leave them to the court of public ignorance?
In Los Angeles Times (31 Mar 1989).
Science quotes on:  |  Acid (83)  |  Acid Rain (2)  |  America (143)  |  Choose (116)  |  Court (35)  |  Danger (127)  |  Deal (192)  |  Democracy (36)  |  Depend (238)  |  Dependence (46)  |  Diet (56)  |  Effect (414)  |  Good (906)  |  Grasp (65)  |  Greenhouse Effect (5)  |  Heredity (62)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Illiteracy (8)  |  Illiterate (6)  |  Importance (299)  |  Layer (41)  |  Leader (51)  |  Literacy (10)  |  Must (1525)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Ozone (7)  |  Ozone Layer (3)  |  Possible (560)  |  Premise (40)  |  Program (57)  |  Proper (150)  |  Public (100)  |  Question (649)  |  Require (229)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Safe (61)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Illiteracy (8)  |  Solution (282)  |  Solution. (53)  |  Support (151)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Threat (36)  |  Threaten (33)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Whole (756)  |  World (1850)

Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.
From 'The Rainy Day', The Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1855), 112.
Science quotes on:  |  Dark (145)  |  Dreary (6)  |  Life (1870)  |  Sorrow (21)

Iris from sea brings wind or mighty rain.
Fragment 50. In The Fragments of Empedocles, translated by William Ellery Leonard, (1908), 35.
Science quotes on:  |  Meteorology (36)  |  Sea (326)  |  Wind (141)

It is estimated that thirty-five to fifty acres of rain forest are chopped down every minute.
From interview collected in Pamela Weintraub (ed.), The Omni Interviews (1984), 80.
Science quotes on:  |  Acre (13)  |  Chop (7)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Down (455)  |  Estimate (59)  |  Forest (161)  |  Forestry (17)  |  Minute (129)  |  Rain Forest (34)

It is hard to imagine while strenuously walking in the heart of an equatorial rain forest, gasping for every breath in a stifling humid sauna, how people could have ever adapted to life under these conditions. It is not just the oppressive climate - the tall forest itself is dark, little light reaching the floor from the canopy, and you do not see any animals. It is a complete contrast to the herbivore-rich dry savannahs of tropical Africa. Yet there are many animals here, evident by the loud, continual noise of large cryptic insects and the constant threat of stepping on a deadly king cobra. This was my first impression of the rain forest in Borneo.
The Humans Who Went Extinct
Science quotes on:  |  Adapt (70)  |  Africa (38)  |  Animal (651)  |  Borneo (3)  |  Breath (61)  |  Canopy (8)  |  Climate (102)  |  Cobra (2)  |  Complete (209)  |  Condition (362)  |  Constant (148)  |  Continual (44)  |  Contrast (45)  |  Cryptic (2)  |  Dark (145)  |  Deadly (21)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dry (65)  |  Equatorial (3)  |  Evident (92)  |  First (1302)  |  Floor (21)  |  Forest (161)  |  Gasp (6)  |  Hard (246)  |  Heart (243)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Impression (118)  |  Insect (89)  |  King (39)  |  Large (398)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Loud (9)  |  Noise (40)  |  Oppressive (2)  |  People (1031)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Reach (286)  |  Savannah (2)  |  See (1094)  |  Step (234)  |  Stifle (5)  |  Tall (11)  |  Threat (36)  |  Tropical (9)  |  Walk (138)

It is the middle of the night when a glittering theatre of light suddenly appears in front of the Dhaka. Where, moments before there was only darkness, suddenly there are hundreds of columns of light. The sound of helicopters and car horns carry across to the ship on the breeze. There is the scent of rain after it has evaporated from warm streets. This is unmistakably Singapore, the small city-state at the most southern point of the Asiatic mainland. Singapore was built as a centre for world trade by the British over 250 years ago, and today, Singapore has the largest container harbour in the world. This is where the axes of world trade cross paths: from the Far East to Europe, from the Far East to Southeast Asia/the East, and from the Far East to Australia. Everything runs like clockwork here. Within five hours the Dhaka has been unloaded.
Made on Earth
Science quotes on:  |  Across (32)  |  Appear (122)  |  Asia (7)  |  Australia (11)  |  Axe (16)  |  Breeze (8)  |  British (42)  |  Build (211)  |  Car (75)  |  Carry (130)  |  Centre (31)  |  City (87)  |  Clockwork (7)  |  Column (15)  |  Container (2)  |  Cross (20)  |  Darkness (72)  |  East (18)  |  Europe (50)  |  Evaporate (5)  |  Everything (489)  |  Far (158)  |  Five (16)  |  Front (16)  |  Glitter (10)  |  Harbor (8)  |  Helicopter (2)  |  Horn (18)  |  Hour (192)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Hundreds (6)  |  Large (398)  |  Largest (39)  |  Light (635)  |  Mainland (3)  |  Middle (19)  |  Moment (260)  |  Most (1728)  |  Night (133)  |  Path (159)  |  Point (584)  |  Run (158)  |  Scent (7)  |  Ship (69)  |  Singapore (2)  |  Small (489)  |  Sound (187)  |  Southern (3)  |  State (505)  |  Street (25)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Theatre (5)  |  Today (321)  |  Trade (34)  |  Unmistakably (2)  |  Warm (74)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

It was a dark and stormy night, so R. H. Bing volunteered to drive some stranded mathematicians from the fogged-in Madison airport to Chicago. Freezing rain pelted the windscreen and iced the roadway as Bing drove on—concentrating deeply on the mathematical theorem he was explaining. Soon the windshield was fogged from the energetic explanation. The passengers too had beaded brows, but their sweat arose from fear. As the mathematical description got brighter, the visibility got dimmer. Finally, the conferees felt a trace of hope for their survival when Bing reached forward—apparently to wipe off the moisture from the windshield. Their hope turned to horror when, instead, Bing drew a figure with his finger on the foggy pane and continued his proof—embellishing the illustration with arrows and helpful labels as needed for the demonstration.
In 'R. H. Bing', Biographical Memoirs: National Academy of Sciences (2002), 49. Anecdote based on the recollections of Bing's colleagues, Steve Armentrout and C. E. Burgess. The narrative was given in a memorial tribute at the University of Texas at Austin.
Science quotes on:  |  Arrow (22)  |  Brow (3)  |  Concentrate (28)  |  Dark (145)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Description (89)  |  Draw (140)  |  Drive (61)  |  Embellish (4)  |  Energetic (6)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Fear (212)  |  Figure (162)  |  Finger (48)  |  Fog (10)  |  Forward (104)  |  Freezing (16)  |  Hope (321)  |  Horror (15)  |  Ice (58)  |  Illustration (51)  |  Label (11)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Moisture (21)  |  Night (133)  |  Passenger (10)  |  Proof (304)  |  Reach (286)  |  Roadway (2)  |  Soon (187)  |  Stormy (2)  |  Strand (9)  |  Survival (105)  |  Sweat (17)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Trace (109)  |  Turn (454)  |  Visibility (6)  |  Volunteer (7)  |  Windshield (2)  |  Wipe (6)

It’s like seeing a light at the end of the tunnel and the tunnel has leaves on it.
About rain forest destruction and species extinction.
Quoted in Douglas Martin, 'A Brief Walk Through Time', New York Times (4 Jan 2002), E39.
Science quotes on:  |  Deforestation (50)  |  Destruction (135)  |  End (603)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Forest (161)  |  Light (635)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Species (435)  |  Tunnel (13)

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)  |  Long (778)  |  Looking (191)  |  March (48)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Past (355)  |  Present (630)  |  Progress (492)  |  Quiet (37)  |  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)

Many animals even now spring out of the soil,
Coalescing from the rains and the heat of the sun.
Small wonder, then, if more and bigger creatures,
Full-formed, arose from the new young earth and sky.
The breed, for instance, of the dappled birds
Shucked off their eggshells in the springtime, as
Crickets in summer will slip their slight cocoons
All by themselves, and search for food and life.
Earth gave you, then, the first of mortal kinds,
For all the fields were soaked with warmth and moisture.
On the Nature of Things, trans. Anthony M. Esolen (1995), Book 5, lines 794-803, 181.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Bird (163)  |  Cocoon (4)  |  Creature (242)  |  Cricket (8)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Field (378)  |  First (1302)  |  Food (213)  |  Form (976)  |  Heat (180)  |  Kind (564)  |  Life (1870)  |  Moisture (21)  |  More (2558)  |  Mortal (55)  |  New (1273)  |  Search (175)  |  Sky (174)  |  Small (489)  |  Soil (98)  |  Spring (140)  |  Springtime (5)  |  Summer (56)  |  Sun (407)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Warmth (21)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Young (253)

May the road rise to meet you. May the wind always be at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face, the rains fall soft upon your fields and, until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of his hand.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Face (214)  |  Fall (243)  |  Field (378)  |  God (776)  |  Hand (149)  |  Hold (96)  |  Meet (36)  |  Palm (5)  |  Rise (169)  |  Road (71)  |  Shine (49)  |  Soft (30)  |  Sun (407)  |  Warm (74)  |  Wind (141)

Nature uncovers the inner secrets of nature in two ways: one by the force of bodies operating outside it; the other by the very movements of its innards. The external actions are strong winds, rains, river currents, sea waves, ice, forest fires, floods; there is only one internal force—earthquake.
About the Layers of the Earth and other Works on Geology (1757), trans. A. P. Lapov (1949), 45.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Current (122)  |  Earthquake (37)  |  Fire (203)  |  Flood (52)  |  Force (497)  |  Forest (161)  |  Geology (240)  |  Ice (58)  |  Inner (72)  |  Internal (69)  |  Movement (162)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outside (141)  |  River (140)  |  Sea (326)  |  Secret (216)  |  Strong (182)  |  Two (936)  |  Uncover (20)  |  Wave (112)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wind (141)

Not from the stars do I my judgement pluck,
And yet methinks I have astronomy.
But not to tell of good or evil luck,
Of plagues, of dearths, or season's quality;
Nor can I fortune to brief minutes tell,
Pointing to each his thunder, rain, and wind,
Or say with princes if it shall go well …
Opening lines of 'Sonnet 14' (1609) in Complete Dramatic Works and Miscellaneous Poems (1823), 776. (1906), 14.
Science quotes on:  |  Astrology (46)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Brief (37)  |  Do (1905)  |  Evil (122)  |  Fortune (50)  |  Good (906)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Luck (44)  |  Minute (129)  |  Plague (42)  |  Quality (139)  |  Say (989)  |  Season (47)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Tell (344)  |  Thunder (21)  |  Wind (141)

Science tells us what storms are in the sky and when and where they will descend upon our continent, and nobody now thinks of praying for rain or fair weather.
From speech (20 Nov 1883) delivered to the Bethel Literary and Historical Association, Washington D.C.,'It Moves, or Philosophy of Reform', collected in The Essential Douglass: Selected Writings and Speeches (2016), 291.
Science quotes on:  |  Prayer (30)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Weather (49)

Sometime in my early teens, I started feeling an inner urgency, ups and downs of excitement and frustration, caused by such unlikely occupations as reading Granville’s course of calculus ... I found this book in the attic of a friend’s apartment. Among other standard stuff, it contained the notorious epsilon-delta definition of continuous functions. After struggling with this definition for some time (it was the hot Crimean summer, and I was sitting in the shadow of a dusty apple tree), I got so angry that I dug a shallow grave for the book between the roots, buried it there, and left in disdain. Rain started in an hour. I ran back to the tree and exhumed the poor thing. Thus, I discovered that I loved it, regardless.
'Mathematics as Profession and vocation', in V. Arnold et al. (eds.), Mathematics: Frontiers and Perspectives (2000), 153. Reprinted in Mathematics as Metaphor: Selected Essays of Yuri I. Manin (2007), 79.
Science quotes on:  |  Anger (21)  |  Angry (10)  |  Apartment (4)  |  Apple (46)  |  Attic (3)  |  Back (395)  |  Biography (254)  |  Book (413)  |  Burial (8)  |  Bury (19)  |  Calculus (65)  |  Cause (561)  |  Contain (68)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Course (413)  |  Definition (238)  |  Dig (25)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Disdain (10)  |  Down (455)  |  Dusty (8)  |  Early (196)  |  Excitement (61)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Find (1014)  |  Friend (180)  |  Frustration (14)  |  Function (235)  |  Grave (52)  |  Hot (63)  |  Hour (192)  |  Inner (72)  |  Leave (138)  |  Love (328)  |  Notorious (8)  |  Occupation (51)  |  Other (2233)  |  Poor (139)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Regardless (8)  |  Root (121)  |  Run (158)  |  Shadow (73)  |  Shallow (8)  |  Sit (51)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Sometime (4)  |  Standard (64)  |  Start (237)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Stuff (24)  |  Summer (56)  |  Teen (2)  |  Teenager (6)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tree (269)  |  Unlikely (15)  |  Urgency (13)

Spontaneous generation, to put the matter simply, takes place in smaller plants, especially in those that are annuals and herbaceous. But still it occasionally occurs too in larger plants whenever there is rainy weather or some peculiar condition of air or soil; for thus it is said that the silphium sprang up in Libya when a murky and heavy sort of wet weather condition occurred, and that the timber growth which is now there has come from some similar reason or other; for it was not there in former times.
De Causis Plantarum 1.5.1, in Robert Ewing Dengler (trans.) Theophrastus: De Causis Plantarum Book One: Text, Critical Apparatus, Translation, and Commentary, (1927), 31.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Annual (5)  |  Condition (362)  |  Former (138)  |  Generation (256)  |  Growth (200)  |  Heavy (24)  |  Herbaceous (2)  |  Large (398)  |  Matter (821)  |  Occasional (23)  |  Occur (151)  |  Occurence (3)  |  Other (2233)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Plant (320)  |  Reason (766)  |  Small (489)  |  Soil (98)  |  Spontaneous (29)  |  Spontaneous Generation (9)  |  Still (614)  |  Timber (8)  |  Time (1911)  |  Weather (49)  |  Whenever (81)

That all plants immediately and substantially stem from the element water alone I have learnt from the following experiment. I took an earthern vessel in which I placed two hundred pounds of earth dried in an oven, and watered with rain water. I planted in it a willow tree weighing five pounds. Five years later it had developed a tree weighing one hundred and sixty-nine pounds and about three ounces. Nothing but rain (or distilled water) had been added. The large vessel was placed in earth and covered by an iron lid with a tin-surface that was pierced with many holes. I have not weighed the leaves that came off in the four autumn seasons. Finally I dried the earth in the vessel again and found the same two hundred pounds of it diminished by about two ounces. Hence one hundred and sixty-four pounds of wood, bark and roots had come up from water alone. (1648)
A diligent experiment that was quantitatively correct only as far as it goes. He overlooked the essential role of air and photosynthesis in the growth process.
Complex. atque mist. elem. fig., 30, Opp. pp. 104-5; Aufgang, 148. In Walter Pagel, Joan Baptista Van Helmont (2002) , 53.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Alone (324)  |  Autumn (11)  |  Bark (19)  |  Biochemistry (50)  |  Develop (278)  |  Diligent (19)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Element (322)  |  Essential (210)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Growth (200)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Iron (99)  |  Large (398)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Oven (5)  |  Overlook (33)  |  Photosynthesis (21)  |  Plant (320)  |  Process (439)  |  Quantitative (31)  |  Role (86)  |  Root (121)  |  Season (47)  |  Stem (31)  |  Surface (223)  |  Tin (18)  |  Tree (269)  |  Two (936)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Water (503)  |  Weigh (51)  |  Wood (97)  |  Year (963)

The cause of rain is now, I consider, no longer an object of doubt. If two masses of air of unequal temperatures, by the ordinary currents of the winds, are intermixed, when saturated with vapour, a precipitation ensues. If the masses are under saturation, then less precipitation takes place, or none at all, according to the degree. Also, the warmer the air, the greater is the quantity of vapour precipitated in like circumstances. ... Hence the reason why rains are heavier in summer than in winter, and in warm countries than in cold.
Memoirs of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Manchester (1819), 3, 507. Quoted in George Drysdale Dempsey and Daniel Kinnear Clark, On the Drainage of Lands, Towns, & Buildings (1887), 246.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Air (366)  |  Cause (561)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Cold (115)  |  Consider (428)  |  Current (122)  |  Degree (277)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Greater (288)  |  Intermix (3)  |  Mixture (44)  |  Object (438)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Precipitation (7)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Reason (766)  |  Saturation (9)  |  Summer (56)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Two (936)  |  Unequal (12)  |  Vapour (16)  |  Warm (74)  |  Warmth (21)  |  Why (491)  |  Wind (141)  |  Winter (46)

The Grand Canyon, is a land of song. Mountains of music swell in the rivers, hills of music billow in the creeks, and meadows of music murmur in the rills that ripple over the rocks. Altogether it is a symphony of multitudinous melodies. All this is the music of waters. The adamant foundations of the earth have been wrought into a sublime harp, upon which the clouds of the heavens play with mighty tempests or with gentle showers.
In Canyons of the Colorado (1895), 394-397.
Science quotes on:  |  Colorado River (5)  |  Creek (2)  |  Grand Canyon (11)  |  Harp (4)  |  Hill (23)  |  Meadow (21)  |  Melody (2)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Music (133)  |  Ripple (12)  |  Rock (176)  |  Shower (7)  |  Song (41)

The new chemistry indeed has given us a new principle of the generation of rain, by proving water to be a composition of different gases, and has aided our theory of meteoric lights.
Letter (5 Sep 1822) to George F. Hopkins. Collected in The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (1854), Vol. 7, 260.
Science quotes on:  |  Aid (101)  |  Aurora (3)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Composition (86)  |  Different (595)  |  Gas (89)  |  Generation (256)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Light (635)  |  New (1273)  |  Principle (530)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Water (503)

The number of stars making up the Milky Way is about 10¹¹ or something like the number of raindrops falling in Hyde Park in a day’s heavy rain.
From review of Harlow Shapley, Of Stars and Men in 'Man and his Universe', New Scientist (12 Mar 1959), 594,
Science quotes on:  |  Day (43)  |  Fall (243)  |  Heavy (24)  |  Making (300)  |  Milky Way (29)  |  Number (710)  |  Raindrop (4)  |  Something (718)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Way (1214)

The overwhelming astonishment, the queerest structure we know about so far in the whole universe, the greatest of all cosmological scientific puzzles, confounding all our efforts to comprehend it, is the earth. We are only now beginning to appreciate how strange and splendid it is, how it catches the breath, the loveliest object afloat around the sun, enclosed in its own blue bubble of atmosphere, manufacturing and breathing its own oxygen, fixing its own nitrogen from the air into its own soil, generating its own weather at the surface of its rain forests, constructing its own carapace from living parts: chalk cliffs, coral reefs, old fossils from earlier forms of life now covered by layers of new life meshed together around the globe, Troy upon Troy.
In Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler’s Ninth Symphony (1984), 22-23.
Science quotes on:  |  Afloat (4)  |  Air (366)  |  Appreciate (67)  |  Astonish (39)  |  Astonishment (30)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Blue (63)  |  Breath (61)  |  Breathe (49)  |  Breathing (23)  |  Bubble (23)  |  Catch (34)  |  Chalk (9)  |  Cliff (22)  |  Comprehend (44)  |  Confound (21)  |  Confounding (8)  |  Construct (129)  |  Coral Reef (15)  |  Cosmological (11)  |  Cosmos (64)  |  Cover (40)  |  Early (196)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effort (243)  |  Enclose (2)  |  Fix (34)  |  Forest (161)  |  Form (976)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Generate (16)  |  Geology (240)  |  Globe (51)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Know (1538)  |  Layer (41)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Lovely (12)  |  Manufacturing (29)  |  Mesh (3)  |  Meteorology (36)  |  New (1273)  |  Nitrogen (32)  |  Object (438)  |  Old (499)  |  Overwhelm (5)  |  Overwhelming (30)  |  Oxygen (77)  |  Part (235)  |  Puzzle (46)  |  Queer (9)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Soil (98)  |  Splendid (23)  |  Strange (160)  |  Structure (365)  |  Sun (407)  |  Surface (223)  |  Together (392)  |  Troy (3)  |  Universe (900)  |  Weather (49)  |  Whole (756)

The ravages committed by man subvert the relations and destroy the balance which nature had established between her organized and her inorganic creations; and she avenges herself upon the intruder, by letting loose upon her defaced provinces destructive energies hitherto kept in check by organic forces destined to be his best auxiliaries, but which he has unwisely dispersed and driven from the field of action. When the forest is gone, the great reservoir of moisture stored up in its vegetable mould is evaporated, and returns only in deluges of rain to wash away the parched dust into which that mould has been converted. The well-wooded and humid hills are turned to ridges of dry rock, which encumbers the low grounds and chokes the watercourses with its debris, and–except in countries favored with an equable distribution of rain through the seasons, and a moderate and regular inclination of surface–the whole earth, unless rescued by human art from the physical degradation to which it tends, becomes an assemblage of bald mountains, of barren, turfless hills, and of swampy and malarious plains. There are parts of Asia Minor, of Northern Africa, of Greece, and even of Alpine Europe, where the operation of causes set in action by man has brought the face of the earth to a desolation almost as complete as that of the moon; and though, within that brief space of time which we call “the historical period,” they are known to have been covered with luxuriant woods, verdant pastures, and fertile meadows, they are now too far deteriorated to be reclaimable by man, nor can they become again fitted for human use, except through great geological changes, or other mysterious influences or agencies of which we have no present knowledge, and over which we have no prospective control. The earth is fast becoming an unfit home for its noblest inhabitant, and another era of equal human crime and human improvidence, and of like duration with that through which traces of that crime and that improvidence extend, would reduce it to such a condition of impoverished productiveness, of shattered surface, of climatic excess, as to threaten the depravation, barbarism, and perhaps even extinction of the species.
Man and Nature, (1864), 42-3.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Africa (38)  |  Art (680)  |  Assemblage (17)  |  Balance (82)  |  Balance Of Nature (7)  |  Barbarism (8)  |  Barren (33)  |  Become (821)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Best (467)  |  Brief (37)  |  Call (781)  |  Cause (561)  |  Change (639)  |  Complete (209)  |  Condition (362)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Control (182)  |  Creation (350)  |  Crime (39)  |  Degradation (18)  |  Deluge (14)  |  Destined (42)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Distribution (51)  |  Dry (65)  |  Dust (68)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Era (51)  |  Excess (23)  |  Extend (129)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Face (214)  |  Favor (69)  |  Fertile (30)  |  Field (378)  |  Force (497)  |  Forest (161)  |  Great (1610)  |  Ground (222)  |  Historical (70)  |  Home (184)  |  Human (1512)  |  Impoverished (3)  |  Inclination (36)  |  Influence (231)  |  Inhabitant (50)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Low (86)  |  Man (2252)  |  Meadow (21)  |  Moisture (21)  |  Mold (37)  |  Moon (252)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Mysterious (83)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Operation (221)  |  Organic (161)  |  Other (2233)  |  Period (200)  |  Physical (518)  |  Present (630)  |  Productivity (23)  |  Prospective (7)  |  Province (37)  |  Ravage (7)  |  Reduce (100)  |  Regular (48)  |  Reservoir (9)  |  Return (133)  |  Rock (176)  |  Season (47)  |  Set (400)  |  Shattered (8)  |  Space (523)  |  Species (435)  |  Surface (223)  |  Tend (124)  |  Threaten (33)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trace (109)  |  Turn (454)  |  Use (771)  |  Vegetable (49)  |  Verdant (3)  |  Wash (23)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wood (97)

The School of Physics could give us no suitable premises, but for lack of anything better, the Director permitted us to use an abandoned shed which had been in service as a dissecting room of the School of Medicine. Its glass roof did not afford complete shelter against rain; the heat was suffocating in summer, and the bitter cold of winter was only a little lessened by the iron stove, except in its immediate vicinity. There was no question of obtaining the needed proper apparatus in common use by chemists. We simply had some old pine-wood tables with furnaces and gas burners. We had to use the adjoining yard for those of our chemical operations that involved producing irritating gases; even then the gas often filled our shed. With this equipment we entered on our exhausting work. Yet it was in this miserable old shed that we passed the best and happiest years of our life.
As translated by Charlotte and Vernon Kellogg in Marie Curie, 'Autobiographical Notes', Pierre Curie (1923), 186. [With her husband, Pierre Curie, it was in this poorly equipped facility that they worked on their discovery of polonium (announced Jul 1898) and radium (announced Dec 1898). —Webmaster]
Science quotes on:  |  Apparatus (70)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Cold (115)  |  Dissection (35)  |  Equipment (45)  |  Exhaustion (18)  |  Furnace (13)  |  Happy (108)  |  Heat (180)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Room (42)  |  Shed (6)  |  Stove (3)  |  Summer (56)  |  Winter (46)  |  Work (1402)  |  Yard (10)

The sea is the source of water and the source of wind; for neither would blasts of wind arise in the clouds and blow out from within them, except for the great sea, nor would the streams of rivers nor the rain-water in the sky exist but for the sea ; but the great sea is the begetter of clouds and winds and rivers.
Quoted in Arthur Fairbanks (ed. And trans.), The First Philosophers of Greece (1898), 69, fragment 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Arise (162)  |  Blast (13)  |  Blow (45)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Exist (458)  |  Great (1610)  |  Ocean (216)  |  River (140)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sky (174)  |  Stream (83)  |  Water (503)  |  Wind (141)

The sea is the universal sewer where all kinds of pollution end up conveyed by rain from the atmosphere and from the mainland.
Statement in testimony to the Twelfth Meeting With the Panel on Science and Technology (28 Jan 1971), printed in Proceedings Before the Committee on Science and Astronautics, U.S. House of Representatives, Ninety-Second Congress, First Session, No. 1 (1971), 325.
Science quotes on:  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Convey (17)  |  End (603)  |  Kind (564)  |  Mainland (3)  |  Pollution (53)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sewer (5)  |  Universal (198)

The sun, moving as it does, sets up processes of change and becoming and decay, and by its agency the finest and sweetest water is every day carried up and is dissolved into vapour and rises to the upper region, where it is condensed again by the cold and so returns to the earth. This, as we have said before, is the regular course of nature.
Aristotle
Meteorology (350 B.C.), Book II, translated by E. W. Webster. Internet Classics Archive, (classics.mit.edu).
Science quotes on:  |  Becoming (96)  |  Change (639)  |  Cold (115)  |  Condensation (12)  |  Course (413)  |  Decay (59)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Meteorology (36)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Regular (48)  |  Return (133)  |  Rise (169)  |  Set (400)  |  Sun (407)  |  Vapour (16)  |  Water (503)  |  Water Cycle (5)

The sun's rays are the ultimate source of almost every motion which takes place on the surface of the earth. By their heat are produced all winds, and those disturbances in the electric equilibrium of the atmosphere which give rise to the phenomena of terrestrial magnetism. By their vivifying action vegetables are elaborated from inorganic matter, and become in their turn the support of animals and of man, and the sources of those great deposits of dynamical efficiency which are laid up for human use in our coal strata. By them the waters of the sea are made to circulate in vapor through the air, and irrigate the land, producing springs and rivers. By them are produced all disturbances of the chemical equilibrium of the elements of nature which, by a series of compositions and decompositions, give rise to new products, and originate a transfer of materials. Even the slow degradation of the solid constituents of the surface, in which its chief geological changes consist, and their diffusion among the waters of the ocean, are entirely due to the abrasion of the wind, rain, and tides, which latter, however, are only in part the effect of solar influence and the alternate action of the seasons.
from Outlines of Astronomy (1849), 237.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Air (366)  |  Animal (651)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Become (821)  |  Change (639)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chief (99)  |  Coal (64)  |  Composition (86)  |  Consist (223)  |  Constituent (47)  |  Decomposition (19)  |  Degradation (18)  |  Diffusion (13)  |  Disturbance (34)  |  Due (143)  |  Dynamical (15)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effect (414)  |  Efficiency (46)  |  Elaborated (7)  |  Electric (76)  |  Element (322)  |  Equilibrium (34)  |  Great (1610)  |  Heat (180)  |  Human (1512)  |  Influence (231)  |  Magnetism (43)  |  Man (2252)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Motion (320)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Originate (39)  |  Photosynthesis (21)  |  Produced (187)  |  Product (166)  |  Ray (115)  |  Rise (169)  |  River (140)  |  Sea (326)  |  Season (47)  |  Series (153)  |  Slow (108)  |  Solar Energy (21)  |  Solid (119)  |  Spring (140)  |  Strata (37)  |  Sun (407)  |  Support (151)  |  Surface (223)  |  Surface Of The Earth (36)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Through (846)  |  Tide (37)  |  Transfer (21)  |  Turn (454)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Use (771)  |  Vapor (12)  |  Vegetable (49)  |  Water (503)  |  Weather (49)  |  Wind (141)

The time has come to link ecology to economic and human development. When you have seen one ant, one bird, one tree, you have not seen them all. What is happening to the rain forests of Madagascar and Brazil will affect us all.
Quoted in Jamie Murphy and Andrea Dorfman, 'The Quiet Apocalypse,' Time (13 Oct 1986).
Science quotes on:  |  Ant (34)  |  Biology (232)  |  Bird (163)  |  Brazil (3)  |  Development (441)  |  Ecology (81)  |  Economic (84)  |  Economics (44)  |  Forest (161)  |  Happening (59)  |  Human (1512)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Madagascar (3)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Time (1911)  |  Time Has Come (8)  |  Tree (269)  |  Will (2350)

The tropical rain forests of the world harbor the majority of the planet’s species, yet this wealth of species is being quickly spent. While the exact numbers of species involved and the rate of forest clearing are still under debate, the trend is unmistakable—the richest terrestrial biome is being altered at a scale unparalleled in geologic history.
In The Fragmented Forest: Island Biogeography Theory and the Preservation of Biotic Diversity (1984),
Science quotes on:  |  Alter (64)  |  Altered (32)  |  Being (1276)  |  Clearing (2)  |  Debate (40)  |  Deforestation (50)  |  Forest (161)  |  Geologic History (2)  |  Harbor (8)  |  History (716)  |  Involved (90)  |  Majority (68)  |  Number (710)  |  Planet (402)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Rate (31)  |  Richest (2)  |  Scale (122)  |  Species (435)  |  Spent (85)  |  Still (614)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Trend (23)  |  Tropical (9)  |  Unmistakable (6)  |  Unparalleled (3)  |  Wealth (100)  |  World (1850)

The wintry clouds drop spangles on the mountains. If the thing occurred once in a century historians would chronicle and poets would sing of the event; but Nature, prodigal of beauty, rains down her hexagonal ice-stars year by year, forming layers yards in thickness. The summer sun thaws and partially consolidates the mass. Each winter's fall is covered by that of the ensuing one, and thus the snow layer of each year has to sustain an annually augmented weight. It is more and more compacted by the pressure, and ends by being converted into the ice of a true glacier, which stretches its frozen tongue far down beyond the limits of perpetual snow. The glaciers move, and through valleys they move like rivers.
The Glaciers of the Alps & Mountaineering in 1861 (1911), 247.
Science quotes on:  |  Annual (5)  |  Augment (12)  |  Augmentation (4)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Being (1276)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Century (319)  |  Chronicle (6)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Compact (13)  |  Consolidation (4)  |  Conversion (17)  |  Cover (40)  |  Down (455)  |  Drop (77)  |  End (603)  |  Ensuing (3)  |  Event (222)  |  Fall (243)  |  Forming (42)  |  Freezing (16)  |  Glacier (17)  |  Hexagon (4)  |  Historian (59)  |  Ice (58)  |  Layer (41)  |  Limit (294)  |  Mass (160)  |  More (2558)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Move (223)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Occurrence (53)  |  Partially (8)  |  Perpetual (59)  |  Perpetuity (9)  |  Poet (97)  |  Pressure (69)  |  Prodigal (2)  |  River (140)  |  Snow (39)  |  Song (41)  |  Spangle (2)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Stretch (39)  |  Summer (56)  |  Sun (407)  |  Sustain (52)  |  Thaw (2)  |  Thickness (5)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  Tongue (44)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Valley (37)  |  Weight (140)  |  Winter (46)  |  Yard (10)  |  Year (963)

The world goes up and the world goes down,
And the sunshine follows the rain;
And yesterday’s sneer and yesterday’s frown
can never come over again.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Down (455)  |  Follow (389)  |  Frown (5)  |  Never (1089)  |  Sneer (9)  |  Sunshine (12)  |  World (1850)  |  Yesterday (37)

The young genius early exults in the contemplation of power and beauty. During Scott’s childhood, a frightful thunder-storm raged at Edinburgh, which made his brothers and the domestics huddle together in one room, shivering with fear at every peal. Young Walter was found lying on his back in the garden, the rain pitilessly pelting his face, while he, almost convulsed with delight, shouted, at every flash, “bonnie! bonnie!” Schiller was found by his father, on a similar occasion, perched upon a tree, and, on being harshly questioned as to his object, whimpered out that he wanted to see where the thunder came from.
In 'Genius', Wellman’s Miscellany (Dec 1871), 4, No. 6, 204. A variation of the anecdote about Walter Scott is given in George Gilfillan (ed.), 'Memoir of Sir Walter Scott', The Poetical Works of Sir Walter Scott: With memoir and critical dissertation (1857), viii. The anecdote about Schiller is of dubious authenticity, according to Charles Follen (ed.), The Life of Friedrich Schiller: Comprehending an Examination of His Works (1837), 7
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Being (1276)  |  Brother (47)  |  Childhood (42)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Delight (111)  |  Domestic (27)  |  Early (196)  |  Edinburgh (2)  |  Face (214)  |  Father (113)  |  Fear (212)  |  Flash (49)  |  Garden (64)  |  Genius (301)  |  Lying (55)  |  Object (438)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Peal (2)  |  Perch (7)  |  Power (771)  |  Question (649)  |  Friedrich Schiller (10)  |  Scott_Walter (2)  |  See (1094)  |  Shout (25)  |  Storm (56)  |  Thunder (21)  |  Thunderstorm (7)  |  Together (392)  |  Tree (269)  |  Want (504)  |  Young (253)

There are three elements of mountaineering—difficulty, danger, and exposure. Difficulty is the technical aspect of it. Danger, it is best to avoid, but some people like to increase danger to a point where their success is dependent only on luck. And exposure, which is what truly defines Alpinism, is what you face in wild nature. It’s the weather, the cold, the oxygen, the storms, the avalanches and rock falls, rain and snow. It’s the exposure that determines how you will move, it tells you that one wrong step means death. Exposure means no help is coming from outside, it’s you and the mountain.
From interview with Rudraneil Sengupta, 'Reinhold Messner: When You’re Alone, Fear is All on You', Mint (1 Mar 2014). A business newspaper in India, also online at livemint.com website.
Science quotes on:  |  Avalanche (5)  |  Danger (127)  |  Death (406)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Exposure (9)  |  Help (116)  |  Mountaineering (5)  |  Snow (39)  |  Weather (49)

There is a kind of plant that eats organic food with its flowers: when a fly settles upon the blossom, the petals close upon it and hold it fast till the plant has absorbed the insect into its system; but they will close on nothing but what is good to eat; of a drop of rain or a piece of stick they will take no notice. Curious! that so unconscious a thing should have such a keen eye to its own interest.
In Erewhon: Or Over the Range (1880), 190.
Science quotes on:  |  Absorb (54)  |  Blossom (22)  |  Curious (95)  |  Drop (77)  |  Eat (108)  |  Eye (440)  |  Flower (112)  |  Fly (153)  |  Food (213)  |  Good (906)  |  Insect (89)  |  Interest (416)  |  Kind (564)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Notice (81)  |  Organic (161)  |  Plant (320)  |  System (545)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Will (2350)

To pray without faith is to make a small fire while it is raining heavily.
Quoted in Kim Lim (ed.), 1,001 Pearls of Spiritual Wisdom: Words to Enrich, Inspire, and Guide Your Life (2014), 177
Science quotes on:  |  Faith (209)  |  Fire (203)  |  Heavily (14)  |  Pray (19)  |  Small (489)

To render aid to the worthless is sheer waste. Rain does not freshen the Dead Sea, but only enables it to dissolve more salt.
From chapter 'Jottings from a Note-Book', in Canadian Stories (1918), 172.
Science quotes on:  |  Aid (101)  |  Dead (65)  |  Dissolve (22)  |  Enable (122)  |  Freshen (2)  |  More (2558)  |  Render (96)  |  Salt (48)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sheer (9)  |  Waste (109)  |  Worthless (22)

Visible from Earth orbit … tropical rain forests of equatorial regions are huge expanses of monotonous, mottled dark green. During the day they are frequently covered with enormous thunderstorms that extend for hundreds of miles. The view has an air of fantasy about it, and you grope for words to describe what you see. My personal reaction was one of feeling humble, awed, and privileged to be witness to such a scene.
In How Do You Go To The Bathroom In Space?: All the Answers to All the Questions You Have About Living in Space (1999), 107.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Awe (43)  |  Covered (5)  |  Dark (145)  |  Describe (132)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enormous (44)  |  Equatorial (3)  |  Expanse (6)  |  Extend (129)  |  Fantasy (15)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Forest (161)  |  Green (65)  |  Grope (5)  |  Humble (54)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Mile (43)  |  Orbit (85)  |  Privilege (41)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Scene (36)  |  See (1094)  |  Thunderstorm (7)  |  Tropical (9)  |  View (496)  |  Visible (87)  |  Witness (57)  |  Word (650)

We had various kinds of tape-recorded concerts and popular music. But by the end of the flight what we listened to most was Russian folk songs. We also had recordings of nature sounds: thunder, rain, the singing of birds. We switched them on most frequently of all, and we never grew tired of them. It was as if they returned us to Earth.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Bird (163)  |  Concert (7)  |  Earth (1076)  |  End (603)  |  Flight (101)  |  Folk (10)  |  Frequently (21)  |  Grow (247)  |  Kind (564)  |  Listen (81)  |  Most (1728)  |  Music (133)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Popular (34)  |  Record (161)  |  Recording (13)  |  Return (133)  |  Russian (3)  |  Sing (29)  |  Singing (19)  |  Song (41)  |  Sound (187)  |  Switch (10)  |  Thunder (21)  |  Tired (13)  |  Various (205)

We have now felled forest enough everywhere, in many districts far too much. Let us restore this one element of material life to its normal proportions, and devise means for maintaining the permanence of its relations to the fields, the meadows and the pastures, to the rain and the dews of heaven, to the springs and rivulets with which it waters down the earth.
From Man and Nature (1864), 328-329.
Science quotes on:  |  Deforestation (50)  |  Devise (16)  |  Dew (10)  |  District (11)  |  Down (455)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Element (322)  |  Enough (341)  |  Everywhere (98)  |  Field (378)  |  Forest (161)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Life (1870)  |  Material (366)  |  Meadow (21)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Normal (29)  |  Pasture (15)  |  Permanence (26)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Reforestation (6)  |  Relation (166)  |  Restore (12)  |  Rivulet (5)  |  Spring (140)  |  Water (503)  |  Water Conservation (3)

We may conclude, that the flux and reflux of the ocean have produced all the mountains, valleys, and other inequalities on the surface of the earth; that currents of the sea have scooped out the valleys, elevated the hills, and bestowed on them their corresponding directions; that that same waters of the ocean, by transporting and depositing earth, &c., have given rise to the parallel strata; that the waters from the heavens gradually destroy the effects of the sea, by continually diminishing the height of the mountains, filling up the valleys, and choking the mouths of rivers; and, by reducing every thing to its former level, they will, in time, restore the earth to the sea, which, by its natural operations, will again create new continents, interspersed with mountains and valleys, every way similar to those we inhabit.
'Second Discours: Histoire et Théorie de la Terre', Histoire Naturelle, Générale et Particulière, Avec la Description du Cabinet du Roi (1749), Vol. I, 124; Natural History, General and Particular (1785), Vol. I, Irans. W. Smellie, 57-8.
Science quotes on:  |  Bestow (18)  |  Choking (3)  |  Conclude (66)  |  Continent (79)  |  Create (245)  |  Current (122)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Direction (185)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effect (414)  |  Flux (21)  |  Former (138)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Mouth (54)  |  Natural (810)  |  New (1273)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Other (2233)  |  Parallel (46)  |  Produced (187)  |  Reflux (2)  |  Rise (169)  |  River (140)  |  Sea (326)  |  Strata (37)  |  Surface (223)  |  Surface Of The Earth (36)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Valley (37)  |  Water (503)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

We need go back only a few centuries to find the great mass of people depending on religion for the satisfaction of practically all their wishes. From rain out of the sky to good health on earth, they sought their desires at the altars of their gods. Whether they wanted large families, good crops, freedom from pestilence, or peace of mind, they conceived themselves as dependent on the favor of heaven. Then science came with its alternative, competitive method of getting what we want. That is science’s most important attribute. As an intellectual influence it is powerful enough, but as a practical way of achieving man’s desires it is overwhelming.
In 'The Real Point of Conflict between Science and Religion', collected in Living Under Tension: Sermons On Christianity Today (1941), 140-141.
Science quotes on:  |  Achieving (3)  |  Altar (11)  |  Attribute (65)  |  Back (395)  |  Century (319)  |  Conceived (3)  |  Crop (26)  |  Desire (212)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enough (341)  |  Family (101)  |  Favor (69)  |  Find (1014)  |  Freedom (145)  |  God (776)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Health (210)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Important (229)  |  Influence (231)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Large (398)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mass (160)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Overwhelming (30)  |  Peace (116)  |  Peace Of Mind (4)  |  People (1031)  |  Pestilence (14)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Practical (225)  |  Religion (369)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Sky (174)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Want (504)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wish (216)

We should scarcely be excused in concluding this essay without calling the reader's attention to the beneficent and wise laws established by the author of nature to provide for the various exigencies of the sublunary creation, and to make the several parts dependent upon each other, so as to form one well-regulated system or whole.
'Experiments and Observations to Determine whether the Quantity of Rain and Dew is Equal to the Quantity of Water carried off by the Rivers and Raised by Evaporation', Memoirs Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society, 1803, 5, part 2, 372.
Science quotes on:  |  Attention (196)  |  Author (175)  |  Beneficent (9)  |  Creation (350)  |  Essay (27)  |  Form (976)  |  Law (913)  |  Meteorology (36)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Other (2233)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  System (545)  |  Various (205)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wise (143)

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)  |  Long (778)  |  Magic (92)  |  Method (531)  |  Nation (208)  |  Part (235)  |  Physical (518)  |  Premise (40)  |  Reason (766)  |  Relax (3)  |  School (227)  |  Sign (63)  |  Teach (299)  |  Treaty (3)  |  Underlying (33)  |  Unlikely (15)  |  Want (504)  |  War (233)

We stand by the river and admire the great body of water flowing so sweetly on; could you trace it back to its source, you might find a mere rivulet, but meandering on, joined by other streams and by secret springs, and fed by the rains and dews of heaven, it gathers volume and force, makes its way through the gorges of the mountains, plows, widens and deepens its channel through the provinces, and attains its present majesty.
From Address (1 Aug 1875), 'The Growth of Principles' at Saratoga. Collected in William L. Snyder (ed.), Great Speeches by Great Lawyers: A Collection of Arguments and Speeches (1901), 246.
Science quotes on:  |  Attain (126)  |  Back (395)  |  Body (557)  |  Channel (23)  |  Deepen (6)  |  Dew (10)  |  Erosion (20)  |  Find (1014)  |  Force (497)  |  Gather (76)  |  Geology (240)  |  Gorge (3)  |  Great (1610)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Hydrology (10)  |  Majesty (21)  |  Meander (3)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Other (2233)  |  Plow (7)  |  Present (630)  |  Province (37)  |  River (140)  |  Rivulet (5)  |  Secret (216)  |  Source (101)  |  Spring (140)  |  Stand (284)  |  Stream (83)  |  Through (846)  |  Trace (109)  |  Volume (25)  |  Water (503)  |  Way (1214)  |  Widen (10)

What friends do with us and for us is a real part of our life; for it strengthens and advances our personality. The assault of our enemies is not part of our life ; it is only part of our experience ; we throw it off and guard ourselves against it as against frost, storm, rain, hail, or any other of the external evils which may be expected to happen.
In The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe (1906), 201.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Against (332)  |  Assault (12)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enemy (86)  |  Evil (122)  |  Expect (203)  |  Experience (494)  |  External (62)  |  Friend (180)  |  Frost (15)  |  Guard (19)  |  Hail (4)  |  Happen (282)  |  Life (1870)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Part (235)  |  Personality (66)  |  Real (159)  |  Storm (56)  |  Strengthen (25)  |  Throw (45)

When I arrived in California to join the faculty of the New University which opened in October 1891, it was near the end of the dry season and probably no rain had fallen for three or four months. The bare cracked adobe fields surrounding the new buildings ... offered a decidedly unpromising outlook... A month or two later, however, there was a magical transformation. With the advent of the autumn rains the whole country quickly turned green, and a profusion of liverworts such as I had never seen before appeared on the open ground... I soon realized that right in my own backyard, so to speak, was a wealth of material such as I had never imagined would be my good fortune to encounter. ... Such an invitation to make a comprehensive study of the structure and development of the liverworts could not be resisted; and the next three years were largely devoted to this work which finally resulted in the publication of 'The Mosses and Ferns' in 1895.
In The Structure and Development of Mosses and Ferns (Archegoniatae) (1905, 3rd ed. 1918, rev. 1928). Cited in William C. Steere, Obituary, 'Douglas Houghton Campbell', American Bryological and Lichenological Society, The Bryologist (1953), 131.
Science quotes on:  |  Autumn (11)  |  Backyard (4)  |  Bare (33)  |  Book (413)  |  Building (158)  |  Comprehensive (29)  |  Country (269)  |  Development (441)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Dry (65)  |  Encounter (23)  |  End (603)  |  Fern (10)  |  Field (378)  |  Fortune (50)  |  Good (906)  |  Green (65)  |  Ground (222)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Invitation (12)  |  Material (366)  |  Month (91)  |  Never (1089)  |  New (1273)  |  Next (238)  |  Offer (142)  |  Open (277)  |  Outlook (32)  |  Profusion (3)  |  Publication (102)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Right (473)  |  Season (47)  |  Soon (187)  |  Speak (240)  |  Structure (365)  |  Study (701)  |  Transformation (72)  |  Turn (454)  |  Two (936)  |  University (130)  |  Unpromising (2)  |  Wealth (100)  |  Whole (756)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)

Why is it that showers and even storms seem to come by chance, so that many people think it quite natural to pray for rain or fine weather, though they would consider it ridiculous to ask for an eclipse by prayer.
Science and Method (1908), trans. Francis Maitland (1914), 68.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Chance (244)  |  Consider (428)  |  Eclipse (25)  |  Natural (810)  |  People (1031)  |  Prayer (30)  |  Ridicule (23)  |  Ridiculous (24)  |  Shower (7)  |  Storm (56)  |  Storms (18)  |  Think (1122)  |  Weather (49)  |  Why (491)


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.