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Home > Dictionary of Science Quotations > Scientist Names Index D > René Dubos Quotes

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René Dubos
(20 Feb 1901 - 20 Feb 1982)

French-American microbiologist and environmentalist.


Science Quotes by René Dubos (9 quotes)

Eradication of microbial disease is a will-o’-the-wisp; pursuing it leads into a morass of hazy biological concepts and half truths.
— René Dubos
Man Adapting (1965), 381.
Science quotes on:  |  Biological (137)  |  Concept (242)  |  Disease (340)  |  Lead (391)  |  Microbe (30)  |  Pursuing (27)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Will (2350)

Gauss [replied], when asked how soon he expected to reach certain mathematical conclusions, “that he had them long ago, all he was worrying about was how to reach them.”
— René Dubos
In Louis Pasteur, Free Lance of Science (1950), 365. Also excerpted in 'Mechanisms of Discovery', collected in I.S. Gordon and S. Sorkin (eds.) The Armchair Science Reader (1959), 336.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Certain (557)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Expect (203)  |  Carl Friedrich Gauss (79)  |  Long (778)  |  Long Ago (12)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Reach (286)  |  Soon (187)

Man not only survives and functions in his environment, he shapes it and he is shaped by it.
— René Dubos
In Barbara Ward and René Jules Dubos, Only One Earth: the Care and Maintenance of a Small Planet: an unofficial report commissioned by the Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment (1972), 30. This is similar to the quote, “Man shapes himself through decisions that shape his environment,” which is commonly seen attributed to Dubos, but without citation. If you know the primary source of this wording of that quote, please contact webmaster.
Science quotes on:  |  Decision (98)  |  Environment (239)  |  Function (235)  |  Himself (461)  |  Man (2252)  |  Shape (77)  |  Survival (105)  |  Survive (87)

Microbiology is usually regarded as having no relevance to the feelings and aspirations of the man of flesh and bone. Yet, never in my professional life do I find myself far removed from the man of flesh and bone. It is not only because microbes are ubiquitous in our environment, and therefore must be studied for the sake of human welfare. More interesting, and far more important in the long run, is the fact that microbes exhibit profound resemblances to man. They resemble him in their physical makeup, in their properties, in their responses to various stimuli; they also display associations with other living things which have perplexing and illuminating analogies with human societies.
— René Dubos
Science quotes on:  |  Analogy (76)  |  Aspiration (35)  |  Association (49)  |  Bone (101)  |  Display (59)  |  Do (1905)  |  Environment (239)  |  Exhibit (21)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Feelings (52)  |  Find (1014)  |  Flesh (28)  |  Human (1512)  |  Illuminate (26)  |  Illuminating (12)  |  In The Long Run (18)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Man (2252)  |  Microbe (30)  |  Microbes (14)  |  Microbiology (11)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Myself (211)  |  Never (1089)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perplex (6)  |  Physical (518)  |  Professional (77)  |  Profound (105)  |  Regard (312)  |  Relevance (18)  |  Resemblance (39)  |  Resemble (65)  |  Response (56)  |  Sake (61)  |  Society (350)  |  Stimulus (30)  |  Study (701)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Ubiquitous (5)  |  Usually (176)  |  Various (205)  |  Welfare (30)

Most of the dangerous aspects of technological civilization arise, not from its complexities, but from the fact that modern man has become more interested in the machines and industrial goods themselves than in their use to human ends.
— René Dubos
In A God Within (1972).
Science quotes on:  |  Arise (162)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Become (821)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  End (603)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Good (906)  |  Human (1512)  |  Interest (416)  |  Machine (271)  |  Man (2252)  |  Modern (402)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Technological (62)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Use (771)

Religion and science ... constitute deep-rooted and ancient efforts to find richer experience and deeper meaning than are found in the ordinary biological and social satisfactions. As pointed out by Whitehead, religion and science have similar origins and are evolving toward similar goals. Both started from crude observations and fanciful concepts, meaningful only within a narrow range of conditions for the people who formulated them of their limited tribal experience. But progressively, continuously, and almost simultaneously, religious and scientific concepts are ridding themselves of their coarse and local components, reaching higher and higher levels of abstraction and purity. Both the myths of religion and the laws of science, it is now becoming apparent, are not so much descriptions of facts as symbolic expressions of cosmic truths.
— René Dubos
'On Being Human,' A God Within, Scribner (1972).
Science quotes on:  |  Abstraction (48)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Apparent (85)  |  Become (821)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Biological (137)  |  Both (496)  |  Coarse (4)  |  Component (51)  |  Concept (242)  |  Condition (362)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Continuously (7)  |  Cosmic (74)  |  Crude (32)  |  Deep (241)  |  Description (89)  |  Effort (243)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Experience (494)  |  Expression (181)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Fanciful (6)  |  Find (1014)  |  Formulate (16)  |  Goal (155)  |  High (370)  |  Law (913)  |  Level (69)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Local (25)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Meaningful (19)  |  Myth (58)  |  Narrow (85)  |  Observation (593)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Origin (250)  |  People (1031)  |  Point (584)  |  Progressively (4)  |  Purity (15)  |  Range (104)  |  Reach (286)  |  Religion (369)  |  Religious (134)  |  Rich (66)  |  Rid (14)  |  Root (121)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Similar (36)  |  Simultaneous (23)  |  Social (261)  |  Start (237)  |  Symbolic (16)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Toward (45)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Alfred North Whitehead (140)

The experiment serves two purposes, often independent one from the other: it allows the observation of new facts, hitherto either unsuspected, or not yet well defined; and it determines whether a working hypothesis fits the world of observable facts.
— René Dubos
In Louis Pasteur, Free Lance of Science (1960), 362.
Science quotes on:  |  Definition (238)  |  Determine (152)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Fit (139)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Independent (74)  |  New (1273)  |  Observable (21)  |  Observation (593)  |  Other (2233)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Two (936)  |  World (1850)

The progress of science depends less than is usually believed on the efforts and performance of the individual genius ... many important discoveries have been made by men of ordinary talents, simply because chance had made them, at the proper time and in the proper place and circumstances, recipients of a body of doctrines, facts and techniques that rendered almost inevitable the recognition of an important phenomenon. It is surprising that some historian has not taken malicious pleasure in writing an anthology of 'one discovery' scientists. Many exciting facts have been discovered as a result of loose thinking and unimaginative experimentation, and described in wrappings of empty words. One great discovery does not betoken a great scientist; science now and then selects insignificant standard bearers to display its banners.
— René Dubos
Louis Pasteur, Free Lance of Science (1986), 368
Science quotes on:  |  Banner (9)  |  Body (557)  |  Chance (244)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Depend (238)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Display (59)  |  Effort (243)  |  Empty (82)  |  Exciting (50)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Genius (301)  |  Great (1610)  |  Historian (59)  |  Individual (420)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Insignificant (33)  |  Malicious (8)  |  Men Of Science (147)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Performance (51)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Progress (492)  |  Progress Of Science (40)  |  Proper (150)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Render (96)  |  Result (700)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Select (45)  |  Serendipity (17)  |  Talent (99)  |  Technique (84)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Usually (176)  |  Word (650)  |  Writing (192)

There is a demon in technology. It was put there by man and man will have to exorcise it before technological civilization can achieve the eighteenth-century ideal of humane civilized life.
— René Dubos
A God Within (1972), 216.
Science quotes on:  |  18th Century (21)  |  Century (319)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Demon (8)  |  Humane (19)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Technological (62)  |  Technology (281)  |  Will (2350)


See also:

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)
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