TODAY IN SCIENCE HISTORY ®  •  TODAYINSCI ®
Celebrating 24 Years on the Web
Find science on or your birthday

Today in Science History - Quickie Quiz
Who said: “A change in motion is proportional to the motive force impressed and takes place along the straight line in which that force is impressed.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Dictionary of Science Quotations > Scientist Names Index D > Pierre Duhem Quotes

Thumbnail of Pierre Duhem (source)
Pierre Duhem
(10 Jun 1861 - 14 Sep 1916)

French physicist, philosopher of science and mathematician who produced interesting work in the field of thermodynamics, electricity, hydrodynamics and acoustics.


Science Quotes by Pierre Duhem (10 quotes)

A theory of physics is not an explanation; it is a system of mathematical oppositions deduced from a small number of principles the aim of which is to represent as simply, as completely, and as exactly as possible, a group of experimental laws.
— Pierre Duhem
As quoted in Philipp Frank, Modern Science and its Philosophy (1949), 15, which cites Théorie Physique; Son Objet—Son Structure (1906), 24.
Science quotes on:  |  Aim (175)  |  Complete (209)  |  Completely (137)  |  Deduce (27)  |  Exact (75)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Group (83)  |  Law (913)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Number (710)  |  Opposition (49)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Possible (560)  |  Principle (530)  |  Represent (157)  |  Simply (53)  |  Small (489)  |  System (545)  |  Theory (1015)

By the fruit one judges the tree; the tree of science grows exceedingly slowly; centuries elapse before one can pluck the ripe fruits; even today it is hardly possible for us to shell and appraise the kernel of the teachings that blossomed in the seventeenth century. He who sows cannot therefore judge the worth of the corn. He must have faith in the fruitfulness of the seed in order that he may follow untiringly his chosen furrow when he casts his ideas to the four winds of heaven.
— Pierre Duhem
As quoted in Philipp Frank, Modern Science and its Philosophy (1949), 62, which cites Évolution de la Mécanique (1903).
Science quotes on:  |  17th Century (20)  |  Appraise (2)  |  Blossom (22)  |  Cast (69)  |  Century (319)  |  Choose (116)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Corn (20)  |  Elapse (3)  |  Exceedingly (28)  |  Faith (209)  |  Follow (389)  |  Fruit (108)  |  Fruitfulness (2)  |  Furrow (5)  |  Grow (247)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Idea (881)  |  Judge (114)  |  Kernel (4)  |  Must (1525)  |  Order (638)  |  Pluck (5)  |  Possible (560)  |  Ripe (5)  |  Seed (97)  |  Shell (69)  |  Slowly (19)  |  Sow (11)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Teachings (11)  |  Today (321)  |  Tree (269)  |  Wind (141)  |  Worth (172)

If the aim of physical theories is to explain experimental laws, theoretical physics is not an autonomous science; it is subordinate to metaphysics.
— Pierre Duhem
The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (1906), 2nd edition (1914), trans. Philip P. Wiener (1954), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Aim (175)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Explain (334)  |  Law (913)  |  Metaphysics (53)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physics (564)  |  Theoretical Physics (26)  |  Theory (1015)

The experimentum crucis is impossible in physics.
— Pierre Duhem
As quoted in Philipp Frank, Modern Science and its Philosophy (1949), 15, which cites Théorie Physique; Son Objet—Son Structure (1906), 285. [Note: the experimentum crucis is a “crucial experiment” to be a conclusive test to decide between different hypotheses.]
Science quotes on:  |  Experiment (736)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)

The experimental verifications are not the basis of the theory, but its culmination.
— Pierre Duhem
As quoted in Philipp Frank, Modern Science and its Philosophy (1949), 16, which cites Théorie Physique; Son Objet—Son Structure (1906), 285. [Note: the experimentum crucis is a “crucial experiment” to be a conclusive test to decide between different hypotheses.]
Science quotes on:  |  Basis (180)  |  Culmination (5)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Verification (32)

The history of science alone can keep the physicist from the mad ambitions of dogmatism as well as the despair of pyrrhonian scepticism.
— Pierre Duhem
The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (1906), 2nd edition (1914), trans. Philip P. Wiener (1954), 270.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Ambition (46)  |  Despair (40)  |  Dogmatism (15)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Science (80)  |  Mad (54)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Scepticism (17)

The physicist can never subject an isolated hypothesis to experimental test, but only a whole group of hypotheses.
— Pierre Duhem
The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (1906), 2nd edition (1914), trans. Philip P. Wiener (1954), 187.
Science quotes on:  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Never (1089)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Subject (543)  |  Test (221)  |  Whole (756)

The watchmaker to whom one gives a watch that does not run will take it all apart and will examine each of the pieces until he finds out which one is damaged. The physician to whom one presents a patient cannot dissect him to establish the diagnosis. The physicist resembles a doctor, not a watchmaker.
— Pierre Duhem
In Revue des Questions Scientifiques, 1897.
Science quotes on:  |  Diagnosis (65)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Examine (84)  |  Find (1014)  |  Patient (209)  |  Physician (284)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Present (630)  |  Resemble (65)  |  Run (158)  |  Watch (118)  |  Watchmaker (3)  |  Will (2350)

This whole theory of electrostatics constitutes a group of abstract ideas and general propositions, formulated in the clear and precise language of geometry and algebra, and connected with one another by the rules of strict logic. This whole fully satisfies the reason of a French physicist and his taste for clarity, simplicity and order. The same does not hold for the Englishman. These abstract notions of material points, force, line of force, and equipotential surface do not satisfy his need to imagine concrete, material, visible, and tangible things. 'So long as we cling to this mode of representation,' says an English physicist, 'we cannot form a mental representation of the phenomena which are really happening.' It is to satisfy the need that he goes and creates a model.
The French or German physicist conceives, in the space separating two conductors, abstract lines of force having no thickness or real existence; the English physicist materializes these lines and thickens them to the dimensions of a tube which he will fill with vulcanised rubber. In place of a family of lines of ideal forces, conceivable only by reason, he will have a bundle of elastic strings, visible and tangible, firmly glued at both ends to the surfaces of the two conductors, and, when stretched, trying both to contact and to expand. When the two conductors approach each other, he sees the elastic strings drawing closer together; then he sees each of them bunch up and grow large. Such is the famous model of electrostatic action imagined by Faraday and admired as a work of genius by Maxwell and the whole English school.
The employment of similar mechanical models, recalling by certain more or less rough analogies the particular features of the theory being expounded, is a regular feature of the English treatises on physics. Here is a book* [by Oliver Lodge] intended to expound the modern theories of electricity and to expound a new theory. In it are nothing but strings which move around pulleys, which roll around drums, which go through pearl beads, which carry weights; and tubes which pump water while others swell and contract; toothed wheels which are geared to one another and engage hooks. We thought we were entering the tranquil and neatly ordered abode of reason, but we find ourselves in a factory.
*Footnote: O. Lodge, Les Théories Modernes (Modern Views on Electricity) (1889), 16.
— Pierre Duhem
The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (1906), 2nd edition (1914), trans. Philip P. Wiener (1954), 70-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Action (342)  |  Algebra (117)  |  Approach (112)  |  Being (1276)  |  Book (413)  |  Both (496)  |  Carry (130)  |  Certain (557)  |  Clarity (49)  |  Closer (43)  |  Conceivable (28)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Concrete (55)  |  Conductor (17)  |  Connect (126)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Contact (66)  |  Create (245)  |  Dimension (64)  |  Do (1905)  |  Drawing (56)  |  Drum (8)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Electrostatic (7)  |  Electrostatics (6)  |  Employment (34)  |  End (603)  |  Engage (41)  |  Existence (481)  |  Expand (56)  |  Factory (20)  |  Family (101)  |  Find (1014)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  General (521)  |  Genius (301)  |  Geometry (271)  |  German (37)  |  Grow (247)  |  Happening (59)  |  Idea (881)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Language (308)  |  Large (398)  |  Sir Oliver Joseph Lodge (13)  |  Logic (311)  |  Long (778)  |  Material (366)  |  Materialize (2)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  James Clerk Maxwell (91)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Mental (179)  |  Model (106)  |  Modern (402)  |  More (2558)  |  More Or Less (71)  |  Move (223)  |  New (1273)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Notion (120)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physics (564)  |  Point (584)  |  Precise (71)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Reason (766)  |  Regular (48)  |  Representation (55)  |  Roll (41)  |  Rubber (11)  |  Rule (307)  |  Say (989)  |  School (227)  |  See (1094)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Small (489)  |  Space (523)  |  Stretch (39)  |  Surface (223)  |  Tangible (15)  |  Taste (93)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Together (392)  |  Tooth (32)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Trying (144)  |  Two (936)  |  View (496)  |  Visible (87)  |  Water (503)  |  Weight (140)  |  Wheel (51)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

Underneath all the various theories which are only created to be destroyed; underneath all the hypotheses which one century regards as disclosing the secret mechanism and hidden spring of the universe—and which the following century breaks to pieces as children’s toys—may be recognized the slow progress, slow but incessant, of mathematical physics.
— Pierre Duhem
Quote translated from 'Les Théories de l’Optique', Revue des Deux Mondes (1 May 1894), Vol. 123, 125; in 'What is Science', compiled by Mrs. H.O. Ward, in J. M. Stoddart (ed.), The New Science Review: A Miscellany of Modern Thought and Discovery (Oct 1894), Vol. 1, No. 2, 173. From the original French, “Sous les théories qui ne s’élèvent que pour être abuttues, sous les hypothèses qu’un siècle contemple comme le mécanisme secret et le ressort caché de l’Univers, et que le siècle suivant brise comme des jouets d’enfant, se poursuit le progrès lent, mais incessant, de la physique mathématique.” Note: in the New Science Review, the author is incorrectly identified as “Duhene.”
Science quotes on:  |  Break (109)  |  Century (319)  |  Creation (350)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Incessant (9)  |  Mathematical Physics (12)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Progress (492)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Secret (216)  |  Slow (108)  |  Spring (140)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Toy (22)  |  Universe (900)


See also:
  • 10 Jun - short biography, births, deaths and events on date of Duhem's birth.

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.