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Home > Dictionary of Science Quotations > Scientist Names Index O > Sir William Osler Quotes > Experiment

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Sir William Osler
(12 Jul 1849 - 29 Dec 1919)

Canadian physician, medical educator and author whose clinical teaching, research and personality strongly influenced medical practice, including encouraging a warmer bedside manner between doctors and their patients. He wrote Principles and Practice of Medicine (1892), one of the most successful textbooks in medical history.


Sir William Osler Quotes on Experiment (4 quotes)

>> Click for 47 Science Quotes by Sir William Osler

>> Click for Sir William Osler Quotes on | Medicine | Nature |

Seeing and thinking have done much for human progress; in the sphere of mind and morals everything, and could the world have been saved by armchair philosophy, the Greeks would have done it; but only a novum organon could do this, the powerful possibilities of which were only revealed when man began to search our the secrets of nature by way of experiment, to use the words of Harvey.
— Sir William Osler
Address at the opening of the new Pathological Institute of the Royal Infirmary, Glasgow (4 Oct 1911). Printed in 'The Pathological Institute of a General Hospital', Glasgow Medical Journal (1911), 76, 326.
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That man can interrogate as well as observe nature was a lesson slowly learned in his evolution. Of the two methods by which he can do this, the mathematical and the experimental, both have been equally fruitful—by the one he has gauged the starry heights and harnessed the cosmic forces to his will; by the other he has solved many of the problems of life and lightened many of the burdens of humanity.
— Sir William Osler
In 'The Evolution of the Idea of Experiment in Medicine', in C.G. Roland, Sir William Osler, 1849-1919: A Selection for Medical Students (1982), 103. As cited in William Osler and Mark E. Silverman (ed.), The Quotable Osler (2002), 249
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The ancients thought as clearly as we do, had greater skills in the arts and in architecture, but they had never learned the use of the great instrument which has given man control over nature—experiment.
— Sir William Osler
Address at the opening of the new Pathological Institute of the Royal Infirmary, Glasgow (4 Oct 1911). Printed in 'The Pathological Institute of a General Hospital', Glasgow Medical Journal (1911), 76, 327.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Architecture (50)  |  Art (680)  |  Control (182)  |  Do (1905)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greater (288)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Man (2252)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Skill (116)  |  Thought (995)  |  Use (771)

To each of us life is an experiment in Nature’s laboratory, and she tests and tries us in a thousand ways, using us and improving us if we serve her turn, ruthlessly dispensing with us if we do not.
— Sir William Osler
In 'The Evolution of the Idea of Experiment in Medicine', Transactions of the Congress of American Physicians and Surgeons. Seventh Triennial Session (1907), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Dispense (10)  |  Do (1905)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Life (1870)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Ruthless (12)  |  Test (221)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Turn (454)  |  Way (1214)


See also:
  • 12 Jul - short biography, births, deaths and events on date of Osler's birth.
  • Sir William Osler - Excerpt from 'Books And Men' address (12 Jan 1901)
  • William Osler - context of quote “Two sorts of doctors” - Medium image (500 x 250 px)
  • William Osler - context of quote “Two sorts of doctors” - Large image (800 x 400 px)
  • William Osler: A Life in Medicine, by Michael Bliss. - book suggestion.

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
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