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Emerson M. Pugh
( - )
physicist.
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Science Quotes by Emerson M. Pugh (1 quote)
If the brain were so simple
That we could understand it,
We would be so simple
That we couldn’t.
That we could understand it,
We would be so simple
That we couldn’t.
— Emerson M. Pugh
From c. 1938. Quoted and cited by his son, George Edgin Pugh, as a footnoted epigraph, in The Biological Origin of Human Values (1978), 154. The quote is also widely seen slightly paraphrased, attributed to Lyall Watson (q.v. on the Lyall Watson web page of this site, beginning, “If the brain were so simple…”). For example, introduced as “Biologist Lyall Watson spoke of the Catch-22 of brain research:” in Marilyn Ferguson The Aquarian Conspiracy: Personal and Social Transformation in the 1980s (1987), 539. The quote is also widely seen in various paraphrases, attributed to others, including Pat Bahn and Ian Stewart.
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) -- 
