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 have no satisfaction in formulas unless I feel their arithmetical magnitude.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index I > Category: Impressed

Impressed Quotes (39 quotes)

… the Einsteins were taken to the Mt. Wilson Observatory in California. Mrs. Einstein was particularly impressed by the giant telescope. “What on earth do they use it for?” she asked. Her host explained that one of its chief purposes was to find out the shape of the universe. “Oh,” said Mrs. Einstein, “my husband does that on the back of an envelope.”
In Try and Stop Me (1945).
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Back (395)  |  Chief (99)  |  Do (1905)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Envelope (6)  |  Explain (334)  |  Find (1014)  |  Giant (73)  |  Impress (66)  |  Observatory (18)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Telescope (106)  |  Universe (900)  |  Use (771)

[A crowd] thinks in images, and the image itself calls up a series of other images, having no logical connection with the first … A crowd scarcely distinguishes between the subjective and the objective. It accepts as real the images invoked in its mind, though they most often have only a very distant relation with the observed facts. * * * Crowds being only capable of thinking in images are only to be impressed by images. It is only images that terrify or attract them and become motives of action.
From Psychologie des Foules (1895), 29 & 56. English text in The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind (1897), Book 1, Chap 2, 22 & last sentence, 55. Original French text: “[La foule] pense par images, et l’image évoquée en évoque elle-même une série d’autres n’ayant aucun lien logique avec la première. … La foule ne sépare guère le subjectif de l’objectif. Elle admet comme réelles les images évoquées dans son esprit, et qui le plus souvent n’ont qu’une parenté lointaine avec le fait observé. * * * Les foules, ne pouvant penser que par images,ne se laissent impressionner que par des images. Seules les images les terrifient ou les séduisent, et deviennent des mobiles d’action.”
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Action (342)  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Call (781)  |  Capable (174)  |  Connection (171)  |  Crowd (25)  |  Distant (33)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  First (1302)  |  Image (97)  |  Impress (66)  |  Invoke (7)  |  Logical (57)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motive (62)  |  Objective (96)  |  Observed (149)  |  Other (2233)  |  Real (159)  |  Relation (166)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Seduce (4)  |  Series (153)  |  Subjective (20)  |  Terrify (12)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)

[On mediocrity] What we have today is a retreat into low-level goodness. Men are all working hard building barbecues, being devoted to their wives and spending time with their children. Many of us feel, “We never had it so good!” After three wars and a depression, we’re impressed by the rising curve. All we want is it not to blow up.
As quoted in interview with Frances Glennon, 'Student and Teacher of Human Ways', Life (14 Sep 1959), 147.
Science quotes on:  |  Barbecue (2)  |  Being (1276)  |  Blow (45)  |  Blow Up (8)  |  Building (158)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Curve (49)  |  Depression (26)  |  Devote (45)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Feel (371)  |  Good (906)  |  Goodness (26)  |  Hard (246)  |  Impress (66)  |  Low (86)  |  Mediocrity (8)  |  Never (1089)  |  Retreat (13)  |  Rising (44)  |  Spend (97)  |  Spending (24)  |  Time (1911)  |  Today (321)  |  Want (504)  |  War (233)  |  Wife (41)

[The object of education is] to train the mind to ascertain the sequence of a particular conclusion from certain premises, to detect a fallacy, to correct undue generalisation, to prevent the growth of mistakes in reasoning. Everything in these must depend on the spirit and the manner in which the instruction itself is conveyed and honoured. If you teach scientific knowledge without honouring scientific knowledge as it is applied, you do more harm than good. I do think that the study of natural science is so glorious a school for the mind, that with the laws impressed on all these things by the Creator, and the wonderful unity and stability of matter, and the forces of matter, there cannot be a better school for the education of the mind.
Giving Evidence (18 Nov 1862) to the Public Schools Commission. As quoted in John L. Lewis, 125 Years: The Physical Society & The Institute of Physics (1999), 168-169.
Science quotes on:  |  Applied (176)  |  Ascertain (41)  |  Better (493)  |  Certain (557)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Creator (97)  |  Depend (238)  |  Detect (45)  |  Do (1905)  |  Education (423)  |  Everything (489)  |  Fallacy (31)  |  Force (497)  |  Glorious (49)  |  Good (906)  |  Growth (200)  |  Harm (43)  |  Honour (58)  |  Impress (66)  |  Instruction (101)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Law (913)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mistake (180)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Object (438)  |  Premise (40)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  School (227)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Sequence (68)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Stability (28)  |  Study (701)  |  Teach (299)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Train (118)  |  Unity (81)  |  Wonderful (155)

[Writing this letter] has permitted me, for a moment, to abstract myself from the dry and dreary waste of politics, into which I have been impressed by the times on which I happened, and to indulge in the rich fields of nature, where alone I should have served as a volunteer, if left to my natural inclinations and partialties.
In letter to Caspar Wistar (21 Jun 1807), collected in Thomas Jefferson Randolph (ed.), Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson (1829), Vol. 4, 94.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Alone (324)  |  Dry (65)  |  Field (378)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Impress (66)  |  Inclination (36)  |  Indulge (15)  |  Letter (117)  |  Moment (260)  |  Myself (211)  |  Natural (810)  |  Naturalist (79)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Politics (122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Volunteer (7)  |  Waste (109)  |  Writing (192)

Again the message to experimentalists is: Be sensible but don’t be impressed too much by negative arguments. If at all possible, try it and see what turns up. Theorists almost always dislike this sort of approach.
What Mad Pursuit: A Personal View of Scientific Discovery (1988), 113.
Science quotes on:  |  Approach (112)  |  Argument (145)  |  Dislike (16)  |  Experimentalist (20)  |  Impress (66)  |  Message (53)  |  Negative (66)  |  Possible (560)  |  See (1094)  |  Sensible (28)  |  Theorist (44)  |  Try (296)  |  Turn (454)

Among the scenes which are deeply impressed on my mind, none exceed in sublimity the primeval [tropical] forests, ... temples filled with the varied productions of the God of Nature. No one can stand in these solitudes unmoved, and not feel that there is more in man than the mere breath of his body.
In What Mr. Darwin Saw in His Voyage Round the World in the Ship “Beagle” 1879, 170.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Breath (61)  |  Feel (371)  |  Fill (67)  |  Forest (161)  |  God (776)  |  Impress (66)  |  Impression (118)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Primeval (15)  |  Production (190)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Scene (36)  |  Solitude (20)  |  Stand (284)  |  Sublimity (6)  |  Temple (45)  |  Various (205)

Among the scenes which are deeply impressed on my mind, none exceed in sublimity the primeval forests undefaced by the hand of man; whether those of Brazil, where the powers of Life are predominant, or those of Tierra del Fuego, where Death and Decay prevail. Both are temples filled with the varied productions of the God of Nature: no one can stand in these solitudes unmoved, and not feel that there is more in man than the mere breath of his body.
Journal of Researches: into the Natural History and Geology of the Countries Visited During the Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle Round the World (1839), ch. XXIII, 604-5.
Science quotes on:  |  Beagle (14)  |  Body (557)  |  Both (496)  |  Breath (61)  |  Death (406)  |  Decay (59)  |  Feel (371)  |  Forest (161)  |  God (776)  |  Impress (66)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Power (771)  |  Prevail (47)  |  Primeval (15)  |  Production (190)  |  Scene (36)  |  Solitude (20)  |  Stand (284)  |  Temple (45)

As science, of necessity, becomes more involved with itself, so also, of necessity, it becomes more international. I am impressed to know that of the 670 members of this Academy [National Academy of Sciences], 163 were born in other lands.
From Address to the Centennial Convocation of the National Academy of Sciences (22 Oct 1963), 'A Century of Scientific Conquest.' Online at The American Presidency Project.
Science quotes on:  |  Academy (37)  |  Become (821)  |  Born (37)  |  Impress (66)  |  International (40)  |  Involved (90)  |  Know (1538)  |  Land (131)  |  Member (42)  |  More (2558)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Other (2233)

But in the heavens we discover by their light, and by their light alone, stars so distant from each other that no material thing can ever have passed from one to another; and yet this light, which is to us the sole evidence of the existence of these distant worlds, tells us also that each of them is built up of molecules of the same kinds as those which we find on earth. A molecule of hydrogen, for example, whether in Sirius or in Arcturus, executes its vibrations in precisely the same time. Each molecule, therefore, throughout the universe, bears impressed on it the stamp of a metric system as distinctly as does the metre of the Archives at Paris, or the double royal cubit of the Temple of Karnac ... the exact quantity of each molecule to all others of same kind gives it, as Sir John Herschel has well said, the essential character of a manufactured article and precludes the idea of its being external and self-existent.
'Molecules', 1873. In W. D. Niven (ed.), The Scientific Papers of James Clerk Maxwell (1890), Vol. 2, 375-6.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Arcturus (4)  |  Bear (162)  |  Being (1276)  |  Character (259)  |  Discover (571)  |  Distance (171)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Essential (210)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Execute (7)  |  Existence (481)  |  Find (1014)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Sir John Herschel (24)  |  Hydrogen (80)  |  Idea (881)  |  Impress (66)  |  Kind (564)  |  Light (635)  |  Material (366)  |  Metric System (6)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pass (241)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Royal (56)  |  Self (268)  |  Sole (50)  |  Stamp (36)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  System (545)  |  Tell (344)  |  Temple (45)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vibration (26)  |  World (1850)

By firm immutable immortal laws Impress’d on Nature by the GREAT FIRST CAUSE,
Say, MUSE! how rose from elemental strife
Organic forms, and kindled into life;
How Love and Sympathy with potent charm
Warm the cold heart, the lifted hand disarm;
Allure with pleasures, and alarm with pains,
And bind Society in golden chains.
From 'Production of Life', The Temple of Nature; or, The Origin of Society: A Poem, with Philosophical Notes (1803), 3, Canto I, lines 1-8.
Science quotes on:  |  Alarm (19)  |  Allure (4)  |  Bind (26)  |  Cause (561)  |  Chain (51)  |  Charm (54)  |  Cold (115)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Firm (47)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Golden (47)  |  Great (1610)  |  Heart (243)  |  Immortal (35)  |  Immutable (26)  |  Impress (66)  |  Kindled (2)  |  Law (913)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lift (57)  |  Love (328)  |  Muse (10)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Organic (161)  |  Origin Of Life (37)  |  Pain (144)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Poem (104)  |  Potent (15)  |  Rose (36)  |  Say (989)  |  Society (350)  |  Strife (9)  |  Sympathy (35)  |  Warm (74)

Combining in our survey then, the whole range of deposits from the most recent to the most ancient group, how striking a succession do they present:– so various yet so uniform–so vast yet so connected. In thus tracing back to the most remote periods in the physical history of our continents, one system of operations, as the means by which many complex formations have been successively produced, the mind becomes impressed with the singleness of nature's laws; and in this respect, at least, geology is hardly inferior in simplicity to astronomy.
The Silurian System (1839), 574.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Back (395)  |  Become (821)  |  Combination (150)  |  Complex (202)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Connect (126)  |  Connection (171)  |  Continent (79)  |  Deposit (12)  |  Do (1905)  |  Formation (100)  |  Geology (240)  |  History (716)  |  Impress (66)  |  Impression (118)  |  Inferior (37)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Nature (80)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Period (200)  |  Physical (518)  |  Present (630)  |  Produced (187)  |  Production (190)  |  Range (104)  |  Recent (78)  |  Remote (86)  |  Respect (212)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Singleness (2)  |  Striking (48)  |  Succession (80)  |  Survey (36)  |  System (545)  |  Trace (109)  |  Uniformity (38)  |  Variety (138)  |  Various (205)  |  Vast (188)  |  Whole (756)

Every body perseveres in its state of being at rest or of moving uniformly straight forward, except insofar as it is compelled to change its state by forces impressed.
The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy (1687), 3rd edition (1726), trans. I. Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman (1999), Axioms, or Laws of Motion, Law 1, 416.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Body (557)  |  Change (639)  |  Force (497)  |  Forward (104)  |  Impress (66)  |  Law Of Motion (14)  |  Rest (287)  |  State (505)  |  Straight (75)

Haemoglobin is a very large molecule by ordinary standards, containing about ten thousand atoms, but the chances are that your haemoglobin and mine are identical, and significantly different from that of a pig or horse. You may be impressed by how much human beings differ from one another, but if you were to look into the fine details of the molecules of which they are constructed, you would be astonished by their similarity.
In Of Molecules and Men (1966, 2004), 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Astonish (39)  |  Astonishment (30)  |  Atom (381)  |  Being (1276)  |  Chance (244)  |  Construct (129)  |  Construction (114)  |  Detail (150)  |  Differ (88)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Fine (37)  |  Haemoglobin (4)  |  Horse (78)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Identical (55)  |  Impress (66)  |  Large (398)  |  Look (584)  |  Mine (78)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Pig (8)  |  Significance (114)  |  Similarity (32)  |  Standard (64)  |  Thousand (340)

I am glad that the life of pandas is so dull by human standards, for our efforts at conservation have little moral value if we preserve creatures only as human ornaments; I shall be impressed when we show solicitude for warty toads and slithering worms.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Conservation (187)  |  Creature (242)  |  Dull (58)  |  Effort (243)  |  Glad (7)  |  Human (1512)  |  Impress (66)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Moral (203)  |  Ornament (20)  |  Panda (2)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Show (353)  |  Slither (2)  |  Standard (64)  |  Toad (10)  |  Value (393)  |  Worm (47)

I asked Fermi whether he was not impressed by the agreement between our calculated numbers and his measured numbers. He replied, “How many arbitrary parameters did you use for your calculations?" I thought for a moment about our cut-off procedures and said, “Four." He said, “I remember my friend Johnny von Neumann used to say, with four parameters I can fit an elephant, and with five I can make him wiggle his trunk.” With that, the conversation was over.
As given in 'A Meeting with Enrico Fermi', Nature (22 Jan 2004), 427, 297. As quoted in Steven A. Frank, Dynamics of Cancer: Incidence, Inheritance, and Evolution (2007), 87. Von Neumann meant nobody need be impressed when a complex model fits a data set well, because if manipulated with enough flexible parameters, any data set can be fitted to an incorrect model, even one that plots a curve on a graph shaped like an elephant!
Science quotes on:  |  Agreement (55)  |  Arbitrary (27)  |  Ask (420)  |  Calculate (58)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Conversation (46)  |  Curve (49)  |  Cut (116)  |  Data (162)  |  Elephant (35)  |  Enrico Fermi (20)  |  Fit (139)  |  Friend (180)  |  Graph (8)  |  Impress (66)  |  Moment (260)  |  Number (710)  |  Parameter (4)  |  Procedure (48)  |  Remember (189)  |  Say (989)  |  Shape (77)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thought (995)  |  Trunk (23)  |  Use (771)  |  John von Neumann (29)

I do not maintain that the chief value of the study of arithmetic consists in the lessons of morality that arise from this study. I claim only that, to be impressed from day to day, that there is something that is right as an answer to the questions with which one is able to grapple, and that there is a wrong answer—that there are ways in which the right answer can be established as right, that these ways automatically reject error and slovenliness, and that the learner is able himself to manipulate these ways and to arrive at the establishment of the true as opposed to the untrue, this relentless hewing to the line and stopping at the line, must color distinctly the thought life of the pupil with more than a tinge of morality. … To be neighborly with truth, to feel one’s self somewhat facile in ways of recognizing and establishing what is right, what is correct, to find the wrong persistently and unfailingly rejected as of no value, to feel that one can apply these ways for himself, that one can think and work independently, have a real, a positive, and a purifying effect upon moral character. They are the quiet, steady undertones of the work that always appeal to the learner for the sanction of his best judgment, and these are the really significant matters in school work. It is not the noise and bluster, not even the dramatics or the polemics from the teacher’s desk, that abide longest and leave the deepest and stablest imprint upon character. It is these still, small voices that speak unmistakably for the right and against the wrong and the erroneous that really form human character. When the school subjects are arranged on the basis of the degree to which they contribute to the moral upbuilding of human character good arithmetic will be well up the list.
In Arithmetic in Public Education (1909), 18. As quoted and cited in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-book (1914), 69.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Answer (389)  |  Apply (170)  |  Arise (162)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Arrange (33)  |  Arrive (40)  |  Automatic (16)  |  Basis (180)  |  Best (467)  |  Bluster (2)  |  Build (211)  |  Character (259)  |  Chief (99)  |  Claim (154)  |  Color (155)  |  Consist (223)  |  Contribute (30)  |  Degree (277)  |  Desk (13)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dramatic (19)  |  Effect (414)  |  Erroneous (31)  |  Error (339)  |  Establish (63)  |  Establishment (47)  |  Facile (4)  |  Feel (371)  |  Find (1014)  |  Form (976)  |  Good (906)  |  Grapple (11)  |  Himself (461)  |  Human (1512)  |  Impress (66)  |  Imprint (6)  |  Independently (24)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Learner (10)  |  Lesson (58)  |  Life (1870)  |  List (10)  |  Maintain (105)  |  Manipulate (11)  |  Matter (821)  |  Moral (203)  |  Morality (55)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Noise (40)  |  Oppose (27)  |  Polemic (3)  |  Positive (98)  |  Pupil (62)  |  Question (649)  |  Quiet (37)  |  Reject (67)  |  Rejected (26)  |  Relentless (9)  |  Right (473)  |  Sanction (8)  |  School (227)  |  Self (268)  |  Significant (78)  |  Slovenliness (2)  |  Small (489)  |  Something (718)  |  Speak (240)  |  Stable (32)  |  Steady (45)  |  Still (614)  |  Study (701)  |  Subject (543)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  True (239)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Undertone (2)  |  Unmistakable (6)  |  Untrue (12)  |  Value (393)  |  Value Of Mathematics (60)  |  Voice (54)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)  |  Wrong (246)

I prefer a God who once and for all impressed his will upon creation, to one who continually busied about modifying what he had already done.
Attributed. As stated in W.F. Bynum and Roy Porter, Oxford Dictionary of Scientific Quotations (2005), 575.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Continuity (39)  |  Creation (350)  |  Evolution (635)  |  God (776)  |  Impress (66)  |  Modification (57)  |  Will (2350)

I was very impressed that one simple theory could incorporate so much physics
Alan Guth
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Impress (66)  |  Incorporate (9)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Simple (426)  |  Theory (1015)

Impressed force is the action exerted on a body to change its state either of resting or of moving uniformly straight forward.
The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy (1687), 3rd edition (1726), trans. I. Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman (1999), Definition 4, 405.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Body (557)  |  Change (639)  |  Exert (40)  |  Force (497)  |  Forward (104)  |  Impress (66)  |  Law Of Motion (14)  |  Rest (287)  |  State (505)  |  Straight (75)

In the heavens we discover [stars] by their light, and by their light alone ... the sole evidence of the existence of these distant worlds ... that each of them is built up of molecules of the same kinds we find on earth. A molecule of hydrogen, for example, whether in Sirius or in Arcturus, executes its vibrations in precisely the same time. Each molecule therefore throughout the universe bears impressed upon it the stamp of a metric system as distinctly as does the metre of the Archives at Paris, or the royal cubit of the Temple of Karnac.
[Footnote: Where Maxwell uses the term “molecule” we now use the term “atom.”]
Lecture to the British Association at Bradford (1873), 'Atoms and Molecules'. Quoted by Ernest Rutherford, in 'The Constitution of Matter and the Evolution of the Elements', The Popular Science Monthly (Aug 1915), 112.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Arcturus (4)  |  Atom (381)  |  Bear (162)  |  Cubit (2)  |  Discover (571)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Execute (7)  |  Existence (481)  |  Find (1014)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Hydrogen (80)  |  Impress (66)  |  Kind (564)  |  Light (635)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Metric System (6)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Royal (56)  |  Small (489)  |  Sole (50)  |  Spectroscopy (11)  |  Stamp (36)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  System (545)  |  Temple (45)  |  Term (357)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Use (771)  |  Vibration (26)  |  Wavelength (10)  |  World (1850)

Just now nuclear physicists are writing a great deal about hypothetical particles called neutrinos supposed to account for certain peculiar facts observed in β-ray disintegration. We can perhaps best describe the neutrinos as little bits of spin-energy that have got detached. I am not much impressed by the neutrino theory. In an ordinary way I might say that I do not believe in neutrinos… But I have to reflect that a physicist may be an artist, and you never know where you are with artists. My old-fashioned kind of disbelief in neutrinos is scarcely enough. Dare I say that experimental physicists will not have sufficient ingenuity to make neutrinos? Whatever I may think, I am not going to be lured into a wager against the skill of experimenters under the impression that it is a wager against the truth of a theory. If they succeed in making neutrinos, perhaps even in developing industrial applications of them, I suppose I shall have to believe—though I may feel that they have not been playing quite fair.
From Tarner Lecture, 'Discovery or Manufacture?' (1938), in The Philosophy of Physical Science (1939, 2012), 112.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Against (332)  |  Application (257)  |  Artist (97)  |  Best (467)  |  Call (781)  |  Certain (557)  |  Dare (55)  |  Deal (192)  |  Describe (132)  |  Disbelief (4)  |  Disintegration (8)  |  Do (1905)  |  Energy (373)  |  Enough (341)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Experimental Physicist (11)  |  Experimenter (40)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Feel (371)  |  Great (1610)  |  Impress (66)  |  Impression (118)  |  Ingenuity (42)  |  Kind (564)  |  Know (1538)  |  Little (717)  |  Making (300)  |  Neutrino (11)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Nuclear Physicist (5)  |  Observed (149)  |  Old (499)  |  Old-Fashioned (9)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Particle (200)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Playing (42)  |  Ray (115)  |  Say (989)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Skill (116)  |  Spin (26)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Think (1122)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Will (2350)  |  Writing (192)

Knowledge begets knowledge. The more I see, the more impressed I am not with what we know but with how tremendous the areas are as yet unexplored.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Area (33)  |  Beget (4)  |  Impress (66)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  More (2558)  |  See (1094)  |  Tremendous (29)  |  Unexplored (15)

Law 2: A change in motion is proportional to the motive force impressed and takes place along the straight line in which that force is impressed.
The Principia: Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy (1687), 3rd edition (1726), trans. I. Bernard Cohen and Anne Whitman (1999), Axioms, or Laws of Motion, Law 2, 416.
Science quotes on:  |  Change (639)  |  Force (497)  |  Impress (66)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Motion (14)  |  Motion (320)  |  Motive (62)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Straight (75)  |  Straight Line (34)

Mathematics accomplishes really nothing outside of the realm of magnitude; marvellous, however, is the skill with which it masters magnitude wherever it finds it. We recall at once the network of lines which it has spun about heavens and earth; the system of lines to which azimuth and altitude, declination and right ascension, longitude and latitude are referred; those abscissas and ordinates, tangents and normals, circles of curvature and evolutes; those trigonometric and logarithmic functions which have been prepared in advance and await application. A look at this apparatus is sufficient to show that mathematicians are not magicians, but that everything is accomplished by natural means; one is rather impressed by the multitude of skilful machines, numerous witnesses of a manifold and intensely active industry, admirably fitted for the acquisition of true and lasting treasures.
In Werke [Kehrbach] (1890), Bd. 5, 101. As quoted, cited and translated in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-Book (1914), 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Acquisition (46)  |  Active (80)  |  Admirably (3)  |  Advance (298)  |  Altitude (5)  |  Apparatus (70)  |  Application (257)  |  Ascension (4)  |  Await (6)  |  Circle (117)  |  Curvature (8)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Everything (489)  |  Evolute (2)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fit (139)  |  Function (235)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Impress (66)  |  Industry (159)  |  Intense (22)  |  Latitude (6)  |  Line (100)  |  Logarithmic (5)  |  Longitude (8)  |  Look (584)  |  Machine (271)  |  Magician (15)  |  Magnitude (88)  |  Manifold (23)  |  Marvellous (25)  |  Master (182)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Multitude (50)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nature Of Mathematics (80)  |  Network (21)  |  Normal (29)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Outside (141)  |  Prepare (44)  |  Really (77)  |  Realm (87)  |  Recall (11)  |  Refer (14)  |  Right (473)  |  Show (353)  |  Skill (116)  |  Skillful (17)  |  Spin (26)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  System (545)  |  Tangent (6)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Trigonometry (7)  |  True (239)  |  Wherever (51)  |  Witness (57)

Modern masters of science are much impressed with the need of beginning all inquiry with a fact. The ancient masters of religion were quite equally impressed with that necessity. They began with the fact of sin—a fact as practical as potatoes. Whether or not man could be washed in miraculous waters, there was no doubt at any rate that he wanted washing.
In Orthodoxy (1908), 24.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Equally (129)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Impress (66)  |  Impression (118)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Man (2252)  |  Master (182)  |  Miraculous (11)  |  Modern (402)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Need (320)  |  Potato (11)  |  Practical (225)  |  Religion (369)  |  Sin (45)  |  Want (504)  |  Wash (23)  |  Water (503)

My boyhood life in New York City has impressed me with the popular ignorance and also with the great need of something better than local lore and weather proverbs.
In 'How the United States Weather Bureau Was Started', Scientific American (20 May 1916), 114, 529.
Science quotes on:  |  Better (493)  |  Boyhood (4)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Life (1870)  |  Local (25)  |  Need (320)  |  Popular (34)  |  Proverb (29)  |  Weather (49)

On coming down the stairs at dinner Tris [Trismegistus = Frankland] who walked before me seemed impressed by a mechanical impulse which impelled him along the corridor with a fervid velocity. On reaching the stair bottom I discovered the cause of the attraction. Miss Edmondson, like a pure planet, had checked his gravitating tendencies and lo! He stood radiant with smiles dropping joysparkes from his eyes as he clasped her hand. His countenance became a transparency through which the full proportions of his soul shone manifest; his blood tingled from his eyebrows to his finger ends, and wealthy with rich emotions his face became the avenue of what he felt.
Journals of John Tyndall, 18 Jan 1848. Royal Institution Archives.
Science quotes on:  |  Attraction (61)  |  Avenue (14)  |  Biography (254)  |  Blood (144)  |  Cause (561)  |  Coming (114)  |  Countenance (9)  |  Discover (571)  |  Down (455)  |  Dropping (8)  |  Emotion (106)  |  End (603)  |  Eye (440)  |  Face (214)  |  Fervid (2)  |  Sir Edward Frankland (2)  |  Impress (66)  |  Impulse (52)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Miss (51)  |  Planet (402)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Pure (299)  |  Radiant (15)  |  Smile (34)  |  Soul (235)  |  Through (846)  |  Transparency (7)  |  Velocity (51)  |  Walk (138)

One of the most impressive discoveries was the origin of the energy of the stars, that makes them continue to burn. One of the men who discovered this was out with his girl friend the night after he realized that nuclear reactions must be going on in the stars in order to make them shine.
She said “Look at how pretty the stars shine!”
He said, “Yes, and right now I am the only man in the world who knows why they shine.”
She merely laughed at him. She was not impressed with being out with the only man who, at that moment, knew why stars shine. Well, it is sad to be alone, but that is the way it is in this world.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Being (1276)  |  Burn (99)  |  Continue (179)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Energy (373)  |  Friend (180)  |  Girl (38)  |  Impress (66)  |  Impressive (27)  |  Know (1538)  |  Laugh (50)  |  Look (584)  |  Man (2252)  |  Merely (315)  |  Moment (260)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Night (133)  |  Nuclear (110)  |  Nuclear Reaction (2)  |  Order (638)  |  Origin (250)  |  Pretty (21)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Realize (157)  |  Right (473)  |  Sadness (36)  |  Say (989)  |  Shine (49)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Way (1214)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)

People were pretty well spellbound by what Bohr said… While I was very much impressed by [him], his arguments were mainly of a qualitative nature, and I was not able to really pinpoint the facts behind them. What I wanted was statements which could be expressed in terms of equations, and Bohr's work very seldom provided such statements. I am really not sure how much later my work was influenced by these lectures of Bohr's... He certainly did not have a direct influence because he did not stimulate one to think of new equations.
Recalling the occasion in May 1925 (a year before receiving his Ph.D.) when he met Niels Bohr who was in Cambridge to give a talk on the fundamental difficulties of the quantum theory.
In History of Twentieth Century Physics (1977), 109. In A. Pais, 'Playing With Equations, the Dirac Way'. Behram N. Kursunoglu (Ed.) and Eugene Paul Wigner (Ed.), Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac: Reminiscences about a Great Physicist (1990), 94.
Science quotes on:  |  Argument (145)  |  Behind (139)  |  Niels Bohr (55)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Direct (228)  |  Equation (138)  |  Express (192)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Impress (66)  |  Influence (231)  |  Lecture (111)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Occasion (87)  |  People (1031)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Seldom (68)  |  Statement (148)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Think (1122)  |  Want (504)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)

Statistical accounts are to be referred to as a dictionary by men of riper years, and by young men as a grammar, to teach them the relations and proportions of different statistical subjects, and to imprint them on the mind at a time when the memory is capable of being impressed in a lasting and durable manner, thereby laying the foundation for accurate and valuable knowledge.
In The Statistical Breviary: Shewing, on a Principle Entirely New, the Resources of Every State and Kingdom in Europe (1801), 5-6.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Accurate (88)  |  Being (1276)  |  Capability (44)  |  Capable (174)  |  Dictionary (15)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Durable (7)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Grammar (15)  |  Impress (66)  |  Imprint (6)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lasting (7)  |  Manner (62)  |  Memory (144)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Reference (33)  |  Relation (166)  |  Ripe (5)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Subject (543)  |  Teach (299)  |  Time (1911)  |  Value (393)  |  Year (963)  |  Young (253)  |  Youth (109)

The imagination of the crowds … is impressed above all by images. … It is possible to evoke them through the judicious use of words and formulas.
From Psychologie des Foules (1895), 90. English text in The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind (1897), Book 2, Chap. 2, 95. Original French text: “L’imagination des foules … est impressionnée surtout par des images. … Il est possible de les évoquer par l’emploi judicieux des mots et des formules.” A paraphrase is also seen, without the ellipses, as “Crowds are influenced mainly by images produced by the judicious employment of words and formulas.”
Science quotes on:  |  Crowd (25)  |  Evoke (13)  |  Formula (102)  |  Image (97)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Impress (66)  |  Influence (231)  |  Judicious (3)  |  Possible (560)  |  Through (846)  |  Use (771)  |  Word (650)

The invertebrated classes include the most numerous and diversified forms of the Animal Kingdom. At the very beginning of our inquiries into their vital powers and acts we are impressed with their important relations to the maintenance of life and organization on this planet, and their influence in purifying the sea and augmenting and enriching the land—relations of which the physiologist conversant only with the vertebrated animals must have remained ignorant.
In Lecture, delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons, collected in Lecture 24, 'Cephalopoda', Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Invertebrate Animals (1843), Vol. 1, 362.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Animal (651)  |  Animal Kingdom (21)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Class (168)  |  Conversant (6)  |  Diversified (3)  |  Enriching (2)  |  Form (976)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Importance (299)  |  Impress (66)  |  Include (93)  |  Influence (231)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Invertebrate (6)  |  Kingdom (80)  |  Land (131)  |  Life (1870)  |  Maintenance (21)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Organization (120)  |  Physiologist (31)  |  Planet (402)  |  Power (771)  |  Purifying (2)  |  Relation (166)  |  Remain (355)  |  Sea (326)  |  Vertebrate (22)  |  Vital (89)

The more I think of it, I find this conclusion more impressed upon me—that the greatest thing a human soul ever does in this world is to see something, and tell what it saw in a plain way.
Modern Painters: pt. 4. Of Many Things (1850), 268. books.google.com John Ruskin - 1850
Science quotes on:  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Doing (277)  |  Find (1014)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Human (1512)  |  Impress (66)  |  Impression (118)  |  More (2558)  |  Plain (34)  |  Saw (160)  |  See (1094)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Something (718)  |  Soul (235)  |  Tell (344)  |  Telling (24)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)

There was one quality of mind which seemed to be of special and extreme advantage in leading him [Charles Darwin] to make discoveries. It was the power of never letting exceptions pass unnoticed. Everybody notices a fact as an exception when it is striking or frequent, but he had a special instinct for arresting an exception. A point apparently slight and unconnected with his present work is passed over by many a man almost unconsciously with some half-considered explanation, which is in fact no explanation. It was just these things that he seized on to make a start from. In a certain sense there is nothing special in this procedure, many discoveries being made by means of it. I only mention it because, as I watched him at work, the value of this power to an experimenter was so strongly impressed upon me.
In Charles Darwin: His Life Told in an Autobiographical Chapter, and in a Selected Series of his Published Letters (1908), 94-95.
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (144)  |  Being (1276)  |  Biography (254)  |  Certain (557)  |  Consider (428)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Everybody (72)  |  Exception (74)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimenter (40)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Extreme (78)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Impress (66)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mention (84)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Notice (81)  |  Pass (241)  |  Point (584)  |  Power (771)  |  Present (630)  |  Procedure (48)  |  Quality (139)  |  Sense (785)  |  Special (188)  |  Start (237)  |  Striking (48)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Unconnected (10)  |  Value (393)  |  Watch (118)  |  Work (1402)

We are impressed and even daunted by the immense Universe to be explored. “What we know is a point to what we do not know.”
In Emerson’s Complete Works: Volume 1, Nature, Addresses and Lectures (1855, 1889), 45.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Immense (89)  |  Impress (66)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Point (584)  |  Universe (900)

We find that whole communities suddenly fix their minds upon one object, and go mad in its pursuit; that millions of people become simultaneously impressed with one delusion, and run after it, till their attention is caught by some new folly more captivating than the first.
From Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions (1841), Vol. 1, 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Attention (196)  |  Become (821)  |  Captivate (5)  |  Captivating (4)  |  Catch (34)  |  Community (111)  |  Delusion (26)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Fix (34)  |  Folly (44)  |  Impress (66)  |  Mad (54)  |  Million (124)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1273)  |  Object (438)  |  People (1031)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Run (158)  |  Simultaneous (23)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Whole (756)

We have chosen to write the biography of our disease because we love it platonically — as Amy Lowell loved Keats — and have sought its acquaintance wherever we could find it. And in this growing intimacy we have become increasingly impressed with the influence that this and other infectious diseases, which span — in their protoplasmic continuities — the entire history of mankind, have had upon the fates of men.
Rats, Lice and History (1935)
Science quotes on:  |  Acquaintance (38)  |  Become (821)  |  Biography (254)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Disease (340)  |  Fate (76)  |  Find (1014)  |  Growing (99)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Mankind (15)  |  Impress (66)  |  Influence (231)  |  Love (328)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Other (2233)  |  Wherever (51)  |  Write (250)

When external objects are impressed on the sensory nerves, they excite vibrations in the aether residing in the pores of these nerves... Thus it seems that light affects both the optic nerve and the aether and ... the affections of the aether are communicated to the optic nerve, and vice versa. And the same may be observed of frictions of the skin, taste, smells and sounds... Vibrations in the aether will agitate the small particles of the medullary substance of the sensory nerves with synchronous vibrations... up to the brain... These vibrations are motions backwards and forwards of small particles, of the same kind with the oscillations of pendulums, and the tremblings of the particles of the sounding bodies (but) exceedingly short and small, so as not to have the least efficacy to disturb or move the whole bodies of the nerves... That the nerves themselves should vibrate like musical strings is highly absurd.
Observations on Man, His Frame, His Duty, and His Expectations (1749), part 1, 11-22.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurd (60)  |  Aether (13)  |  Affection (44)  |  Backwards (18)  |  Both (496)  |  Brain (281)  |  Disturb (31)  |  Exceedingly (28)  |  Forward (104)  |  Friction (14)  |  Impress (66)  |  Kind (564)  |  Light (635)  |  Motion (320)  |  Move (223)  |  Nerve (82)  |  Object (438)  |  Observed (149)  |  Oscillation (13)  |  Particle (200)  |  Pendulum (17)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sensory (16)  |  Short (200)  |  Skin (48)  |  Small (489)  |  Smell (29)  |  Sound (187)  |  Substance (253)  |  Taste (93)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Vibrate (7)  |  Vibration (26)  |  Vice (42)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)


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.