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: “Environmental extremists ... wouldn�t let you build a house unless it looked like a bird�s nest.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index I > Category: Inventiveness

Inventiveness Quotes (8 quotes)

Comprehension, inventiveness, direction, and criticism: intelligence is contained in these four words.
Les idées modernes sur les enfants (1909), 118.
Science quotes on:  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Criticism (85)  |  Direction (185)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Word (650)

For three million years we were hunter-gatherers, and it was through the evolutionary pressures of that way of life that a brain so adaptable and so creative eventually emerged. Today we stand with the brains of hunter-gatherers in our heads, looking out on a modern world made comfortable for some by the fruits of human inventiveness, and made miserable for others by the scandal of deprivation in the midst of plenty.
Co-author with American science writer Roger Amos Lewin (1946), Origins: What New Discoveries Reveal about the Emergence of our Species and its Possible Future (1977), 249.
Science quotes on:  |  Adaptability (7)  |  Brain (281)  |  Creative (144)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Deprivation (5)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fruit (108)  |  Human (1512)  |  Hunter (28)  |  Hunter-Gatherer (2)  |  Life (1870)  |  Looking (191)  |  Modern (402)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pressure (69)  |  Stand (284)  |  Through (846)  |  Today (321)  |  Way (1214)  |  Way Of Life (15)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

Good methods can teach us to develop and use to better purpose the faculties with which nature has endowed us, while poor methods may prevent us from turning them to good account. Thus the genius of inventiveness, so precious in the sciences, may be diminished or even smothered by a poor method, while a good method may increase and develop it.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Better (493)  |  Develop (278)  |  Endowed (52)  |  Genius (301)  |  Good (906)  |  Increase (225)  |  Method (531)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Poor (139)  |  Precious (43)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Smother (3)  |  Teach (299)  |  Use (771)

It just so happens that during the 1950s, the first great age of molecular biology, the English schools of Oxford and particularly of Cambridge produced more than a score of graduates of quite outstanding ability—much more brilliant, inventive, articulate and dialectically skillful than most young scientists; right up in the Jim Watson class. But Watson had one towering advantage over all of them: in addition to being extremely clever he had something important to be clever about.
From the postscript to 'Lucky Jim', New York Review of Books (28 Mar 1968). Also collected in 'Lucky Jim', Pluto’s Republic (1982), 275. Also excerpted in Richard Dawkins (ed.), The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing (2008), 186.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Addition (70)  |  Advantage (144)  |  Age (509)  |  Being (1276)  |  Biology (232)  |  Brilliance (14)  |  Brilliant (57)  |  Cambridge (17)  |  Class (168)  |  Clever (41)  |  Cleverness (15)  |  DNA (81)  |  First (1302)  |  Graduate (32)  |  Great (1610)  |  Happen (282)  |  Importance (299)  |  Molecular Biology (27)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Outstanding (16)  |  Oxford (16)  |  Produced (187)  |  Right (473)  |  School (227)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Skill (116)  |  Skillful (17)  |  Something (718)  |  Towering (11)  |  James Watson (33)  |  Young (253)

The mind of this man [Adme Mariotte] was highly capable of all learning, and the works published by him attest to the highest erudition. In 1667, on the strength of a singular doctrine, he was elected to the Academy. In him, sharp inventiveness always shone forth combined with the industry to carry through, as the works referred to in the course of this treatise will testify. His cleverness in the design of experiments was almost incredible, and he carried them out with minimal expense.
Translated from the Latin in Regiae Scientiarum Academiae Historia (1698), 233.
Science quotes on:  |  Academy (37)  |  Attest (4)  |  Biography (254)  |  Clever (41)  |  Design (203)  |  Doctrine (81)  |  Elect (5)  |  Erudition (7)  |  Expense (21)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Incredible (43)  |  Industry (159)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Learn (672)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Publish (42)  |  Sharp (17)  |  Shine (49)  |  Singular (24)  |  Strength (139)

The United States pledges before you—and therefore before the world—its determination to help solve the fearful atomic dilemma—to devote its entire heart and mind to find the way by which the miraculous inventiveness of man shall not be dedicated to his death, but consecrated to his life.
From address to the General Assembly of the United Nations (8 Dec 1953).
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic (6)  |  Consecrate (3)  |  Death (406)  |  Dedicated (19)  |  Determination (80)  |  Devote (45)  |  Dilemma (11)  |  Entire (50)  |  Fearful (7)  |  Find (1014)  |  Heart (243)  |  Help (116)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Miraculous (11)  |  Pledge (4)  |  Solve (145)  |  State (505)  |  United States (31)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)

The value of fundamental research does not lie only in the ideas it produces. There is more to it. It affects the whole intellectual life of a nation by determining its way of thinking and the standards by which actions and intellectual production are judged. If science is highly regarded and if the importance of being concerned with the most up-to-date problems of fundamental research is recognized, then a spiritual climate is created which influences the other activities. An atmosphere of creativity is established which penetrates every cultural frontier. Applied sciences and technology are forced to adjust themselves to the highest intellectual standards which are developed in the basic sciences. This influence works in many ways: some fundamental students go into industry; the techniques which are applied to meet the stringent requirements of fundamental research serve to create new technological methods. The style, the scale, and the level of scientific and technical work are determined in pure research; that is what attracts productive people and what brings scientists to those countries where science is at the highest level. Fundamental research sets the standards of modern scientific thought; it creates the intellectual climate in which our modern civilization flourishes. It pumps the lifeblood of idea and inventiveness not only into the technological laboratories and factories, but into every cultural activity of our time. The case for generous support for pure and fundamental science is as simple as that.
In 'Why Pure Science?' in Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, 1965.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Activity (218)  |  Adjust (11)  |  Applied (176)  |  Applied Science (36)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Basic (144)  |  Being (1276)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Climate (102)  |  Concern (239)  |  Country (269)  |  Create (245)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Cultural (26)  |  Develop (278)  |  Establish (63)  |  Factory (20)  |  Flourish (34)  |  Frontier (41)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Generous (17)  |  Idea (881)  |  Importance (299)  |  Industry (159)  |  Influence (231)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Inventive (10)  |  Judge (114)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Lie (370)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lifeblood (4)  |  Method (531)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Civilization (3)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nation (208)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  People (1031)  |  Problem (731)  |  Production (190)  |  Productive (37)  |  Pump (9)  |  Pure (299)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Regard (312)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Research (753)  |  Scale (122)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Thought (17)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Serve (64)  |  Set (400)  |  Simple (426)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Standard (64)  |  Stringent (2)  |  Student (317)  |  Support (151)  |  Technique (84)  |  Technological (62)  |  Technology (281)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Value (393)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whole (756)  |  Work (1402)

When men are engaged in war and conquest, the tools of science become as dangerous as a razor in the hands of a child of three. We must not condemn man because his inventiveness and patient conquest of the forces of nature are being exploited for false and destructive purposes. Rather, we should remember that the fate of mankind hinges entirely upon man’s moral development.
In 'I Am an American' (22 Jun 1940), Einstein Archives 29-092. Excerpted in David E. Rowe and Robert J. Schulmann, Einstein on Politics: His Private Thoughts and Public Stands on Nationalism, Zionism, War, Peace, and the Bomb (2007), 470. The British Library Sound Archive holds a recording of this statement by Einstein. It was during a radio broadcast for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, interviewed by a State Department Official. Einstein spoke following an examination on his application for American citizenship in Trenton, New Jersey. The attack on Pearl Harbor and America’s declaration of war on Japan was still over a year in the future.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Child (333)  |  Condemn (44)  |  Condemnation (16)  |  Conquest (31)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Development (441)  |  Exploit (19)  |  Exploitation (14)  |  False (105)  |  Fate (76)  |  Force (497)  |  Force Of Nature (9)  |  Hand (149)  |  Hinge (4)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Moral (203)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Patience (58)  |  Patient (209)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Razor (4)  |  Remember (189)  |  Tool (129)  |  War (233)


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.