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: “Genius is two percent inspiration, ninety-eight percent perspiration.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index P > Category: Phenomena

Phenomena Quotes (8 quotes)

Almost all the greatest discoveries in astronomy have resulted from what we have elsewhere termed Residual Phenomena, of a qualitative or numerical kind, of such portions of the numerical or quantitative results of observation as remain outstanding and unaccounted for, after subducting and allowing for all that would result from the strict application of known principles.
Outlines of Astronomy (1876), 626.
Science quotes on:  |  Allowing (2)  |  Application (257)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Kind (564)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Observation (593)  |  Outstanding (16)  |  Portion (86)  |  Principle (530)  |  Qualitative (15)  |  Quantitative (31)  |  Remain (355)  |  Residual (5)  |  Result (700)  |  Term (357)  |  Unaccounted (2)

Engineering is the art of directing the great sources of power in nature for the use and the convenience of people. In its modern form engineering involves people, money, materials, machines, and energy. It is differentiated from science because it is primarily concerned with how to direct to useful and economical ends the natural phenomena which scientists discover and formulate into acceptable theories. Engineering therefore requires above all the creative imagination to innovate useful applications of natural phenomena. It seeks newer, cheaper, better means of using natural sources of energy and materials.
In McGraw Hill, Science and Technology Encyclopedia
Science quotes on:  |  Acceptable (14)  |  Application (257)  |  Art (680)  |  Better (493)  |  Cheaper (6)  |  Concern (239)  |  Convenience (54)  |  Creative (144)  |  Differentiate (19)  |  Direct (228)  |  Directing (5)  |  Discover (571)  |  Economical (11)  |  End (603)  |  Energy (373)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Form (976)  |  Formulate (16)  |  Great (1610)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Innovate (2)  |  Involve (93)  |  Machine (271)  |  Material (366)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Modern (402)  |  Money (178)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nature (2017)  |  People (1031)  |  Person (366)  |  Power (771)  |  Primarily (12)  |  Require (229)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Seek (218)  |  Source (101)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Use (771)  |  Useful (260)

I am ever more intrigued by the correspondence between mathematics and physical facts. The adaptability of mathematics to the description of physical phenomena is uncanny.
From Nobel Banquet Speech (10 Dec 1981), in Wilhelm Odelberg (ed.), Les Prix Nobel 1981 (1981), 59.
Science quotes on:  |  Adaptability (7)  |  Correspondence (24)  |  Description (89)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Intrigued (4)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  More (2558)  |  Physical (518)  |  Uncanny (5)

It is easy to make out three areas where scientists will be concentrating their efforts in the coming decades. One is in physics, where leading theorists are striving, with the help of experimentalists, to devise a single mathematical theory that embraces all the basic phenomena of matter and energy. The other two are in biology. Biologists—and the rest of us too—would like to know how the brain works and how a single cell, the fertilized egg cell, develops into an entire organism
Article 'The View From Mars', in Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences: Research Facilities of the Future (1994), 735, 37.
Science quotes on:  |  Basic (144)  |  Biologist (70)  |  Biology (232)  |  Brain (281)  |  Cell (146)  |  Coming (114)  |  Concentrate (28)  |  Decade (66)  |  Develop (278)  |  Devise (16)  |  Easy (213)  |  Effort (243)  |  Egg (71)  |  Embrace (47)  |  Energy (373)  |  Entire (50)  |  Experimentalist (20)  |  Fertilized (2)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Matter (821)  |  Organism (231)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Rest (287)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Single (365)  |  Strive (53)  |  Theorist (44)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Two (936)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

My view, the skeptical one, holds that we may be as far away from an understanding of elementary particles as Newton's successors were from quantum mechanics. Like them, we have two tremendous tasks ahead of us. One is to study and explore the mathematics of the existing theories. The existing quantum field-theories may or may not be correct, but they certainly conceal mathematical depths which will take the genius of an Euler or a Hamilton to plumb. Our second task is to press on with the exploration of the wide range of physical phenomena of which the existing theories take no account. This means pressing on with experiments in the fashionable area of particle physics. Outstanding among the areas of physics which have been left out of recent theories of elementary particles are gravitation and cosmology
In Scientific American (Sep 1958). As cited in '50, 100 & 150 years ago', Scientific American (Sep 2008), 299, No. 3, 14.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Concealing (2)  |  Correctness (12)  |  Cosmology (26)  |  Depth (97)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Leonhard Euler (35)  |  Existing (10)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Fashionable (15)  |  Field (378)  |  Genius (301)  |  Gravitation (72)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Outstanding (16)  |  Particle (200)  |  Particle Physics (13)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physics (564)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Field Theory (3)  |  Quantum Mechanics (47)  |  Range (104)  |  Recent (78)  |  Skeptic (8)  |  Skeptical (21)  |  Study (701)  |  Successor (16)  |  Task (152)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Tremendous (29)  |  Two (936)  |  Understanding (527)  |  View (496)  |  Wide (97)  |  Will (2350)

Nature is disordered, powerful and chaotic, and through fear of the chaos we impose system on it. We abhor complexity, and seek to simplify things whenever we can by whatever means we have at hand. We need to have an overall explanation of what the universe is and how it functions. In order to achieve this overall view we develop explanatory theories which will give structure to natural phenomena: we classify nature into a coherent system which appears to do what we say it does.
In Day the Universe Changed (1985), 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Abhorrence (8)  |  Achievement (187)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Chaos (99)  |  Classification (102)  |  Coherence (13)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Develop (278)  |  Development (441)  |  Disorder (45)  |  Do (1905)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Fear (212)  |  Function (235)  |  Imposition (5)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Need (320)  |  Order (638)  |  Overall (10)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Research (753)  |  Say (989)  |  Seek (218)  |  Seeking (31)  |  Simplification (20)  |  Simplify (14)  |  Structure (365)  |  System (545)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  Universe (900)  |  View (496)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Whenever (81)  |  Will (2350)

The man of science who cannot formulate a hypothesis is only an accountant of phenomena.
The Road to Reason (1948), 77.
Science quotes on:  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Man (2252)  |  Men Of Science (147)

While it is never safe to affirm that the future of Physical Science has no marvels in store even more astonishing than those of the past, it seems probable that most of the grand underlying principles have been firmly established, and that further advances are to be sought chiefly in the rigorous applications of these principles to all the phenomena which come under our notice. It is here that the science of measurement shows its importance—where the quantitative results are more to be desired than qualitative work. An eminent physicist has remarked that the future truths of Physical Science are to be looked for in the sixth place of decimals.
University of Chicago, Annual Register 1894-1895 (1894), 150. Michelson also incorporated these lines in his address, 'Some of the Objects and Methods of Physical Science', at the opening of the Physics and Electrical Engineering Laboratory at the University of Kansas, reprinted in The Electrical Engineer (1 Jan 1896), 21, No. 400, 9.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Application (257)  |  Astonishing (29)  |  Chiefly (47)  |  Decimal (21)  |  Desired (5)  |  Established (7)  |  Future (467)  |  Grand (29)  |  Importance (299)  |  Look (584)  |  Marvel (37)  |  Measurement (178)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Never (1089)  |  Notice (81)  |  Past (355)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Principle (530)  |  Qualitative (15)  |  Quantitative (31)  |  Result (700)  |  Rigorous (50)  |  Safe (61)  |  Show (353)  |  Store (49)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Underlying (33)  |  Work (1402)


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.