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 P > Category: Posterity

Posterity Quotes (29 quotes)


[The infinitely small] neither have nor can have theory; it is a dangerous instrument in the hands of beginners [ ... ] anticipating, for my part, the judgement of posterity, I would dare predict that this method will be accused one day, and rightly, of having retarded the progress of the mathematical sciences.
Annales des Mathematiques Pures et Appliquées (1814-5), 5, 148.
Science quotes on:  |  Accusation (6)  |  Anticipation (18)  |  Beginner (11)  |  Danger (127)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Dare (55)  |  Differentiation (28)  |  Infinity (96)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Method (531)  |  Predict (86)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Progress (492)  |  Retardation (5)  |  Small (489)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Will (2350)

[Et peut-être la posterité me saura gré de lui avoir fait connaître que les Anciens n’ont pas tout su.]
And perhaps, posterity will thank me for having shown that the ancients did not know everything.
'Relation of New Discoveries in the Science of Numbers', in Letter (Aug 1659) to Pierre de Carcavi, an amateur mathematician, collected in OEuvres de Fermat: Correspondance (1894), 436. Translation, used as an epigraph, in D.M. Burton, Elementary Number Theory (1976, 1989), 107.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Everything (489)  |  Know (1538)  |  Show (353)  |  Thank (48)  |  Will (2350)

Carpent tua poma nepotes
Your descendants shall gather your fruits.
Virgil
Eclogues, IX, line 50. In The Works of Virgil: Translated Into English Prose, as Near the Original as the Different Idioms of the Latin and English Languages Will Allow (1770), 46, it is translated as “Posterity shall pluck the fruit of thy plantations.”
Science quotes on:  |  Descendant (18)  |  Fruit (108)  |  Gather (76)  |  Gathering (23)

Et j’espère que nos neveux me sauront gré, non seulement des choses que j'ai ici expliquées, mais aussi de celles que j'ai omises volontairement, afin de leur laisser le plaisir de les inventer.
I hope that posterity will judge me kindly, not only as to the things which I have explained, but also as to those which I have intentionally omitted so as to leave to others the pleasure of discovery.
Concluding remark in Géométrie (1637), as translated by David Eugene Smith and Marcia L. Latham, in The Geometry of René Descartes (1925, 1954), 240.
Science quotes on:  |  Discovery (837)  |  Explain (334)  |  Hope (321)  |  Intentional (4)  |  Judge (114)  |  Kindly (2)  |  Leave (138)  |  Omit (12)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Will (2350)

And therefore though Adam was framed without this part (a navel), as having no other womb than that of his proper principles, yet was not his posterity without the same: for the seminality of his fabric contained the power thereof; and was endued with the science of those parts whose predestinations upon succession it did accomplish.
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Adam (7)  |  Contain (68)  |  Fabric (27)  |  Navel (2)  |  Other (2233)  |  Power (771)  |  Principle (530)  |  Proper (150)  |  Reproduction (74)  |  Succession (80)  |  Womb (25)

At the entrance to the observatory Stjerneborg located underground, Tycho Brahe built a Ionic portal. On top of this were three sculptured lions. On both sides were inscriptions and on the backside was a longer inscription in gold letters on a porfyr stone: Consecrated to the all-good, great God and Posterity. Tycho Brahe, Son of Otto, who realized that Astronomy, the oldest and most distinguished of all sciences, had indeed been studied for a long time and to a great extent, but still had not obtained sufficient firmness or had been purified of errors, in order to reform it and raise it to perfection, invented and with incredible labour, industry, and expenditure constructed various exact instruments suitable for all kinds of observations of the celestial bodies, and placed them partly in the neighbouring castle of Uraniborg, which was built for the same purpose, partly in these subterranean rooms for a more constant and useful application, and recommending, hallowing, and consecrating this very rare and costly treasure to you, you glorious Posterity, who will live for ever and ever, he, who has both begun and finished everything on this island, after erecting this monument, beseeches and adjures you that in honour of the eternal God, creator of the wonderful clockwork of the heavens, and for the propagation of the divine science and for the celebrity of the fatherland, you will constantly preserve it and not let it decay with old age or any other injury or be removed to any other place or in any way be molested, if for no other reason, at any rate out of reverence to the creator’s eye, which watches over the universe. Greetings to you who read this and act accordingly. Farewell!
(Translated from the original in Latin)
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Age (509)  |  Application (257)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Both (496)  |  Celestial (53)  |  Constant (148)  |  Construct (129)  |  Creator (97)  |  Decay (59)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Divine (112)  |  Entrance (16)  |  Error (339)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Everything (489)  |  Expenditure (16)  |  Extent (142)  |  Eye (440)  |  Finish (62)  |  Glorious (49)  |  God (776)  |  Gold (101)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greeting (10)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Honour (58)  |  Incredible (43)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Industry (159)  |  Injury (36)  |  Inscription (12)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Island (49)  |  Kind (564)  |  Labor (200)  |  Letter (117)  |  Lion (23)  |  Live (650)  |  Long (778)  |  Monument (45)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observatory (18)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Old (499)  |  Old Age (35)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Portal (9)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Propagation (15)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Rare (94)  |  Read (308)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reform (22)  |  Research (753)  |  Side (236)  |  Still (614)  |  Stone (168)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Time (1911)  |  Top (100)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Underground (12)  |  Universe (900)  |  Useful (260)  |  Various (205)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wonderful (155)

Each generation of humanity takes the earth as trustees… We ought to bequeath to posterity as many forests and orchards as we have exhausted and consumed.
From address (22 Apr 1885), as reported in 'An Address by J. Sterling Morton on Arbor Day 1885', Nebraska City News. Also appears in J. Sterling Morton, 'Arbor Day', Proceedings of the American Forestry Congress at its Meeting Held in Boston, September 1885 (1886), 51.
Science quotes on:  |  Arbor Day (4)  |  Bequeath (2)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Exhausted (3)  |  Forest (161)  |  Generation (256)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Orchard (4)  |  Trustee (3)

Endowed with two qualities, which seemed incompatible with each other, a volcanic imagination and a pertinacity of intellect which the most tedious numerical calculations could not daunt, Kepler conjectured that the movements of the celestial bodies must be connected together by simple laws, or, to use his own expression, by harmonic laws. These laws he undertook to discover. A thousand fruitless attempts, errors of calculation inseparable from a colossal undertaking, did not prevent him a single instant from advancing resolutely toward the goal of which he imagined he had obtained a glimpse. Twenty-two years were employed by him in this investigation, and still he was not weary of it! What, in reality, are twenty-two years of labor to him who is about to become the legislator of worlds; who shall inscribe his name in ineffaceable characters upon the frontispiece of an immortal code; who shall be able to exclaim in dithyrambic language, and without incurring the reproach of anyone, “The die is cast; I have written my book; it will be read either in the present age or by posterity, it matters not which; it may well await a reader, since God has waited six thousand years for an interpreter of his words.”
In 'Eulogy on Laplace', in Smithsonian Report for the year 1874 (1875), 131-132.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Age (509)  |  Anyone (38)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Await (6)  |  Become (821)  |  Body (557)  |  Book (413)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Cast (69)  |  Celestial (53)  |  Character (259)  |  Code (31)  |  Colossal (15)  |  Conjecture (51)  |  Connect (126)  |  Die (94)  |  Discover (571)  |  Employ (115)  |  Endow (17)  |  Endowed (52)  |  Error (339)  |  Exclaim (15)  |  Expression (181)  |  Frontispiece (2)  |  Fruitless (9)  |  Glimpse (16)  |  Goal (155)  |  God (776)  |  Harmonic (4)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Immortal (35)  |  Incompatible (4)  |  Incur (4)  |  Inscribe (4)  |  Inseparable (18)  |  Instant (46)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Interpreter (8)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Johannes Kepler (95)  |  Labor (200)  |  Language (308)  |  Law (913)  |  Legislator (4)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Matter (821)  |  Most (1728)  |  Movement (162)  |  Must (1525)  |  Name (359)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pertinacity (2)  |  Present (630)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Quality (139)  |  Read (308)  |  Reader (42)  |  Reality (274)  |  Reproach (4)  |  Resolutely (3)  |  Simple (426)  |  Single (365)  |  Still (614)  |  Tedious (15)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Together (392)  |  Toward (45)  |  Two (936)  |  Undertake (35)  |  Undertaking (17)  |  Use (771)  |  Volcano (46)  |  Wait (66)  |  Weary (11)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)  |  Write (250)  |  Year (963)

From thus meditating on the great similarity of the structure of the warm-blooded animals, and at the same time of the great changes they undergo both before and after their nativity; and by considering in how minute a portion of time many of the changes of animals above described have been produced; would it be too bold to imagine that, in the great length of time since the earth began to exist, perhaps millions of ages before the commencement of the history of mankind would it be too bold to imagine that all warm-blooded animals have arisen from one living filament, which THE GREAT FIRST CAUSE endued with animality, with the power of acquiring new parts, attended with new propensities, directed by irritations, sensations, volitions and associations, and thus possessing the faculty of continuing to improve by its own inherent activity, and of delivering down these improvements by generation to its posterity, world without end!
Zoonomia, Or, The Laws of Organic Life, in three parts (1803), Vol. 1, 397.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Age (509)  |  Animal (651)  |  Association (49)  |  Attend (67)  |  Blood (144)  |  Bold (22)  |  Both (496)  |  Cause (561)  |  Change (639)  |  Commencement (14)  |  Direct (228)  |  Down (455)  |  Earth (1076)  |  End (603)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Exist (458)  |  Filament (4)  |  First (1302)  |  Generation (256)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Mankind (15)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Inherent (43)  |  Living (492)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Minute (129)  |  New (1273)  |  Portion (86)  |  Power (771)  |  Produced (187)  |  Sensation (60)  |  Similarity (32)  |  Small (489)  |  Structure (365)  |  Time (1911)  |  Volition (3)  |  Warm (74)  |  Warm-Blooded (3)  |  World (1850)

It is probable that the scheme of physics will be enlarged so as to embrace the behaviour of living organisms under the influence of life and mind. Biology and psychology are not alien sciences; their operations are not solely mechanical, nor can they be formulated by physics as it is today; but they belong to a physical universe, and their mode of action ought to be capable of being formulated in terms of an enlarged physics in the future, in which the ether will take a predominant place. On the other hand it may be thought that those entities cannot be brought to book so easily, and that they will always elude our ken. If so, there will be a dualism in the universe, which posterity will find staggering, but that will not alter the facts.
In Past Years: an Autobiography (1932), 350. Quoted in book review, Waldehar Kaempfert, 'Sir Oliver Lodge Stands by the Old Physics', New York Times (21 Feb 1932), BR5.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Alien (35)  |  Alter (64)  |  Behaviour (42)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belong (168)  |  Biology (232)  |  Book (413)  |  Capable (174)  |  Dualism (4)  |  Elude (11)  |  Eluding (2)  |  Embrace (47)  |  Enlargement (8)  |  Ether (37)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Find (1014)  |  Formulation (37)  |  Future (467)  |  Influence (231)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mode (43)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Organism (231)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physics (564)  |  Predominance (3)  |  Probability (135)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Staggering (2)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thought (995)  |  Today (321)  |  Universe (900)  |  Will (2350)

It so happens that the work which is likely to be our most durable monument, and to convey some knowledge of us to the most remote posterity, is a work of bare utility; not a shrine, not a fortress, not a palace, but a bridge.
Writing upon the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge, New York.
'The Bridge as a Monument', Harper's Weekly (26 May 1883), 27, 326. In David P. Billington, The Tower and the Bridge: The New Art of Structural Engineering (1983), 17.
Science quotes on:  |  Bare (33)  |  Bridge (49)  |  Bridge Engineering (8)  |  Brooklyn Bridge (2)  |  Durable (7)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Fortress (4)  |  Happen (282)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Monument (45)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Palace (8)  |  Remote (86)  |  Shrine (8)  |  Utility (52)  |  Work (1402)  |  Writing (192)

Much is said about the progress of science in these centuries. I should say that the useful results of science had accumulated, but that there had been no accumulation of knowledge, strictly speaking, for posterity; for knowledge is to be acquired only by corresponding experience. How can be know what we are told merely? Each man can interpret another’s experience only by his own.
In A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1862), 384.
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulation (51)  |  Acquired (77)  |  Experience (494)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Man (2252)  |  Merely (315)  |  Progress (492)  |  Progress Of Science (40)  |  Result (700)  |  Say (989)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Useful (260)

Nothing holds me ... I will indulge in my sacred fury; I will triumph over mankind by the honest confession that I have stolen the golden vases of the Egyptians to build up a tabernacle for my God, far away from the confines of Egypt. If you forgive me, I rejoice ; if you are angry, I can bear it. The die is cast; the book is written, to be read either now or by posterity, I care not which. It may well wait a century for a reader, as God has waited six thousand years for an observer.
As given in David Brewster, The Martyrs of Science (1841), 217.
Science quotes on:  |  Bear (162)  |  Book (413)  |  Build (211)  |  Care (203)  |  Cast (69)  |  Century (319)  |  Confession (9)  |  Egypt (31)  |  Forgive (12)  |  God (776)  |  Golden (47)  |  Honest (53)  |  Indulge (15)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Read (308)  |  Sacred (48)  |  Tabernacle (5)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Triumph (76)  |  Wait (66)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

One feature which will probably most impress the mathematician accustomed to the rapidity and directness secured by the generality of modern methods is the deliberation with which Archimedes approaches the solution of any one of his main problems. Yet this very characteristic, with its incidental effects, is calculated to excite the more admiration because the method suggests the tactics of some great strategist who foresees everything, eliminates everything not immediately conducive to the execution of his plan, masters every position in its order, and then suddenly (when the very elaboration of the scheme has almost obscured, in the mind of the spectator, its ultimate object) strikes the final blow. Thus we read in Archimedes proposition after proposition the bearing of which is not immediately obvious but which we find infallibly used later on; and we are led by such easy stages that the difficulties of the original problem, as presented at the outset, are scarcely appreciated. As Plutarch says: “It is not possible to find in geometry more difficult and troublesome questions, or more simple and lucid explanations.” But it is decidedly a rhetorical exaggeration when Plutarch goes on to say that we are deceived by the easiness of the successive steps into the belief that anyone could have discovered them for himself. On the contrary, the studied simplicity and the perfect finish of the treatises involve at the same time an element of mystery. Though each step depends on the preceding ones, we are left in the dark as to how they were suggested to Archimedes. There is, in fact, much truth in a remark by Wallis to the effect that he seems “as it were of set purpose to have covered up the traces of his investigation as if he had grudged posterity the secret of his method of inquiry while he wished to extort from them assent to his results.” Wallis adds with equal reason that not only Archimedes but nearly all the ancients so hid away from posterity their method of Analysis (though it is certain that they had one) that more modern mathematicians found it easier to invent a new Analysis than to seek out the old.
In The Works of Archimedes (1897), Preface, vi.
Science quotes on:  |  Accustom (52)  |  Accustomed (46)  |  Add (42)  |  Admiration (61)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Anyone (38)  |  Appreciate (67)  |  Approach (112)  |  Archimedes (63)  |  Assent (12)  |  Bear (162)  |  Belief (615)  |  Blow (45)  |  Calculate (58)  |  Certain (557)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Conducive (3)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Cover (40)  |  Dark (145)  |  Deceive (26)  |  Decidedly (2)  |  Deliberation (5)  |  Depend (238)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Discover (571)  |  Easier (53)  |  Easiness (4)  |  Easy (213)  |  Effect (414)  |  Elaboration (11)  |  Element (322)  |  Eliminate (25)  |  Equal (88)  |  Everything (489)  |  Exaggeration (16)  |  Excite (17)  |  Execution (25)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Extort (2)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Feature (49)  |  Final (121)  |  Find (1014)  |  Finish (62)  |  Foresee (22)  |  Generality (45)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Great (1610)  |  Grudge (2)  |  Hide (70)  |  Himself (461)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Impress (66)  |  Incidental (15)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Invent (57)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Involve (93)  |  Late (119)  |  Lead (391)  |  Leave (138)  |  Lucid (9)  |  Main (29)  |  Master (182)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Modern (402)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Nearly (137)  |  New (1273)  |  Object (438)  |  Obscure (66)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Old (499)  |  Order (638)  |  Original (61)  |  Outset (7)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Plan (122)  |  Plutarch (16)  |  Position (83)  |  Possible (560)  |  Precede (23)  |  Present (630)  |  Probably (50)  |  Problem (731)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Question (649)  |  Rapidity (29)  |  Read (308)  |  Reason (766)  |  Remark (28)  |  Result (700)  |  Same (166)  |  Say (989)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Secret (216)  |  Secure (23)  |  Secured (18)  |  Seek (218)  |  Set (400)  |  Simple (426)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Solution (282)  |  Spectator (11)  |  Stage (152)  |  Step (234)  |  Strike (72)  |  Study (701)  |  Successive (73)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Suggest (38)  |  Tactic (9)  |  Time (1911)  |  Trace (109)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Troublesome (8)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  John Wallis (3)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wish (216)

Only those works which are well-written will pass to posterity: the amount of knowledge, the uniqueness of the facts, even the novelty of the discoveries are no guarantees of immortality ... These things are exterior to a man but style is the man himself.
'Discours prononcé dans l'Académie française, Le Samedi 25 Aout 1753', Histoire Naturelle, Générale et Particulière, Avec la Description du Cabinet du Roi (1753), Vol. 7, xvi-xvii.
Science quotes on:  |  Amount (153)  |  Book (413)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Guarantee (30)  |  Himself (461)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Man (2252)  |  Novelty (31)  |  Pass (241)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Uniqueness (11)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancestor (63)  |  Anthropology (61)  |  Forward (104)  |  Look (584)  |  Never (1089)  |  People (1031)  |  Will (2350)

Professor von Pirquet has come to this country exactly at the right time to aid us. He has shown us how to detect tuberculosis before it has become so developed as to be contagious and has so taken hold of the individual as to be recognized by any other means. In thousands of cases I for my part am unable to detect tuberculosis in infancy or early childhood without the aid of the tuberculin test which Prof. von Pirquet has shown to be the best. He has taught us how by tubercular skin tests, to detect it. ... What Dr. von Pirquet has done already will make his name go down to posterity as one of the great reformers in tuberculin tests and as one who has done an immense amount of good to humanity. The skin test in twenty-four hours will show you whether the case is tubercular.
Discussion on 'The Relation of Tuberculosis to Infant Mortality', read at the third mid-year meeting of the American Academy of Medicine, New Haven, Conn, (4 Nov 1909). In Bulletin of the American Academy of Medicine (1910), 11, 78.
Science quotes on:  |  Aid (101)  |  Already (226)  |  Amount (153)  |  Become (821)  |  Best (467)  |  Childhood (42)  |  Contagion (9)  |  Country (269)  |  Detect (45)  |  Detection (19)  |  Develop (278)  |  Down (455)  |  Early (196)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  Hour (192)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Immense (89)  |  Individual (420)  |  Infancy (14)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Name (359)  |  Other (2233)  |  Baron Clemens von Pirquet (3)  |  Professor (133)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Reformer (5)  |  Right (473)  |  Show (353)  |  Skin (48)  |  Test (221)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tuberculosis (9)  |  Will (2350)

Psychoanalytic theory is the most stupendous intellectual confidence trick of the twentieth century and a terminal product as well—something akin to a dinosaur or zeppelin in the history of ideas, a vast structure of radically unsound design and with no posterity.
'Victims of Psychiatry', The New York Review of Books (23 Jan 1975), 21. Cited in David E. Stannard, Shrinking History: On Freud and the Failure of Psychohistory (1980), 150.
Science quotes on:  |  20th Century (40)  |  Century (319)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Confidence Trick (2)  |  Design (203)  |  Dinosaur (26)  |  History (716)  |  Idea (881)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Most (1728)  |  Product (166)  |  Psychoanalysis (37)  |  Radical (28)  |  Something (718)  |  Structure (365)  |  Stupendous (13)  |  Terminal (2)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Trick (36)  |  Unsound (5)  |  Vast (188)  |  Zeppelin (4)

The Commonwealth of Learning is not at this time without Master-Builders, whose mighty Designs, in advancing the Sciences, will leave lasting Monuments to the Admiration of Posterity; But every one must not hope to be a Boyle, or a Sydenham; and in an Age that produces such Masters, as the Great-Huygenius, and the incomparable Mr. Newton, with some other of that Strain; 'tis Ambition enough to be employed as an Under-Labourer in clearing Ground a little, and removing some of the Rubbish, that lies in the way to Knowledge.
An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690). Edited by Peter Nidditch (1975), The Epistle to the Reader, 9-10.
Science quotes on:  |  Admiration (61)  |  Age (509)  |  Ambition (46)  |  Robert Boyle (28)  |  Design (203)  |  Employ (115)  |  Enough (341)  |  Great (1610)  |  Ground (222)  |  Hope (321)  |  Christiaan Huygens (11)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Learning (291)  |  Lie (370)  |  Little (717)  |  Master (182)  |  Monument (45)  |  Must (1525)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Other (2233)  |  Rubbish (12)  |  Thomas Sydenham (8)  |  Time (1911)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

The genius of Man in our time has gone into jet-propulsion, atom-splitting, penicillin-curing, etc. There is left none over for works of imagination; of spiritual insight or mystical enlightenment. I asked for bread and was given a tranquilizer. It is important to recognize that in our time man has not written one word, thought one thought, put two notes or two bricks together, splashed color on to canvas or concrete into space, in a manner which will be of any conceivable imaginative interest to posterity.
The Most of Malcolm Muggeridge (1966), 70.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Atom (381)  |  Bread (42)  |  Brick (20)  |  Color (155)  |  Conceivable (28)  |  Concrete (55)  |  Enlightenment (21)  |  Genius (301)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Insight (107)  |  Interest (416)  |  Jet (4)  |  Man (2252)  |  Penicillin (18)  |  Propulsion (10)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Space (523)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Tranquilizer (4)  |  Two (936)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)  |  Work (1402)

The name of Sir Isaac Newton has by general consent been placed at the head of those great men who have been the ornaments of their species. … The philosopher [Laplace], indeed, to whom posterity will probably assign a place next to Newton, has characterized the Principia as pre-eminent above all the productions of human intellect.
In Life of Sir Isaac Newton (1831), 1, 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Assign (15)  |  Characterize (22)  |  Consent (14)  |  General (521)  |  Great (1610)  |  Head (87)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Intellect (32)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Pierre-Simon Laplace (63)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Name (359)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Next (238)  |  Ornament (20)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Place (192)  |  Preeminent (6)  |  Principia (14)  |  Probably (50)  |  Production (190)  |  Species (435)  |  Will (2350)

The Reason of making Experiments is, for the Discovery of the Method of Nature, in its Progress and Operations. Whosoever, therefore doth rightly make Experiments, doth design to enquire into some of these Operations; and, in order thereunto, doth consider what Circumstances and Effects, in the Experiment, will be material and instructive in that Enquiry, whether for the confirming or destroying of any preconceived Notion, or for the Limitation and Bounding thereof, either to this or that Part of the Hypothesis, by allowing a greater Latitude and Extent to one Part, and by diminishing or restraining another Part within narrower Bounds than were at first imagin'd, or hypothetically supposed. The Method therefore of making Experiments by the Royal Society I conceive should be this.
First, To propound the Design and Aim of the Curator in his present Enquiry.
Secondly, To make the Experiment, or Experiments, leisurely, and with Care and Exactness.
Thirdly, To be diligent, accurate, and curious, in taking Notice of, and shewing to the Assembly of Spectators, such Circumstances and Effects therein occurring, as are material, or at least, as he conceives such, in order to his Theory .
Fourthly, After finishing the Experiment, to discourse, argue, defend, and further explain, such Circumstances and Effects in the preceding Experiments, as may seem dubious or difficult: And to propound what new Difficulties and Queries do occur, that require other Trials and Experiments to be made, in order to their clearing and answering: And farther, to raise such Axioms and Propositions, as are thereby plainly demonstrated and proved.
Fifthly, To register the whole Process of the Proposal, Design, Experiment, Success, or Failure; the Objections and Objectors, the Explanation and Explainers, the Proposals and Propounders of new and farther Trials; the Theories and Axioms, and their Authors; and, in a Word the history of every Thing and Person, that is material and circumstantial in the whole Entertainment of the said Society; which shall be prepared and made ready, fairly written in a bound Book, to be read at the Beginning of the Sitting of the Society: The next Day of their Meeting, then to be read over and further discoursed, augmented or diminished, as the Matter shall require, and then to be sign'd by a certain Number of the Persons present, who have been present, and Witnesses of all the said Proceedings, who, by Subscribing their names, will prove undoubted testimony to Posterity of the whole History.
'Dr Hooke's Method of Making Experiments' (1664-5). In W. Derham (ed.), Philosophical Experiments and Observations Of the Late Eminent Dr. Robert Hooke, F.R.S. And Geom. Prof. Gresh. and Other Eminent Virtuoso's in his Time (1726), 26-8.
Science quotes on:  |  Accurate (88)  |  Aim (175)  |  Assembly (13)  |  Augment (12)  |  Author (175)  |  Axiom (65)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Book (413)  |  Bound (120)  |  Care (203)  |  Certain (557)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Consider (428)  |  Curious (95)  |  Design (203)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Diligent (19)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Effect (414)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Entertainment (19)  |  Exactness (29)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Extent (142)  |  Failure (176)  |  Farther (51)  |  First (1302)  |  Greater (288)  |  History (716)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Limitation (52)  |  Making (300)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Method (531)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Next (238)  |  Notice (81)  |  Notion (120)  |  Number (710)  |  Objection (34)  |  Occur (151)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Person (366)  |  Present (630)  |  Proceeding (38)  |  Process (439)  |  Progress (492)  |  Proposal (21)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Prove (261)  |  Read (308)  |  Reason (766)  |  Register (22)  |  Require (229)  |  Research (753)  |  Royal (56)  |  Royal Society (17)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Society (350)  |  Success (327)  |  Testimony (21)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Trial (59)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)

There are many points in the history of an invention which the inventor himself is apt to overlook as trifling, but in which posterity never fail to take a deep interest. The progress of the human mind is never traced with such a lively interest as through the steps by which it perfects a great invention; and there is certainly no invention respecting which this minute information will be more eagerly sought after, than in the case of the steam-engine.
Quoted in The Origin and Progress of the Mechanical Inventions of James Watt (1854), Vol.1, 4.
Science quotes on:  |  Certainly (185)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Deep (241)  |  Engine (99)  |  Fail (191)  |  Great (1610)  |  Himself (461)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Information (173)  |  Interest (416)  |  Invention (400)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Lively (17)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Minute (129)  |  More (2558)  |  Never (1089)  |  Overlook (33)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Point (584)  |  Progress (492)  |  Steam (81)  |  Steam Engine (47)  |  Step (234)  |  Through (846)  |  Will (2350)

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar quote: it is well to remember that there is in general no correlation between the judgment of posteri
This [Nobel Prize makes] a huge perturbation in my life [and] is not something which I have particularly liked … in many ways I would have much preferred not to have received it … it is well to remember that there is in general no correlation between the judgment of posterity and the judgment of contemporaries.
From Kameshwar C. Wall, 'Conversations with Chandra', Chandra: A Biography of S. Chandrasekhar (1991), 296-298.
Science quotes on:  |  Contemporary (33)  |  Correlation (19)  |  General (521)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Life (1870)  |  Nobel Prize (42)  |  Perturbation (7)  |  Prefer (27)  |  Receive (117)  |  Remember (189)  |  Something (718)  |  Way (1214)

This theory [the oxygen theory] is not as I have heard it described, that of the French chemists, it is mine (elle est la mienne); it is a property which I claim from my contemporaries and from posterity.
Memoires de Chimie (1805), Vol. 2, 87, trans. M. P. Crosland.
Science quotes on:  |  Attribution (4)  |  Biography (254)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Claim (154)  |  Mine (78)  |  Oxygen (77)  |  Property (177)  |  Theory (1015)

This very sun, this very moon, these stars, this very order and revolution of the universe, is the same which your ancestors enjoyed, and which will be the admiration of your posterity.
From Essay 1, Chapter 19. In Craufurd Tait Ramage (ed.), Beautiful Thoughts from French and Italian Authors (1866), 164.
Science quotes on:  |  Admiration (61)  |  Ancestor (63)  |  Enjoy (48)  |  Moon (252)  |  Order (638)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Sun (407)  |  Universe (900)  |  Will (2350)

Three ways have been taken to account for it [racial differences]: either that they are the posterity of Ham, who was cursed; or that God at first created two kinds of men, one black and another white; or that by the heat of the sun the skin is scorched, and so gets the sooty hue. This matter has been much canvassed among naturalists, but has never been brought to any certain issue.
In James Boswell, London Journal, 1762-1763, as First Published in 1950 from the Original Manuscript (1956), 251.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Black (46)  |  Certain (557)  |  Color (155)  |  Create (245)  |  Curse (20)  |  Difference (355)  |  First (1302)  |  God (776)  |  Ham (2)  |  Heat (180)  |  Kind (564)  |  Matter (821)  |  Naturalist (79)  |  Never (1089)  |  Race (278)  |  Scorch (2)  |  Skin (48)  |  Soot (11)  |  Study (701)  |  Sun (407)  |  Two (936)  |  Way (1214)  |  White (132)

We, the people, still believe that our obligations as Americans are not just to ourselves, but to all posterity. We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations. Some may still deny the overwhelming judgment of science, but none can avoid the devastating impact of raging fires and crippling drought and more powerful storms.
In Second Inaugural Address (21 Jan 2013) at the United States Capitol.
Science quotes on:  |  American (56)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Belief (615)  |  Betray (8)  |  Change (639)  |  Children (201)  |  Climate (102)  |  Climate Change (76)  |  Crippling (2)  |  Deny (71)  |  Devastating (6)  |  Do (1905)  |  Drought (14)  |  Failure (176)  |  Fire (203)  |  Future (467)  |  Generation (256)  |  Impact (45)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Knowing (137)  |  More (2558)  |  Obligation (26)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Overwhelming (30)  |  People (1031)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Raging (2)  |  Respond (14)  |  Still (614)  |  Storm (56)  |  Storms (18)  |  Threat (36)  |  Will (2350)

Whatever the skill of any country may be in the sciences, it is from its excellence in polite learning alone that it must expect a character from posterity.
Essays, on Miscellaneous Subjects (1818), 198.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Character (259)  |  Country (269)  |  Excellence (40)  |  Expect (203)  |  Learning (291)  |  Must (1525)  |  Polite (9)  |  Skill (116)  |  Whatever (234)


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.