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: “Politics is more difficult than physics.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index S > Category: Simplification

Simplification Quotes (20 quotes)

A good teacher is a master of simplification and an enemy of simplism.
Erin Gruwell and Frank McCourt, The Gigantic Book of Teachers' Wisdom (2007), 73.Erin Gruwell, Frank McCourt
Science quotes on:  |  Enemy (86)  |  Good (906)  |  Master (182)  |  Teacher (154)

According to the older view, for every single effect of a serum, there was a separate substance, or at least a particular chemical group... A normal serum contained as many different haemagglutinins as it agglutinated different cells. The situation was undoubtedly made much simpler if, to use the Ehrlich terminology... the separate haptophore groups can combine with an extremely large number of receptors in stepwise differing quantities as a stain does with different animal tissues, though not always with the same intensity. A normal serum would therefore visibly affect such a large number of different blood cells... not because it contained countless special substances, but because of the colloids of the serum, and therefore of the agglutinins by reason of their chemical constitution and the electrochemical properties resulting from it. That this manner of representation is a considerable simplification is clear; it also opens the way to direct experimental testing by the methods of structural chemistry.
'Die Theorien der Antikorperbildung ... ', Wiener klinische Wöchenschrift (1909), 22, 1623-1631. Trans. Pauline M. H. Mazumdar.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Animal (651)  |  Blood (144)  |  Cell (146)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Colloid (5)  |  Combine (58)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Constitution (78)  |  Countless (39)  |  Different (595)  |  Direct (228)  |  Effect (414)  |  Electrochemical (4)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Immunology (14)  |  Intensity (34)  |  Large (398)  |  Method (531)  |  Number (710)  |  Open (277)  |  Reason (766)  |  Representation (55)  |  Separate (151)  |  Serum (11)  |  Single (365)  |  Situation (117)  |  Special (188)  |  Structural (29)  |  Structure (365)  |  Substance (253)  |  Terminology (12)  |  Tissue (51)  |  Use (771)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)

I believe … that we can still have a genre of scientific books suitable for and accessible alike to professionals and interested laypeople. The concepts of science, in all their richness and ambiguity, can be presented without any compromise, without any simplification counting as distortion, in language accessible to all intelligent people … I hope that this book can be read with profit both in seminars for graduate students and–if the movie stinks and you forgot your sleeping pills–on the businessman’s special to Tokyo.
In Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History (1990), Preface, 16.
Science quotes on:  |  Accessible (27)  |  Alike (60)  |  Ambiguity (17)  |  Belief (615)  |  Book (413)  |  Both (496)  |  Compromise (12)  |  Concept (242)  |  Count (107)  |  Counting (26)  |  Distortion (13)  |  Forget (125)  |  Genre (3)  |  Graduate (32)  |  Graduate Student (13)  |  Hope (321)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Interest (416)  |  Language (308)  |  Laypeople (2)  |  Movie (21)  |  People (1031)  |  Pill (7)  |  Present (630)  |  Professional (77)  |  Profit (56)  |  Read (308)  |  Richness (15)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Seminar (5)  |  Sleep (81)  |  Special (188)  |  Still (614)  |  Stink (8)  |  Student (317)  |  Suitable (10)  |  Tokyo (3)

I despair of persuading people to drop the familiar and comforting tactic of dichotomy. Perhaps, instead, we might expand the framework of debates by seeking other dichotomies more appropriate than, or simply different from, the conventional divisions. All dichotomies are simplifications, but the rendition of a conflict along differing axes of several orthogonal dichotomies might provide an amplitude of proper intellectual space without forcing us to forgo our most comforting tool of thought.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Amplitude (4)  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Axe (16)  |  Comfort (64)  |  Conflict (77)  |  Conventional (31)  |  Debate (40)  |  Despair (40)  |  Dichotomy (4)  |  Differ (88)  |  Different (595)  |  Division (67)  |  Drop (77)  |  Expand (56)  |  Familiar (47)  |  Force (497)  |  Forgo (4)  |  Framework (33)  |  Instead (23)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1031)  |  Persuade (11)  |  Proper (150)  |  Provide (79)  |  Seek (218)  |  Several (33)  |  Simply (53)  |  Space (523)  |  Tactic (9)  |  Thought (995)  |  Tool (129)

Indeed, nothing more beautifully simplifying has ever happened in the history of science than the whole series of discoveries culminating about 1914 which finally brought practically universal acceptance to the theory that the material world contains but two fundamental entities, namely, positive and negative electrons, exactly alike in charge, but differing widely in mass, the positive electron—now usually called a proton—being 1850 times heavier than the negative, now usually called simply the electron.
Time, Matter and Values (1932), 46. Cited in Karl Raimund Popper and William Warren Bartley (ed.), Quantum Theory and theSchism in Physics (1992), 37.
Science quotes on:  |  Acceptance (56)  |  Alike (60)  |  Being (1276)  |  Call (781)  |  Charge (63)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Electron (96)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Science (80)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Mass (160)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  More (2558)  |  Negative (66)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Positive (98)  |  Proton (23)  |  Series (153)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Universal (198)  |  Usually (176)  |  Whole (756)  |  World (1850)

It is often the scientist’s experience that he senses the nearness of truth when … connections are envisioned. A connection is a step toward simplification, unification. Simplicity is indeed often the sign of truth and a criterion of beauty.
In Toward the Habit of Truth (1990).
Science quotes on:  |  Beauty (313)  |  Connection (171)  |  Criterion (28)  |  Envision (3)  |  Experience (494)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Sense (785)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Step (234)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Unification (11)

It would seem at first sight as if the rapid expansion of the region of mathematics must be a source of danger to its future progress. Not only does the area widen but the subjects of study increase rapidly in number, and the work of the mathematician tends to become more and more specialized. It is, of course, merely a brilliant exaggeration to say that no mathematician is able to understand the work of any other mathematician, but it is certainly true that it is daily becoming more and more difficult for a mathematician to keep himself acquainted, even in a general way, with the progress of any of the branches of mathematics except those which form the field of his own labours. I believe, however, that the increasing extent of the territory of mathematics will always be counteracted by increased facilities in the means of communication. Additional knowledge opens to us new principles and methods which may conduct us with the greatest ease to results which previously were most difficult of access; and improvements in notation may exercise the most powerful effects both in the simplification and accessibility of a subject. It rests with the worker in mathematics not only to explore new truths, but to devise the language by which they may be discovered and expressed; and the genius of a great mathematician displays itself no less in the notation he invents for deciphering his subject than in the results attained. … I have great faith in the power of well-chosen notation to simplify complicated theories and to bring remote ones near and I think it is safe to predict that the increased knowledge of principles and the resulting improvements in the symbolic language of mathematics will always enable us to grapple satisfactorily with the difficulties arising from the mere extent of the subject.
In Presidential Address British Association for the Advancement of Science, Section A., (1890), Nature, 42, 466.
Science quotes on:  |  Access (21)  |  Accessibility (3)  |  Acquaint (11)  |  Additional (6)  |  Area (33)  |  Arise (162)  |  Arising (22)  |  Attain (126)  |  Become (821)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Belief (615)  |  Both (496)  |  Branch (155)  |  Brilliant (57)  |  Bring (95)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Communication (101)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Counteract (5)  |  Course (413)  |  Daily (91)  |  Danger (127)  |  Decipher (7)  |  Devise (16)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Discover (571)  |  Display (59)  |  Ease (40)  |  Effect (414)  |  Enable (122)  |  Exaggeration (16)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Expansion (43)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Express (192)  |  Extent (142)  |  Facility (14)  |  Faith (209)  |  Field (378)  |  First (1302)  |  First Sight (6)  |  Form (976)  |  Future (467)  |  General (521)  |  Genius (301)  |  Grapple (11)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Himself (461)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Increase (225)  |  Invent (57)  |  Keep (104)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Labor (200)  |  Language (308)  |  Less (105)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mere (86)  |  Merely (315)  |  Method (531)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  New (1273)  |  Notation (28)  |  Number (710)  |  Of Course (22)  |  Open (277)  |  Other (2233)  |  Power (771)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Predict (86)  |  Previously (12)  |  Principle (530)  |  Progress (492)  |  Rapid (37)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  Region (40)  |  Remote (86)  |  Rest (287)  |  Result (700)  |  Safe (61)  |  Satisfactory (19)  |  Say (989)  |  Seem (150)  |  Sight (135)  |  Simplify (14)  |  Source (101)  |  Specialized (9)  |  Study (701)  |  Study And Research In Mathematics (61)  |  Subject (543)  |  Symbolic (16)  |  Tend (124)  |  Territory (25)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Think (1122)  |  True (239)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Understand (648)  |  Way (1214)  |  Well-Chosen (2)  |  Widen (10)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worker (34)

It would seem that more than function itself, simplicity is the deciding factor in the aesthetic equation. One might call the process beauty through function and simplification.
As quoted in Christian Science Monitor (7 May 1952).
Science quotes on:  |  Aesthetic (48)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Call (781)  |  Decision (98)  |  Equation (138)  |  Factor (47)  |  Function (235)  |  Invention (400)  |  More (2558)  |  Process (439)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Through (846)

Knowledge is a process of piling up facts; wisdom lies in their simplification.
In Fischerisms (1930), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lie (370)  |  Process (439)  |  Wisdom (235)

Mathematics is often considered a difficult and mysterious science, because of the numerous symbols which it employs. Of course, nothing is more incomprehensible than a symbolism which we do not understand. … But this is not because they are difficult in themselves. On the contrary they have invariably been introduced to make things easy. … [T]he symbolism is invariably an immense simplification. It … represents an analysis of the ideas of the subject and an almost pictorial representation of their relations to each other.
In Introduction to Mathematics (1911), 59-60.
Science quotes on:  |  Analysis (244)  |  Consider (428)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Course (413)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Do (1905)  |  Easy (213)  |  Employ (115)  |  Idea (881)  |  Immense (89)  |  Incomprehensible (31)  |  Introduced (3)  |  Invariably (35)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mathematics As A Language (20)  |  More (2558)  |  Mysterious (83)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pictorial (2)  |  Relation (166)  |  Represent (157)  |  Representation (55)  |  Subject (543)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Understand (648)

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)  |  Phenomena (8)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Research (753)  |  Say (989)  |  Seek (218)  |  Seeking (31)  |  Simplify (14)  |  Structure (365)  |  System (545)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  Universe (900)  |  View (496)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Whenever (81)  |  Will (2350)

Science means simplification. It substitutes a single rule for a million miscellaneous observations.
In Chats on Science (1924), 4.
Science quotes on:  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Million (124)  |  Observation (593)  |  Rule (307)  |  Single (365)  |  Substitute (47)

Simplification of modes of proof is not merely an indication of advance in our knowledge of a subject, but is also the surest guarantee of readiness for farther progress.
In Lord Kelvin and Peter Guthrie Tait Elements of Natural Philosophy (1873), Preface.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Farther (51)  |  Guarantee (30)  |  Indication (33)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Merely (315)  |  Mode (43)  |  Progress (492)  |  Proof (304)  |  Readiness (9)  |  Subject (543)  |  Surest (5)

The central dogma, enunciated by Crick in 1958 and the keystone of molecular biology ever since, is likely to prove a considerable over-simplification. That is the heretical but inescapable conclusion stemming from experiments done in the past few months in two laboratories in the United States.
Anonymous
'News and Views', Nature, 1970, 226, 1198.
Science quotes on:  |  Biology (232)  |  Central (81)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Francis Crick (62)  |  Dogma (49)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Inescapable (7)  |  Molecular Biology (27)  |  Month (91)  |  Past (355)  |  Prove (261)  |  State (505)  |  Two (936)

The method of science depends on our attempts to describe the world with simple theories: theories that are complex may become untestable, even if they happen to be true. Science may be described as the art of systematic over-simplification—the art of discerning what we may with advantage omit.
Karl Raimund Popper and William Warren Bartley (ed.), The Open Universe: an Argument for Indeterminism (1991), 44. by Karl Raimund Popper, William Warren Bartley - Science - 1991
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (144)  |  Art (680)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Become (821)  |  Complex (202)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Depend (238)  |  Describe (132)  |  Description (89)  |  Discern (35)  |  Discerning (16)  |  Happen (282)  |  Method (531)  |  Omit (12)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Simple (426)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Systematic (58)  |  Test (221)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Truth (1109)  |  World (1850)

The present state of electrical science seems peculiarly unfavorable to speculation … to appreciate the requirements of the science, the student must make himself familiar with a considerable body of most intricate mathematics, the mere retention of which in the memory materially interferes with further progress. The first process therefore in the effectual study of the science, must be one of simplification and reduction of the results of previous investigation to a form in which the mind can grasp them.
First sentence of Maxwell’s first paper (read 10 Dec 1855), 'On Faraday’s Lines of Force', Transactions of the Cambridge Philosophical Society (1857), Vol. X, part I. Collected in William Davidson Niven (ed.), The Scientific Papers of James Clerk Maxwell (1890), Vol. 1, 155.
Science quotes on:  |  Appreciate (67)  |  Body (557)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Effective (68)  |  Electrical (57)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Familiar (47)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Grasp (65)  |  Himself (461)  |  Interfere (17)  |  Intricate (29)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Memory (144)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Present (630)  |  Process (439)  |  Progress (492)  |  Reduction (52)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Result (700)  |  Retention (5)  |  Science And Education (17)  |  Speculation (137)  |  State (505)  |  Student (317)  |  Study (701)  |  Unfavorable (3)

The simplification of anything is always sensational.
From Varied Types (1903), 126.
Science quotes on:  |  Sensational (2)

There is one simplification at least. Electrons behave ... in exactly the same way as photons; they are both screwy, but in exactly in the same way...
'Probability abd Uncertainty—the Quantum Mechanical View of Nature', the sixth of his Messenger Lectures (1964), Cornell University. Collected in The Character of Physical Law (1967), 128.
Science quotes on:  |  Behave (18)  |  Both (496)  |  Electron (96)  |  Photon (11)  |  Way (1214)

To remember simplified pictures is better than to forget accurate figures.
In Otto Neurath, Empiricism and Sociology (1973), 220.
Science quotes on:  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Accurate (88)  |  Better (493)  |  Figure (162)  |  Forget (125)  |  Maxim (19)  |  Picture (148)  |  Remember (189)  |  Statistics (170)

When the first mathematical, logical, and natural uniformities, the first laws, were discovered, men were so carried away by the clearness, beauty and simplification that resulted, that they believed themselves to have deciphered authentically the eternal thoughts of the Almighty.
From Lecture (Nov 1906) at the Lowell Institute, Boston. Published in 'The Present Dilemma in Philosophy',Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking: Popular Lectures on Philosophy (1907), 56.
Science quotes on:  |  Almighty (23)  |  Authentic (9)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Belief (615)  |  Clarity (49)  |  Decipher (7)  |  Discover (571)  |  Eternal (113)  |  First (1302)  |  Law (913)  |  Logical (57)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Natural (810)  |  Result (700)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thought (995)  |  Uniformity (38)


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.