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: “As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality.”
more quiz questions >>
Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index S > Category: Something

Something Quotes (718 quotes)

...for the animals, which we resemble and which would be our equals if we did not have reason, do not reflect upon the actions or the passions of their external or internal senses, and do not know what is color, odor or sound, or if there is any differences between these objects, to which they are moved rather than moving themselves there. This comes about by the force of the impression that the different objects make on their organs and on their senses, for they cannot discern if it is more appropriate to go and drink or eat or do something else, and they do not eat or drink or do anything else except when the presence of objects or the animal imagination [l'imagination brutalle], necessitates them and transports them to their objects, without their knowing what they do, whether good or bad; which would happen to us just as to them if we were destitute of reason, for they have no enlightenment except what they must have to take their nourishment and to serve us for the uses to which God has destined them.
[Arguing the uniqueness of man by regarding animals to be merely automatons.].
Les Préludes de l'Harmonie Universelle (1634), 135-139. In Charles Coulston Gillespie (ed.), Dictionary of Scientific Biography (1974), Vol. 9, 318.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Animal (651)  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Automaton (12)  |  Bad (185)  |  Color (155)  |  Destined (42)  |  Destiny (54)  |  Destitution (2)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Discern (35)  |  Discerning (16)  |  Do (1905)  |  Drink (56)  |  Eat (108)  |  Enlightenment (21)  |  Equal (88)  |  Force (497)  |  God (776)  |  Good (906)  |  Happen (282)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Impression (118)  |  Internal (69)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Merely (315)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Nourishment (26)  |  Object (438)  |  Odor (11)  |  Organ (118)  |  Passion (121)  |  Presence (63)  |  Reason (766)  |  Resemblance (39)  |  Resemble (65)  |  Sense (785)  |  Serve (64)  |  Sound (187)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Transport (31)  |  Uniqueness (11)  |  Use (771)

...I believe there exists, & I feel within me, an instinct for the truth, or knowledge or discovery, of something of the same nature as the instinct of virtue, & that our having such an instinct is reason enough for scientific researches without any practical results ever ensuing from them.
The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, Vol. 4. (1847-50)
Science quotes on:  |  Biography (254)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Enough (341)  |  Ensuing (3)  |  Exist (458)  |  Feel (371)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Practical (225)  |  Reason (766)  |  Result (700)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Virtue (117)

...I may perhaps venture a short word on the question much discussed in certain quarters, whether in the work of excavation it is a good thing to have cooperation between men and women ... Of a mixed dig ... I have seen something, and it is an experiment that I would be reluctant to try again. I would grant if need be that women are admirable fitted for the work, yet I would uphold that they should undertake it by themselves ... the work of an excavator on the dig and off it lays on those who share it a bond of closer daily intercourse than is conceivable ... between men and women, except in chance cases, I do not believe that such close and unavoidable companionship can ever be other than a source of irritation; at any rate, I believe that however it may affect women, the ordinary male at least cannot stand it ... A minor ... objection lies in one particular form of contraint ... moments will occur on the best regulated dig when you want to say just what you think without translation, which before the ladies, whatever their feelings about it, cannot be done.
Archaeological Excavation (1915), 63-64. In Getzel M. Cohen and Martha Sharp Joukowsky Breaking Ground (2006), 557-558. By (), 163-164.
Science quotes on:  |  Archaeologist (18)  |  Best (467)  |  Bond (46)  |  Certain (557)  |  Chance (244)  |  Closer (43)  |  Companionship (4)  |  Conceivable (28)  |  Cooperation (38)  |  Daily (91)  |  Dig (25)  |  Do (1905)  |  Excavation (8)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Feelings (52)  |  Form (976)  |  Good (906)  |  Grant (76)  |  Lie (370)  |  Moment (260)  |  Objection (34)  |  Occur (151)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Other (2233)  |  Question (649)  |  Say (989)  |  Share (82)  |  Short (200)  |  Stand (284)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Translation (21)  |  Try (296)  |  Undertake (35)  |  Want (504)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Will (2350)  |  Women Scientists (18)  |  Word (650)  |  Work (1402)

...it would be a simple way of solving the goiter problem. And in addition to that it would be the biggest thing in a medical proposition to be carried out in the state of Michigan, and Michigan is a large place. And as I thought of the thing the more convinced I became that this oughtn't to be a personal thing, This ought to be something done by the Michigan State Medical Society as a body.
Recommending the addition of a trace of iodine to table salt.
Opening address to the Medical Department of the University of Michigan, Sep 1914. Quoted by Howard Markel in 'When it Rains it Pours' : Endemic Goiter, Iodized Salt, and David Murray Cowie, M.D. American Journal of Public Health, Feb 1987, vol.77, No.2, page 222.
Science quotes on:  |  Addition (70)  |  Body (557)  |  Iodine (7)  |  Large (398)  |  More (2558)  |  Problem (731)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Salt (48)  |  Simple (426)  |  Society (350)  |  State (505)  |  Table (105)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Trace (109)  |  Way (1214)

…The present revolution of scientific thought follows in natural sequence on the great revolutions at earlier epochs in the history of science. Einstein’s special theory of relativity, which explains the indeterminateness of the frame of space and time, crowns the work of Copernicus who first led us to give up our insistence on a geocentric outlook on nature; Einstein's general theory of relativity, which reveals the curvature or non-Euclidean geometry of space and time, carries forward the rudimentary thought of those earlier astronomers who first contemplated the possibility that their existence lay on something which was not flat. These earlier revolutions are still a source of perplexity in childhood, which we soon outgrow; and a time will come when Einstein’s amazing revelations have likewise sunk into the commonplaces of educated thought.
In The Theory of Relativity and its Influence on Scientific Thought (1922), 31-32
Science quotes on:  |  Amazing (35)  |  Astronomer (97)  |  Childhood (42)  |  Commonplace (24)  |  Crown (39)  |  Curvature (8)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Epoch (46)  |  Existence (481)  |  Explain (334)  |  First (1302)  |  Flat (34)  |  Follow (389)  |  Forward (104)  |  General (521)  |  Geocentric (6)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Science (80)  |  Insistence (12)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Non-Euclidean (7)  |  Outlook (32)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Present (630)  |  Relativity (91)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Revelation (51)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Thought (17)  |  Sequence (68)  |  Soon (187)  |  Space (523)  |  Space And Time (38)  |  Special (188)  |  Still (614)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Theory Of Relativity (33)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

...the scientific cast of mind examines the world critically, as if many alternative worlds might exist, as if other things might be here which are not. Then we are forced to ask why what we see is present and not something else. Why are the Sun and moon and the planets spheres? Why not pyramids, or cubes, or dodecahedra? Why not irregular, jumbly shapes? Why so symmetrical, worlds? If you spend any time spinning hypotheses, checking to see whether they make sense, whether they conform to what else we know. Thinking of tests you can pose to substantiate or deflate hypotheses, you will find yourself doing science.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Alternative (32)  |  Ask (420)  |  Cast (69)  |  Check (26)  |  Conform (15)  |  Critical (73)  |  Cube (14)  |  Deflate (2)  |  Doing (277)  |  Examine (84)  |  Exist (458)  |  Find (1014)  |  Force (497)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Irregular (7)  |  Jumble (10)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Moon (252)  |  Other (2233)  |  Planet (402)  |  Pose (9)  |  Present (630)  |  Pyramid (9)  |  Scientific (955)  |  See (1094)  |  Sense (785)  |  Shape (77)  |  Spend (97)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Spin (26)  |  Spinning (18)  |  Substantiate (4)  |  Sun (407)  |  Symmetrical (3)  |  Test (221)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Time (1911)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

…the simplicity, the indispensableness of each word, each letter, each little dash, that among all artists raises the mathematician nearest to the World-creator; it establishes a sublimity which is equalled in no other art,—Something like it exists at most in symphonic music.
As quoted in Robert E. Moritz, 'Meaning, Methods and Mission of Modern Mathematics', The Scientific Monthly (May 1928), 26, No. 5, 424.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Artist (97)  |  Creator (97)  |  Dash (3)  |  Equal (88)  |  Establish (63)  |  Exist (458)  |  Indispensable (31)  |  Letter (117)  |  Little (717)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Most (1728)  |  Music (133)  |  Other (2233)  |  Raise (38)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Sublime (50)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)

“Every moment dies a man,/ Every moment one is born”:
I need hardly point out to you that this calculation would tend to keep the sum total of the world's population in a state of perpetual equipoise whereas it is a well-known fact that the said sum total is constantly on the increase. I would therefore take the liberty of suggesting that in the next edition of your excellent poem the erroneous calculation to which I refer should be corrected as follows:
'Every moment dies a man / And one and a sixteenth is born.” I may add that the exact figures are 1.167, but something must, of course, be conceded to the laws of metre.
Unpublished letter to Tennyson in response to his Vision of Sin (1842). Quoted in Philip and Emily Morrison, Charles Babbage and his Calculating Engines: Selected Writings by Charles Babbage and Others (1961), xxiii.
Science quotes on:  |  Calculation (134)  |  Course (413)  |  Erroneous (31)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Figure (162)  |  Follow (389)  |  Increase (225)  |  Known (453)  |  Law (913)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Moment (260)  |  Must (1525)  |  Next (238)  |  Perpetual (59)  |  Poem (104)  |  Point (584)  |  Population (115)  |  State (505)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Sum (103)  |  Tend (124)  |  Total (95)  |  World (1850)

“Facts, facts, facts,” cries the scientist if he wants to emphasize the necessity of a firm foundation for science. What is a fact? A fact is a thought that is true. But the scientist will surely not recognize something which depends on men's varying states of mind to be the firm foundation of science.
From the first chapter of an unfinished book, The Thought: A Logical Inquiry (1918), collected in Arthur Sullivan (ed.), Logicism and the Philosophy of Language: Selections from Frege and Russell (2003), 215.
Science quotes on:  |  Depend (238)  |  Emphasize (25)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Firm (47)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Scientist (881)  |  State (505)  |  Surely (101)  |  Thought (995)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Want (504)  |  Will (2350)

“Talent is a long patience.” We must look on what we wish to express long enough and with enough attention to discover an aspect that has not been seen and portrayed by another. There is, in everything, something unexplored, because we always use our eyes only with the recollection of what has been thought before on the subject we are contemplating.
From Pierre et Jean (1888), as translated by Alexina Loranger in 'Introduction', Pierre et Jean (Peter and John) (1890), 38-39. The opening words are quoted from Gustave Flaubert. From the original French, “Le talent est une longue patience. — Il s’agit de regarder tout ce qu’on veut exprimer assez longtemps et avec assez d’attention pour en découvrir un aspect qui n’ait été vu et dit par personne. Il y a, dans tout, de l’inexploré, parce que nous sommes habitués à ne nous servir de nos yeux qu’avec le souvenir de ce qu’on a pensé avant nous sur ce que nous contemplons.”
Science quotes on:  |  Aspect (129)  |  Attention (196)  |  Contemplate (29)  |  Discover (571)  |  Enough (341)  |  Everything (489)  |  Express (192)  |  Eye (440)  |  Long (778)  |  Look (584)  |  Must (1525)  |  Patience (58)  |  Portray (6)  |  Recollection (12)  |  See (1094)  |  Subject (543)  |  Talent (99)  |  Thought (995)  |  Unexplored (15)  |  Use (771)  |  Wish (216)

“Wu Li” was more than poetic. It was the best definition of physics that the conference would produce. It caught that certain something, that living quality that we were seeking to express in a book, that thing without which physics becomes sterile. “Wu” can mean either “matter” or “energy.” “Li” is a richly poetic word. It means “universal order” or “universal law.” It also means “organic patterns.” The grain in a panel of wood is Li. The organic pattern on the surface of a leaf is also Li, and so is the texture of a rose petal. In short, Wu Li, the Chinese word for physics, means “patterns of organic energy” (“matter/ energy” [Wu] + “universal order/organic patterns” [Li]). This is remarkable since it reflects a world view which the founders of western science (Galileo and Newton) simply did not comprehend, but toward which virtually every physical theory of import in the twentieth century is pointing!
In The Dancing Wu Li Masters: An Overview of the New Physics (1979), 5.
Science quotes on:  |  20th Century (40)  |  Become (821)  |  Best (467)  |  Book (413)  |  Catch (34)  |  Century (319)  |  Certain (557)  |  Chinese (22)  |  Comprehend (44)  |  Conference (18)  |  Definition (238)  |  Energy (373)  |  Express (192)  |  Founder (26)  |  Galileo Galilei (134)  |  Grain (50)  |  Law (913)  |  Leaf (73)  |  Living (492)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  More (2558)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Order (638)  |  Organic (161)  |  Panel (2)  |  Pattern (116)  |  Petal (4)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physics (564)  |  Poem (104)  |  Produce (117)  |  Quality (139)  |  Remarkable (50)  |  Rose (36)  |  Seek (218)  |  Short (200)  |  Sterile (24)  |  Surface (223)  |  Texture (8)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Universal (198)  |  View (496)  |  Western (45)  |  Wood (97)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)  |  World View (3)

[A key to success] is being able to talk to camera without a teleprompter. … If you believe something and want to make clear what you are talking about, you ought to be able to articulate it without a teleprompter.
From interview with Michael Bond, 'It’s a Wonderful Life', New Scientist (14 Dec 2002), 176, No. 2373, 48.
Science quotes on:  |  Articulate (8)  |  Being (1276)  |  Camera (7)  |  Success (327)  |  Talk (108)  |  Talking (76)  |  Want (504)

[About his invention of an invisible paint, Pop Porter (Victor Moore):] You paint something with it and you can't see it. I'm worried about it though ... I painted the can with it and now I can't find it.
From movie True to Life (1943). Writers, Don Hartman and Harry Tugend. In Larry Langman and Paul Gold, Comedy Quotes from the Movies (2001), 289.
Science quotes on:  |  Can (2)  |  Find (1014)  |  Invention (400)  |  Invisibility (5)  |  Invisible (66)  |  Joke (90)  |  Paint (22)  |  See (1094)  |  Worry (34)

[American] Fathers are spending too much time taking care of babies. No other civilization ever let responsible and important men spend their time in this way. They should not be involved in household details. They should take the children on trips, explore with them and talk things over. Men today have lost something by turning towards the home instead of going out of it.
As quoted in interview with Frances Glennon, 'Student and Teacher of Human Ways', Life (14 Sep 1959), 147.
Science quotes on:  |  Baby (29)  |  Care (203)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Detail (150)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Father (113)  |  Go (6)  |  Home (184)  |  Household (8)  |  Important (229)  |  Instead (23)  |  Involve (93)  |  Involved (90)  |  Other (2233)  |  Responsible (19)  |  Spend (97)  |  Spending (24)  |  Talk (108)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Today (321)  |  Trip (11)  |  Turn (454)  |  Way (1214)

[Astronomy] gets you outside yourself into something much bigger
As quoted in John Noble Wilford, 'Sizing up the Cosmos: An Astronomers Quest', New York Times (12 Mar 1991), C10.
Science quotes on:  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Bigger (5)  |  Outside (141)  |  Yourself (7)

[At my secondary school] if you were very bright, you did classics; if you were pretty thick, you did woodwork; and if you were neither of those poles, you did science. The number of kids in my school who did science because they were excited by the notion of science was pretty small. You were allocated to those things, you weren’t asked. This was in the late 1930s/early 1940s … Science was seen as something more remote and less to do with everyday life.
From interview with Brian Cox and Robert Ince, in 'A Life Measured in Heartbeats', New Statesman (21 Dec 2012), 141, No. 5138, 32.
Science quotes on:  |  Allocated (2)  |  Ask (420)  |  Bright (81)  |  Do (1905)  |  Early (196)  |  Everyday (32)  |  Everyday Life (15)  |  Excited (8)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Late (119)  |  Life (1870)  |  More (2558)  |  Notion (120)  |  Number (710)  |  Pole (49)  |  Remote (86)  |  School (227)  |  Small (489)  |  Student (317)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Woodwork (2)

[Blackett] came one morning, deep in thought, into the G (technical) Office at Stanmore. It was a bitterly cold day, and the staff were shivering in a garret warmed over only with an oil-stove. Without a word of greeting, Blackett stepped silently up on to the table and stood there pondering with his feet among the plans. After ten minutes somebody coughed uneasily and said, diffidently: “Wouldn’t you like a chair, sir … or something?” “No, thank you,” said Professor Blackett, “it is necessary to apply scientific methods. Hot air rises. The warmest spot in this room, therefore, will be near the ceiling.” At this, Colonel Krohn, my technical G.S.O., stepped up on the table beside the Professor, and for the next half-hour, the two stayed there in silence. At the end of this period Professor Blackett stepped down from the table saying: “Well! That’s that problem solved.” And so it was.
Anecdote as told by General Sir Frederick Pile, in Frederick Pile, Ack-Ack: Britain’s Defence Against Air Attack During Second World War (1949), 161. As cited by Maurice W. Kirby and Jonathan Rosenhead, 'Patrick Blackett (1897)' in Arjang A. Assad (ed.) and Saul I. Gass (ed.),Profiles in Operations Research: Pioneers and Innovators (2011), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Apply (170)  |  Ceiling (5)  |  Chair (25)  |  Cold (115)  |  Deep (241)  |  Down (455)  |  End (603)  |  Greeting (10)  |  Heat (180)  |  Hot (63)  |  Hour (192)  |  Method (531)  |  Minute (129)  |  Morning (98)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Next (238)  |  Office (71)  |  Oil (67)  |  Period (200)  |  Physics (564)  |  Plan (122)  |  Problem (731)  |  Professor (133)  |  Rise (169)  |  Rising (44)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Silence (62)  |  Standing (11)  |  Stove (3)  |  Table (105)  |  Thank (48)  |  Thank You (8)  |  Thought (995)  |  Two (936)  |  Warm (74)  |  Warmth (21)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)

[Coleridge] selected an instance of what was called the sublime, in DARWIN, who imagined the creation of the universe to have taken place in a moment, by the explosion of a mass of matter in the womb, or centre of space. In one and the same instant of time, suns and planets shot into systems in every direction, and filled and spangled the illimitable void! He asserted this to be an intolerable degradation—referring, as it were, all the beauty and harmony of nature to something like the bursting of a barrel of gunpowder! that spit its combustible materials into a pock-freckled creation!
In Seamus Perry (eds.), Coleridge’s Responses: Vol. 1: Coleridge on Writers and Writing (2007), 338-339.
Science quotes on:  |  Assert (69)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Big Bang (45)  |  Call (781)  |  Creation (350)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Degradation (18)  |  Direction (185)  |  Explosion (51)  |  Gunpowder (18)  |  Harmony (105)  |  Instant (46)  |  Mass (160)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Moment (260)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Planet (402)  |  Select (45)  |  Space (523)  |  Sublime (50)  |  Sun (407)  |  System (545)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Void (31)  |  Womb (25)

[Creationists] make it sound as though a “theory” is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night.
Remark to the National Center Against Censorship (NCAC)(1980). In Norman A. Johnson, Darwinian Detectives (2007), 27.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Creationist (16)  |  Dream (222)  |  Drunk (10)  |  Sound (187)  |  Theory (1015)

[Freud's] great strength, though sometimes also his weakness, was the quite extraordinary respect he had for the singular fact... When he got hold of a simple but significant fact he would feel, and know, that it was an example of something general or universal, and the idea of collecting statistics on the matter was quite alien to him.
The Life and Work of Sigmund Freud (1953), Vol 1, 96-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Alien (35)  |  Biography (254)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Feel (371)  |  Sigmund Freud (70)  |  General (521)  |  Great (1610)  |  Idea (881)  |  Know (1538)  |  Matter (821)  |  Respect (212)  |  Significant (78)  |  Simple (426)  |  Singular (24)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Strength (139)  |  Universal (198)  |  Weakness (50)

[Godfrey H. Hardy] personified the popular idea of the absent-minded professor. But those who formed the idea that he was merely an absent-minded professor would receive a shock in conversation, where he displayed amazing vitality on every subject under the sun. ... He was interested in the game of chess, but was frankly puzzled by something in its nature which seemed to come into conflict with his mathematical principles.
In 'Prof. G. H. Hardy: A Mathematician of Genius,' Obituary The Times.
Science quotes on:  |  Absent-Minded (4)  |  Amazing (35)  |  Chess (27)  |  Conflict (77)  |  Conversation (46)  |  Display (59)  |  Form (976)  |  Game (104)  |  G. H. Hardy (71)  |  Idea (881)  |  Interest (416)  |  Merely (315)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Obituary (11)  |  Principle (530)  |  Professor (133)  |  Receive (117)  |  Shock (38)  |  Subject (543)  |  Sun (407)  |  Vitality (24)

[In my early youth, walking with my father,] “See that bird?” he says. “It’s a Spencer’s warbler.” (I knew he didn’t know the real name.) “Well, in Italian, it’s a Chutto Lapittida. In Portuguese, it’s a Bom da Peida. In Chinese, it’s a Chung-long-tah, and in Japanese, it’s a Katano Tekeda. You can know the name of that bird in all the languages of the world, but when you’re finished, you’ll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird. You’ll only know about humans in different places, and what they call the bird. So let’s look at the bird and see what it’s doing—that’s what counts.” (I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.)
In 'The Making of a Scientist', What Do You Care What Other People Think?": Further Adventures of a Curious Character (2001), 13-14.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolutely (41)  |  Bird (163)  |  Call (781)  |  Chinese (22)  |  Count (107)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Doing (277)  |  Early (196)  |  Father (113)  |  Finish (62)  |  Human (1512)  |  Italian (13)  |  Japanese (7)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Language (308)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Long (778)  |  Look (584)  |  Name (359)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Observation (593)  |  Say (989)  |  See (1094)  |  Warbler (2)  |  Whatever (234)  |  World (1850)  |  Youth (109)

[In relation to business:] Invention must be its keynote—a steady progression from one thing to another. As each in turn approaches a saturated market, something new must be produced.
Aphorism listed Frederick Seitz, The Cosmic Inventor: Reginald Aubrey Fessenden (1866-1932) (1999), 55, being Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, Held at Philadelphia For Promoting Useful Knowledge, Vol. 86, Pt. 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Approach (112)  |  Business (156)  |  Invention (400)  |  Keynote (2)  |  Market (23)  |  Must (1525)  |  New (1273)  |  Produced (187)  |  Production (190)  |  Progression (23)  |  Saturation (9)  |  Steady (45)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Turn (454)

[In the case of research director, Willis R. Whitney, whose style was to give talented investigators as much freedom as possible, you may define “serendipity” as] the art of profiting from unexpected occurrences. When you do things in that way you get unexpected results. Then you do something else and you get unexpected results in another line, and you do that on a third line and then all of a sudden you see that one of these lines has something to do with the other. Then you make a discovery that you never could have made by going on a direct road.
Quoted in Guy Suits, 'Willis Rodney Whitney', National Academy of Sciences, Biographical Memoirs (1960), 355.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Direct (228)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Freedom (145)  |  Investigator (71)  |  Never (1089)  |  Occurrence (53)  |  Other (2233)  |  Possible (560)  |  Profit (56)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  See (1094)  |  Serendipity (17)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Talent (99)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Unexpected (55)  |  Way (1214)  |  Willis R. Whitney (17)

[Lifting off into space] I wasn’t really scared. I was very excited, and I was very anxious. When you’re getting ready to launch into space, you’re sitting on a big explosion waiting to happen. So most astronauts getting ready to lift off are excited and very anxious and worried about that explosion—because if something goes wrong in the first seconds of launch, there's not very much you can do.
Interview conducted on Scholastic website (20 Nov 1998).
Science quotes on:  |  Anxious (4)  |  Astronaut (34)  |  Big (55)  |  Do (1905)  |  Excited (8)  |  Explosion (51)  |  First (1302)  |  Happen (282)  |  Launch (21)  |  Lift (57)  |  Lift Off (3)  |  Most (1728)  |  Ready (43)  |  Scared (2)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Space (523)  |  Wait (66)  |  Waiting (42)  |  Worry (34)  |  Wrong (246)

[Misquotation; not by Einstein.] You do not really understand something unless you can explain it to your grandmother.
No evidence exists that this was ever said or written by Einstein, yet is often seen attribued to him, for example, in Rosemarie Jarski, Words from the Wise: Over 6,000 of the Smartest Things Ever Said (2007), 515. However, see a similar quote by Ernest Rutherford about explaining to a “barmaid.”
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Grandmother (4)  |  Misquotation (4)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)

[Otto Struve] made the remark once that he never looked at the spectrum of a star, any star, where he didn’t find something important to work on.
'Oral History Transcript: Dr. William Wilson Morgan' (8 Aug 1978) in the Niels Bohr Library & Archives.
Science quotes on:  |  Find (1014)  |  Importance (299)  |  Look (584)  |  Never (1089)  |  Remark (28)  |  Research (753)  |  Spectrum (35)  |  Star (460)  |  Work (1402)

[Public cynicism towards professional expertise is] entirely wrong, and it’s the road back to the cave. The way we got out of the caves and into modern civilisation is through the process of understanding and thinking. Those things were not done by gut instinct. Being an expert does not mean that you are someone with a vested interest in something; it means you spend your life studying something. You’re not necessarily right–but you’re more likely to be right than someone who’s not spent their life studying it.
Brian Cox
As quoted in interview with Decca Aitkenhead, 'Prof Brian Cox: Being anti-expert – that’s the way back to the cave', The Guardian (2 Jul 2016)
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Being (1276)  |  Cave (17)  |  Civilisation (23)  |  Cynicism (4)  |  Entirely (36)  |  Expert (67)  |  Expertise (8)  |  Gut Instinct (2)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Interest (416)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Modern (402)  |  More (2558)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Process (439)  |  Professional (77)  |  Public (100)  |  Right (473)  |  Road (71)  |  Spend (97)  |  Spent (85)  |  Studying (70)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Through (846)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wrong (246)

[Richard P.] Feynman's cryptic remark, “no one is that much smarter ...,” to me, implies something Feynman kept emphasizing: that the key to his achievements was not anything “magical” but the right attitude, the focus on nature's reality, the focus on asking the right questions, the willingness to try (and to discard) unconventional answers, the sensitive ear for phoniness, self-deception, bombast, and conventional but unproven assumptions.
In book review of James Gleick's Genius, 'Complexities of Feynman', Science, 259 (22 Jan 1993), 22
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Answer (389)  |  Asking (74)  |  Assumption (96)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Convention (16)  |  Conventional (31)  |  Cryptic (2)  |  Deception (9)  |  Discard (32)  |  Ear (69)  |  Emphasis (18)  |  Richard P. Feynman (125)  |  Focus (36)  |  Implication (25)  |  Magic (92)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Question (649)  |  Reality (274)  |  Remark (28)  |  Right (473)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Deception (2)  |  Sensitivity (10)  |  Try (296)  |  Unconventional (4)  |  Unproven (5)  |  Willingness (10)

[T]here is little chance that aliens from two societies anywhere in the Galaxy will be culturally close enough to really 'get along.' This is something to ponder as you watch the famous cantina scene in Star Wars. ... Does this make sense, given the overwhelmingly likely situation that galactic civilizations differ in their level of evolutionary development by thousands or millions of years? Would you share drinks with a trilobite, an ourang-outang, or a saber-toothed tiger? Or would you just arrange to have a few specimens stuffed and carted off to the local museum?
Quoted in 'Do Aliens Exist in the Milky Way', PBS web page for WGBH Nova, 'Origins.'
Science quotes on:  |  Alien (35)  |  Arrange (33)  |  Chance (244)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Cooperation (38)  |  Culture (157)  |  Development (441)  |  Differ (88)  |  Drink (56)  |  Enough (341)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Extraterrestrial Life (20)  |  Galactic (6)  |  Galaxy (53)  |  Little (717)  |  Museum (40)  |  Overwhelming (30)  |  Ponder (15)  |  Scene (36)  |  Sense (785)  |  Share (82)  |  Situation (117)  |  Society (350)  |  Specimen (32)  |  Star (460)  |  Star Wars (3)  |  Stuff (24)  |  Taxidermy (2)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Tooth (32)  |  Trilobite (6)  |  Two (936)  |  War (233)  |  Watch (118)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

[The nanotube] brings those properties you cannot get from other organic molecules. And it’s still carbon, so it has organic chemistry. Here is an object that has, to a superlative degree, the aspects that we hold most central to the inorganic world: hardness, toughness, terrific strength, thermal and electrical conductivity. Things you just can’t do with bone and wood. But it’s made out of carbon. It’s something that plays the game at the same level of perfection as molecules and life.
From interview in 'Wires of Wonder', Technology Review (Mar 2001), 104, No. 2, 88.
Science quotes on:  |  Aspect (129)  |  Bone (101)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Central (81)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Conductivity (4)  |  Degree (277)  |  Do (1905)  |  Electrical (57)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Game (104)  |  Hardness (4)  |  Inorganic (14)  |  Life (1870)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Most (1728)  |  Object (438)  |  Organic (161)  |  Organic Chemistry (41)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Property (177)  |  Still (614)  |  Strength (139)  |  Terrific (4)  |  Thermal (15)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Wood (97)  |  World (1850)

[The parasite that causes malaria] edges through the cells of the stomach wall of the mosquito and forms a cyst which grows and eventually bursts to release hundreds of “sporozoites” into the body cavity of the mosquito … As far as we can tell, the parasite does not harm the mosquito … It has always seemed to me, though, that these growing cysts … must at least give the mosquito something corresponding to a stomach-ache.
In The Prevalence of People (1955, 1962), 165.
Science quotes on:  |  Body (557)  |  Burst (41)  |  Bursting (3)  |  Cause (561)  |  Cavity (9)  |  Cell (146)  |  Edge (51)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Form (976)  |  Grow (247)  |  Growing (99)  |  Growth (200)  |  Harm (43)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Malaria (10)  |  Mosquito (16)  |  Must (1525)  |  Parasite (33)  |  Release (31)  |  Stomach (40)  |  Stomachache (3)  |  Tell (344)  |  Through (846)  |  Wall (71)

[There was] in some of the intellectual leaders a great aspiration to demonstrate that the universe ran like a piece of clock-work, but this was was itself initially a religious aspiration. It was felt that there would be something defective in Creation itself—something not quite worthy of God—unless the whole system of the universe could be shown to be interlocking, so that it carried the pattern of reasonableness and orderliness. Kepler, inaugurating the scientist’s quest for a mechanistic universe in the seventeenth century, is significant here—his mysticism, his music of the spheres, his rational deity demand a system which has the beauty of a piece of mathematics.
In The Origins of Modern Science (1950), 105.
Science quotes on:  |  17th Century (20)  |  Aspiration (35)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Century (319)  |  Clock (51)  |  Clockwork (7)  |  Creation (350)  |  Defective (4)  |  Deity (22)  |  Demand (131)  |  Demonstrate (79)  |  God (776)  |  Great (1610)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Johannes Kepler (95)  |  Leader (51)  |  Mathematical Beauty (19)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Music (133)  |  Music Of The Spheres (3)  |  Mysticism (14)  |  Orderliness (9)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Pattern (116)  |  Quest (39)  |  Rational (95)  |  Reasonable (29)  |  Reasonableness (6)  |  Religious (134)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Significant (78)  |  Sphere (118)  |  System (545)  |  Universe (900)  |  Whole (756)  |  Work (1402)

[William Gull] sought to teach his students not to think they could cure disease. “The best of all remedies,” he would say, “is a warm bed.” “ I can tell you something of how you get ill, but I cannot tell you how you get well.” “ Healing is accomplished ‘By an operation more divine Than tongue or pen can give expression to.’” “Remedies act best when there is a tendency to get well.”
Stated in Sir William Withey Gull and Theodore Dyke Acland (ed.), A Collection of the Published Writings of William Withey Gull (1896), xxvi.
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Act (278)  |  Bed (25)  |  Best (467)  |  Cure (124)  |  Disease (340)  |  Divine (112)  |  Expression (181)  |  Sir William Withey Gull (39)  |  Healing (28)  |  More (2558)  |  Operation (221)  |  Pen (21)  |  Remedy (63)  |  Say (989)  |  Student (317)  |  Teach (299)  |  Tell (344)  |  Tendency (110)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tongue (44)  |  Warm (74)

[In refutation of evolution] They use carbon dating ... to prove that something was millions of years old. Well, we have the eruption of Mt. Saint Helens and the carbon dating test that they used then would have to then prove that these were hundreds of millions of years younger, when what happened was they had the exact same results on the fossils and canyons that they did the tests on that were supposedly 100 millions of years old. And it’s the kind of inconsistent tests like this that they’re basing their “facts” on.
[Citing results from a solitary young-Earth creationist, questioning whether the lava dome at Mount St. Helens is really a million years old.]
From interview by Miles O''Brien on CNN (30 Mar 1996). Reported from transcript, via Nexis, in New York Magazine (15 Sep 2010).
Science quotes on:  |  Canyon (9)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Creationism (8)  |  Creationist (16)  |  Dome (9)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Eruption (10)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Kind (564)  |  Lava (12)  |  Mount (43)  |  Mount St. Helens (2)  |  Old (499)  |  Prove (261)  |  Result (700)  |  Saint (17)  |  Test (221)  |  Use (771)  |  Year (963)  |  Young (253)  |  Younger (21)

A stands for atom; it is so small No one has ever seen it at all.
B stands for bomb; the bombs are much bigger,
So, brother, do not be too fast on the trigger.
H has become a most ominous letter.
It means something bigger if not something better.
As quoted in Robert Coughlan, 'Dr. Edward Teller’s Magnificent Obsession', Life (6 Sep 1954), 74.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  Become (821)  |  Better (493)  |  Brother (47)  |  Do (1905)  |  Hydrogen Bomb (16)  |  Letter (117)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Most (1728)  |  Ominous (5)  |  Small (489)  |  Stand (284)  |  Trigger (6)

Ath. There still remain three studies suitable for freemen. Calculation in arithmetic is one of them; the measurement of length, surface, and depth is the second; and the third has to do with the revolutions of the stars in reference to one another … there is in them something that is necessary and cannot be set aside, … if I am not mistaken, [something of] divine necessity; for as to the human necessities of which men often speak when they talk in this manner, nothing can be more ridiculous than such an application of the words.
Cle. And what necessities of knowledge are there, Stranger, which are divine and not human?
Ath. I conceive them to be those of which he who has no use nor any knowledge at all cannot be a god, or demi-god, or hero to mankind, or able to take any serious thought or charge of them.
Plato
In Republic, Bk. 7, in Jowett, Dialogues of Plato (1897, 2010), Vol. 4, 331.
Science quotes on:  |  Application (257)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Charge (63)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Depth (97)  |  Divine (112)  |  Do (1905)  |  Estimates of Mathematics (30)  |  God (776)  |  Hero (45)  |  Human (1512)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Length (24)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Mistake (180)  |  More (2558)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Reference (33)  |  Remain (355)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Ridiculous (24)  |  Serious (98)  |  Set (400)  |  Set Aside (4)  |  Speak (240)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Still (614)  |  Study (701)  |  Suitable (10)  |  Surface (223)  |  Thought (995)  |  Use (771)  |  Word (650)

Clarke's First Law: When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
'Hazards of Prophecy: The Failure of Imagination'. In the collection. Profiles of the Future: An Enquiry into the Limits of the Possible (1962, rev. 1973), 14.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  First (1302)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Law (913)  |  Possible (560)  |  Research (753)  |  Right (473)  |  Scientist (881)  |  State (505)  |  Wrong (246)

Die Mathematiker sind eine Art Franzosen. Spricht man zu ihnen, so übersetzen sie alles in ihre eigene Sprache, und so wird es alsobald etwas ganz anderes.
Mathematicians are a kind of Frenchmen. Whenever you say anything or talk to them, they translate it into their own language, and right away it is something completely different.
Quoted by Christiane Senn-Fennell, 'Oral and Written Communication', in Ian Westbury et al. (eds.), Teaching as a Reflective Practice (2000), 225.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Completely (137)  |  Different (595)  |  Frenchman (4)  |  Kind (564)  |  Language (308)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Right (473)  |  Say (989)  |  Talk (108)  |  Translate (21)  |  Whenever (81)

Dilbert: Maybe I’m unlucky in love because I’m so knowledgeable about science that I intimidate people. Their intimidation becomes low self-esteem, then they reject me to protect their egos.
Dogbert: Occam’s Razor.
Dilbert: What is “Occam's Razor”?
Dogbert: A guy named Occam had a rule about the world. Basically he said that when there are multiple explanations for something the simplest explanation is usually correct. The simplest explanation for your poor love life is that you’re immensely unattractive.
Dilbert: Maybe Occam had another rule that specifically exempted this situation, but his house burned down with all his notes. Then he forgot.
Dogbert: Occam’s Razor.
Dilbert: I’m an idiot.
Dogbert: I don’t think we can rule it out at this point.
Dilbert comic strip (11 Jul 1993).
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Burn (99)  |  Correct (95)  |  Down (455)  |  Ego (17)  |  Exemption (3)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Forgetfulness (8)  |  House (143)  |  Idiot (22)  |  Intimidation (3)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Love (328)  |  Low (86)  |  Luck (44)  |  Multiple (19)  |  Note (39)  |  Occam�s Razor (3)  |  People (1031)  |  Point (584)  |  Poor (139)  |  Protect (65)  |  Protection (41)  |  Reject (67)  |  Rejection (36)  |  Rule (307)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Esteem (7)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Situation (117)  |  Think (1122)  |  Unattractive (3)  |  Usually (176)  |  World (1850)

Dilbert: I’m obsessed with inventing a perpetual motion machine. Most scientists think it's impossible, but I have something they don’t.
Dogbert: A lot of spare time?
Dilbert: Exactly.
Dilbert cartoon strip (8 Aug 1991).
Science quotes on:  |  Impossibility (60)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Invention (400)  |  Lot (151)  |  Machine (271)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motion (320)  |  Obsession (13)  |  Perpetual (59)  |  Perpetual Motion (14)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Spare Time (3)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Time (1911)

Every teacher certainly should know something of non-euclidean geometry. Thus, it forms one of the few parts of mathematics which, at least in scattered catch-words, is talked about in wide circles, so that any teacher may be asked about it at any moment. … Imagine a teacher of physics who is unable to say anything about Röntgen rays, or about radium. A teacher of mathematics who could give no answer to questions about non-euclidean geometry would not make a better impression.
On the other hand, I should like to advise emphatically against bringing non-euclidean into regular school instruction (i.e., beyond occasional suggestions, upon inquiry by interested pupils), as enthusiasts are always recommending. Let us be satisfied if the preceding advice is followed and if the pupils learn to really understand euclidean geometry. After all, it is in order for the teacher to know a little more than the average pupil.
In George Edward Martin, The Foundations of Geometry and the Non-Euclidean Plane (1982), 72.
Science quotes on:  |  Advice (57)  |  Advise (7)  |  Against (332)  |  Answer (389)  |  Ask (420)  |  Average (89)  |  Better (493)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Bring (95)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Circle (117)  |  Emphatically (8)  |  Enthusiast (9)  |  Euclidean (3)  |  Follow (389)  |  Form (976)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Give (208)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Impression (118)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Instruction (101)  |  Interest (416)  |  Know (1538)  |  Learn (672)  |  Least (75)  |  Let (64)  |  Little (717)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Moment (260)  |  More (2558)  |  Non-Euclidean (7)  |  Occasional (23)  |  On The Other Hand (40)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Part (235)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Precede (23)  |  Pupil (62)  |  Question (649)  |  Radium (29)  |  Ray (115)  |  Really (77)  |  Recommend (27)  |  Regular (48)  |  Wilhelm Röntgen (8)  |  Satisfied (23)  |  Say (989)  |  Scatter (7)  |  School (227)  |  Suggestion (49)  |  Talk (108)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Unable (25)  |  Understand (648)  |  Wide (97)  |  Word (650)  |  X-ray (43)

Puisqu'on ne peut être universel en sachant tout ce qui se peut sur tout, il faut savoir peu de tout. Car il est bien plus beau de savoir quelque chose de tout que de savoir rout d'une chose; cette universalité est la plus belle. Si on pouvait avoir les deux, encore mieux.
Since we cannot be universal and know all that is to be known of everything, we ought to know a little about everything, For it is far better to know something about everything than to know all about one thing.
Pensées. Quoted in Nigel Rees, Brewer's Famous Quotations: 5000 Quotations and the Stories Behind Them (2006), 249.
Science quotes on:  |  Better (493)  |  Car (75)  |  Everything (489)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Little (717)  |  Plus (43)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Universal (198)

Ratbert (as lab rat, to scientist): Doc, we have to talk. Every day you feed me over a hundred pounds of macaroni and cheese. At first I thought you were just being a good host. But lately I’ve been thinking it could be something far more sinister.
Scientist (thinking): Macaroni and cheese causes paranoia.
Dilbert cartoon strip (24 Jul 1990).
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Cause (561)  |  Cheese (10)  |  Experiment (736)  |  First (1302)  |  Food (213)  |  Good (906)  |  Host (16)  |  Hundred (240)  |  More (2558)  |  Paranoia (3)  |  Rat (37)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Sinister (8)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)

Socrates: Shall we set down astronomy among the objects of study? Glaucon: I think so, to know something about the seasons, the months and the years is of use for military purposes, as well as for agriculture and for navigation. Socrates: It amuses me to see how afraid you are, lest the common herd of people should accuse you of recommending useless studies.
As quoted by Plato. In Richard Garnett, Léon Vallée, Alois Brandl (eds.), The Universal Anthology: A Collection of the Best Literature (1899), Vol. 4, 111.
Science quotes on:  |  Accuse (4)  |  Afraid (24)  |  Agriculture (78)  |  Amuse (2)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Common (447)  |  Down (455)  |  Know (1538)  |  Military (45)  |  Month (91)  |  Navigation (26)  |  Object (438)  |  People (1031)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Recommend (27)  |  Season (47)  |  See (1094)  |  Set (400)  |  Study (701)  |  Think (1122)  |  Use (771)  |  Useless (38)  |  Year (963)

To Wheeler's comment, If you haven't found something strange during the day, it hasn't been much of a day, a student responded, I can't believe that space is that crummy. Wheeler replied: To disagree leads to study, to study leads to understanding, to understand is to appreciate, to appreciate is to love. So maybe I'll end up loving your theory.
Quoted in Charles Birch, Biology and the Riddle of Life (1999), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Appreciate (67)  |  End (603)  |  Lead (391)  |  Love (328)  |  Space (523)  |  Strange (160)  |  Student (317)  |  Study (701)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  John Wheeler (40)

~~[Misattributed]~~ Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.
Although describing Sagan’s viewpoint on extra-terrestrial life, expressed in the interview, these were her own summarizing words by the reporter, Sharon Begley, in 'Seeking Other Worlds', Newsweek (15 Aug 1977), 90, 53. The statement was not in quotation marks, and not Sagan’s own words, as verified on the quoteinvestigator.com website. [Updated on todayinsci site 25 Sep 2019.] An example of this narrative text being mistakenly printed as a Sagan quote is in Larry Chang, Wisdom for the Soul: Five Millennia of Prescriptions for Spiritual Healing (2006), 561, without source reference.
Science quotes on:  |  Incredible (43)  |  Known (453)  |  Research (753)  |  Waiting (42)

A chess problem is genuine mathematics, but it is in some way “trivial” mathematics. However, ingenious and intricate, however original and surprising the moves, there is something essential lacking. Chess problems are unimportant. The best mathematics is serious as well as beautiful—“important” if you like, but the word is very ambiguous, and “serious” expresses what I mean much better.
'A Mathematician's Apology', in James Roy Newman, The World of Mathematics (2000), 2029.
Science quotes on:  |  Ambiguous (14)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Best (467)  |  Better (493)  |  Chess (27)  |  Essential (210)  |  Genuine (54)  |  Important (229)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Intricate (29)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Move (223)  |  Original (61)  |  Problem (731)  |  Serious (98)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Trivial (59)  |  Unimportant (6)  |  Way (1214)  |  Word (650)

A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.
In Mostly Harmless (1992), 135.
Science quotes on:  |  Common (447)  |  Complete (209)  |  Completely (137)  |  Design (203)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Fool (121)  |  Foolproof (5)  |  Ingenuity (42)  |  Mistake (180)  |  People (1031)  |  Trying (144)  |  Underestimate (7)

A genius is one who shoots at something no one else can see—and hits it.
Anonymous
In M. P. Singh, Quote Unquote (2007), 148.
Science quotes on:  |  Genius (301)  |  See (1094)

A good many times I have been present at gatherings of people who, by the standards of the traditional culture, are thought highly educated and who have with considerable gusto been expressing their incredulity at the illiteracy of scientists. Once or twice I have been provoked and have asked the company how many of them could describe the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The response was cold: it was also negative. Yet I was asking something which is about the scientific equivalent of: Have you read a work of Shakespeare’s?
The Two Cultures: The Rede Lecture (1959), 15-6.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Asking (74)  |  Cold (115)  |  Company (63)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Culture (157)  |  Describe (132)  |  Educated (12)  |  Equivalent (46)  |  Gather (76)  |  Gathering (23)  |  Good (906)  |  Illiteracy (8)  |  Incredulity (5)  |  Law (913)  |  Negative (66)  |  People (1031)  |  Present (630)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Response (56)  |  Science Literacy (6)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Illiteracy (8)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Second Law Of Thermodynamics (14)  |  William Shakespeare (109)  |  Standard (64)  |  Thermodynamics (40)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Traditional (16)  |  Work (1402)

A human being is part of the whole, called by us “Universe”; a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest—a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely but the striving for such achievement is, in itself, a part of the liberation and a foundation for inner security.
In Letter (4 Mar 1950), replying to a grieving father over the loss of a young son. In Dear Professor Einstein: Albert Einstein’s Letters to and from Children (2002), 184.
Science quotes on:  |  Achieve (75)  |  Achievement (187)  |  Affection (44)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Being (1276)  |  Call (781)  |  Circle (117)  |  Compassion (12)  |  Completely (137)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Creature (242)  |  Delusion (26)  |  Desire (212)  |  Embrace (47)  |  Experience (494)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Feelings (52)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Free (239)  |  Himself (461)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Inner (72)  |  Kind (564)  |  Liberation (12)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Live (650)  |  Living (492)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nobody (103)  |  Optical (11)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Part (235)  |  Person (366)  |  Personal (75)  |  Prison (13)  |  Rest (287)  |  Restrict (13)  |  Security (51)  |  Separate (151)  |  Space (523)  |  Strive (53)  |  Task (152)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Time And Space (39)  |  Universe (900)  |  Whole (756)  |  Widen (10)

A little science is something that they must have. I should like my nephews to know what air is, and water; why we breathe, and why wood burns; the nutritive elements essential to plant life, and the constituents of the soil. And it is no vague and imperfect knowledge from hearsay I would have them gain of these fundamental truths, on which depend agriculture and the industrial arts and our health itself; I would have them know these things thoroughly from their own observation and experience. Books here are insufficient, and can serve merely as aids to scientific experiment.
Science quotes on:  |  Agriculture (78)  |  Aid (101)  |  Air (366)  |  Art (680)  |  Book (413)  |  Breathe (49)  |  Burn (99)  |  Constituent (47)  |  Depend (238)  |  Element (322)  |  Essential (210)  |  Experience (494)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Gain (146)  |  Health (210)  |  Hearsay (5)  |  Imperfect (46)  |  Industrial (15)  |  Insufficient (10)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Merely (315)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nephew (2)  |  Observation (593)  |  Plant (320)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Serve (64)  |  Soil (98)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thoroughly (67)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Vague (50)  |  Water (503)  |  Why (491)  |  Wood (97)

A man’s first duty, a young man’s at any rate, is to be ambitious … the noblest ambition is that of leaving behind one something of permanent value.
In A Mathematician's Apology (1940, 2012), 77.
Science quotes on:  |  Ambition (46)  |  Behind (139)  |  Duty (71)  |  First (1302)  |  Leaving (10)  |  Man (2252)  |  Noble (93)  |  Permanent (67)  |  Value (393)  |  Young (253)

A mathematician who can only generalise is like a monkey who can only climb UP a tree. ... And a mathematician who can only specialise is like a monkey who can only climb DOWN a tree. In fact neither the up monkey nor the down monkey is a viable creature. A real monkey must find food and escape his enemies and so must be able to incessantly climb up and down. A real mathematician must be able to generalise and specialise. ... There is, I think, a moral for the teacher. A teacher of traditional mathematics is in danger of becoming a down monkey, and a teacher of modern mathematics an up monkey. The down teacher dishing out one routine problem after another may never get off the ground, never attain any general idea. and the up teacher dishing out one definition after the other may never climb down from his verbiage, may never get down to solid ground, to something of tangible interest for his pupils.
From 'A Story With A Moral', Mathematical Gazette (Jun 1973), 57, No. 400, 86-87
Science quotes on:  |  Attain (126)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Climb (39)  |  Creature (242)  |  Danger (127)  |  Definition (238)  |  Down (455)  |  Enemy (86)  |  Escape (85)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Find (1014)  |  Food (213)  |  General (521)  |  Generalization (61)  |  Ground (222)  |  Idea (881)  |  Incessant (9)  |  Interest (416)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Mathematics (50)  |  Monkey (57)  |  Moral (203)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  Other (2233)  |  Problem (731)  |  Pupil (62)  |  Real (159)  |  Routine (26)  |  Solid (119)  |  Specialization (24)  |  Tangible (15)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tree (269)  |  Up (5)  |  Verbiage (3)

A mile and a half from town, I came to a grove of tall cocoanut trees, with clean, branchless stems reaching straight up sixty or seventy feet and topped with a spray of green foliage sheltering clusters of cocoanuts—not more picturesque than a forest of colossal ragged parasols, with bunches of magnified grapes under them, would be. I once heard a grouty northern invalid say that a cocoanut tree might be poetical, possibly it was; but it looked like a feather-duster struck by lightning. I think that describes it better than a picture—and yet, without any question, there is something fascinating about a cocoanut tree—and graceful, too.
In Roughing It (1913), 184-85.
Science quotes on:  |  Better (493)  |  Branch (155)  |  Bunch (7)  |  Clean (52)  |  Cluster (16)  |  Coconut (2)  |  Colossal (15)  |  Describe (132)  |  Fascinating (38)  |  Fascination (35)  |  Feather (13)  |  Foliage (6)  |  Forest (161)  |  Grape (4)  |  Green (65)  |  Grove (7)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Look (584)  |  More (2558)  |  Picture (148)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Question (649)  |  Reach (286)  |  Say (989)  |  Shelter (23)  |  Spray (5)  |  Stem (31)  |  Straight (75)  |  Strike (72)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tree (269)  |  Trunk (23)

A pessimist is a person who is always right but doesn’t get any enjoyment out of it, while an optimist, is one who imagines that the future is uncertain. It is a duty to be an optimist, because if you imagine that the future is uncertain, then you must do something about it.
In The Pursuit of Simplicity (1980, 1981), 149, footnote 19.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Duty (71)  |  Enjoyment (37)  |  Future (467)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Must (1525)  |  Optimist (8)  |  Person (366)  |  Pessimist (7)  |  Right (473)  |  Uncertain (45)

A premature attempt to explain something that thrills you will destroy your perceptivity rather than increase it, because your tendency will be to explain away rather than seek out.
Victor K. McElhenty, Insisting on the Impossible, 245.
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (266)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Increase (225)  |  Premature (22)  |  Seek (218)  |  Tendency (110)  |  Thrill (26)  |  Will (2350)

A scientific invention consists of six (or some number) ideas, five of which are absurd but which, with the addition of the sixth and enough rearrangement of the combinations, results in something no one has thought of before.
As quoted in Robert Coughlan, 'Dr. Edward Teller’s Magnificent Obsession', Life (6 Sep 1954), 66.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurd (60)  |  Addition (70)  |  Combination (150)  |  Consist (223)  |  Enough (341)  |  Idea (881)  |  Invention (400)  |  Number (710)  |  Rearrangement (5)  |  Result (700)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Thought (995)

A scientist is in a sense a learned small boy. There is something of the scientist in every small boy. Others must outgrow it. Scientists can stay that way all their lives.
Nobel banquet speech (10 Dec 1967). In Ragnar Granit (ed.), Les Prix Nobel en 1967 (1968).
Science quotes on:  |  Boy (100)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Learning (291)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Must (1525)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outgrow (4)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Sense (785)  |  Small (489)  |  Stay (26)  |  Way (1214)

A short, broad man of tremendous vitality, the physical type of Hereward, the last of the English, and his brother-in-arms, Winter, Sylvester’s capacious head was ever lost in the highest cloud-lands of pure mathematics. Often in the dead of night he would get his favorite pupil, that he might communicate the very last product of his creative thought. Everything he saw suggested to him something new in the higher algebra. This transmutation of everything into new mathematics was a revelation to those who knew him intimately. They began to do it themselves. His ease and fertility of invention proved a constant encouragement, while his contempt for provincial stupidities, such as the American hieroglyphics for π and e, which have even found their way into Webster’s Dictionary, made each young worker apply to himself the strictest tests.
In Florian Cajori, Teaching and History of Mathematics in the United States (1890), 265.
Science quotes on:  |  Algebra (117)  |  American (56)  |  Apply (170)  |  Arm (82)  |  Arms (37)  |  Broad (28)  |  Brother (47)  |  Capacious (2)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Communicate (39)  |  Constant (148)  |  Contempt (20)  |  Creative (144)  |  Dead (65)  |  Do (1905)  |  Ease (40)  |  Encouragement (27)  |  English (35)  |  Everything (489)  |  Favorite (37)  |  Fertility (23)  |  Head (87)  |  Hieroglyphic (6)  |  High (370)  |  Himself (461)  |  Invention (400)  |  Last (425)  |  Lost (34)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  New (1273)  |  Night (133)  |  Often (109)  |  Physical (518)  |  Pi (14)  |  Product (166)  |  Provincial (2)  |  Pupil (62)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Mathematics (72)  |  Revelation (51)  |  Saw (160)  |  Short (200)  |  Strict (20)  |  Stupidity (40)  |  James Joseph Sylvester (58)  |  Test (221)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thought (995)  |  Transmutation (24)  |  Tremendous (29)  |  Type (171)  |  Vitality (24)  |  Way (1214)  |  Winter (46)  |  Worker (34)  |  Young (253)

A single tree by itself is dependent upon all the adverse chances of shifting circumstances. The wind stunts it: the variations in temperature check its foliage: the rains denude its soil: its leaves are blown away and are lost for the purpose of fertilisation. You may obtain individual specimens of line trees either in exceptional circumstances, or where human cultivation had intervened. But in nature the normal way in which trees flourish is by their association in a forest. Each tree may lose something of its individual perfection of growth, but they mutually assist each other in preserving the conditions of survival. The soil is preserved and shaded; and the microbes necessary for its fertility are neither scorched, nor frozen, nor washed away. A forest is the triumph of the organisation of mutually dependent species.
In Science and the Modern World (1926), 296-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Assistance (23)  |  Association (49)  |  Chance (244)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Condition (362)  |  Cultivation (36)  |  Dependence (46)  |  Ecology (81)  |  Exceptional (19)  |  Fertility (23)  |  Flourish (34)  |  Foliage (6)  |  Forest (161)  |  Freezing (16)  |  Growth (200)  |  Human (1512)  |  Individual (420)  |  Lose (165)  |  Microbe (30)  |  Microbes (14)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Organization (120)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Preservation (39)  |  Preserving (18)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Rain (70)  |  Shift (45)  |  Single (365)  |  Soil (98)  |  Species (435)  |  Specimen (32)  |  Stunt (7)  |  Survival (105)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Tree (269)  |  Triumph (76)  |  Variation (93)  |  Wash (23)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wind (141)

A smattering of everything is worth little. It is a fallacy to suppose that an encyclopaedic knowledge is desirable. The mind is made strong, not through much learning, but by the thorough possession of something.
Lecture at a teaching laboratory on Penikese Island, Buzzard's Bay. Quoted from the lecture notes by David Starr Jordan, Science Sketches (1911), 145.
Science quotes on:  |  Desirable (33)  |  Desire (212)  |  Encyclopaedia (3)  |  Everything (489)  |  Fallacy (31)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Learning (291)  |  Little (717)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Possession (68)  |  Smattering (2)  |  Strong (182)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Supposition (50)  |  Thorough (40)  |  Through (846)  |  Worth (172)

A thing is either alive or it isn’t; there is nothing that is almost alive. There is but the remotest possibility of the origin of life by spontaneous generation, and every likelihood that Arrhenius is right when he dares to claim that life is a cosmic phenomenon, something that drifts between the spheres, like light, and like light transiently descends upon those fit to receive it.
In An Almanac for Moderns (1935), 393.
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (97)  |  Svante Arrhenius (11)  |  Claim (154)  |  Cosmic (74)  |  Dare (55)  |  Descend (49)  |  Descent (30)  |  Drift (14)  |  Fit (139)  |  Generation (256)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Likelihood (10)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Origin (250)  |  Origin Of Life (37)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Receive (117)  |  Right (473)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Spontaneous (29)  |  Spontaneous Generation (9)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Transient (13)

A wealthy doctor who can help a poor man, and will not without a fee, has less sense of humanity than a poor ruffian who kills a rich man to supply his necessities. It is something monstrous to consider a man of a liberal education tearing out the bowels of a poor family by taking for a visit what would keep them a week.
In The Tatler: Or, Lucubrations of Isaac Bickerstaff, Esq (8 Oct 1709), collected in Harrison’s British Classicks (1785), Vol. 3, No. 78, 220. Isaac Bickerstaff was the nom de plume used by Richard Steele, who published it—with uncredited contributions from Joseph Addison under the same invented name. The original has no authorship indicated for the item, but (somehow?) later publications attribute it to Addison. For example, in Samuel Austin Allibone (ed.), Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay (1876), 535.
Science quotes on:  |  Bowel (17)  |  Consider (428)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Education (423)  |  Family (101)  |  Fee (9)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Keep (104)  |  Kill (100)  |  Liberal (8)  |  Man (2252)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Monstrous (7)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Poor (139)  |  Rich (66)  |  Sense (785)  |  Supply (100)  |  Tear (48)  |  Treatment (135)  |  Visit (27)  |  Wealth (100)  |  Week (73)  |  Will (2350)

A weird happening has occurred in the case of a lansquenet named Daniel Burghammer, of the squadron of Captain Burkhard Laymann Zu Liebenau, of the honorable Madrucci Regiment in Piadena, in Italy. When the same was on the point of going to bed one night he complained to his wife, to whom he had been married by the Church seven years ago, that he had great pains in his belly and felt something stirring therein. An hour thereafter he gave birth to a child, a girl. When his wife was made aware of this, she notified the occurrence at once. Thereupon he was examined and questioned. … He confessed on the spot that he was half man and half woman and that for more than seven years he had served as a soldier in Hungary and the Netherlands… . When he was born he was christened as a boy and given in baptism the name of Daniel… . He also stated that while in the Netherlands he only slept once with a Spaniard, and he became pregnant therefrom. This, however, he kept a secret unto himself and also from his wife, with whom he had for seven years lived in wedlock, but he had never been able to get her with child… . The aforesaid soldier is able to suckle the child with his right breast only and not at all on the left side, where he is a man. He has also the natural organs of a man for passing water. Both are well, the child is beautiful, and many towns have already wished to adopt it, which, however, has not as yet been arranged. All this has been set down and described by notaries. It is considered in Italy to be a great miracle, and is to be recorded in the chronicles. The couple, however, are to be divorced by the clergy.
Anonymous
'From Piadena in Italy, the 26th day of May 1601'. As quoted in George Tennyson Matthews (ed.) The Fugger Newsletter (1970), 247-248. A handwritten collection of news reports (1568-1604) by the powerful banking and merchant house of Fugger in Ausburg. This was footnoted in The Story of the Secret Service (1937), 698. https://books.google.com/books?id=YfssAAAAMAAJ Richard Wilmer Rowan - 1937
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Birth (154)  |  Both (496)  |  Boy (100)  |  Captain (16)  |  Child (333)  |  Church (64)  |  Confess (42)  |  Consider (428)  |  Divorce (7)  |  Down (455)  |  Girl (38)  |  Great (1610)  |  Happening (59)  |  Himself (461)  |  Honorable (14)  |  Hour (192)  |  Hungary (3)  |  Man (2252)  |  Miracle (85)  |  More (2558)  |  Name (359)  |  Natural (810)  |  Never (1089)  |  Occurrence (53)  |  Organ (118)  |  Pain (144)  |  Passing (76)  |  Point (584)  |  Question (649)  |  Record (161)  |  Reproduction (74)  |  Right (473)  |  Secret (216)  |  Set (400)  |  Side (236)  |  Soldier (28)  |  Water (503)  |  Wife (41)  |  Wish (216)  |  Woman (160)  |  Year (963)

A work of genius is something like the pie in the nursery song, in which the four and twenty blackbirds are baked. When the pie is opened, the birds begin to sing. Hereupon three fourths of the company run away in a fright; and then after a time, feeling ashamed, they would fain excuse themselves by declaring, the pie stank so, they could not sit near it. Those who stay behind, the men of taste and epicures, say one to another, We came here to eat. What business have birds, after they have been baked, to be alive and singing? This will never do. We must put a stop to so dangerous an innovation: for who will send a pie to an oven, if the birds come to life there? We must stand up to defend the rights of all the ovens in England. Let us have dead birds..dead birds for our money. So each sticks his fork into a bird, and hacks and mangles it a while, and then holds it up and cries, Who will dare assert that there is any music in this bird’s song?
Co-author with his brother Augustus William Hare Guesses At Truth, By Two Brothers: Second Edition: With Large Additions (1848), Second Series, 86. (The volume is introduced as “more than three fourths new.” This quote is identified as by Julius; Augustus had died in 1833.)
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (97)  |  Ashamed (3)  |  Assert (69)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Baking (2)  |  Begin (275)  |  Behind (139)  |  Bird (163)  |  Blackbird (4)  |  Business (156)  |  Company (63)  |  Cry (30)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Dare (55)  |  Death (406)  |  Defend (32)  |  Do (1905)  |  Eat (108)  |  Eating (46)  |  England (43)  |  Excuse (27)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Fork (2)  |  Fright (11)  |  Genius (301)  |  Hacking (2)  |  Holding (3)  |  Innovation (49)  |  Life (1870)  |  Money (178)  |  Music (133)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nursery (4)  |  Open (277)  |  Opening (15)  |  Oven (5)  |  Pie (4)  |  Right (473)  |  Run (158)  |  Say (989)  |  French Saying (67)  |  Sing (29)  |  Singing (19)  |  Song (41)  |  Stand (284)  |  Standing (11)  |  Stink (8)  |  Stop (89)  |  Taste (93)  |  Themself (4)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

Abel has left mathematicians something to keep them busy for five hundred years.
As quoted by Eric Temple Bell in The Queen of the Sciences (1931, 1938), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Niels Henrik Abel (15)  |  Busy (32)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Year (963)

About 85 per cent of my “thinking” time was spent getting into a position to think, to make a decision, to learn something I needed to know. Much more time went into finding or obtaining information than into digesting it. Hours went into the plotting of graphs... When the graphs were finished, the relations were obvious at once, but the plotting had to be done in order to make them so.
From article 'Man-Computer Symbiosis', in IRE Transactions on Human Factors in Electronics (Mar 1960), Vol. HFE-1, 4-11.
Science quotes on:  |  Decision (98)  |  Digesting (2)  |  Finding (34)  |  Finish (62)  |  Graph (8)  |  Hour (192)  |  Information (173)  |  Know (1538)  |  Learn (672)  |  More (2558)  |  Need (320)  |  Obtaining (5)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Order (638)  |  Relation (166)  |  Spent (85)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Time (1911)

About eight days ago I discovered that sulfur in burning, far from losing weight, on the contrary, gains it; it is the same with phosphorus; this increase of weight arises from a prodigious quantity of air that is fixed during combustion and combines with the vapors. This discovery, which I have established by experiments, that I regard as decisive, has led me to think that what is observed in the combustion of sulfur and phosphorus may well take place in the case of all substances that gain in weight by combustion and calcination; and I am persuaded that the increase in weight of metallic calxes is due to the same cause... This discovery seems to me one of the most interesting that has been made since Stahl and since it is difficult not to disclose something inadvertently in conversation with friends that could lead to the truth I have thought it necessary to make the present deposit to the Secretary of the Academy to await the time I make my experiments public.
Sealed note deposited with the Secretary of the French Academy 1 Nov 1772. Oeuvres de Lavoisier, Correspondance, Fasc. II. 1770-75 (1957), 389-90. Adapted from translation by A. N. Meldrum, The Eighteenth-Century Revolution in Science (1930), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Academy (37)  |  Air (366)  |  Arise (162)  |  Burn (99)  |  Burning (49)  |  Calcination (4)  |  Cause (561)  |  Combination (150)  |  Combine (58)  |  Combustion (22)  |  Compound (117)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Conversation (46)  |  Decisive (25)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Disclose (19)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Due (143)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Friend (180)  |  Gain (146)  |  Increase (225)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Lead (391)  |  Letter (117)  |  Most (1728)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Observed (149)  |  Phosphorus (18)  |  Present (630)  |  Prodigious (20)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Regard (312)  |  Georg Ernst Stahl (9)  |  Substance (253)  |  Sulfur (5)  |  Sulphur (19)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Vapor (12)  |  Weight (140)

According to Herr Cook's observation, the inhabitants of New Guinea have something they set light to which burns up almost like gunpowder. They also put it into hollow staves, and from a distance you could believe they are shooting. But it does not produce so much as a bang. Presumably they are trying to imitate the Europeans. They have failed to realize its real purpose.
Aphorism 27 in Notebook D (1773-1775), as translated by R.J. Hollingdale in Aphorisms (1990). Reprinted as The Waste Books (2000), 48.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Anthropology (61)  |  Bang (29)  |  Burn (99)  |  Distance (171)  |  Europe (50)  |  Fail (191)  |  Gunpowder (18)  |  Imitate (18)  |  Imitation (24)  |  Inhabitant (50)  |  Light (635)  |  New (1273)  |  New Guinea (4)  |  Observation (593)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Realize (157)  |  Rifle (3)  |  Set (400)  |  Shooting (6)  |  Trying (144)

Accurate and minute measurement seems to the non-scientific imagination, a less lofty and dignified work than looking for something new. But nearly all the grandest discoveries of science have been but the rewards of accurate measurement and patient long-continued labour in the minute sifting of numerical results.
Presidential inaugural address, to the General Meeting of the British Association, Edinburgh (2 Aug 1871). In Report of the Forty-First Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (1872), xci.
Science quotes on:  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Accurate (88)  |  Dignified (13)  |  Dignity (44)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Grandest (10)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Labor (200)  |  Lofty (16)  |  Long (778)  |  Looking (191)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Minute (129)  |  Minuteness (8)  |  Nearly (137)  |  New (1273)  |  Non-Scientific (7)  |  Number (710)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Patience (58)  |  Patient (209)  |  Result (700)  |  Reward (72)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Work (1402)

After a tremendous task has been begun in our time, first by Copernicus and then by many very learned mathematicians, and when the assertion that the earth moves can no longer be considered something new, would it not be much better to pull the wagon to its goal by our joint efforts, now that we have got it underway, and gradually, with powerful voices, to shout down the common herd, which really does not weigh arguments very carefully?
Letter to Galileo (13 Oct 1597). In James Bruce Ross (ed.) and Mary Martin (ed., trans.), 'Comrades in the Pursuit of Truth', The Portable Renaissance Reader (1953, 1981), 599. As quoted and cited in Merry E. Wiesner, Early Modern Europe, 1450-1789 (2013), 377.
Science quotes on:  |  Argument (145)  |  Assertion (35)  |  Better (493)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Common (447)  |  Consider (428)  |  Copernicus_Nicolaud (2)  |  Down (455)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effort (243)  |  First (1302)  |  Goal (155)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Herd (17)  |  Joint (31)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Move (223)  |  New (1273)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Pull (43)  |  Shout (25)  |  Task (152)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tremendous (29)  |  Voice (54)  |  Wagon (10)  |  Weigh (51)

Agriculture is something like farming; only farming is doing it.
Anonymous
Science quotes on:  |  Agriculture (78)  |  Doing (277)  |  Farming (8)

All children are curious and I wonder by what process this trait becomes developed in some and suppressed in others. I suspect again that schools and colleges help in the suppression insofar as they meet curiosity by giving the answers, rather than by some method that leads from narrower questions to broader questions. It is hard to satisfy the curiosity of a child, and even harder to satisfy the curiosity of a scientist, and methods that meet curiosity with satisfaction are thus not apt to foster the development of the child into the scientist. I don't advocate turning all children into professional scientists, although I think there would be advantages if all adults retained something of the questioning attitude, if their curiosity were less easily satisfied by dogma, of whatever variety.
The Nature of Natural History (1950, 1990), 256-257.
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (144)  |  Advocate (20)  |  Answer (389)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Become (821)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  College (71)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Curious (95)  |  Develop (278)  |  Development (441)  |  Dogma (49)  |  Foster (12)  |  Hard (246)  |  Lead (391)  |  Method (531)  |  Other (2233)  |  Process (439)  |  Professional (77)  |  Question (649)  |  Retain (57)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  School (227)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Suppression (9)  |  Think (1122)  |  Variety (138)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Wonder (251)

Although man is not armed by nature nor is naturally swiftest in flight, yet he has something better by far—reason. For by the possession of this function he exceeds the beasts to such a degree that he subdues. … You see, therefore, how much the gift of reason surpasses mere physical equipment.
As given in Toby E. Huff, The Rise of Early Modern Science: Islam, China and the West (2003), 102, citing Tina Stiefel, Science, Reason, and Faith in the Twelfth Century (1976), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Arm (82)  |  Armed (2)  |  Beast (58)  |  Better (493)  |  Degree (277)  |  Equipment (45)  |  Flight (101)  |  Function (235)  |  Gift (105)  |  Man (2252)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Physical (518)  |  Possession (68)  |  Reason (766)  |  See (1094)  |  Subdue (7)  |  Surpassing (12)  |  Swiftness (5)

Alvarez seemed to care less about the way the picture in the puzzle would look, when everything fit together, than about the fun of looking for pieces that fit. He loved nothing more than doing something that everybody else thought impossible. His designs were clever, and usually exploited some little-known principle that everyone else had forgotten.
As quoted in Walter Sullivan, 'Luis W. Alvarez, Nobel Physicist Who Explored Atom, Dies at 77: Obituary', New York Times (2 Sep 1988).
Science quotes on:  |  Luis W. Alvarez (24)  |  Care (203)  |  Clever (41)  |  Design (203)  |  Doing (277)  |  Everybody (72)  |  Everything (489)  |  Exploit (19)  |  Fit (139)  |  Forget (125)  |  Forgotten (53)  |  Fun (42)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Known (453)  |  Little (717)  |  Look (584)  |  Looking (191)  |  More (2558)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Picture (148)  |  Piece (39)  |  Principle (530)  |  Puzzle (46)  |  Thought (995)  |  Together (392)  |  Usually (176)  |  Way (1214)

Among the memoirs of Kirchhoff are some of uncommon beauty. … Can anything be beautiful, where the author has no time for the slightest external embellishment?—But—; it is this very simplicity, the indispensableness of each word, each letter, each little dash, that among all artists raises the mathematician nearest to the World-creator; it establishes a sublimity which is equalled in no other art, something like it exists at most in symphonic music. The Pythagoreans recognized already the similarity between the most subjective and the most objective of the arts.
In Ceremonial Speech (15 Nov 1887) celebrating the 301st anniversary of the Karl-Franzens-University Graz. Published as Gustav Robert Kirchhoff: Festrede zur Feier des 301. Gründungstages der Karl-Franzens-Universität zu Graz (1888), 28-29, as translated in Robert Édouard Moritz, Memorabilia Mathematica; Or, The Philomath’s Quotation-book (1914), 186. From the original German, “Gerade unter den zuletzt erwähnten Abhandlungen Kirchhoff’s sind einige von ungewöhnlicher Schönheit. … kann etwas schön sein, wo dem Autor auch zur kleinsten äusseren Ausschmückung die Zeit fehlt?–Doch–; gerade durch diese Einfachheit, durch diese Unentbehrlichkeit jedes Wortes, jedes Buchstaben, jedes Strichelchens kömmt der Mathematiker unter allen Künstlern dem Weltenschöpfer am nächsten; sie begründet eine Erhabenheit, die in keiner Kunst ein Gleiches,–Aehnliches höchstens in der symphonischen Musik hat. Erkannten doch schon die Pythagoräer die Aehnlichkeit der subjectivsten und der objectivsten der Künste.”
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Art (680)  |  Artist (97)  |  Author (175)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Creator (97)  |  Dash (3)  |  Equal (88)  |  Establish (63)  |  Exist (458)  |  Indispensable (31)  |  Gustav Robert Kirchhoff (4)  |  Letter (117)  |  Little (717)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics And Art (8)  |  Mathematics As A Fine Art (23)  |  Memoir (13)  |  Most (1728)  |  Music (133)  |  Objective (96)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pythagoras (38)  |  Raise (38)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Similarity (32)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Subjective (20)  |  Sublimity (6)  |  Symphony (10)  |  Time (1911)  |  Uncommon (14)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)

An experiment differs from an observation in this, that knowledge gained through observation seems to appear of itself, while that which an experiment brings us is the fruit of an effort that we make, with the object of knowing whether something exists or does not exist.
Traité sur l'expérience en médecine (1774), Vol. 1, 45. In Claude Bernard, Henry C. Greene, L. J. Henderson, An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine (1957), 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Differ (88)  |  Effort (243)  |  Exist (458)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fruit (108)  |  Gain (146)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Object (438)  |  Observation (593)  |  Through (846)

An invention that is quickly accepted will turn out to be a rather trivial alteration of something that has already existed.
Speaking at a shareholders’ meeting (1975). As quoted by Victor K. McElheny, in Insisting On The Impossible: The Life Of Edwin Land (1999), 403.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Acceptance (56)  |  Already (226)  |  Alteration (31)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Invention (400)  |  Trivial (59)  |  Turn (454)  |  Will (2350)

An inventor is an opportunist, one who takes occasion by the hand; who, having seen where some want exists, successfully applies the right means to attain the desired end. The means may be largely, or even wholly, something already known, or there may be a certain originality or discovery in the means employed. But in every case the inventor uses the work of others. If I may use a metaphor, I should liken him to the man who essays the conquest of some virgin alp. At the outset he uses the beaten track, and, as he progresses in the ascent, he uses the steps made by those who have preceded him, whenever they lead in the right direction; and it is only after the last footprints have died out that he takes ice-axe in hand and cuts the remaining steps, few or many, that lift him to the crowning height which is his goal.
In Kenneth Raydon Swan, Sir Joseph Swan (1946), 44.
Science quotes on:  |  Alp (9)  |  Already (226)  |  Application (257)  |  Ascent (7)  |  Attain (126)  |  Attainment (48)  |  Beaten Track (4)  |  Certain (557)  |  Conquest (31)  |  Crown (39)  |  Cut (116)  |  Death (406)  |  Desire (212)  |  Direction (185)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Employ (115)  |  End (603)  |  Essay (27)  |  Exist (458)  |  Footprint (16)  |  Goal (155)  |  Height (33)  |  Ice (58)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Last (425)  |  Lead (391)  |  Leading (17)  |  Lift (57)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Metaphor (37)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Opportunist (3)  |  Originality (21)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outset (7)  |  Preceded (2)  |  Progress (492)  |  Remaining (45)  |  Right (473)  |  Step (234)  |  Success (327)  |  Track (42)  |  Use (771)  |  Virgin (11)  |  Want (504)  |  Whenever (81)  |  Wholly (88)  |  Work (1402)

Analogy is a wonderful, useful and most important form of thinking, and biology is saturated with it. Nothing is worse than a horrible mass of undigested facts, and facts are indigestible unless there is some rhyme or reason to them. The physicist, with his facts, seeks reason; the biologist seeks something very much like rhyme, and rhyme is a kind of analogy.... This analogizing, this fine sweeping ability to see likenesses in the midst of differences is the great glory of biology, but biologists don't know it.... They have always been so fascinated and overawed by the superior prestige of exact physical science that they feel they have to imitate it.... In its central content, biology is not accurate thinking, but accurate observation and imaginative thinking, with great sweeping generalizations.
In Science is a Sacred Cow (1950), 98-100.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Accurate (88)  |  Analogy (76)  |  Awe (43)  |  Biologist (70)  |  Biology (232)  |  Central (81)  |  Content (75)  |  Difference (355)  |  Exact (75)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Fascination (35)  |  Feel (371)  |  Form (976)  |  Generalization (61)  |  Glory (66)  |  Great (1610)  |  Horrible (10)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Imitate (18)  |  Imitation (24)  |  Importance (299)  |  Kind (564)  |  Know (1538)  |  Likeness (18)  |  Mass (160)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Observation (593)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Prestige (16)  |  Reason (766)  |  Rhyme (6)  |  Saturation (9)  |  See (1094)  |  Seek (218)  |  Superior (88)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Undigested (2)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Wonderful (155)

And do you know what “the world” is to me? Shall I show it to you in my mirror? This world: a monster of energy, without beginning, without end; a firm, iron magnitude of force that does not grow bigger or smaller, that does not expend itself but only transforms itself; as a whole, of unalterable size, a household without expenses or losses, but likewise without increase or income; enclosed by “nothingness”' as by a boundary; not by something blurry or wasted, not something endlessly extended, but set in a definite space as a definite force, and not a space that might be “empty” here or there, but rather as force throughout, as a play of forces and waves of forces, at the same time one and many, increasing here and at the same time decreasing there; a sea of forces flowing and rushing together, eternally changing, eternally flooding back, with tremendous years of recurrence, with an ebb and a flood of its forms; out of the simplest forms striving toward the most complex, out of the stillest, most rigid, coldest forms toward the hottest, most turbulent, most self-contradictory, and then again returning home to the simple out of this abundance, out of the play of contradictions back to the joy of concord, still affirming itself in this uniformity of its courses and its years, blessing itself as that which must return eternally, as a becoming that knows no satiety, no disgust, no weariness: this, my Dionysian world of the eternally self-creating, the eternally self-destroying, this mystery world of the twofold voluptuous delight, my “beyond good and evil,” without goal, unless the joy of the circle itself is a goal; without will, unless a ring feels good will toward itself-do you want a name for this world? A solution for all its riddles? A light for you, too, you best-concealed, strongest, most intrepid, most midnightly men?—This world is the will to power—and nothing besides! And you yourselves are also this will to power—and nothing besides!
The Will to Power (Notes written 1883-1888), book 4, no. 1067. Trans. W. Kaufmann and R. J. Hollingdale and ed. W. Kaufmann (1968), 549-50.
Science quotes on:  |  Abundance (26)  |  Back (395)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Best (467)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Blessing (26)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Circle (117)  |  Complex (202)  |  Concealed (25)  |  Contradiction (69)  |  Course (413)  |  Definite (114)  |  Delight (111)  |  Disgust (10)  |  Do (1905)  |  Empty (82)  |  End (603)  |  Energy (373)  |  Evil (122)  |  Extend (129)  |  Feel (371)  |  Firm (47)  |  Flood (52)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Goal (155)  |  Good (906)  |  Grow (247)  |  Home (184)  |  Income (18)  |  Increase (225)  |  Iron (99)  |  Joy (117)  |  Know (1538)  |  Light (635)  |  Magnitude (88)  |  Mirror (43)  |  Monster (33)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Name (359)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Nothingness (12)  |  Power (771)  |  Return (133)  |  Riddle (28)  |  Rigid (24)  |  Sea (326)  |  Self (268)  |  Set (400)  |  Show (353)  |  Simple (426)  |  Solution (282)  |  Space (523)  |  Still (614)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Together (392)  |  Transform (74)  |  Transformation (72)  |  Tremendous (29)  |  Uniformity (38)  |  Voluptuous (3)  |  Want (504)  |  Wave (112)  |  Weariness (6)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

And, notwithstanding a few exceptions, we do undoubtedly find that the most truly eminent men have had not only their affections, but also their intellect, greatly influenced by women. I will go even farther; and I will venture to say that those who have not undergone that influence betray a something incomplete and mutilated. We detect, even in their genius, a certain frigidity of tone; and we look in vain for that burning fire, that gushing and spontaneous nature with which our ideas of genius are indissolubly associated. Therefore, it is, that those who are most anxious that the boundaries of knowledge should be enlarged, ought to be most eager that the influence of women should be increased, in order that every resource of the human mind may be at once and quickly brought into play.
Lecture (19 Mar 1858) at the Royal Institution, 'The Influence Of Women On The Progress Of Knowledge', collected in The Miscellaneous and Posthumous Works of Henry Thomas Buckle (1872), Vol. 1, 17. Published in Frazier’s Magazine (Apr 1858).
Science quotes on:  |  Affection (44)  |  Burning (49)  |  Certain (557)  |  Detect (45)  |  Do (1905)  |  Eminent (20)  |  Exception (74)  |  Farther (51)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fire (203)  |  Genius (301)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Idea (881)  |  Incomplete (31)  |  Influence (231)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Look (584)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mutilated (2)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Order (638)  |  Say (989)  |  Spontaneous (29)  |  Tone (22)  |  Truly (118)  |  Vain (86)  |  Will (2350)  |  Women (9)

Andrade [who was looking after wartime inventions] is like an inverted Micawber, waiting for something to turn down.
As quoted by C.P. Snow in his Lectures at Harvard University (1960), in which he spoke extensively about Henry Tizard. Collected in print as Science and Government (1960), 6. Snow gave this quote to exemplify what he called Tizard's “lively satirical tongue,” but Tizard probably did not originate the epigram. The article 'A Spectator's Notebook' The Spectator (21 Dec 1944), 4, states it was coined by Philip Guedalla, “unless, indeed, which is unlikely, it goes back farther still.” As early as during the first World War, Guedalla “applied it to the Inventions Board under Lord Fisher, sitting in an office in Cockspur Street, and ‘waiting like a kind of inverted Mr. Micawber, for something to turn down.’” Webmaster assumes Tizard's quote refers to Edward Neville da Costa Andrade, also a wartime science consultant.
Science quotes on:  |  Down (455)  |  Invention (400)  |  Inverted (2)  |  Looking (191)  |  Turn (454)  |  Waiting (42)  |  Wartime (4)  |  World War II (9)

Any time you wish to demonstrate something, the number of faults is proportional to the number of viewers.
Anonymous
Bye's First Law of Model Railroading. In Paul Dickson, The Official Rules, (1978), 23.
Science quotes on:  |  Demonstrate (79)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Failure (176)  |  Fault (58)  |  Number (710)  |  Time (1911)  |  Wish (216)

Anyone of common mental and physical health can practice scientific research. … Anyone can try by patient experiment what happens if this or that substance be mixed in this or that proportion with some other under this or that condition. Anyone can vary the experiment in any number of ways. He that hits in this fashion on something novel and of use will have fame. … The fame will be the product of luck and industry. It will not be the product of special talent.
In Essays of a Catholic Layman in England (1931).
Science quotes on:  |  Common (447)  |  Condition (362)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fame (51)  |  Happen (282)  |  Health (210)  |  Industry (159)  |  Luck (44)  |  Mental (179)  |  Novel (35)  |  Number (710)  |  Other (2233)  |  Patient (209)  |  Physical (518)  |  Practice (212)  |  Product (166)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Special (188)  |  Substance (253)  |  Talent (99)  |  Try (296)  |  Use (771)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

As experimentalists, we always can find something to do, even if we have to work with string and sealing wax.
As quoted in T.W. Hänsch, 'From (Incr)edible Lasers to New Spectroscopy', collected in William M. Yen and Marc D. Levenson (eds.), Lasers, Spectroscopy and New Ideas: A Tribute to Arthur L. Schawlow (2013), 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimentalist (20)  |  Find (1014)  |  Research (753)  |  String (22)  |  Wax (13)  |  Work (1402)

Ask a scientist what he conceives the scientific method to be, and he will adopt an expression that is at once solemn and shifty eyed: solemn because he feels he ought to declare an opinion; shifty eyed because he is wondering how to conceal the fact that he has no opinion to declare. If taunted he would probably mumble something about “Induction” and “Establishing the Laws of Nature”, but if anyone working in a laboratory professed to be trying to establish the Laws of Nature by induction, we should think he was overdue for leave.
From a Jayne Lecture (1968), 'Induction and Intuition in Scientific Thought', printed in Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society (1969), Vol. 75. Lecture republished as Induction and Intuition in Scientific Thought (2009), 11. Also included in Peter Medawar, Pluto’s Republic (1984), 80.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Conceal (19)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Declare (48)  |  Expression (181)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Feel (371)  |  Induction (81)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Nature (80)  |  Method (531)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Profess (21)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Solemn (20)  |  Think (1122)  |  Trying (144)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wondering (3)

Astronomy is one of the sublimest fields of human investigation. The mind that grasps its facts and principles receives something of the enlargement and grandeur belonging to the science itself. It is a quickener of devotion.
In Thoughts Selected From the Writings of Horace Mann (1872), 41.
Science quotes on:  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Belonging (36)  |  Devotion (37)  |  Enlargement (8)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Field (378)  |  Grandeur (35)  |  Human (1512)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Principle (530)  |  Receive (117)  |  Sublime (50)

At first he who invented any art that went beyond the common perceptions of man was naturally admired by men, not only because there was something useful in the inventions, but because he was thought wise and superior to the rest. But as more arts were invented, and some were directed to the necessities of life, others to its recreation, the inventors of the latter were always regarded as wiser than the inventors of the former, because their branches of knowledge did not aim at utility.
Aristotle
Metaphysics, 981b, 13-20. In Jonathan Barnes (ed.), The Complete Works of Aristotle (1984), Vol. 2, 1553.
Science quotes on:  |  Aim (175)  |  Art (680)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Common (447)  |  Direct (228)  |  First (1302)  |  Former (138)  |  Invention (400)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perception (97)  |  Recreation (23)  |  Regard (312)  |  Rest (287)  |  Superior (88)  |  Thought (995)  |  Useful (260)  |  Utility (52)  |  Wise (143)

At Gabriel College there was a very holy object on the high altar of the Oratory, covered with a black velvet cloth... At the height of the invocation the Intercessor lifted the cloth to reveal in the dimness a glass dome inside which there was something too distant to see, until he pulled a string attached to a shutter above, letting a ray of sunlight through to strike the dome exactly. Then it became clear: a little thing like a weathervane, with four sails black on one side and white on the other, began to whirl around as the light struck it. It illustrated a moral lesson, the Intercessor explained, for the black of ignorance fled from the light, whereas the wisdom of white rushed to embrace it.
[Alluding to Crookes's radiometer.]
Northern Lights (2001), 149.
Science quotes on:  |  Altar (11)  |  Attach (57)  |  Attached (36)  |  Black (46)  |  College (71)  |  Sir William Crookes (10)  |  Dome (9)  |  Embrace (47)  |  Explain (334)  |  Glass (94)  |  High (370)  |  Holy (35)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Lesson (58)  |  Lift (57)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Moral (203)  |  Object (438)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pull (43)  |  Ray (115)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Sail (37)  |  See (1094)  |  Side (236)  |  Strike (72)  |  Sunlight (29)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  Whirl (10)  |  White (132)  |  Wisdom (235)

At moments of great enthusiasm it seems to me that no one in the world has ever made something this beautiful and important.
As quoted on the website mcescher.com, without citation.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Enthusiasm (59)  |  Great (1610)  |  Important (229)  |  Moment (260)  |  Seem (150)  |  World (1850)

At the beginning of this debate Stephen [Hawking] said that he thinks that he is a positivist, whereas I am a Platonist. I am happy with him being a positivist, but I think that the crucial point here is, rather, that I am a realist. Also, if one compares this debate with the famous debate of Bohr and Einstein, some seventy years ago, I should think that Stephen plays the role of Bohr, whereas I play Einstein's role! For Einstein argued that there should exist something like a real world, not necessarily represented by a wave function, whereas Bohr stressed that the wave function doesn't describe a 'real' microworld but only 'knowledge' that is useful for making predictions.
Debate at the Isaac Newton Institute of the Mathematical Sciences, Cambridge University (1994), transcribed in Stephen Hawking and Roger Penrose, The Nature of Space and Time (1996), 134-135.
Science quotes on:  |  Beginning (312)  |  Being (1276)  |  Niels Bohr (55)  |  Compare (76)  |  Debate (40)  |  Describe (132)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  Exist (458)  |  Function (235)  |  Happy (108)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Making (300)  |  Microworld (2)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Point (584)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Quantum Physics (19)  |  Represent (157)  |  Role (86)  |  Stress (22)  |  Think (1122)  |  Useful (260)  |  Wave (112)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

Authority—the fact, namely, that something has already happened or been said or decided, is of great value; but it is only a pedant who demands authority for everything.
In The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe (1906), 188.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Authority (99)  |  Decide (50)  |  Demand (131)  |  Everything (489)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Great (1610)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Pedant (5)  |  Value (393)

Before I built a wall I’d ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offence.
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That wants it down.
From 'Mending Wall', in North of Boston (1914). Collected in Robert Frost and Thomas Fasano (ed.), Selected Early Poems of Robert Frost (2008), 52. Note: This passage may be the source which John F. Kennedy had in mind when he wrote in his personal notebook, "Don't ever take a fence down until you know the reason why it was put up." (see John F. Kennedy quotes on this site). The words in that terse paraphrase are those of Kennedy, and are neither those of Frost, or, as often attributed, G.K. Chesterton (q.v).
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Build (211)  |  Down (455)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Love (328)  |  Offence (4)  |  Reason (766)  |  Wall (71)  |  Want (504)

Behold the mighty dinosaur,
Famous in prehistoric lore,
Not only for his power and strength
But for his intellectual length.
You will observe by these remains
The creature had two sets of brains—
One in his head (the usual place),
The other at his spinal base.
Thus he could reason 'A priori'
As well as 'A posteriori'.
No problem bothered him a bit
He made both head and tail of it.
So wise was he, so wise and solemn,
Each thought filled just a spinal column.
If one brain found the pressure strong
It passed a few ideas along.
If something slipped his forward mind
'Twas rescued by the one behind.
And if in error he was caught
He had a saving afterthought.
As he thought twice before he spoke
He had no judgment to revoke.
Thus he could think without congestion
Upon both sides of every question.
Oh, gaze upon this model beast
Defunct ten million years at least.
'The Dinosaur: A Poem' (1912). In E. H. Colbert (ed.), The Dinosaur Book (1951), 78.
Science quotes on:  |  A Posteriori (2)  |  A Priori (26)  |  Afterthought (6)  |  Base (120)  |  Beast (58)  |  Behind (139)  |  Both (496)  |  Bother (8)  |  Brain (281)  |  Congestion (2)  |  Creature (242)  |  Dinosaur (26)  |  Error (339)  |  Forward (104)  |  Gaze (23)  |  Head (87)  |  Idea (881)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Million (124)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Model (106)  |  Observe (179)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pass (241)  |  Power (771)  |  Prehistoric (12)  |  Pressure (69)  |  Problem (731)  |  Question (649)  |  Reason (766)  |  Remain (355)  |  Rescue (14)  |  Set (400)  |  Side (236)  |  Solemn (20)  |  Solemnity (6)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Spinal Column (2)  |  Spine (9)  |  Strength (139)  |  Strong (182)  |  Tail (21)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Twice (20)  |  Two (936)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wisdom (235)  |  Wise (143)  |  Year (963)

Biological diversity is the key to the maintenance of the world as we know it. Life in a local site struck down by a passing storm springs back quickly: opportunistic species rush in to fill the spaces. They entrain the succession that circles back to something resembling the original state of the environment.
In 'Storm Over the Amazon', The Diversity of Life (1992), 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Biological (137)  |  Biological Diversity (5)  |  Circle (117)  |  Diversity (75)  |  Down (455)  |  Environment (239)  |  Fill (67)  |  Key (56)  |  Know (1538)  |  Life (1870)  |  Local (25)  |  Maintenance (21)  |  Original (61)  |  Passing (76)  |  Quickly (21)  |  Resemble (65)  |  Rush (18)  |  Site (19)  |  Space (523)  |  Species (435)  |  Spring (140)  |  State (505)  |  Storm (56)  |  Strike (72)  |  Succession (80)  |  World (1850)

Biologically speaking, if something bites you, it is more likely to be female.
As quoted, without source, in Des MacHale, Wit (2003), 236.
Science quotes on:  |  Biologically (4)  |  Bite (18)  |  Female (50)  |  Likely (36)  |  More (2558)  |  Speak (240)  |  Speaking (118)

BRAIN, n. An apparatus with which we think that we think. That which distinguishes the man who is content to be something from the man who wishes to do something. A man of great wealth, or one who has been pitchforked into high station, has commonly such a headful of brain that his neighbors cannot keep their hats on. In our civilization, and under our republican form of government, brain is so highly honored that it is rewarded by exemption from the cares of office.
The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce (1911), Vol. 7, The Devil's Dictionary,  41.
Science quotes on:  |  Apparatus (70)  |  Brain (281)  |  Care (203)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Do (1905)  |  Exemption (3)  |  Form (976)  |  Government (116)  |  Great (1610)  |  High (370)  |  Honor (57)  |  Humour (116)  |  Man (2252)  |  Office (71)  |  Pitchfork (2)  |  Reward (72)  |  Station (30)  |  Think (1122)  |  Wealth (100)

But how is one to make a scientist understand that there is something unalterably deranged about differential calculus, quantum theory, or the obscene and so inanely liturgical ordeals of the precession of the equinoxes.
In Van Gogh, the Man Suicided by Society (1947). As translated in Jack Hirschman (ed.) Artaud Anthology (1965), 149.
Science quotes on:  |  Calculus (65)  |  Deranged (3)  |  Differential Calculus (11)  |  Equinox (5)  |  Obscene (3)  |  Ordeal (2)  |  Precession (4)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Understand (648)

But in the present century, thanks in good part to the influence of Hilbert, we have come to see that the unproved postulates with which we start are purely arbitrary. They must be consistent, they had better lead to something interesting.
In A History of Geometrical Methods (1940, reprint 2003), 423.
Science quotes on:  |  Arbitrary (27)  |  Better (493)  |  Century (319)  |  Consistent (50)  |  Good (906)  |  David Hilbert (45)  |  Influence (231)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Lead (391)  |  Must (1525)  |  Postulate (42)  |  Present (630)  |  Purely (111)  |  See (1094)  |  Start (237)  |  Thank (48)  |  Thanks (26)  |  Unproven (5)

But it is precisely mathematics, and the pure science generally, from which the general educated public and independent students have been debarred, and into which they have only rarely attained more than a very meagre insight. The reason of this is twofold. In the first place, the ascendant and consecutive character of mathematical knowledge renders its results absolutely insusceptible of presentation to persons who are unacquainted with what has gone before, and so necessitates on the part of its devotees a thorough and patient exploration of the field from the very beginning, as distinguished from those sciences which may, so to speak, be begun at the end, and which are consequently cultivated with the greatest zeal. The second reason is that, partly through the exigencies of academic instruction, but mainly through the martinet traditions of antiquity and the influence of mediaeval logic-mongers, the great bulk of the elementary text-books of mathematics have unconsciously assumed a very repellant form,—something similar to what is termed in the theory of protective mimicry in biology “the terrifying form.” And it is mainly to this formidableness and touch-me-not character of exterior, concealing withal a harmless body, that the undue neglect of typical mathematical studies is to be attributed.
In Editor’s Preface to Augustus De Morgan and Thomas J. McCormack (ed.), Elementary Illustrations of the Differential and Integral Calculus (1899), v.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Academic (20)  |  Antiquity (34)  |  Ascendant (2)  |  Assume (43)  |  Attain (126)  |  Attribute (65)  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Biology (232)  |  Body (557)  |  Book (413)  |  Bulk (24)  |  Character (259)  |  Conceal (19)  |  Consecutive (2)  |  Consequent (19)  |  Cultivate (24)  |  Debar (2)  |  Devotee (7)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Educated (12)  |  Elementary (98)  |  End (603)  |  Exigency (3)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Exterior (7)  |  Field (378)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Formidable (8)  |  General (521)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Harmless (9)  |  Independent (74)  |  Influence (231)  |  Insight (107)  |  Instruction (101)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Logic (311)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Meager (2)  |  Medieval (12)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature Of Mathematics (80)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Neglect (63)  |  Part (235)  |  Patient (209)  |  Person (366)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Presentation (24)  |  Protective (5)  |  Public (100)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Science (30)  |  Rarely (21)  |  Reason (766)  |  Render (96)  |  Repellent (4)  |  Result (700)  |  Speak (240)  |  Student (317)  |  Study (701)  |  Term (357)  |  Terrify (12)  |  Textbook (39)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thorough (40)  |  Through (846)  |  Touch (146)  |  Tradition (76)  |  Typical (16)  |  Unacquainted (3)  |  Unconscious (24)  |  Undue (4)  |  Zeal (12)

But we shall not satisfy ourselves simply with improving steam and explosive engines or inventing new batteries; we have something much better to work for, a greater task to fulfill. We have to evolve means for obtaining energy from stores which are forever inexhaustible, to perfect methods which do not imply consumption and waste of any material whatever.
Speech (12 Jan 1897) at a gala inaugurating power service from Niagara Falls to Buffalo, NY. Printed in 'Tesla on Electricity', The Electrical Review (27 Jan 1897), 30, No. 3, 47.
Science quotes on:  |  Battery (12)  |  Better (493)  |  Energy (373)  |  Engine (99)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Explosive (24)  |  Forever (111)  |  Fulfill (19)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greater (288)  |  Improve (64)  |  Invent (57)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  New (1273)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Satisfy (29)  |  Simply (53)  |  Steam (81)  |  Store (49)  |  Task (152)  |  Work (1402)

But why, it has been asked, did you go there [the Antarctic]? Of what use to civilization can this lifeless continent be? ... [Earlier] expeditions contributed something to the accumulating knowledge of the Antarctic ... that helps us thrust back further the physical and spiritual shadows enfolding our terrestrial existence. Is it not true that one of the strongest and most continuously sustained impulses working in civilization is that which leads to discovery? As long as any part of the world remains obscure, the curiosity of man must draw him there, as the lodestone draws the mariner's needle, until he comprehends its secret.
In 'Hoover Presents Special Medal to Byrd...', New York Times (21 Jun 1930), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulation (51)  |  Antarctic (7)  |  Ask (420)  |  Asking (74)  |  Back (395)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Continent (79)  |  Contribution (93)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Draw (140)  |  Existence (481)  |  Expedition (9)  |  Going (6)  |  Impulse (52)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lead (391)  |  Lifeless (15)  |  Lodestone (7)  |  Long (778)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mariner (12)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Obscure (66)  |  Obscurity (28)  |  Physical (518)  |  Remain (355)  |  Secret (216)  |  Shadow (73)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Sustain (52)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Thrust (13)  |  Use (771)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)

But, you might say, “none of this shakes my belief that 2 and 2 are 4.” You are quite right, except in marginal cases—and it is only in marginal cases that you are doubtful whether a certain animal is a dog or a certain length is less than a meter. Two must be two of something, and the proposition “2 and 2 are 4” is useless unless it can be applied. Two dogs and two dogs are certainly four dogs, but cases arise in which you are doubtful whether two of them are dogs. “Well, at any rate there are four animals,” you may say. But there are microorganisms concerning which it is doubtful whether they are animals or plants. “Well, then living organisms,” you say. But there are things of which it is doubtful whether they are living organisms or not. You will be driven into saying: “Two entities and two entities are four entities.” When you have told me what you mean by “entity,” we will resume the argument.
In Basic Writings, 1903-1959 (1961), 108.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Applied (176)  |  Apply (170)  |  Argument (145)  |  Arise (162)  |  Belief (615)  |  Case (102)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Concern (239)  |  Correct (95)  |  Dog (70)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Doubtful (30)  |  Entity (37)  |  Length (24)  |  Live (650)  |  Living (492)  |  Marginal (3)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meter (9)  |  Microorganism (29)  |  Must (1525)  |  Organism (231)  |  Plant (320)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Resume (4)  |  Right (473)  |  Say (989)  |  Shake (43)  |  Tell (344)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Two (936)  |  Useless (38)  |  Will (2350)

By profession a biologist, [Thomas Henry Huxley] covered in fact the whole field of the exact sciences, and then bulged through its four fences. Absolutely nothing was uninteresting to him. His curiosity ranged from music to theology and from philosophy to history. He didn't simply know something about everything; he knew a great deal about everything.
'Thomas Henry Huxley.' In the Baltimore Evening Sun (4 May 1925). Reprinted in A Second Mencken Chrestomathy: A New Selection from the Writings of America's Legendary Editor, Critic, and Wit (2006), 157.
Science quotes on:  |  Biologist (70)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Deal (192)  |  Everything (489)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Fence (11)  |  Field (378)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  Thomas Henry Huxley (132)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Music (133)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Profession (108)  |  Theology (54)  |  Through (846)  |  Uninteresting (9)  |  Whole (756)

By research in pure science I mean research made without any idea of application to industrial matters but solely with the view of extending our knowledge of the Laws of Nature. I will give just one example of the ‘utility’ of this kind of research, one that has been brought into great prominence by the War—I mean the use of X-rays in surgery. Now, not to speak of what is beyond money value, the saving of pain, or, it may be, the life of the wounded, and of bitter grief to those who loved them, the benefit which the state has derived from the restoration of so many to life and limb, able to render services which would otherwise have been lost, is almost incalculable. Now, how was this method discovered? It was not the result of a research in applied science starting to find an improved method of locating bullet wounds. This might have led to improved probes, but we cannot imagine it leading to the discovery of X-rays. No, this method is due to an investigation in pure science, made with the object of discovering what is the nature of Electricity. The experiments which led to this discovery seemed to be as remote from ‘humanistic interest’ —to use a much misappropriated word—as anything that could well be imagined. The apparatus consisted of glass vessels from which the last drops of air had been sucked, and which emitted a weird greenish light when stimulated by formidable looking instruments called induction coils. Near by, perhaps, were great coils of wire and iron built up into electro-magnets. I know well the impression it made on the average spectator, for I have been occupied in experiments of this kind nearly all my life, notwithstanding the advice, given in perfect good faith, by non-scientific visitors to the laboratory, to put that aside and spend my time on something useful.
In Speech made on behalf of a delegation from the Conjoint Board of Scientific Studies in 1916 to Lord Crewe, then Lord President of the Council. In George Paget Thomson, J. J. Thomson and the Cavendish Laboratory in His Day (1965), 167-8.
Science quotes on:  |  Advice (57)  |  Air (366)  |  Apparatus (70)  |  Application (257)  |  Applied (176)  |  Applied Science (36)  |  Average (89)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Bitter (30)  |  Call (781)  |  Consist (223)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Drop (77)  |  Due (143)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Faith (209)  |  Find (1014)  |  Glass (94)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Grief (20)  |  Idea (881)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Impression (118)  |  Induction (81)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Interest (416)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Iron (99)  |  Kind (564)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Last (425)  |  Law (913)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Looking (191)  |  Magnet (22)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Method (531)  |  Money (178)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Non-Scientific (7)  |  Object (438)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Pain (144)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Probe (12)  |  Prominence (5)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Science (30)  |  Ray (115)  |  Remote (86)  |  Render (96)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Service (110)  |  Speak (240)  |  Spend (97)  |  State (505)  |  Suck (8)  |  Surgery (54)  |  Time (1911)  |  Use (771)  |  Useful (260)  |  Utility (52)  |  Value (393)  |  Vessel (63)  |  View (496)  |  War (233)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wire (36)  |  Word (650)  |  Wound (26)  |  X-ray (43)

Champions aren’t made in gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them—a desire, a dream, a vision. They have to have last-minute stamina, they have to be a little faster, they have to have the skill and the will. But the will must be stronger than the skill.
As co-author with Richard Durham, in The Greatest: My Own Story (1975), 365.
Science quotes on:  |  Champion (6)  |  Deep (241)  |  Desire (212)  |  Dream (222)  |  Fast (49)  |  Faster (50)  |  Gym (3)  |  Inside (30)  |  Last (425)  |  Little (717)  |  Make (25)  |  Minute (129)  |  Must (1525)  |  Skill (116)  |  Strong (182)  |  Stronger (36)  |  Vision (127)  |  Will (2350)

Chance ... must be something more than the name we give to our ignorance.
In Science and Method (1908) translated by Francis Maitland (1914, 2007), 66.
Science quotes on:  |  Chance (244)  |  Definition (238)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Name (359)

Classification is now a pejorative statement. You know, these classifiers look like “dumb fools.” I’m a classifier. But I’d like to use a word that includes more than what people consider is encompassed by classification. It is more than that, and it’s something which can be called phenomenology.
'Oral History Transcript: Dr. William Wilson Morgan' (8 Aug 1978) in the Niels Bohr Library & Archives.
Science quotes on:  |  Call (781)  |  Classification (102)  |  Consider (428)  |  Dumb (11)  |  Fool (121)  |  Include (93)  |  Know (1538)  |  Look (584)  |  More (2558)  |  People (1031)  |  Phenomenology (3)  |  Statement (148)  |  Use (771)  |  Word (650)

Clean water is a great example of something that depends on energy. And if you solve the water problem, you solve the food problem.
In Lecture (2003) at the National Renewable Energy Laboratories in Golden, Colorado, as quoted in obituary, Barnaby J. Feder, 'Richard E. Smalley, 62, Dies; Chemistry Nobel Winner:', New York Times (29 Oct 2005), Late Edition (East Coast), C16.
Science quotes on:  |  Clean (52)  |  Depend (238)  |  Energy (373)  |  Example (98)  |  Food (213)  |  Great (1610)  |  Problem (731)  |  Solve (145)  |  Water (503)

Connected by innumerable ties with abstract science, Physiology is yet in the most intimate relation with humanity; and by teaching us that law and order, and a definite scheme of development, regulate even the strangest and wildest manifestations of individual life, she prepares the student to look for a goal even amidst the erratic wanderings of mankind, and to believe that history offers something more than an entertaining chaos—a journal of a toilsome, tragi-comic march nowither.
In 'Educational Value of Natural History Sciences', Lay Sermons, Addresses, and Reviews (1870), 97.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Belief (615)  |  Chaos (99)  |  Comic (5)  |  Connect (126)  |  Definite (114)  |  Development (441)  |  Entertaining (9)  |  Erratic (4)  |  Goal (155)  |  History (716)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Individual (420)  |  Innumerable (56)  |  Intimate (21)  |  Journal (31)  |  Law (913)  |  Law And Order (5)  |  Life (1870)  |  Look (584)  |  Manifestation (61)  |  Mankind (356)  |  March (48)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Offer (142)  |  Order (638)  |  Physiology (101)  |  Prepare (44)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Strange (160)  |  Student (317)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Tie (42)  |  Toil (29)  |  Tragic (19)  |  Wild (96)

Consciousness is not sharply defined, but fades into sub-consciousness; and beyond that we must postulate something indefinite but yet continuous with our mental nature. This I take it be the world-stuff.
From Gifford Lecture, Edinburgh, (1927), 'Reality', collected in The Nature of the Physical World (1928), 280.
Science quotes on:  |  Beyond (316)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Indefinite (21)  |  Mental (179)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Postulate (42)  |  World (1850)

Disease is not something personal and special, but only a manifestation of life under modified conditions, operating according to the same laws as apply to the living body at all times, from the first moment until death.
In Ian F. McNeely, Medicine on a Grand Scale: Rudolf Virchow, Liberalism, and the Public Health (2002), 26.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Apply (170)  |  Body (557)  |  Condition (362)  |  Death (406)  |  Disease (340)  |  First (1302)  |  Law (913)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Manifestation (61)  |  Moment (260)  |  Special (188)  |  Time (1911)

Do not expect to be hailed as a hero when you make your great discovery. More likely you will be a ratbag—maybe failed by your examiners. Your statistics, or your observations, or your literature study, or your something else will be patently deficient. Do not doubt that in our enlightened age the really important advances are and will be rejected more often than acclaimed. Nor should we doubt that in our own professional lifetime we too will repudiate with like pontifical finality the most significant insight ever to reach our desk.
Theories of the Earth and Universe (1988), 365.
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Age (509)  |  Career (86)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Enlighten (32)  |  Enlightened (25)  |  Examiner (5)  |  Expect (203)  |  Fail (191)  |  Finality (8)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hero (45)  |  Insight (107)  |  Literature (116)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Observation (593)  |  Patently (4)  |  Professional (77)  |  Progress (492)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reject (67)  |  Rejected (26)  |  Repudiate (7)  |  Significant (78)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Study (701)  |  Will (2350)

Does it mean, if you don’t understand something, and the community of physicists don’t understand it, that means God did it? Is that how you want to play this game? Because if it is, here’s a list of the things in the past that the physicists—at the time—didn’t understand … [but now we do understand.] If that’s how you want to invoke your evidence for God, then God is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance, that’s getting smaller and smaller and smaller, as time moves on. So just be ready for that to happen, if that’s how you want to come at the problem. That’s simply the “God of the Gaps” argument that’s been around for ever.
From interview, The Science Studio video series of The Science Network website, episode 'The Moon, the Tides and why Neil DeGrasse Tyson is Colbert’s God' (20 Jan 2011), time 26:58-27:55.
Science quotes on:  |  Argument (145)  |  Community (111)  |  Do (1905)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Game (104)  |  Gap (36)  |  God (776)  |  Happen (282)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Invoke (7)  |  List (10)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Move (223)  |  Past (355)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Play (116)  |  Pocket (11)  |  Problem (731)  |  Ready (43)  |  Receding (2)  |  Science And God (5)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Small (489)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Understand (648)  |  Want (504)

Each and every loss becomes an instance of ultimate tragedy–something that once was, but shall never be known to us. The hump of the giant deer–as a nonfossilizable item of soft anatomy–should have fallen into the maw of erased history. But our ancestors provided a wondrous rescue, and we should rejoice mightily. Every new item can instruct us; every unexpected object possesses beauty for its own sake; every rescue from history’s great shredding machine is–and I don’t know how else to say this–a holy act of salvation for a bit of totality.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Anatomy (75)  |  Ancestor (63)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Become (821)  |  Bit (21)  |  Deer (11)  |  Erase (7)  |  Fall (243)  |  Giant (73)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  Holy (35)  |  Hump (3)  |  Instance (33)  |  Instruction (101)  |  Item (4)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Loss (117)  |  Machine (271)  |  Mightily (2)  |  Never (1089)  |  New (1273)  |  Object (438)  |  Possess (157)  |  Provide (79)  |  Rejoice (11)  |  Rescue (14)  |  Sake (61)  |  Salvation (13)  |  Say (989)  |  Shred (7)  |  Soft (30)  |  Totality (17)  |  Tragedy (31)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Unexpected (55)  |  Wondrous (22)

Education, like everything else, goes in fads, and has the normal human tendency to put up with something bad for just so long, and then rush to the other extreme.
In Science is a Sacred Cow (1950), 43.
Science quotes on:  |  Bad (185)  |  Education (423)  |  Everything (489)  |  Extreme (78)  |  Fad (10)  |  Human (1512)  |  Long (778)  |  Other (2233)  |  Rush (18)  |  Tendency (110)  |  Tolerance (11)

Educators may bring upon themselves unnecessary travail by taking a tactless and unjustifiable position about the relation between scientific and religious narratives. … The point is that profound but contradictory ideas may exist side by side, if they are constructed from different materials and methods and have different purposes. Each tells us something important about where we stand in the universe, and it is foolish to insist that they must despise each other.
In The End of Education: Redefining the Value of School (1995), 107.
Science quotes on:  |  Construct (129)  |  Contradictory (8)  |  Creationism (8)  |  Despise (16)  |  Different (595)  |  Educator (7)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Exist (458)  |  Foolish (41)  |  Idea (881)  |  Important (229)  |  Insist (22)  |  Material (366)  |  Method (531)  |  Must (1525)  |  Narrative (9)  |  Other (2233)  |  Point (584)  |  Position (83)  |  Profound (105)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Relation (166)  |  Religious (134)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Side (236)  |  Side By Side (2)  |  Stand (284)  |  Tell (344)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Travail (5)  |  Universe (900)  |  Unjustifiable (2)  |  Unnecessary (23)

Edward [Teller] isn’t the cloistered kind of scientist. He gets his ideas in conversation and develops them by trying them out on people. We were coming back from Europe on the Ile de France and I was standing in the ship’s nightclub when he came up and said, 'Freddie, I think I have an idea.’ It was something he’d just thought of about magnetohydrodynamics. I was a bachelor then and I’d located several good-looking girls on the ship, but I knew what I had to do, so I disappeared and started working on the calculations. I’d get something finished and start prowling on the deck again when Edward would turn up out of the night and we’d walk the deck together while he talked and I was the brick wall he was bouncing these things off of. By the end of the trip we had a paper. He’d had the ideas, and I’d done some solving of equations. But he insisted that we sign in alphabetical order, which put my name first.
As quoted in Robert Coughlan, 'Dr. Edward Teller’s Magnificent Obsession', Life (6 Sep 1954), 61-62.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Bounce (2)  |  Brick (20)  |  Brick Wall (2)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Coming (114)  |  Conversation (46)  |  Develop (278)  |  Disappear (84)  |  Do (1905)  |  End (603)  |  Equation (138)  |  Finish (62)  |  First (1302)  |  Girl (38)  |  Good (906)  |  Idea (881)  |  Insist (22)  |  Kind (564)  |  Looking (191)  |  Name (359)  |  Order (638)  |  Paper (192)  |  People (1031)  |  Reclusive (2)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Ship (69)  |  Solve (145)  |  Start (237)  |  Edward Teller (43)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Together (392)  |  Trying (144)  |  Turn (454)  |  Walk (138)  |  Wall (71)

Einstein’s 1905 paper came out and suddenly changed people’s thinking about space-time. We’re again [2007] in the middle of something like that. When the dust settles, time—whatever it may be—could turn out to be even stranger and more illusory than even Einstein could imagine.
Quoted by Tim Folger in 'Newsflash: Time May Not Exist', Discover Magazine (Jun 2007).
Science quotes on:  |  Dust (68)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  Imagine (176)  |  More (2558)  |  Paper (192)  |  People (1031)  |  Publication (102)  |  Space (523)  |  Space-Time (20)  |  Strange (160)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Time (1911)  |  Turn (454)  |  Whatever (234)

ELECTRICITY, n. The power that causes all natural phenomena not known to be caused by something else. It is the same thing as lightning, and its famous attempt to strike Dr. Franklin is one of the most picturesque incidents in that great and good man's career. The memory of Dr. Franklin is justly held in great reverence, particularly in France, where a waxen effigy of him was recently on exhibition, bearing the following touching account of his life and services to science:
Monsieur Franqulin, inventor of electricity. This illustrious savant, after having made several voyages around the world, died on the Sandwich Islands and was devoured by savages, of whom not a single fragment was ever recovered.
Electricity seems destined to play a most important part in the arts and industries. The question of its economical application to some purposes is still unsettled, but experiment has already proved that it will propel a street car better than a gas jet and give more light than a horse.
The Cynic's Word Book (1906), 87. Also published later as The Devil's Dictionary.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Already (226)  |  Application (257)  |  Art (680)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Better (493)  |  Car (75)  |  Career (86)  |  Cause (561)  |  Destined (42)  |  Devour (29)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Exhibition (7)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fragment (58)  |  Benjamin Franklin (95)  |  Gas (89)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Horse (78)  |  Humour (116)  |  Illustrious (10)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Island (49)  |  Known (453)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Man (2252)  |  Memory (144)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Natural (810)  |  Power (771)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Question (649)  |  Service (110)  |  Single (365)  |  Still (614)  |  Strike (72)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Touching (16)  |  Unsettled (3)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

Engineering is quite different from science. Scientists try to understand nature. Engineers try to make things that do not exist in nature. Engineers stress invention. To embody an invention the engineer must put his idea in concrete terms, and design something that people can use. That something can be a device, a gadget, a material, a method, a computing program, an innovative experiment, a new solution to a problem, or an improvement on what is existing. Since a design has to be concrete, it must have its geometry, dimensions, and characteristic numbers. Almost all engineers working on new designs find that they do not have all the needed information. Most often, they are limited by insufficient scientific knowledge. Thus they study mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology and mechanics. Often they have to add to the sciences relevant to their profession. Thus engineering sciences are born.
Y.C. Fung and P. Tong, Classical and Computational Solid Mechanics (2001), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Biology (232)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Concrete (55)  |  Design (203)  |  Device (71)  |  Different (595)  |  Dimension (64)  |  Do (1905)  |  Engineer (136)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Exist (458)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Find (1014)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Idea (881)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Information (173)  |  Invention (400)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Material (366)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Method (531)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Number (710)  |  People (1031)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Problem (731)  |  Profession (108)  |  Science And Engineering (16)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Solution (282)  |  Stress (22)  |  Study (701)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Try (296)  |  Understand (648)  |  Use (771)

Environmentalists may get off on climate porn, but most people just turn away. 'If it was really so bad, they'd do something,' says one colleague, without specifying who 'they' are. The human tendency to convince yourself that everything is OK, because no one else is worried, is deeply ingrained.
'Wake up and smell the smoke of disaster', The Times (8 Nov 2007).
Science quotes on:  |  Bad (185)  |  Climate (102)  |  Colleague (51)  |  Convince (43)  |  Deeply (17)  |  Do (1905)  |  Environmentalist (7)  |  Everything (489)  |  Human (1512)  |  Ingrained (5)  |  Most (1728)  |  People (1031)  |  Say (989)  |  Tendency (110)  |  Turn (454)  |  Worry (34)

Equations are more important to me, because politics is for the present, but an equation is something for eternity.
Quoted in Carl Seelig (ed.), Helle Zeit, Dunkle Zeit: In Memoriam Albert Einstein (1956), 71.
Science quotes on:  |  Biography (254)  |  Equation (138)  |  Eternity (64)  |  More (2558)  |  Politics (122)  |  Present (630)

Even fairly good students, when they have obtained the solution of the problem and written down neatly the argument, shut their books and look for something else. Doing so, they miss an important and instructive phase of the work. ... A good teacher should understand and impress on his students the view that no problem whatever is completely exhausted.
In How to Solve It: A New Aspect of Mathematical Method (2004), 14.
Science quotes on:  |  Argument (145)  |  Book (413)  |  Completely (137)  |  Completeness (19)  |  Doing (277)  |  Down (455)  |  Exhaustion (18)  |  Good (906)  |  Importance (299)  |  Impress (66)  |  Instruction (101)  |  Look (584)  |  Miss (51)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Phase (37)  |  Problem (731)  |  Shut (41)  |  Solution (282)  |  Student (317)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  View (496)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Work (1402)  |  Writing (192)

Every common mechanic has something to say in his craft about good and evil, useful and useless, but these practical considerations never enter into the purview of the mathematician.
Quoted in Robert Drew Hicks, Stoic and Epicurean (1910), 210.
Science quotes on:  |  Common (447)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Craft (11)  |  Enter (145)  |  Evil (122)  |  Good (906)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Never (1089)  |  Practical (225)  |  Say (989)  |  Something To Say (4)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)  |  Uselessness (22)

Every failure teaches a man something, to wit, that he will probably fail again next time.
In A Mencken Chrestomathy (1949, 1956), 617.
Science quotes on:  |  Fail (191)  |  Failure (176)  |  Man (2252)  |  Next (238)  |  Probably (50)  |  Teach (299)  |  Time (1911)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wit (61)

Every man has his little weakness. It often takes the form of a desire to get something for nothing.
Aphorism in The Philistine (Apr 1905), 20, No. 5, 160.
Science quotes on:  |  Desire (212)  |  Form (976)  |  Little (717)  |  Man (2252)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Weakness (50)

Every man has some forte something he can do better than he can do anything else. Many men, however, never find the job they are best fitted for. And often this is because they do not think enough. Too many men drift lazily into any job, suited or unsuited for them; and when they don’t get along well they blame everybody and everything except themselves.
As quoted from an interview by B.C. Forbes in The American Magazine (Jan 1921), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Best (467)  |  Better (493)  |  Blame (31)  |  Do (1905)  |  Drift (14)  |  Enough (341)  |  Everybody (72)  |  Everything (489)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fit (139)  |  Forte (3)  |  Job (86)  |  Lazy (10)  |  Man (2252)  |  Never (1089)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)

Every one is fond of comparing himself to something great and grandiose, as Louis XIV likened himself to the sun, and others have had like similes. I am more humble. I am a mere street scavenger (chiffonier) of science. With my hook in my hand and my basket on my back, I go about the streets of science, collecting what I find.
Quoted in Michael Foster, Claude Bernard (1899), 40.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Basket (8)  |  Collection (68)  |  Comparison (108)  |  Find (1014)  |  Grandiose (4)  |  Great (1610)  |  Himself (461)  |  Hook (7)  |  Humble (54)  |  Humility (31)  |  More (2558)  |  Other (2233)  |  Scavenger (4)  |  Simile (8)  |  Street (25)  |  Sun (407)

Every so often, you have to unlearn what you thought you already knew, and replace it by something more subtle.
With co-author Jack Cohen. In Terry Pratchett, Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen, Chap. 4, 'Science and Magic', The Science of Discworld (Rev. Ed. 2002), 14. Pratchett wrote the fantasy story told in the odd-numbered chapters. Following each, relevant real science is provided by his co-authors, Stewart and Cohen, in the even-numbered chapters (such as Chap. 4), but which of the two wrote which lines, is not designated.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  More (2558)  |  Replace (32)  |  Subtle (37)  |  Thought (995)  |  Unlearn (11)

Every time we get slapped down, we can say, “Thank you Mother Nature,” because it means we’re about to learn something important.
Quoted at end of article of Michael D. Lemonick and J. Madeleine Nash, 'Unraveling Universe', Time (6 Mar 1995), 145, 84.
Science quotes on:  |  Down (455)  |  Importance (299)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Means (587)  |  Mother (116)  |  Mother Nature (5)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Say (989)  |  Slap (3)  |  Thank (48)  |  Thank You (8)  |  Time (1911)

Everything that comes into being seeks room for itself and desires duration: hence it drives something else from its place and shortens its duration.
In The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe (1906), 199.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Desire (212)  |  Drive (61)  |  Duration (12)  |  Everything (489)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Natural Selection (98)  |  Place (192)  |  Room (42)  |  Seek (218)  |  Shorten (5)  |  Survival Of The Fittest (43)

Everything which comes to be, comes to be out of, and everything which passes away passes away into, its opposite or something in between. And the things in between come out of the opposites—thus colors come out of pale and dark. So the things which come to be naturally all are or are out of opposites.
Aristotle
In 'Physics', Book 1, Chapter 2, 188b22, as translated by William Charlton, Physics: Books I and II (1983), 12.
Science quotes on:  |  Color (155)  |  Dark (145)  |  Everything (489)  |  Exist (458)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Law (46)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Pale (9)  |  Pass (241)  |  Thing (1914)

Examine your words well, and you will find that even when you have no motive to be false, it is a very hard thing to say the exact truth, even about your own immediate feelings—much harder than to say something fine about them which is not the exact truth.
In Adam Bede (1859, 1860), 151.
Science quotes on:  |  Exact (75)  |  Examine (84)  |  False (105)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Feelings (52)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fine (37)  |  Hard (246)  |  Harder (6)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Motive (62)  |  Say (989)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)

Experiment is the sole source of truth. It alone can teach us something new; it alone can give us certainty.
Science and Hypothesis (1902), trans. W. J. G. and preface by J. Larmor (1905), 140.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Experiment (736)  |  New (1273)  |  Sole (50)  |  Teach (299)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Truth (1109)

Fear of something is at the root of hate for others and hate within will eventually destroy the hater. Keep your thoughts free from hate, and you will have no fear from those who hate you. ...
David, though small, was filled with truth, right thinking and good will for others. Goliath represents one who let fear into his heart, and it stayed there long enough to grow into hate for others.
In Alvin D. Smith, George Washington Carver: Man of God (1954), 43. Cited in Linda O. McMurry, George Washington Carver, Scientist and Symbol (1982), 107. Smith's book is about his recollections of G.W. Carver's Sunday School classes at Tuskegee, some 40 years earlier. Webmaster, who has not yet been able to see the original book, cautions this quote may be the gist of Carver's words, rather than a verbatim quote.
Science quotes on:  |  David (6)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Enough (341)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Fear (212)  |  Free (239)  |  Good (906)  |  Grow (247)  |  Hate (68)  |  Heart (243)  |  Long (778)  |  Other (2233)  |  Represent (157)  |  Right (473)  |  Root (121)  |  Small (489)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Will (2350)

Finally, since I thought that we could have all the same thoughts, while asleep, as we have while we are awake, although none of them is true at that time, I decided to pretend that nothing that ever entered my mind was any more true than the illusions of my dreams. But I noticed, immediately afterwards, that while I thus wished to think that everything was false, it was necessarily the case that I, who was thinking this, was something. When I noticed that this truth “I think, therefore I am” was so firm and certain that all the most extravagant assumptions of the sceptics were unable to shake it, I judged that I could accept it without scruple as the first principle of the philosophy for which I was searching. Then, when I was examining what I was, I realized that I could pretend that I had no body, and that there was no world nor any place in which I was present, but I could not pretend in the same way that I did not exist. On the contrary, from the very fact that I was thinking of doubting the truth of other things, it followed very evidently and very certainly that I existed; whereas if I merely ceased to think, even if all the rest of what I had ever imagined were true, I would have no reason to believe that I existed. I knew from this that I was a substance, the whole essence or nature of which was to think and which, in order to exist, has no need of any place and does not depend on anything material. Thus this self—that is, the soul by which I am what I am—is completely distinct from the body and is even easier to know than it, and even if the body did not exist the soul would still be everything that it is.
Discourse on Method in Discourse on Method and Related Writings (1637), trans. Desmond M. Clarke, Penguin edition (1999), Part 4, 24-5.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Assumption (96)  |  Awake (19)  |  Body (557)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Completely (137)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Depend (238)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Dream (222)  |  Easier (53)  |  Enter (145)  |  Essence (85)  |  Everything (489)  |  Evidently (26)  |  Exist (458)  |  Extravagant (10)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Firm (47)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Illusion (68)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Know (1538)  |  Material (366)  |  Merely (315)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Present (630)  |  Principle (530)  |  Reason (766)  |  Rest (287)  |  Self (268)  |  Shake (43)  |  Soul (235)  |  Still (614)  |  Substance (253)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wish (216)  |  World (1850)

Firefly meteorites blazed against a dark background, and sometimes the lightning was frighteningly brilliant. Like a boy, I gazed open-mouthed at the fireworks, and suddenly, before my eyes, something magical occurred. A greenish radiance poured from Earth directly up to the station, a radiance resembling gigantic phosphorescent organ pipes, whose ends were glowing crimson, and overlapped by waves of swirling green mist.
“Consider yourself very lucky, Vladimir,” I said to myself, “to have watched the northern lights.”
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Background (44)  |  Blaze (14)  |  Boy (100)  |  Brilliant (57)  |  Consider (428)  |  Crimson (4)  |  Dark (145)  |  Directly (25)  |  Earth (1076)  |  End (603)  |  Eye (440)  |  Firefly (8)  |  Firework (2)  |  Gaze (23)  |  Gigantic (40)  |  Glow (15)  |  Green (65)  |  Light (635)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Lucky (13)  |  Magic (92)  |  Meteorite (9)  |  Mist (17)  |  Mouth (54)  |  Myself (211)  |  Northern Lights (2)  |  Occur (151)  |  Open (277)  |  Organ (118)  |  Overlap (9)  |  Phosphorescent (3)  |  Pipe (7)  |  Pour (9)  |  Radiance (7)  |  Resemble (65)  |  Say (989)  |  Sometimes (46)  |  Station (30)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Swirl (10)  |  Watch (118)  |  Wave (112)

For the birth of something new, there has to be a happening. Newton saw an apple fall; James Watt watched a kettle boil; Roentgen fogged some photographic plates. And these people knew enough to translate ordinary happenings into something new...
Quoted by André Maurois, The Life of Sir Alexander Fleming, trans. by Gerard Hopkins (1959), 167. Cited in Steven Otfinoski, Alexander Fleming: Conquering Disease with Penicillin (1993), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Apple (46)  |  Birth (154)  |  Boil (24)  |  Boiling (3)  |  Enough (341)  |  Fall (243)  |  Fog (10)  |  Happening (59)  |  Kettle (3)  |  New (1273)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  People (1031)  |  Photograph (23)  |  Plate (7)  |  Wilhelm Röntgen (8)  |  Saw (160)  |  Translate (21)  |  Translation (21)  |  Watch (118)  |  Watching (11)  |  James Watt (11)

For the evolution of science by societies the main requisite is the perfect freedom of communication between each member and anyone of the others who may act as a reagent.
The gaseous condition is exemplified in the soiree, where the members rush about confusedly, and the only communication is during a collision, which in some instances may be prolonged by button-holing.
The opposite condition, the crystalline, is shown in the lecture, where the members sit in rows, while science flows in an uninterrupted stream from a source which we take as the origin. This is radiation of science. Conduction takes place along the series of members seated round a dinner table, and fixed there for several hours, with flowers in the middle to prevent any cross currents.
The condition most favourable to life is an intermediate plastic or colloidal condition, where the order of business is (1) Greetings and confused talk; (2) A short communication from one who has something to say and to show; (3) Remarks on the communication addressed to the Chair, introducing matters irrelevant to the communication but interesting to the members; (4) This lets each member see who is interested in his special hobby, and who is likely to help him; and leads to (5) Confused conversation and examination of objects on the table.
I have not indicated how this programme is to be combined with eating.
Letter to William Grylls Adams (3 Dec 1873). In P. M. Harman (ed.), The Scientific Letters and Papers of James Clerk Maxwell (1995), Vol. 2, 1862-1873, 949-50.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Business (156)  |  Chair (25)  |  Collision (16)  |  Colloid (5)  |  Communication (101)  |  Condition (362)  |  Conduction (8)  |  Confusion (61)  |  Conversation (46)  |  Crystal (71)  |  Current (122)  |  Dinner (15)  |  Eat (108)  |  Eating (46)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Examination (102)  |  Flow (89)  |  Flower (112)  |  Freedom (145)  |  Gas (89)  |  Greeting (10)  |  Hobby (14)  |  Hour (192)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Intermediate (38)  |  Irrelevant (11)  |  Lead (391)  |  Lecture (111)  |  Life (1870)  |  Matter (821)  |  Most (1728)  |  Object (438)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Order (638)  |  Origin (250)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Plastic (30)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Program (57)  |  Prolong (29)  |  Radiation (48)  |  Reagent (8)  |  Remark (28)  |  Requisite (12)  |  Say (989)  |  See (1094)  |  Series (153)  |  Short (200)  |  Show (353)  |  Society (350)  |  Something To Say (4)  |  Special (188)  |  Stream (83)  |  Table (105)  |  Talk (108)  |  Uninterrupted (7)

For twenty pages perhaps, he read slowly, carefully, dutifully, with pauses for self-examination and working out examples. Then, just as it was working up and the pauses should have been more scrupulous than ever, a kind of swoon and ecstasy would fall on him, and he read ravening on, sitting up till dawn to finish the book, as though it were a novel. After that his passion was stayed; the book went back to the Library and he was done with mathematics till the next bout. Not much remained with him after these orgies, but something remained: a sensation in the mind, a worshiping acknowledgment of something isolated and unassailable, or a remembered mental joy at the rightness of thoughts coming together to a conclusion, accurate thoughts, thoughts in just intonation, coming together like unaccompanied voices coming to a close.
In Mr. Fortune’s Maggot (1927), 161.
Science quotes on:  |  Accurate (88)  |  Acknowledgment (13)  |  Back (395)  |  Book (413)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Coming (114)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Dawn (31)  |  Ecstasy (9)  |  Examination (102)  |  Fall (243)  |  Finish (62)  |  Joy (117)  |  Kind (564)  |  Library (53)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mental (179)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Next (238)  |  Novel (35)  |  Passion (121)  |  Read (308)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remember (189)  |  Scrupulous (7)  |  Self (268)  |  Sensation (60)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Thought (995)  |  Together (392)

For what is that which we call evil but the absence of good? In the bodies of animals, disease and wounds mean nothing but the absence of health; for when a cure is effected, that does not mean that the evils which were present—namely, the diseases and wounds—go away from the body and dwell elsewhere: they altogether cease to exist; for the wound or disease is not a substance, but a defect in the fleshly substance,—the flesh itself being a substance, and therefore something good, of which those evils—that is, privations of the good which we call health—are accidents. Just in the same way, what are called vices in the soul are nothing but privations of natural good. And when they are cured, they are not transferred elsewhere: when they cease to exist in the healthy soul, they cannot exist anywhere else.
In Marcus Dods (ed.), J.F. Shaw (trans.), The Enchiridion of Augustine, Chap. 9, collected in The Works of Aurelius Augustine, Bishop of Hippo: A new translation (1873), Vol. 9, 181-182.
Science quotes on:  |  Absence (21)  |  Accident (92)  |  Animal (651)  |  Being (1276)  |  Body (557)  |  Call (781)  |  Cease (81)  |  Cure (124)  |  Defect (31)  |  Disease (340)  |  Effect (414)  |  Evil (122)  |  Exist (458)  |  Good (906)  |  Health (210)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Mean (810)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Present (630)  |  Soul (235)  |  Substance (253)  |  Vice (42)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wound (26)

Form your life humanly, and you have done enough: but you will never reach the height of art and the depth of science without something divine.
Idea 68. In Friedrich Schlegel, translated by Ernst Behler and Roman Struc, Dialogue on Poetry and Literary Aphorisms (trans. 1968), 155.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Depth (97)  |  Divine (112)  |  Enough (341)  |  Form (976)  |  Height (33)  |  Life (1870)  |  Never (1089)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reaching (2)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Will (2350)

Furthermore, it’s equally evident that what goes on is actually one degree better than self-reproduction, for organisms appear to have gotten more elaborate in the course of time. Today's organisms are phylogenetically descended from others which were vastly simpler than they are, so much simpler, in fact, that it’s inconceivable, how any kind of description of the latter, complex organism could have existed in the earlier one. It’s not easy to imagine in what sense a gene, which is probably a low order affair, can contain a description of the human being which will come from it. But in this case you can say that since the gene has its effect only within another human organism, it probably need not contain a complete description of what is to happen, but only a few cues for a few alternatives. However, this is not so in phylogenetic evolution. That starts from simple entities, surrounded by an unliving amorphous milieu, and produce, something more complicated. Evidently, these organisms have the ability to produce something more complicated than themselves.
From lecture series on self-replicating machines at the University of Illinois, Lecture 5 (Dec 1949), 'Re-evaluation of the Problems of Complicated Automata—Problems of Hierarchy and Evolution', Theory of Self-Reproducing Automata (1966).
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Alternative (32)  |  Amorphous (6)  |  Being (1276)  |  Better (493)  |  Complete (209)  |  Complex (202)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Course (413)  |  Degree (277)  |  Descend (49)  |  Easy (213)  |  Effect (414)  |  Elaborate (31)  |  Equally (129)  |  Evident (92)  |  Evidently (26)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Exist (458)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Gene (105)  |  Happen (282)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Kind (564)  |  Low (86)  |  Milieu (5)  |  More (2558)  |  Order (638)  |  Organism (231)  |  Other (2233)  |  Phylogenetic (3)  |  Produce (117)  |  Reproduction (74)  |  Say (989)  |  Self (268)  |  Sense (785)  |  Simple (426)  |  Start (237)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Today (321)  |  Will (2350)

Geologists have not been slow to admit that they were in error in assuming that they had an eternity of past time for the evolution of the earth’s history. They have frankly acknowledged the validity of the physical arguments which go to place more or less definite limits to the antiquity of the earth. They were, on the whole, disposed to acquiesce in the allowance of 100 millions of years granted to them by Lord Kelvin, for the transaction of the whole of the long cycles of geological history. But the physicists have been insatiable and inexorable. As remorseless as Lear’s daughters, they have cut down their grant of years by successive slices, until some of them have brought the number to something less than ten millions. In vain have the geologists protested that there must somewhere be a flaw in a line of argument which tends to results so entirely at variance with the strong evidence for a higher antiquity, furnished not only by the geological record, but by the existing races of plants and animals. They have insisted that this evidence is not mere theory or imagination, but is drawn from a multitude of facts which become hopelessly unintelligible unless sufficient time is admitted for the evolution of geological history. They have not been able to disapprove the arguments of the physicists, but they have contended that the physicists have simply ignored the geological arguments as of no account in the discussion.
'Twenty-five years of Geological Progress in Britain', Nature, 1895, 51, 369.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Age Of The Earth (12)  |  Allowance (6)  |  Animal (651)  |  Antiquity (34)  |  Argument (145)  |  Become (821)  |  Controversy (30)  |  Cut (116)  |  Cycle (42)  |  Daughter (30)  |  Definite (114)  |  Discussion (78)  |  Down (455)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Error (339)  |  Eternity (64)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Flaw (18)  |  Furnish (97)  |  Geologist (82)  |  Grant (76)  |  History (716)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Inexorable (10)  |  Insatiable (7)  |  Baron William Thomson Kelvin (74)  |  Limit (294)  |  Long (778)  |  Lord (97)  |  More (2558)  |  More Or Less (71)  |  Multitude (50)  |  Must (1525)  |  Number (710)  |  Past (355)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Plant (320)  |  Protest (9)  |  Race (278)  |  Record (161)  |  Result (700)  |  Slow (108)  |  Strong (182)  |  Successive (73)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Tend (124)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Time (1911)  |  Transaction (13)  |  Unintelligible (17)  |  Vain (86)  |  Validity (50)  |  Variance (12)  |  Whole (756)  |  Year (963)

Geology does better in reclothing dry bones and revealing lost creations, than in tracing veins of lead and beds of iron; astronomy better in opening to us the houses of heaven than in teaching navigation; surgery better in investigating organiation than in setting limbs; only it is ordained that, for our encouragement, every step we make in science adds something to its practical applicabilities.
Modern Painters (1852), Part 3, 8-9.
Science quotes on:  |  Applied Science (36)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Better (493)  |  Bone (101)  |  Creation (350)  |  Dry (65)  |  Encouragement (27)  |  Geology (240)  |  Heaven (266)  |  House (143)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Iron (99)  |  Lead (391)  |  Navigation (26)  |  Practical (225)  |  Setting (44)  |  Step (234)  |  Surgery (54)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Vein (27)

Get a scalpel, and practice just, say, cutting a piece of meat or something like that. You sort of learn how you want to hold your fingers, and that sort of thing, and try to become graceful when you operate.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Learn (672)  |  Meat (19)  |  Practice (212)  |  Say (989)  |  Scalpel (4)  |  Surgery (54)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Try (296)  |  Want (504)

GNU, n. An animal of South Africa, which in its domesticated state resembles a horse, a buffalo and a stag. In its wild condition it is something like a thunderbolt, an earthquake and a cyclone.
The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce (1911), Vol. 7, The Devil's Dictionary,  119.
Science quotes on:  |  Africa (38)  |  Animal (651)  |  Buffalo (7)  |  Condition (362)  |  Cyclone (2)  |  Earthquake (37)  |  Horse (78)  |  Humour (116)  |  Resemble (65)  |  South (39)  |  State (505)  |  Thunderbolt (7)  |  Wild (96)

God was always invented to explain mystery. God is always invented to explain those things that you do not understand. Now, when you finally discover how something works … you don't need him anymore. But … you leave him to create the universe because we haven't figured that out yet.
Interview, collected in Paul C. W. Davies and Julian R. Brown (eds.) Superstrings: A Theory of Everything? (1988), 208-209.
Science quotes on:  |  Create (245)  |  Creation (350)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  God (776)  |  Invention (400)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Need (320)  |  Origin Of The Universe (20)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Universe (900)  |  Work (1402)  |  Working (23)

Gradually, at various points in our childhoods, we discover different forms of conviction. There’s the rock-hard certainty of personal experience (“I put my finger in the fire and it hurt,”), which is probably the earliest kind we learn. Then there’s the logically convincing, which we probably come to first through maths, in the context of Pythagoras’s theorem or something similar, and which, if we first encounter it at exactly the right moment, bursts on our minds like sunrise with the whole universe playing a great chord of C Major.
In short essay, 'Dawkins, Fairy Tales, and Evidence', 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Burst (41)  |  Bursting (3)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Childhood (42)  |  Chord (4)  |  Context (31)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Convincing (9)  |  Different (595)  |  Discover (571)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Experience (494)  |  Finger (48)  |  Fire (203)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hard (246)  |  Hurting (2)  |  Kind (564)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Logic (311)  |  Major (88)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Moment (260)  |  Music (133)  |  Playing (42)  |  Point (584)  |  Pythagoras (38)  |  Right (473)  |  Rock (176)  |  Sunrise (14)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Through (846)  |  Universe (900)  |  Various (205)  |  Whole (756)

Guido was as much enchanted by the rudiments of algebra as he would have been if I had given him an engine worked by steam, with a methylated spirit lamp to heat the boiler; more enchanted, perhaps for the engine would have got broken, and, remaining always itself, would in any case have lost its charm, while the rudiments of algebra continued to grow and blossom in his mind with an unfailing luxuriance. Every day he made the discovery of something which seemed to him exquisitely beautiful; the new toy was inexhaustible in its potentialities.
In Young Archimedes: And Other Stories (1924), 299. The fictional character, Guido, is a seven year old boy. Methylated spirit is an alcohol fuel.
Science quotes on:  |  Alcohol (22)  |  Algebra (117)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Blossom (22)  |  Boiler (7)  |  Break (109)  |  Broken (56)  |  Charm (54)  |  Continue (179)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Enchanted (2)  |  Engine (99)  |  Exquisite (27)  |  Give (208)  |  Grow (247)  |  Heat (180)  |  Inexhaustible (26)  |  Lamp (37)  |  Lose (165)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1273)  |  Potential (75)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remaining (45)  |  Rudiment (6)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Steam (81)  |  Steam Engine (47)  |  Toy (22)  |  Unfailing (6)  |  Work (1402)

Have you ever watched an eagle held captive in a zoo, fat and plump and full of food and safe from danger too?
Then have you seen another wheeling high up in the sky, thin and hard and battle-scarred, but free to soar and fly?
Well, which have you pitied the caged one or his brother? Though safe and warm from foe or storm, the captive, not the other!
There’s something of the eagle in climbers, don’t you see; a secret thing, perhaps the soul, that clamors to be free.
It’s a different sort of freedom from the kind we often mean, not free to work and eat and sleep and live in peace serene.
But freedom like a wild thing to leap and soar and strive, to struggle with the icy blast, to really be alive.
That’s why we climb the mountain’s peak from which the cloud-veils flow, to stand and watch the eagle fly, and soar, and wheel... below...
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (97)  |  Below (26)  |  Blast (13)  |  Brother (47)  |  Cage (12)  |  Captive (2)  |  Climb (39)  |  Climber (7)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Danger (127)  |  Different (595)  |  Eagle (20)  |  Eat (108)  |  Fat (11)  |  Flow (89)  |  Fly (153)  |  Foe (11)  |  Food (213)  |  Free (239)  |  Freedom (145)  |  Full (68)  |  Hard (246)  |  High (370)  |  Hold (96)  |  Icy (3)  |  Kind (564)  |  Leap (57)  |  Live (650)  |  Mean (810)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Often (109)  |  Other (2233)  |  Peace (116)  |  Peak (20)  |  Pity (16)  |  Really (77)  |  Safe (61)  |  Secret (216)  |  See (1094)  |  Serene (5)  |  Sky (174)  |  Sleep (81)  |  Soar (23)  |  Sort (50)  |  Soul (235)  |  Stand (284)  |  Storm (56)  |  Strive (53)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Thin (18)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Veil (27)  |  Warm (74)  |  Watch (118)  |  Wheel (51)  |  Wheeling (3)  |  Why (491)  |  Wild (96)  |  Work (1402)  |  Zoo (9)

He [Robert Hooke] is but of midling stature, something crooked, pale faced, and his face but little belowe, but his head is lardge; his eie full and popping, and not quick; a grey eie. He haz a delicate head of haire, browne, and of an excellent moist curle. He is and ever was very temperate, and moderate in dyet, etc. As he is of prodigious inventive head, so is a person of great vertue and goodnes. Now when I have sayd his Inventive faculty is so great, you cannot imagine his Memory to be excellent, for they are like two Bucketts, as one goes up, the other goes downe. He is certainly the greatest Mechanick this day in the World.
Brief Lives (1680), edited by Oliver Lawson Dick (1949), 165.
Science quotes on:  |  Biography (254)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Delicate (45)  |  Face (214)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Robert Hooke (20)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Little (717)  |  Memory (144)  |  Moist (13)  |  Other (2233)  |  Person (366)  |  Prodigious (20)  |  Two (936)  |  World (1850)

He has something demoniacal in him, who can discern a law, or couple two facts.
In 'Natural History of Massachusetts', The Dial: A Magazine for Literature, Philosophy, and Religion (Jul 1842), 3, No. 1, 39-40. In 'Natural history of Massachusetts', The Dial: A Magazine for Literature, Philosophy, and Religion (Jul 1842), 3, No. 1, 39-40.
Science quotes on:  |  Couple (9)  |  Demon (8)  |  Discern (35)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Law (913)  |  Two (936)

He is not a true man of science who does not bring some sympathy to his studies, and expect to learn something by behavior as well as by application. It is childish to rest in the discovery of mere coincidences, or of partial and extraneous laws.
In A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1862), 381.
Science quotes on:  |  Application (257)  |  Behavior (95)  |  Childish (20)  |  Coincidence (20)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Expect (203)  |  Extraneous (6)  |  Law (913)  |  Learn (672)  |  Man (2252)  |  Men Of Science (147)  |  Mere (86)  |  Partial (10)  |  Rest (287)  |  Study (701)  |  Sympathy (35)  |  True (239)

His [Marvin Minsky’s] basic interest seemed to be in the workings of the human mind and in making machine models of the mind. Indeed, about that time he and a friend made one of the first electronic machines that could actually teach itself to do something interesting. It monitored electronic “rats” that learned to run mazes. It was being financed by the Navy. On one notable occasion, I remember descending to the basement of Memorial Hall, while Minsky worked on it. It had an illuminated display panel that enabled one to follow the progress of the “rats.” Near the machine was a hamster in a cage. When the machine blinked, the hamster would run around its cage happily. Minsky, with his characteristic elfin grin, remarked that on a previous day the Navy contract officer had been down to see the machine. Noting the man’s interest in the hamster, Minsky had told him laconically, “The next one we build will look like a bird.”
Science quotes on:  |  Basic (144)  |  Being (1276)  |  Bird (163)  |  Build (211)  |  Cage (12)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Display (59)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Electronics (21)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Friend (180)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Look (584)  |  Machine (271)  |  Making (300)  |  Man (2252)  |  Maze (11)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Marvin Minsky (10)  |  Model (106)  |  Monitor (10)  |  Navy (10)  |  Next (238)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Officer (12)  |  Progress (492)  |  Rat (37)  |  Remember (189)  |  Run (158)  |  See (1094)  |  Teach (299)  |  Time (1911)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

His mother’s favorite, he [Freud] possessed the self-confidence that told him he would achieve something worth while in life, and the ambition to do so, though for long the direction this would take remained uncertain.
In The Life and Work of Sigmund Freud: The Formative Years and the Great Discoveries, 1856-1900 (1957), 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Ambition (46)  |  Biography (254)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Direction (185)  |  Do (1905)  |  Favorite (37)  |  Sigmund Freud (70)  |  Life (1870)  |  Long (778)  |  Mother (116)  |  Possess (157)  |  Remain (355)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Confidence (11)  |  Uncertain (45)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Worth (172)

However, all scientific statements and laws have one characteristic in common: they are “true or false” (adequate or inadequate). Roughly speaking, our reaction to them is “yes” or “no.” The scientific way of thinking has a further characteristic. The concepts which it uses to build up its coherent systems are not expressing emotions. For the scientist, there is only “being,” but no wishing, no valuing, no good, no evil; no goal. As long as we remain within the realm of science proper, we can never meet with a sentence of the type: “Thou shalt not lie.” There is something like a Puritan's restraint in the scientist who seeks truth: he keeps away from everything voluntaristic or emotional.
Essays in Physics (1950), 68.
Science quotes on:  |  Adequate (50)  |  Being (1276)  |  Build (211)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Common (447)  |  Concept (242)  |  Emotion (106)  |  Everything (489)  |  Evil (122)  |  False (105)  |  Goal (155)  |  Good (906)  |  Inadequate (20)  |  Law (913)  |  Lie (370)  |  Long (778)  |  Never (1089)  |  Proper (150)  |  Puritan (3)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Realm (87)  |  Remain (355)  |  Restraint (16)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Seek (218)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Statement (148)  |  System (545)  |  Thinking (425)  |  True (239)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Type (171)  |  Use (771)  |  Value (393)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wish (216)

Hubble's observations suggested that there was a time, called the big bang, when the universe was infinitesimally small and infinitely dense. Under such conditions all the laws of science, and therefore all ability to predict the future, would break down. If there were events earlier than this time, then they could not affect what happens at the present time. Their existence can be ignored because it would have no observational consequences. One may say that time had a beginning at the big bang, in the sense that earlier times simply would not be defined. It should be emphasized that this beginning in time is very different from those that had been considered previously. In an unchanging universe a beginning in time is something that has to be imposed by some being outside the universe; there is no physical necessity for a beginning. One can imagine that God created the universe at literally any time in the past. On the other hand, if the universe is expanding, there may be physical reasons why there had to be a beginning. One could still imagine that God created the universe at the instant of the big bang, or even afterwards in just such a way as to make it look as though there had been a big bang, but it would be meaningless to suppose that it was created before the big bang. An expanding universe does not preclude a creator, but it does place limits on when he might have carried out his job!
A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes (1988), 8-9.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Bang (29)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Being (1276)  |  Big Bang (45)  |  Break (109)  |  Call (781)  |  Condition (362)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Consider (428)  |  Creator (97)  |  Different (595)  |  Down (455)  |  Event (222)  |  Existence (481)  |  Future (467)  |  God (776)  |  Happen (282)  |  Edwin Powell Hubble (29)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Instant (46)  |  Job (86)  |  Law (913)  |  Limit (294)  |  Literally (30)  |  Look (584)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observational (15)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outside (141)  |  Past (355)  |  Physical (518)  |  Predict (86)  |  Present (630)  |  Reason (766)  |  Say (989)  |  Sense (785)  |  Small (489)  |  Still (614)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Way (1214)  |  Why (491)

I am afraid I shall have to give up my trade; I am far too inert to keep up with organic chemistry, it is becoming too much for me, though I may boast of having contributed something to its development. The modern system of formulae is to me quite repulsive.
Letter to Christian Schönbein (21 May 1862), The Letters of Faraday and Schoenbein, 1836-1862 (1899), footnote, 225.
Science quotes on:  |  Becoming (96)  |  Boast (22)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Contribution (93)  |  Development (441)  |  Formula (102)  |  Inert (14)  |  Modern (402)  |  Organic (161)  |  Organic Chemistry (41)  |  System (545)  |  Trade (34)

I am always surprised when a young man tells me he wants to work at cosmology. I think of cosmology as something that happens to one, not something one can choose.
In Presidential Address (8 Feb 1963), Quarterly Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society (Mar 1963), 4, 185.
Science quotes on:  |  Choice (114)  |  Choose (116)  |  Cosmology (26)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happening (59)  |  Man (2252)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Tell (344)  |  Telling (24)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Want (504)  |  Work (1402)  |  Young (253)

I became expert at dissecting crayfish. At one point I had a crayfish claw mounted on an apparatus in such a way that I could operate the individual nerves. I could get the several-jointed claw to reach down and pick up a pencil and wave it around. I am not sure that what I was doing had much scientific value, although I did learn which nerve fiber had to be excited to inhibit the effects of another fiber so that the claw would open. And it did get me interested in robotic instrumentation, something that I have now returned to. I am trying to build better micromanipulators for surgery and the like.
In Jeremy Bernstein, 'A.I.', The New Yorker (14 Dec 1981).
Science quotes on:  |  Apparatus (70)  |  Better (493)  |  Build (211)  |  Claw (8)  |  Dissect (2)  |  Doing (277)  |  Down (455)  |  Effect (414)  |  Excite (17)  |  Expert (67)  |  Fiber (16)  |  Individual (420)  |  Inhibit (4)  |  Instrumentation (4)  |  Interest (416)  |  Joint (31)  |  Learn (672)  |  Manipulate (11)  |  Mount (43)  |  Nerve (82)  |  Open (277)  |  Operate (19)  |  Pencil (20)  |  Pick Up (5)  |  Point (584)  |  Reach (286)  |  Research (753)  |  Return (133)  |  Robot (14)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Surgery (54)  |  Trying (144)  |  Value (393)  |  Wave (112)  |  Way (1214)

I believe in evidence. I believe in observation, measurement, and reasoning, confirmed by independent observers. I’ll believe anything, no matter how wild and ridiculous, if there is evidence for it. The wilder and more ridiculous something is, however, the firmer and more solid the evidence will have to be.
After stating he did definitely not believe in flying saucers, ancient astronauts, Bermuda Triangle or life after death, he explained what he would believe in. From editorial, 'Don’t You Believe?', Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine (18 Jan 1982), 6, No. 1, 6. Collected in The Roving Mind (1983), 43.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (615)  |  Confirm (58)  |  Confirmation (25)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Firm (47)  |  Independent (74)  |  Matter (821)  |  Measurement (178)  |  More (2558)  |  Observation (593)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Ridiculous (24)  |  Solid (119)  |  Wild (96)  |  Will (2350)

I believe natural beauty has a necessary place in the spiritual development of any individual or any society. I believe that whenever we substitute something man-made and artificial for a natural feature of the earth, we have retarded some part of man’s spiritual growth.
As quoted in Linda Lear, Rachel Carson: Witness for Nature (1997), 259.
Science quotes on:  |  Artificial (38)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Belief (615)  |  Development (441)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Feature (49)  |  Growth (200)  |  Individual (420)  |  Man (2252)  |  Man-Made (10)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Beauty (5)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Retarded (5)  |  Society (350)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Substitute (47)  |  Whenever (81)

I believed that, instead of the multiplicity of rules that comprise logic, I would have enough in the following four, as long as I made a firm and steadfast resolution never to fail to observe them.
The first was never to accept anything as true if I did not know clearly that it was so; that is, carefully to avoid prejudice and jumping to conclusions, and to include nothing in my judgments apart from whatever appeared so clearly and distinctly to my mind that I had no opportunity to cast doubt upon it.
The second was to subdivide each on the problems I was about to examine: into as many parts as would be possible and necessary to resolve them better.
The third was to guide my thoughts in an orderly way by beginning, as if by steps, to knowledge of the most complex, and even by assuming an order of the most complex, and even by assuming an order among objects in! cases where there is no natural order among them.
And the final rule was: in all cases, to make such comprehensive enumerations and such general review that I was certain not to omit anything.
The long chains of inferences, all of them simple and easy, that geometers normally use to construct their most difficult demonstrations had given me an opportunity to think that all the things that can fall within the scope of human knowledge follow from each other in a similar way, and as long as one avoids accepting something as true which is not so, and as long as one always observes the order required to deduce them from each other, there cannot be anything so remote that it cannot be reached nor anything so hidden that it cannot be uncovered.
Discourse on Method in Discourse on Method and Related Writings (1637), trans. Desmond M. Clarke, Penguin edition (1999), Part 2, 16.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Accepting (22)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Better (493)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Cast (69)  |  Certain (557)  |  Complex (202)  |  Comprehensive (29)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Construct (129)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Easy (213)  |  Enough (341)  |  Examine (84)  |  Fail (191)  |  Fall (243)  |  Final (121)  |  Firm (47)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  General (521)  |  Guide (107)  |  Human (1512)  |  Include (93)  |  Inference (45)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Logic (311)  |  Long (778)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Multiplicity (14)  |  Natural (810)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Object (438)  |  Observe (179)  |  Omit (12)  |  Opportunity (95)  |  Order (638)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Other (2233)  |  Possible (560)  |  Prejudice (96)  |  Problem (731)  |  Reach (286)  |  Remote (86)  |  Required (108)  |  Resolution (24)  |  Resolve (43)  |  Review (27)  |  Rule (307)  |  Scope (44)  |  Simple (426)  |  Step (234)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Uncover (20)  |  Use (771)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whatever (234)

I came to biochemistry through chemistry; I came to chemistry, partly by the labyrinthine routes that I have related, and partly through the youthful romantic notion that the natural sciences had something to do with nature. What I liked about chemistry was its clarity surrounded by darkness; what attracted me, slowly and hesitatingly, to biology was its darkness surrounded by the brightness of the givenness of nature, the holiness of life. And so I have always oscillated between the brightness of reality and the darkness of the unknowable. When Pascal speaks of God in hiding, Deus absconditus, we hear not only the profound existential thinker, but also the great searcher for the reality of the world. I consider this unquenchable resonance as the greatest gift that can be bestowed on a naturalist.
Heraclitean Fire: Sketches from a Life before Nature (1978), 55.
Science quotes on:  |  Bestow (18)  |  Biochemist (9)  |  Biochemistry (50)  |  Biology (232)  |  Brightness (12)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Clarity (49)  |  Consider (428)  |  Darkness (72)  |  Do (1905)  |  Gift (105)  |  God (776)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Hear (144)  |  Hiding (12)  |  Holiness (7)  |  Life (1870)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Naturalist (79)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Notion (120)  |  Blaise Pascal (81)  |  Profound (105)  |  Reality (274)  |  Resonance (7)  |  Romantic (13)  |  Speak (240)  |  Thinker (41)  |  Through (846)  |  World (1850)

I can see him [Sylvester] now, with his white beard and few locks of gray hair, his forehead wrinkled o’er with thoughts, writing rapidly his figures and formulae on the board, sometimes explaining as he wrote, while we, his listeners, caught the reflected sounds from the board. But stop, something is not right, he pauses, his hand goes to his forehead to help his thought, he goes over the work again, emphasizes the leading points, and finally discovers his difficulty. Perhaps it is some error in his figures, perhaps an oversight in the reasoning. Sometimes, however, the difficulty is not elucidated, and then there is not much to the rest of the lecture. But at the next lecture we would hear of some new discovery that was the outcome of that difficulty, and of some article for the Journal, which he had begun. If a text-book had been taken up at the beginning, with the intention of following it, that text-book was most likely doomed to oblivion for the rest of the term, or until the class had been made listeners to every new thought and principle that had sprung from the laboratory of his mind, in consequence of that first difficulty. Other difficulties would soon appear, so that no text-book could last more than half of the term. In this way his class listened to almost all of the work that subsequently appeared in the Journal. It seemed to be the quality of his mind that he must adhere to one subject. He would think about it, talk about it to his class, and finally write about it for the Journal. The merest accident might start him, but once started, every moment, every thought was given to it, and, as much as possible, he read what others had done in the same direction; but this last seemed to be his real point; he could not read without finding difficulties in the way of understanding the author. Thus, often his own work reproduced what had been done by others, and he did not find it out until too late.
A notable example of this is in his theory of cyclotomic functions, which he had reproduced in several foreign journals, only to find that he had been greatly anticipated by foreign authors. It was manifest, one of the critics said, that the learned professor had not read Rummer’s elementary results in the theory of ideal primes. Yet Professor Smith’s report on the theory of numbers, which contained a full synopsis of Kummer’s theory, was Professor Sylvester’s constant companion.
This weakness of Professor Sylvester, in not being able to read what others had done, is perhaps a concomitant of his peculiar genius. Other minds could pass over little difficulties and not be troubled by them, and so go on to a final understanding of the results of the author. But not so with him. A difficulty, however small, worried him, and he was sure to have difficulties until the subject had been worked over in his own way, to correspond with his own mode of thought. To read the work of others, meant therefore to him an almost independent development of it. Like the man whose pleasure in life is to pioneer the way for society into the forests, his rugged mind could derive satisfaction only in hewing out its own paths; and only when his efforts brought him into the uncleared fields of mathematics did he find his place in the Universe.
In Florian Cajori, Teaching and History of Mathematics in the United States (1890), 266-267.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Adhere (3)  |  Anticipate (20)  |  Appear (122)  |  Article (22)  |  Author (175)  |  Beard (8)  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Being (1276)  |  Board (13)  |  Book (413)  |  Bring (95)  |  Class (168)  |  Companion (22)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Constant (148)  |  Contain (68)  |  Correspond (13)  |  Critic (21)  |  Derive (70)  |  Development (441)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Direction (185)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Doom (34)  |  Effort (243)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Elucidate (4)  |  Emphasize (25)  |  Error (339)  |  Example (98)  |  Explain (334)  |  Field (378)  |  Figure (162)  |  Final (121)  |  Finally (26)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Forehead (3)  |  Foreign (45)  |  Forest (161)  |  Formula (102)  |  Full (68)  |  Function (235)  |  Genius (301)  |  Give (208)  |  Greatly (12)  |  Hair (25)  |  Half (63)  |  Hand (149)  |  Hear (144)  |  Help (116)  |  Hew (3)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Independent (74)  |  Intention (46)  |  Journal (31)  |  Ernst Eduard Kummer (3)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Last (425)  |  Late (119)  |  Lead (391)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Lecture (111)  |  Life (1870)  |  Likely (36)  |  Listen (81)  |  Listener (7)  |  Little (717)  |  Man (2252)  |  Manifest (21)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Mere (86)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mode (43)  |  Moment (260)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  New (1273)  |  Next (238)  |  Notable (6)  |  Number (710)  |  Oblivion (10)  |  Often (109)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outcome (15)  |  Oversight (4)  |  Pass (241)  |  Path (159)  |  Pause (6)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Pioneer (37)  |  Place (192)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Point (584)  |  Possible (560)  |  Prime (11)  |  Principle (530)  |  Professor (133)  |  Quality (139)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  Read (308)  |  Real (159)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Report (42)  |  Reproduce (12)  |  Rest (287)  |  Result (700)  |  Right (473)  |  Rugged (7)  |  Rum (3)  |  Same (166)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  Say (989)  |  See (1094)  |  Seem (150)  |  Several (33)  |  Small (489)  |  Smith (3)  |  Society (350)  |  Soon (187)  |  Sound (187)  |  Spring (140)  |  Start (237)  |  Stop (89)  |  Subject (543)  |  Subsequently (2)  |  James Joseph Sylvester (58)  |  Synopsis (2)  |  Talk (108)  |  Term (357)  |  Textbook (39)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Theory Of Numbers (7)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Universe (900)  |  Way (1214)  |  Weakness (50)  |  White (132)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worry (34)  |  Wrinkle (4)  |  Write (250)  |  Writing (192)

I can think of a few microorganisms, possibly the tubercle bacillus, the syphilis spirochete, the malarial parasite, and a few others, that have a selective advantage in their ability to infect human beings, but there is nothing to be gained, in an evolutionary sense, by the capacity to cause illness or death. Pathogenicity may be something of a disadvantage for most microbes…
In 'Germs', The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher (1974), 90.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Advantage (144)  |  Bacillus (9)  |  Being (1276)  |  Capacity (105)  |  Cause (561)  |  Death (406)  |  Disadvantage (10)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Gain (146)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Illness (35)  |  Infect (3)  |  Malaria (10)  |  Microbe (30)  |  Microbes (14)  |  Microorganism (29)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Other (2233)  |  Parasite (33)  |  Pathogen (5)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Selective (21)  |  Sense (785)  |  Spirochete (2)  |  Syphilis (6)  |  Think (1122)

I cannot but be astonished that Sarsi should persist in trying to prove by means of witnesses something that I may see for myself at any time by means of experiment. Witnesses are examined in doutbful matters which are past and transient, not in those which are actual and present. A judge must seek by means of witnesses to determine whether Peter injured John last night, but not whether John was injured, since the judge can see that for himself.
'The Assayer' (1623), trans. Stillman Drake, Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo (1957), 271.
Science quotes on:  |  Actual (118)  |  Astonish (39)  |  Determine (152)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Himself (461)  |  Judge (114)  |  Last (425)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Must (1525)  |  Myself (211)  |  Observation (593)  |  Past (355)  |  Present (630)  |  Prove (261)  |  See (1094)  |  Seek (218)  |  Time (1911)  |  Transient (13)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Trying (144)

I cannot tell you the efforts to which I was condemned to understand something of the diagrams of Descriptive Geometry, which I detest.
Epigraph, without citation, in E.T. Bell, Men of Mathematics (1937, 1965), 181.
Science quotes on:  |  Condemn (44)  |  Condemned (5)  |  Descriptive (18)  |  Descriptive Geometry (3)  |  Detest (5)  |  Diagram (20)  |  Effort (243)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Tell (344)  |  Understand (648)

I consider that a man’s brain originally is like a little empty attic, and you have to stock it with such furniture as you choose. A fool takes in all the lumber of every sort that he comes across, so that the knowledge which might be useful to him gets crowded out, or at best is jumbled up with a lot of other things so that he has a difficulty in laying his hands upon it. Now the skilful workman is very careful indeed as to what he takes into his brain-attic. He will have nothing but the tools which may help him in doing his work, but of these he has a large assortment, and all in the most perfect order. It is a mistake to think that that little room has elastic walls and can distend to any extent. Depend upon it there comes a time when for every addition of knowledge you forget something that you knew before. It is of the highest importance, therefore, not to have useless facts elbowing out the useful ones.
In 'The Science Of Deduction', A Study In Scarlet (1887, 1904), 15-16.
Science quotes on:  |  Addition (70)  |  Assortment (5)  |  Attic (3)  |  Best (467)  |  Brain (281)  |  Choose (116)  |  Consider (428)  |  Crowd (25)  |  Depend (238)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Doing (277)  |  Elastic (2)  |  Empty (82)  |  Extent (142)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Fool (121)  |  Forget (125)  |  Furniture (8)  |  Importance (299)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Jumble (10)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Large (398)  |  Little (717)  |  Lot (151)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tool (129)  |  Useful (260)  |  Useless (38)  |  Wall (71)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

I consider then, that generally speaking, to render a reason of an effect or Phaenomenon, is to deduce It from something else in Nature more known than it self, and that consequently there may be divers kinds of Degrees of Explication of the same thing. For although such Explications be the most satisfactory to the Understanding, wherein ’tis shewn how the effect is produc’d by the more primitive and Catholick Affection of Matter, namely bulk, shape and motion, yet are not these Explications to be despis’d, wherein particular effects are deduc’d from the more obvious and familiar Qualities or States of Bodies, … For in the search after Natural Causes, every new measure of Discovery does both instinct and gratifie the Understanding.
Physiological Essays (1669), 20.
Science quotes on:  |  Affection (44)  |  Both (496)  |  Bulk (24)  |  Cause (561)  |  Consider (428)  |  Degree (277)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Effect (414)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Kind (564)  |  Known (453)  |  Matter (821)  |  Measure (241)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motion (320)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Primitive (79)  |  Reason (766)  |  Render (96)  |  Research (753)  |  Search (175)  |  Self (268)  |  Speaking (118)  |  State (505)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Understanding (527)

I despise Birth-Control first because it is ... an entirely meaningless word; and is used so as to curry favour even with those who would first recoil from its real meaning. The proceeding these quack doctors recommend does not control any birth. ... But these people know perfectly well that they dare not write the plain word Birth-Prevention, in any one of the hundred places where they write the hypocritical word Birth-Control. They know as well as I do that the very word Birth-Prevention would strike a chill into the public... Therefore they use a conventional and unmeaning word, which may make the quack medicine sound more innocuous. ... A child is the very sign and sacrament of personal freedom. He is a fresh will added to the wills of the world; he is something that his parents have freely chosen to produce ... he is their own creative contribution to creation.
In 'Babies and Distributism', The Well and the Shadows (1935). Collected in G. K. Chesterton and Dale Ahlquist (ed.), In Defense of Sanity: The Best Essays of G.K. Chesterton (2011), 272.
Science quotes on:  |  Birth (154)  |  Child (333)  |  Choice (114)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Contribution (93)  |  Control (182)  |  Conventional (31)  |  Creation (350)  |  Creative (144)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Dare (55)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Favor (69)  |  First (1302)  |  Freedom (145)  |  Fresh (69)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Hypocrite (6)  |  Know (1538)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Medicine (392)  |  More (2558)  |  Parent (80)  |  People (1031)  |  Prevention (37)  |  Proceeding (38)  |  Quack (18)  |  Real (159)  |  Recoil (6)  |  Recommend (27)  |  Recommendation (12)  |  Sacrament (2)  |  Sound (187)  |  Strike (72)  |  Use (771)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)  |  Write (250)

I do not believe that science per se is an adequate source of happiness, nor do I think that my own scientific outlook has contributed very greatly to my own happiness, which I attribute to defecating twice a day with unfailing regularity. Science in itself appears to me neutral, that is to say, it increases men’s power whether for good or for evil. An appreciation of the ends of life is something which must be superadded to science if it is to bring happiness, but only the kind of society to which science is apt to give rise. I am afraid you may be disappointed that I am not more of an apostle of science, but as I grow older, and no doubt—as a result of the decay of my tissues, I begin to see the good life more and more as a matter of balance and to dread all over-emphasis upon anyone ingredient.
Letter to W. W. Norton, Publisher (27 Jan 1931). In The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell, 1914-1944 (1968), Vol. 2, 200.
Science quotes on:  |  Adequate (50)  |  Age (509)  |  Apostle (3)  |  Appreciation (37)  |  Attribute (65)  |  Balance (82)  |  Begin (275)  |  Belief (615)  |  Decay (59)  |  Disappoint (14)  |  Disappointment (18)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Dread (13)  |  Emphasis (18)  |  End (603)  |  Evil (122)  |  Good (906)  |  Grow (247)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Increase (225)  |  Ingredient (16)  |  Kind (564)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Matter (821)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Neutral (15)  |  Outlook (32)  |  Power (771)  |  Regularity (40)  |  Result (700)  |  Rise (169)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientific (955)  |  See (1094)  |  Society (350)  |  Source (101)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tissue (51)

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)  |  Impressed (39)  |  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)  |  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 do not see how a man can work on the frontiers of physics and write poetry at the same time. They are in opposition. In science you want to say something that nobody knew before, in words which everyone can understand. In poetry you are bound to say ... something that everyone knows already in words that nobody can understand.
Commenting to him about the poetry J. Robert Oppenheimer wrote.
Quoted in Steven George Krantz, Mathematical Apocrypha Redux: More Stories and Anecdotes of Mathematicians (2005), 169
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Bound (120)  |  Do (1905)  |  Frontier (41)  |  Know (1538)  |  Man (2252)  |  Nobody (103)  |  J. Robert Oppenheimer (40)  |  Opposition (49)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Say (989)  |  See (1094)  |  Time (1911)  |  Understand (648)  |  Want (504)  |  Word (650)  |  Work (1402)  |  Write (250)

I don't really care how time is reckoned so long as there is some agreement about it, but I object to being told that I am saving daylight when my reason tells me that I am doing nothing of the kind. I even object to the implication that I am wasting something valuable if I stay in bed after the sun has risen. As an admirer of moonlight I resent the bossy insistence of those who want to reduce my time for enjoying it. At the back of the Daylight Saving scheme I detect the bony, blue-fingered hand of Puritanism, eager to push people into bed earlier, and get them up earlier, to make them healthy, wealthy and wise in spite of themselves.
In The Diary of Samuel Marchbanks (1947), 75.
Science quotes on:  |  Admirer (9)  |  Agreement (55)  |  Back (395)  |  Bed (25)  |  Being (1276)  |  Blue (63)  |  Care (203)  |  Daylight (23)  |  Daylight Saving Time (10)  |  Detect (45)  |  Detection (19)  |  Doing (277)  |  Eager (17)  |  Earlier (9)  |  Enjoyment (37)  |  Finger (48)  |  Hand (149)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Insistence (12)  |  Kind (564)  |  Long (778)  |  Moonlight (5)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Object (438)  |  People (1031)  |  Push (66)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reckon (31)  |  Reckoning (19)  |  Reduce (100)  |  Reduction (52)  |  Resent (4)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Spite (55)  |  Sun (407)  |  Sunrise (14)  |  Tell (344)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Value (393)  |  Want (504)  |  Waste (109)  |  Wealthy (5)  |  Wise (143)

I felt more determined than ever to become a physician, and thus place a strong barrier between me and all ordinary marriage. I must have something to engross my thoughts, some object in life which will fill this vacuum, and prevent this sad wearing away of the heart.
Entry from her early journal, stated in Pioneer Work in Opening the Medical Profession to Women (1895), 28.
Science quotes on:  |  Barrier (34)  |  Become (821)  |  Determination (80)  |  Fill (67)  |  Heart (243)  |  Life (1870)  |  Marriage (39)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Object (438)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Physician (284)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Sadness (36)  |  Strong (182)  |  Thought (995)  |  Vacuum (41)  |  Will (2350)

I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery, but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing.
As quoted in John Noble Wilford, 'Sizing up the Cosmos: An Astronomers Quest', New York Times (12 Mar 1991), C10.
Science quotes on:  |  Chaos (99)  |  Existence (481)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Find (1014)  |  God (776)  |  Improbable (15)  |  Instead (23)  |  Miracle (85)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Order (638)  |  Organize (33)  |  Principle (530)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Why (491)

I find myself now preaching about the golden age of manned spaceflight, because something went on there, within us, that we’re missing. When we went to the Moon, it was not only just standing on a new plateau for all mankind. We changed the way everybody in the world thought of themselves, you know. It was a change that went on inside of us. And we’re losing that.
From interview with Ron Stone (24 May 1999) for NASA Johnson Space Center Oral History Project on NASA website.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Change (639)  |  Changed (2)  |  Everybody (72)  |  Find (1014)  |  Golden (47)  |  Golden Age (11)  |  Inside (30)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Missing (21)  |  Moon (252)  |  Myself (211)  |  New (1273)  |  Plateau (8)  |  Space Flight (26)  |  Standing (11)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thought (995)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)

I grew up in Brooklyn, New York … a city neighborhood that included houses, lampposts, walls, and bushes. But with an early bedtime in the winter, I could look out my window and see the stars, and the stars were not like anything else in my neighborhood. [At age 5] I didn’t know what they were.
[At age 9] my mother … said to me, “You have a library card now, and you know how to read. Take the streetcar to the library and get a book on stars.” … I stepped up to the big librarian and asked for a book on stars. … I sat down and found out the answer, which was something really stunning.
I found out that the stars are glowing balls of gas. I also found out that the Sun is a star but really close and that the stars are all suns except really far away I didn’t know any physics or mathematics at that time, but I could imagine how far you’d have to move the Sun away from us till it was only as bright as a star. It was in that library, reading that book, that the scale of the universe opened up to me. There was something beautiful about it.
At that young age, I already knew that I’d be very happy if I could devote my life to finding out more about the stars and the planets that go around them. And it’s been my great good fortune to do just that.
Quoted in interview with Jack Rightmyer, in 'Stars in His Eyes', Highlights For Children (1 Jan 1997). Ages as given in Tom Head (ed.), Conversations with Carl Sagan (2006), x.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Already (226)  |  Answer (389)  |  Ask (420)  |  Ball (64)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Biography (254)  |  Book (413)  |  Bright (81)  |  Brooklyn (3)  |  Career (86)  |  Child (333)  |  City (87)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Early (196)  |  Fortune (50)  |  Gas (89)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Happy (108)  |  House (143)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Know (1538)  |  Library (53)  |  Life (1870)  |  Look (584)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  More (2558)  |  Mother (116)  |  Move (223)  |  Neighborhood (12)  |  New (1273)  |  Open (277)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Planet (402)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Scale (122)  |  See (1094)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Sun (407)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Wall (71)  |  Window (59)  |  Winter (46)  |  Young (253)

I happen to be a kind of monkey. I have a monkeylike curiosity that makes me want to feel, smell, and taste things which arouse my curiosity, then to take them apart. It was born in me. Not everybody is like that, but a scientific researchist should be. Any fool can show me an experiment is useless. I want a man who will try it and get something out of it.
Quoted in Guy Suits, ''Willis Rodney Whitney', National Academy of Sciences, Biographical Memoirs (1960), 357.
Science quotes on:  |  Apart (7)  |  Arousal (2)  |  Birth (154)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Everybody (72)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Fool (121)  |  Happen (282)  |  Kind (564)  |  Man (2252)  |  Monkey (57)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Show (353)  |  Smell (29)  |  Take (10)  |  Taste (93)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Try (296)  |  Uselessness (22)  |  Want (504)  |  Will (2350)

I have a peculiar theory about radium, and I believe it is the correct one. I believe that there is some mysterious ray pervading the universe that is fluorescing to it. In other words, that all its energy is not self-constructed but that there is a mysterious something in the atmosphere that scientists have not found that is drawing out those infinitesimal atoms and distributing them forcefully and indestructibly.
Quoted in 'Edison Fears Hidden Perils of the X-Rays', New York World (3 Aug 1903), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Atom (381)  |  Construct (129)  |  Distribution (51)  |  Drawing (56)  |  Energy (373)  |  Fluorescence (3)  |  Infinitesimal (30)  |  Mysterious (83)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Other (2233)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Pervading (7)  |  Radium (29)  |  Ray (115)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Self (268)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Universe (900)  |  Word (650)

I have always felt that astronomical hypotheses should not be regarded as articles of faith, but should only serve as a framework for astronomical calculations, so that it does not matter whether they were right or wrong, as long as the phenomena can be characterized precisely. For who could possibly be certain as to whether the uneven movement of the sun, if we follow the hypotheses of Ptolemy, can be explained by assuming an epicycle or eccentricity. Both assumptions are plausible. That’s why I would consider it quite desirable for you to tell something about that in the preface. In this way you would appease the Aristotelians and the theologians, whose opposition you dread.
From surviving fragment of a Letter (20 Apr 1541) answering a query from Copernicus as to whether he should publish his book (De Revolutionibus). From the German in Leopold Friedrich Prowe, Nicolaus Coppernicus (1883), Vol. 1, Part 2, 521-522. Translated from Prowe by Webmaster using web resources. Original German: “Hypothesen nicht als Glaubens-Artikel zu betrachten seien, sondern nur als Grundlage für die astronomischen Rechnungen zu dienen hätten, so dass es nicht darauf ankomme, ob sie richtig oder falsch seien, wofern sich nur die Erscheinungen dadurch genau bestimmen liessen. »Denn wer dürfte uns wohl darüber sichere Auskunft geben, ob die ungleiche Bewegung der Sonne, wenn wir den Hypothesen des Ptolemaeus folgen, durch Annahme eines Epicykels oder der Ekcentricität zu erklären sei. Beide Annahmen sind gestattet. Daher würde ich—so schliesst Osiander—es für recht wünschenswerth erachten, wenn Du hierüber in der Vorrede etwas beibrächtest. Auf diese Weise würdest Du die Aristoteliker und die Theologen milder stimmen, von denen Du befürchtest, dass sie heftigen Widerspruch kundthun werden.«” Compare Latin text, from Johannes Kepler, 'Apologia Tychonia', Astronomi Opera Omnia (1858), Vol. 1, 246: “De hypothesibus ego sic sensi semper, non esse articulos fidei, sed fundamenta calculi ita ut, etiamsi falsae sint, modo motuum φαινομενα exacte exhibeant, nihil referat; quis enim nos certiores reddet, an Solis inaequalis motus nomine epicycli an nomine eccentricitatis contingat, si Ptolemaei hypotheses sequamur, cum id possit utrumque. Quare plausibile fore videretur, si hac de re in praefatione nonnihil attingeres. Sic enim placidiores redderes peripatheticos et theologos, quos contradicturos metuis.”
Science quotes on:  |  Allowable (2)  |  Appease (6)  |  Aristotelian (2)  |  Article (22)  |  Assumption (96)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Both (496)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Certain (557)  |  Characterize (22)  |  Consider (428)  |  Desirable (33)  |  Eccentricity (3)  |  Epicycle (4)  |  Explain (334)  |  Faith (209)  |  Fear (212)  |  Follow (389)  |  Framework (33)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Long (778)  |  Matter (821)  |  Movement (162)  |  Opposition (49)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Plausible (24)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Preface (9)  |  Ptolemy (19)  |  Regard (312)  |  Right (473)  |  Sun (407)  |  Tell (344)  |  Theologian (23)  |  Vehement (2)  |  Way (1214)  |  Why (491)  |  Wrong (246)

I have always tried to fit knowledge that I acquired into my understanding of the world. … When something comes along that I don’t understand, that I can’t fit in, that bothers me, I think about it, mull over it, and perhaps ultimately do some work with it. That’s perhaps the reason that I’ve been able to make discoveries in molecular biology.
From interview with Neil A. Campbell, in 'Crossing the Boundaries of Science', BioScience (Dec 1986), 36, No. 11, 739.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquired (77)  |  Biology (232)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fit (139)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Molecular Biology (27)  |  Reason (766)  |  Research (753)  |  Think (1122)  |  Ultimately (56)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

I have been battering away at Saturn, returning to the charge every now and then. I have effected several breaches in the solid ring, and now I am splash into the fluid one, amid a clash of symbols truly astounding. When I reappear it will be in the dusky ring, which is something like the state of the air supposing the siege of Sebastopol conducted from a forest of guns 100 miles one way, and 30,000 miles the other, and the shot never to stop, but go spinning away round a circle, radius 170,000 miles.
Letter to Lewis Campbell (28 Aug 1857). In P. M. Harman (ed.), The Scientific Letters and Papers of James Clerk Maxwell (1990), Vol. 1, 1846-1862, 538.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Astounding (9)  |  Charge (63)  |  Circle (117)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Dusky (4)  |  Effect (414)  |  Fluid (54)  |  Forest (161)  |  Never (1089)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ring (18)  |  Saturn (15)  |  Solid (119)  |  Spinning (18)  |  State (505)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Truly (118)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)

I have been described on more than one occasion as belonging to something called the 'Functional School of Social Anthropology' and even as being its leader, or one of its leaders. This Functional School does not really exist; it is a myth invented by Professor Malinowski ... There is no place in natural science for 'schools' in this sense, and I regard social anthropology as a branch of natural science. ... I conceive of social anthropology as the theoretical natural science of human society, that is, the investigation of social phenomena by methods essentially similar to those used in the physical and biological sciences. I am quite willing to call the subject 'comparative sociology', if anyone so wishes.
In A. Kuper, Anthropologists and Anthropology: The Modern British School (1983), 36.
Science quotes on:  |  Anthropology (61)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belonging (36)  |  Biography (254)  |  Biological (137)  |  Branch (155)  |  Call (781)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Exist (458)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Society (14)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Leader (51)  |  Method (531)  |  More (2558)  |  Myth (58)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Physical (518)  |  Professor (133)  |  Regard (312)  |  School (227)  |  Sense (785)  |  Social (261)  |  Society (350)  |  Sociology (46)  |  Subject (543)  |  Willing (44)

I have been especially fortunate for about 50 years in having two memory banks available—whenever I can't remember something I ask my wife, and thus I am able to draw on this auxiliary memory bank. Moreover, there is a second way In which I get ideas ... I listen carefully to what my wife says, and in this way I often get a good idea. I recommend to ... young people ... that you make a permanent acquisition of an auxiliary memory bank that you can become familiar with and draw upon throughout your lives.
T. Goertzel and B. Goertzel, Linus Pauling (1995), 240.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquisition (46)  |  Ask (420)  |  Auxiliary (11)  |  Available (80)  |  Bank (31)  |  Become (821)  |  Carefully (65)  |  Draw (140)  |  Familiarity (21)  |  Fortunate (31)  |  Fortune (50)  |  Good (906)  |  Idea (881)  |  Life (1870)  |  Listen (81)  |  Listening (26)  |  Live (650)  |  Memory (144)  |  People (1031)  |  Permanence (26)  |  Permanent (67)  |  Recommend (27)  |  Recommendation (12)  |  Remember (189)  |  Remembering (7)  |  Say (989)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Two (936)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whenever (81)  |  Wife (41)  |  Year (963)  |  Young (253)  |  Youth (109)

I have been so constantly under the necessity of watching the movements of the most unprincipled set of pirates I have ever known, that all my time has been occupied in defense, in putting evidence into something like legal shape that I am the inventor of the Electro-Magnetic Telegraph.
From a letter to his brother describing the challenge of defending his patents (19 Apr 1848).
Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals (1914), vol.2, 283.
Science quotes on:  |  Brother (47)  |  Challenge (91)  |  Defense (26)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Known (453)  |  Letter (117)  |  Magnetic (44)  |  Most (1728)  |  Movement (162)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Patent (34)  |  Set (400)  |  Telegraph (45)  |  Time (1911)

I have deeply regretted that I did not proceed far enough [as a Cambridge undergraduate] at least to understand something of the great leading principles of mathematics; for men thus endowed seem to have an extra sense.
In Charles Darwin and Francis Darwin (ed.), 'Autobiography', The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin (1887, 1896), Vol. 1, 40.
Science quotes on:  |  Endow (17)  |  Endowed (52)  |  Enough (341)  |  Extra (7)  |  Great (1610)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Principle (530)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Regret (31)  |  Sense (785)  |  Study (701)  |  Undergraduate (17)  |  Understand (648)

I have indeed lived and worked to my taste either in art or science. What more could a man desire? Knowledge has always been my goal. There is much that I shall leave behind undone…but something at least I was privileged to leave for the world to use, if it so intends…As the Latin poet said I will leave the table of the living like a guest who has eaten his fill. Yes, if I had another life to spend, I certainly would not waste it. But that cannot be, so why complain?
Letter to R. C. Craw, quoted in Tuatara (1984) Vol. 27 (1): 5-7
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Behind (139)  |  Biography (254)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Desire (212)  |  Goal (155)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Latin (44)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Spend (97)  |  Table (105)  |  Taste (93)  |  Use (771)  |  Waste (109)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

I have never done anything 'useful'. No discovery of mine has made, or is likely to make, directly or indirectly, for good or ill, the least difference to the amenity of the world... Judged by all practical standards, the value of my mathematical life is nil; and outside mathematics it is trivial anyhow. I have just one chance of escaping a verdict of complete triviality, that I may be judged to have created something worth creating. And that I have created something is undeniable: the question is about its value.
A Mathematician's Apology (1940), 90-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Chance (244)  |  Complete (209)  |  Difference (355)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Good (906)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mine (78)  |  Never (1089)  |  Outside (141)  |  Practical (225)  |  Question (649)  |  Trivial (59)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)  |  Value (393)  |  Verdict (8)  |  World (1850)  |  Worth (172)

I have never done anything “useful.” No discovery of mine has made, or is likely to make, directly or indirectly, for good or ill, the least difference to the amenity of the world... Judged by all practical standards, the value of my mathematical life is nil; and outside mathematics it is trivial anyhow. I have just one chance of escaping a verdict of complete triviality, that I may be judged to have created something worth creating. And that I have created something is undeniable: the question is about its value. [The things I have added to knowledge do not differ from] the creations of the other artists, great or small, who have left some kind of memorial beind them.
Concluding remarks in A Mathmatician's Apology (1940, 2012), 150-151.
Science quotes on:  |  Artist (97)  |  Biography (254)  |  Chance (244)  |  Complete (209)  |  Creation (350)  |  Differ (88)  |  Difference (355)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Good (906)  |  Great (1610)  |  History Of Science (80)  |  Kind (564)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mine (78)  |  Never (1089)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outside (141)  |  Practical (225)  |  Question (649)  |  Small (489)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Trivial (59)  |  Useful (260)  |  Value (393)  |  Verdict (8)  |  World (1850)  |  Worth (172)

I have not yet lost a feeling of wonder, and of delight, that this delicate motion should reside in all the things around us, revealing itself only to him who looks for it. I remember, in the winter of our first experiments, just seven years ago, looking on snow with new eyes. There the snow lay around my doorstep—great heaps of protons quietly precessing in the earth’s magnetic field. To see the world for a moment as something rich and strange is the private reward of many a discovery.
Opening remark, Nobel Lecture (11 Dec 1952).
Science quotes on:  |  Delicate (45)  |  Delight (111)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Eye (440)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Field (378)  |  First (1302)  |  Great (1610)  |  Look (584)  |  Looking (191)  |  Magnetic (44)  |  Magnetic Field (7)  |  Moment (260)  |  Motion (320)  |  New (1273)  |  Private (29)  |  Proton (23)  |  Remember (189)  |  Reside (25)  |  Revelation (51)  |  Reward (72)  |  Rich (66)  |  See (1094)  |  Snow (39)  |  Strange (160)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Winter (46)  |  Wonder (251)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

I have said that science is impossible without faith. … Inductive logic, the logic of Bacon, is rather something on which we can act than something which we can prove, and to act on it is a supreme assertion of faith … Science is a way of life which can only fluorish when men are free to have faith.
In Calyampudi Radhakrishna Rao, Statistics and Truth (1997), 31.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Sir Francis Bacon (188)  |  Faith (209)  |  Free (239)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Inductive (20)  |  Life (1870)  |  Logic (311)  |  Prove (261)  |  Supreme (73)  |  Way (1214)  |  Way Of Life (15)

I like a teacher who gives you something to take home to think about besides homework.
Performed as Edith Ann.
Science quotes on:  |  Home (184)  |  Teacher (154)  |  Think (1122)

I like the word “nanotechnology.” I like it because the prefix “nano” guarantees it will be fundamental science for decades; the “technology” says it is engineering, something you’re involved in not just because you’re interested in how nature works but because it will produce something that has a broad impact.
From interview in 'Wires of Wonder', Technology Review (Mar 2001), 104, No. 2, 88.
Science quotes on:  |  Decade (66)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Guarantee (30)  |  Impact (45)  |  Interest (416)  |  Interested (5)  |  Involved (90)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Produce (117)  |  Say (989)  |  Technology (281)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)  |  Work (1402)

I mean, if 10 years from now, when you are doing something quick and dirty, you suddenly visualize that I am looking over your shoulders and say to yourself “Dijkstra would not have liked this”, well, that would be enough immortality for me.
In concluding paragraph of 'Introducing a Course on Calculi' (30 Aug 1995) in the E. W. Dijkstra Archive manuscript EWD1213.
Science quotes on:  |  Dirty (17)  |  Doing (277)  |  Enough (341)  |  Immortality (11)  |  Looking (191)  |  Mean (810)  |  Quick (13)  |  Say (989)  |  Shoulder (33)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Visualize (8)  |  Year (963)

I myself, a professional mathematician, on re-reading my own work find it strains my mental powers to recall to mind from the figures the meanings of the demonstrations, meanings which I myself originally put into the figures and the text from my mind. But when I attempt to remedy the obscurity of the material by putting in extra words, I see myself falling into the opposite fault of becoming chatty in something mathematical.
Astronomia Nova, New Astronomy, (1609), Introduction, second paragraph.
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (266)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Fault (58)  |  Figure (162)  |  Find (1014)  |  Material (366)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Mental (179)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Myself (211)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Power (771)  |  Professional (77)  |  Publication (102)  |  Reading (136)  |  Remedy (63)  |  See (1094)  |  Word (650)  |  Work (1402)

I never allow myself to become discouraged under any circumstances. … After we had conducted thousands of experiments on a certain project without solving the problem, … we had learned something. For we had learned for a certainty that the thing couldn’t be done that way, and that we would have to try some other way. We sometimes learn a lot from our failures if we have put into the effort the best thought and work we are capable of.
As quoted from an interview by B.C. Forbes in The American Magazine (Jan 1921), 89.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Best (467)  |  Capable (174)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Discouragement (10)  |  Effort (243)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Failure (176)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Learning (291)  |  Lot (151)  |  Myself (211)  |  Never (1089)  |  Other (2233)  |  Persistence (25)  |  Problem (731)  |  Project (77)  |  Solution (282)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Try (296)  |  Way (1214)  |  Work (1402)

I now think the answer is very simple: it’s true. God did create the universe about 13.7 billion years ago, and of necessity has involved Himself with His creation ever since. The purpose of this universe is something that only God knows for sure, but it is increasingly clear to modern science that the universe was exquisitely fine-tuned to enable human life.
In Letter (May 2005), sent to the Hope College 2005 Alumni Banquet, read in lieu of accepting an award in person, because of declining health from cancer.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Billion (104)  |  Biography (254)  |  Create (245)  |  Creation (350)  |  Enable (122)  |  God (776)  |  Himself (461)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Life (32)  |  Involved (90)  |  Know (1538)  |  Life (1870)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Science (55)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Simple (426)  |  Think (1122)  |  Universe (900)  |  Year (963)

I remember working out a blueprint for my future when I was twelve years old I resolved first to make enough money so I'd never be stopped from finishing anything; second, that to accumulate money in a hurry—and I was in a hurry—I'd have to invent something that people wanted. And third, that if I ever was going to stand on my own feet, I'd have to leave home.
In Sidney Shalett, 'Aviation’s Stormy Genius', Saturday Evening Post (13 Oct 1956), 229, No. 15, 26 & 155
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulate (30)  |  Blueprint (9)  |  Enough (341)  |  Finish (62)  |  First (1302)  |  Future (467)  |  Home (184)  |  Hurry (16)  |  Invention (400)  |  Money (178)  |  Never (1089)  |  Old (499)  |  People (1031)  |  Remember (189)  |  Stand (284)  |  Stop (89)  |  Want (504)  |  Year (963)

I said that there is something every man can do, if he can only find out what that something is. Henry Ford has proved this. He has installed in his vast organization a system for taking hold of a man who fails in one department, and giving him a chance in some other department. Where necessary every effort is made to discover just what job the man is capable of filling. The result has been that very few men have had to be discharged, for it has been found that there was some kind of work each man could do at least moderately well. This wonderful system adopted by my friend Ford has helped many a man to find himself. It has put many a fellow on his feet. It has taken round pegs out of square holes and found a round hole for them. I understand that last year only 120 workers out of his force of 50,000 were discharged.
As quoted from an interview by B.C. Forbes in The American Magazine (Jan 1921), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Capability (44)  |  Capable (174)  |  Chance (244)  |  Department (93)  |  Discharge (21)  |  Discover (571)  |  Do (1905)  |  Effort (243)  |  Fail (191)  |  Failure (176)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Find (1014)  |  Force (497)  |  Henry Ford (23)  |  Friend (180)  |  Himself (461)  |  Job (86)  |  Kind (564)  |  Last (425)  |  Man (2252)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Organization (120)  |  Other (2233)  |  Result (700)  |  Square (73)  |  System (545)  |  Talent (99)  |  Understand (648)  |  Vast (188)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)

I said to myself, if there's a group of these people that are so courageous and so selfless, somebody ought to carry their damn banner and do something about. That's 1965. I was 20 years old. I said I was going to commit my career to curing paralysis.
Referring to the paralyzed veteran volunteers in the spinal cord injury laboratory with whom Green worked while attending medical school.
Quoted in Jennifer Kay 'Neurosurgeon Barth Green: Football player's treatment available to all', Associated Press news report, USA Today website (posted 27 Sep 2007).
Science quotes on:  |  Banner (9)  |  Biography (254)  |  Career (86)  |  Carry (130)  |  Commit (43)  |  Do (1905)  |  Green (65)  |  Injury (36)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Myself (211)  |  Neurosurgery (3)  |  Old (499)  |  Paralysis (9)  |  People (1031)  |  School (227)  |  Spinal Cord (5)  |  Volunteer (7)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)

I saw a horrible brown heap on the floor in the corner, which, but for previous experience in this dismal wise, I might not have suspected to be “the bed.” There was something thrown upon it and I asked what it was. “’Tis the poor craythur that stays here, sur; and ’tis very bad she is, ’tis very bad she’s been this long time, and ’tis better she’ll never be, and ’tis slape she doos all day, and ’tis wake she doos all night, and ‘tis the lead, Sur.” “The what?” “The lead, Sur. Sure, ’tis the lead-mills, where women gets took on at eighteen pence a day, Sur, when they makes application early enough, and is lucky and wanted, and ’tis lead-pisoned she is, Sur, and some of them gits lead-pisoned soon and some of them gets lead-pisoned later, and some but not many, niver, and ’tis all according to the constitooshun, Sur, and some constitooshuns is strong, and some is weak, and her constitooshun is lead-pisoned, bad as can be, Sur, and her brain is coming out at her ear, and it hurts her dreadful, and that’s what it is and niver no more and niver so less, Sur.”
In 'New Uncommercial Samples: A Small Star in the East', All the Year Round (19 Dec 1868), New Series, No. 3, 62.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Application (257)  |  Ask (420)  |  Bad (185)  |  Better (493)  |  Brain (281)  |  Brown (23)  |  Coming (114)  |  Corner (59)  |  Disabled (2)  |  Disease (340)  |  Dreadful (16)  |  Ear (69)  |  Early (196)  |  Enough (341)  |  Experience (494)  |  Lead (391)  |  Lead Poisoning (4)  |  Long (778)  |  Mill (16)  |  More (2558)  |  Never (1089)  |  Poor (139)  |  Saw (160)  |  Soon (187)  |  Strong (182)  |  Time (1911)  |  Want (504)  |  Weak (73)  |  Wise (143)

I sought excitement and, taking chances, I was all ready to fail in order to achieve something large.
On the official Raymond Loewry website. Also quoted in part in Society of Industrial Artists and Designers, Designer (1980).
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Ambition (46)  |  Chance (244)  |  Excitement (61)  |  Fail (191)  |  Failure (176)  |  Large (398)  |  Order (638)  |  Ready (43)  |  Risk (68)  |  Seeking (31)

I stand in favor of using seeds and products that have a proven track record. … There is a big gap between what the facts are, and what the perceptions are. … I mean “genetically modified” sounds Frankensteinish. Drought-resistant sounds really like something you’d want.
Speech at Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) convention, San Diego (Jun 2014). Audio on AgWired website.
Science quotes on:  |  Drought (14)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Favor (69)  |  Frankenstein (3)  |  Gap (36)  |  Mean (810)  |  Perception (97)  |  Product (166)  |  Record (161)  |  Seed (97)  |  Sound (187)  |  Stand (284)  |  Term (357)  |  Track (42)  |  Track Record (4)  |  Want (504)

I tell young people to reach for the stars. And I can't think of a greater high than you could possibly get than by inventing something.
From audio on MIT video '1999 Lemelson-MIT Lifetime Achievement Award Winner', on 'Innovative Lives: Stephanie Kwolek and Kevlar, The Wonder Fiber' on the Smithsonian website.
Science quotes on:  |  Greater (288)  |  High (370)  |  Invention (400)  |  People (1031)  |  Person (366)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Reach (286)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Tell (344)  |  Telling (24)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Young (253)

I think every child born on this planet up to the age of about four or five is fascinated by the natural world. If they aren’t it’s because we deprive them of the opportunity. Over half the world’s population is urbanised and the thought that some children may grow up not looking at a pond or knowing how plants grow is a terrible thing. If you lose that delight and joy and intoxication, you’ve lost something hugely precious.
From interview with Alice Roberts, 'Attenborough: My Life on Earth', The Biologist (Aug 2015), 62, No. 4, 14.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Delight (111)  |  Fascinated (2)  |  Grow (247)  |  Intoxication (7)  |  Joy (117)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Looking (191)  |  Lose (165)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural World (33)  |  Opportunity (95)  |  Planet (402)  |  Plant (320)  |  Pond (17)  |  Population (115)  |  Precious (43)  |  Terrible (41)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Urban (12)  |  World (1850)

I think I have been much of my life an irritant. But some people say that something good came out of my research, something valuable that could be regarded as a pearl, and I can assure those who worked with me it was you who made the pearls and I was merely the grain of sand, the irritant to produce the pearls.
Recalling how, when increasingly in demand to serve on committees, upon attempting to resign from one, he was told by the chairman “We want you as an irritant.” Remark at a luncheon, quoted in Obituary, 'Nicholas Kurti, C. B. E. 14 May 1908-24 November 1998', by J.H. Sanders, Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society (Nov 2000), 46, 309.
Science quotes on:  |  Committee (16)  |  Good (906)  |  Grain (50)  |  Life (1870)  |  Merely (315)  |  Pearl (8)  |  People (1031)  |  Regard (312)  |  Research (753)  |  Sand (63)  |  Say (989)  |  Think (1122)  |  Value (393)  |  Work (1402)

I think I’ve had more failures than successes, but I don’t see the failures as mistakes because I always learned something from those experiences. I see them as having not achieved the initial goal, nothing more than that.
Quoted in Timothy L. O’Brien, 'Not Invented here: Are U.S. Innovators Losing Their Competitive Edge?', New York Times (13 Nov 2005), B6.
Science quotes on:  |  Achieve (75)  |  Experience (494)  |  Failure (176)  |  Goal (155)  |  Initial (17)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Mistake (180)  |  More (2558)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  See (1094)  |  Success (327)  |  Think (1122)

I think it is the general rule that the originator of a new idea is not the most suitable person to develop it, because his fears of something going wrong are really too strong…
At age 69.
The Development of Quantum Theory (1971). 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), 111.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Develop (278)  |  Fear (212)  |  General (521)  |  Idea (881)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Originator (7)  |  Person (366)  |  Rule (307)  |  Strong (182)  |  Think (1122)  |  Wrong (246)

I think it’s a very valuable thing for a doctor to learn how to do research, to learn how to approach research, something there isn't time to teach them in medical school. They don't really learn how to approach a problem, and yet diagnosis is a problem; and I think that year spent in research is extremely valuable to them.
On mentoring a medical student.
Quoted in interview by Mary Ellen Avery (1997)
Science quotes on:  |  Approach (112)  |  Diagnosis (65)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Learn (672)  |  Problem (731)  |  Research (753)  |  School (227)  |  Spent (85)  |  Student (317)  |  Teach (299)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Year (963)

I think that harping on [earthquake] prediction is something between a will-o’-the-wisp and a red herring. Attention is thereby diverted away from positive measures to eliminate earthquake risk.
From interview in the Earthquake Information Bulletin (Jul-Aug 1971), 3, No. 4, as abridged in article on USGS website.
Science quotes on:  |  Attention (196)  |  Divert (3)  |  Earthquake (37)  |  Eliminate (25)  |  Herring (4)  |  Measure (241)  |  Positive (98)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Red (38)  |  Risk (68)  |  Think (1122)  |  Will (2350)

I think there is something more important than believing: Action! The world is full of dreamers, there aren’t enough who will move ahead and begin to take concrete steps to actualize their vision.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Ahead (21)  |  Arent (6)  |  Begin (275)  |  Belief (615)  |  Concrete (55)  |  Dreamer (14)  |  Enough (341)  |  Full (68)  |  Important (229)  |  More (2558)  |  Move (223)  |  Step (234)  |  Think (1122)  |  Vision (127)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

I think there will always be something interesting left to be discovered.
From interview with Neil A. Campbell, in 'Crossing the Boundaries of Science', BioScience (Dec 1986), 36, No. 11, 739.
Science quotes on:  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Research (753)  |  Think (1122)  |  Will (2350)

I think we are living in a new time. I think that the ways of working when there was not the current widespread questioning of what science does are no longer applicable. Besides, there is a difference between the sort of research you do when you’re developing something for the first time and the sort of thing you have to do to make sure it continues to work—and the two different sorts of research are done best by different sorts of people. And, just as with basic science, one needs confirmatory experiments. One can’t just have one group saying “yes they’re safe, yes they’re safe, take our word for it, we made them and we know they’re safe”. Someone else, quite independent, needs to take a look, do the confirmatory experiment. Duplication in this case can do nothing but good.
From interview with Graham Chedd, 'The Lady Gets Her Way', New Scientist (5 Jul 1973), 59, No. 853, 16.
Science quotes on:  |  Applicable (31)  |  Basic (144)  |  Best (467)  |  Confirmation (25)  |  Continue (179)  |  Current (122)  |  Develop (278)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Do (1905)  |  Experiment (736)  |  First (1302)  |  Good (906)  |  Independent (74)  |  Know (1538)  |  Living (492)  |  Look (584)  |  New (1273)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  People (1031)  |  Question (649)  |  Research (753)  |  Safe (61)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  Way (1214)  |  Widespread (23)  |  Word (650)  |  Work (1402)

I trust ... I have succeeded in convincing you that modern chemistry is not, as it has so long appeared, an ever-growing accumulation of isolated facts, as impossible for a single intellect to co-ordinate as for a single memory to grasp.
The intricate formulae that hang upon these walls, and the boundless variety of phenomena they illustrate, are beginning to be for us as a labyrinth once impassable, but to which we have at length discovered the clue. A sense of mastery and power succeeds in our minds to the sort of weary despair with which we at first contemplated their formidable array. For now, by the aid of a few general principles, we find ourselves able to unravel the complexities of these formulae, to marshal the compounds which they represent in orderly series; nay, even to multiply their numbers at our will, and in a great measure to forecast their nature ere we have called them into existence. It is the great movement of modern chemistry that we have thus, for an hour, seen passing before us. It is a movement as of light spreading itself over a waste of obscurity, as of law diffusing order throughout a wilderness of confusion, and there is surely in its contemplation something of the pleasure which attends the spectacle of a beautiful daybreak, something of the grandeur belonging to the conception of a world created out of chaos.
Concluding remark for paper presented at the Friday Discourse of the the Royal Institution (7 Apr 1865). 'On the Combining Power of Atoms', Proceedings of the Royal Institution (1865), 4, No. 42, 416.
Science quotes on:  |  Accumulation (51)  |  Aid (101)  |  Attend (67)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Belonging (36)  |  Boundless (28)  |  Call (781)  |  Chaos (99)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Clue (20)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Compound (117)  |  Conception (160)  |  Confusion (61)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Despair (40)  |  Discover (571)  |  Existence (481)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Forecast (15)  |  Formula (102)  |  General (521)  |  Grandeur (35)  |  Great (1610)  |  Growing (99)  |  Hang (46)  |  Hour (192)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intricate (29)  |  Isolated (15)  |  Labyrinth (12)  |  Law (913)  |  Light (635)  |  Long (778)  |  Mastery (36)  |  Measure (241)  |  Memory (144)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Modern (402)  |  Movement (162)  |  Multiply (40)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Number (710)  |  Obscurity (28)  |  Order (638)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Passing (76)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Power (771)  |  Principle (530)  |  Represent (157)  |  Sense (785)  |  Series (153)  |  Single (365)  |  Spectacle (35)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Surely (101)  |  Throughout (98)  |  Trust (72)  |  Unravel (16)  |  Variety (138)  |  Wall (71)  |  Waste (109)  |  Weary (11)  |  Wilderness (57)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

I want to put in something about Bernoulli’s numbers, in one of my Notes, as an example of how the implicit function may be worked out by the engine, without having been worked out by human head & hands first. Give me the necessary data & formulae.
Lovelace Papers, Bodleian Library, Oxford University, 42, folio 12 (6 Feb 1841). As quoted and cited in Dorothy Stein (ed.), 'This First Child of Mine', Ada: A Life and a Legacy (1985), 106-107.
Science quotes on:  |  Analytical Engine (5)  |  Jacob Bernoulli (6)  |  Calculate (58)  |  Data (162)  |  Engine (99)  |  Example (98)  |  First (1302)  |  Formula (102)  |  Function (235)  |  Hand (149)  |  Head (87)  |  Human (1512)  |  Implicit (12)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Note (39)  |  Number (710)  |  Want (504)  |  Work (1402)

Thomas Edison quote “Afraid of things that worked”, record track background+colorized photo of Edison & tinfoil phonograph
derivative art and colorization © todayinsci.com (Terms of Use) (source)

Please respect the colorization artist’s wishes and do not copy this image for ONLINE use anywhere else.

Thank you.

For offline use, click Terms of Use tab on top menu.

I was always afraid of things that worked the first time. Long experience proved that there were great drawbacks found generally before they could be got commercial; but here was something there was no doubt of.
[Recalling astonishment when his tin-foil cylinder phonograph first played back his voice recording of “Mary had a little lamb.”]
Quoted in Frank Lewis Dyer, Thomas Commerford Martin, Edison: His Life and Inventions (1910), 208.
Science quotes on:  |  Afraid (24)  |  Astonishment (30)  |  Back (395)  |  Commercial (28)  |  Cylinder (11)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Drawback (4)  |  Experience (494)  |  First (1302)  |  Great (1610)  |  Invention (400)  |  Little (717)  |  Long (778)  |  Phonograph (8)  |  Recording (13)  |  Success (327)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tin (18)  |  Work (1402)

I was suffering from a sharp attack of intermittent fever, and every day during the cold and succeeding hot fits had to lie down for several hours, during which time I had nothing to do but to think over any subjects then particularly interesting me. One day something brought to my recollection Malthus's 'Principles of Population', which I had read about twelve years before. I thought of his clear exposition of 'the positive checks to increase'—disease, accidents, war, and famine—which keep down the population of savage races to so much lower an average than that of more civilized peoples. It then occurred to me that these causes or their equivalents are continually acting in the case of animals also; and as animals usually breed much more rapidly than does mankind, the destruction every year from these causes must be enormous in order to keep down the numbers of each species, since they evidently do not increase regularly from year to year, as otherwise the world would long ago have been densely crowded with those that breed most quickly. Vaguely thinking over the enormous and constant destruction which this implied, it occurred to me to ask the question, Why do some die and some live? The answer was clearly, that on the whole the best fitted live. From the effects of disease the most healthy escaped; from enemies, the strongest, swiftest, or the most cunning; from famine, the best hunters or those with the best digestion; and so on. Then it suddenly flashed upon me that this self-acting process would necessarily improve the race, because in every generation the inferior would inevitably be killed off and the superior would remain—that is, the fittest would survive.
[The phrase 'survival of the fittest,' suggested by the writings of Thomas Robert Malthus, was expressed in those words by Herbert Spencer in 1865. Wallace saw the term in correspondence from Charles Darwin the following year, 1866. However, Wallace did not publish anything on his use of the expression until very much later, and his recollection is likely flawed.]
My Life: A Record of Events and Opinions (1905), Vol. 1, 361-362, or in reprint (2004), 190.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Animal (651)  |  Answer (389)  |  Ask (420)  |  Attack (86)  |  Average (89)  |  Best (467)  |  Cause (561)  |  Cold (115)  |  Constant (148)  |  Correspondence (24)  |  Cunning (17)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Digestion (29)  |  Disease (340)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Effect (414)  |  Equivalent (46)  |  Evidently (26)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Express (192)  |  Expression (181)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Famine (18)  |  Fever (34)  |  Fit (139)  |  Flash (49)  |  Flaw (18)  |  Generation (256)  |  Healthy (70)  |  Hot (63)  |  Hour (192)  |  Hunter (28)  |  Increase (225)  |  Inferior (37)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Kill (100)  |  Lie (370)  |  Live (650)  |  Long (778)  |  Thomas Robert Malthus (13)  |  Mankind (356)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Number (710)  |  Order (638)  |  People (1031)  |  Phrase (61)  |  Population (115)  |  Positive (98)  |  Principle (530)  |  Process (439)  |  Question (649)  |  Race (278)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  Read (308)  |  Remain (355)  |  Saw (160)  |  Self (268)  |  Small (489)  |  Species (435)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Subject (543)  |  Succeeding (14)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Suffering (68)  |  Superior (88)  |  Survival (105)  |  Survival Of The Fittest (43)  |  Survive (87)  |  Term (357)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Use (771)  |  Usually (176)  |  War (233)  |  Whole (756)  |  Why (491)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)  |  Writing (192)  |  Year (963)

I was working with a Crookes tube covered by a shield of black cardboard. A piece of barium platino-cyanide paper lay on the bench there. I had been passing a current through the tube, and I noticed a peculiar black line across the paper. …
The effect was one which could only be produced in ordinary parlance by the passage of light. No light could come from the tube because the shield which covered it was impervious to any light known even that of the electric arc. …
I did not think; I investigated. …
I assumed that the effect must have come from the tube since its character indicated that it could come from nowhere else. … It seemed at first a new kind of invisible light. It was clearly something new something unrecorded. …
There is much to do, and I am busy, very busy. [Describing to a journalist the discovery of X-rays that he had made on 8 Nov 1895.]
In H.J.W. Dam in 'The New Marvel in Photography", McClure's Magazine (Apr 1896), 4:5, 413.
Science quotes on:  |  Arc (14)  |  Barium (4)  |  Bench (8)  |  Busy (32)  |  Character (259)  |  Current (122)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Effect (414)  |  Electric (76)  |  Experiment (736)  |  First (1302)  |  Impervious (5)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Invisible (66)  |  Kind (564)  |  Known (453)  |  Light (635)  |  Must (1525)  |  New (1273)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Paper (192)  |  Passage (52)  |  Passing (76)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Photograph (23)  |  Produced (187)  |  Ray (115)  |  Shield (8)  |  Test (221)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Through (846)  |  X-ray (43)

I was working with these very long-chain … extended-chain polymers, where you had a lot of benzene rings in them. … Transforming a polymer solution from a liquid to a fiber requires a process called spinning. … We spun it and it spun beautifully. It [Kevlar] was very strong and very stiff—unlike anything we had made before. I knew that I had made a discovery. I didn’t shout “Eureka!” but I was very excited, as was the whole laboratory excited, and management was excited, because we were looking for something new. Something different. And this was it.
From transcript for video interview (2007, published Aug 2012), 'Stephanie Kwolek: Curiosity and the Discovery of Kevlar', in the series Women in Chemistry, on Chemical Heritage Foundation website.
Science quotes on:  |  Benzene (7)  |  Call (781)  |  Different (595)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Eureka (13)  |  Excitement (61)  |  Extend (129)  |  Fiber (16)  |  Invention (400)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Liquid (50)  |  Long (778)  |  Looking (191)  |  Lot (151)  |  Management (23)  |  New (1273)  |  Polymer (4)  |  Process (439)  |  Require (229)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Research (753)  |  Ring (18)  |  Shout (25)  |  Solution (282)  |  Spinning (18)  |  Stiff (3)  |  Strong (182)  |  Transforming (4)  |  Whole (756)

I wasn’t aware of Chargaff’s rules when he said them, but the effect on me was quite electric because I realized immediately that if you had this sort of scheme that John Griffith was proposing, of adenine being paired with thymine, and guanine being paired with cytosine, then you should get Chargaff’s rules.
I was very excited, but I didn’t actually tell Chargaff because it was something I was doing with John Griffith. There was a sort of musical comedy effect where I forgot what the bases were and I had to go to the library to check, and I went back to John Griffith to find out which places he said. Low and behold, it turned out that John Griffith’s ideas fitted in with Chargaff’s rules!
This was very exciting, and we thought “ah ha!” and we realized—I mean what anyone who is familiar with the history of science ought to realize—that when you have one-to-one ratios, it means things go to together. And how on Earth no one pointed out this simple fact in those years, I don’t know.
From Transcript of documentary by VSM Productions, The DNA Story (1973). As excerpted on web page 'Chargaff’s Rules', Linus Pauling and the Race for DNA on website scarc.library.oregonstate.edu
Science quotes on:  |  Adenine (6)  |  Back (395)  |  Base (120)  |  Being (1276)  |  Comedy (4)  |  Cytosine (6)  |  Doing (277)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effect (414)  |  Electric (76)  |  Exciting (50)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Find (1014)  |  Guanine (5)  |  History (716)  |  History Of Science (80)  |  Idea (881)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Know (1538)  |  Library (53)  |  Low (86)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Pair (10)  |  Point (584)  |  Propose (24)  |  Ratio (41)  |  Realize (157)  |  Rule (307)  |  Scheme (62)  |  Simple (426)  |  Tell (344)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Thymine (6)  |  Together (392)  |  Turn (454)  |  Year (963)

I would be the last to deny that the greatest scientific pioneers belonged to an aristocracy of the spirit and were exceptionally intelligent, something that we as modest investigators will never attain, no matter how much we exert ourselves. Nevertheless … I continue to believe that there is always room for anyone with average intelligence … to utilize his energy and … any man could, if he were so inclined, be the sculptor of his own brain, and that even the least gifted may, like the poorest land that has been well-cultivated and fertilized, produce an abundant harvest..
From Preface to the second edition, Reglas y Consejos sobre Investigacíon Cientifica: Los tónicos de la voluntad. (1897), as translated by Neely and Larry W. Swanson, in Advice for a Young Investigator (1999), xv.
Science quotes on:  |  Abundant (23)  |  Aristocracy (7)  |  Attain (126)  |  Attainment (48)  |  Average (89)  |  Belief (615)  |  Belong (168)  |  Brain (281)  |  Continue (179)  |  Cultivated (7)  |  Deny (71)  |  Energy (373)  |  Exceptional (19)  |  Exert (40)  |  Exertion (17)  |  Fertilized (2)  |  Gift (105)  |  Gifted (25)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Harvest (28)  |  Inclination (36)  |  Inclined (41)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Investigator (71)  |  Land (131)  |  Last (425)  |  Man (2252)  |  Matter (821)  |  Modest (19)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Pioneer (37)  |  Poorest (2)  |  Produce (117)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Sculptor (10)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Utilize (10)  |  Will (2350)

I would say here something that was heard from an ecclesiastic of the most eminent degree [Cardinal Baronius (1538-1607)]: “That the intention of the holy ghost is to teach us how one goes to heaven, not how heaven goes.”
Letter to Madame Christina of Lorraine, Grand Duchess of Tuscany: concerning the Use of Biblical Quotations in Matters of Science (1611 5), trans. Stillman Drake, Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo (1957), 186.
Science quotes on:  |  Cardinal (9)  |  Degree (277)  |  Ghost (36)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Holy (35)  |  Intention (46)  |  Most (1728)  |  Religion (369)  |  Say (989)  |  Teach (299)

I would say here something that was heard from an ecclesiastic of the most eminent degree: 'That the intention of the Holy Ghost is to teach us how one goes to heaven, not how heaven goes.
Letter to Cristina di Lorena, Grand Duchess of Tuscany (the mother of his patron Cosmo), 1615. Translation as given in the Galilean Library web page www.galilean-library.org/manuscript.php?postid=43841.
Science quotes on:  |  Degree (277)  |  Ghost (36)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Holy (35)  |  Intention (46)  |  Most (1728)  |  Say (989)  |  Teach (299)

I’d disband NASA for 10 years and take half its budget to avert natural disasters. We could do it, we’ve got the technology. I'd take the other half to deal with disease and suffering. The time has come to do something bold instead of buying wheelchairs.
Quoted in Jennifer Kay 'Neurosurgeon Barth Green: Football player's treatment available to all', Associated Press news report, USA Today website (posted 27 Sep 2007).
Science quotes on:  |  Bold (22)  |  Deal (192)  |  Disaster (58)  |  Disease (340)  |  Do (1905)  |  NASA (12)  |  Natural (810)  |  Neurosurgery (3)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paralysis (9)  |  Suffering (68)  |  Technology (281)  |  Time (1911)  |  Time Has Come (8)  |  Year (963)

I’ve learned that whenever I decide something with an open heart, I usually make the right decision.
Seventh stanza of poem 'On Turning 70'. The poem is printed in Michigan Office of Services to the Aging, Annual Report 2004 (2005), no page number.
Science quotes on:  |  Decide (50)  |  Decision (98)  |  Heart (243)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Open (277)  |  Right (473)  |  Usual (6)  |  Usually (176)  |  Whenever (81)

I’ve learned that you shouldn’t go through life with a catcher’s mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw something back.
Sixth stanza of poem 'On Turning 70'. The poem is printed in Michigan Office of Services to the Aging, Annual Report 2004 (2005), no page number.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Both (496)  |  Catch (34)  |  Hand (149)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Life (1870)  |  Need (320)  |  Through (846)

I’ve never owned a telescope, but it’s something I'm thinking of looking into.
Brain Droppings (1998), 72.
Science quotes on:  |  Looking (191)  |  Never (1089)  |  Telescope (106)  |  Thinking (425)

If any layman were to ask a number of archaeologists to give, on the spur of the moment, a definition of archaeology, I suspect that such a person might find the answers rather confusing. He would, perhaps, sympathize with Socrates who, when he hoped to learn from the poets and artisans something about the arts they practised, was forced to go away with the conviction that, though they might themselves be able to accomplish something, they certainly could give no clear account to others of what they were trying to do.
Opening statement in lecture at Columbia University (8 Jan 1908), 'Archaeology'. Published by the Columbia University Press (1908).
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Account (195)  |  Answer (389)  |  Archaeologist (18)  |  Archaeology (51)  |  Art (680)  |  Artisan (9)  |  Ask (420)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Confusion (61)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Definition (238)  |  Do (1905)  |  Find (1014)  |  Layman (21)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Moment (260)  |  Number (710)  |  Other (2233)  |  Person (366)  |  Poet (97)  |  Science And Art (195)  |   Socrates, (17)  |  Sympathize (2)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Trying (144)

If any spiritualistic medium can do stunts, there is no more need for special conditions than there is for a chemist to turn down lights, start operations with a hymn, and ask whether there's any chemical present that has affinity with something named Hydrogen.
Lo! (1932). In The Complete Books of Charles Fort (1975), 575.
Science quotes on:  |  Affinity (27)  |  Ask (420)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Condition (362)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Hydrogen (80)  |  Hymn (6)  |  Light (635)  |  More (2558)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Present (630)  |  Special (188)  |  Spiritualism (3)  |  Start (237)  |  Stunt (7)  |  Turn (454)

If I get the impression that Nature itself makes the decisive choice [about] what possibility to realize, where quantum theory says that more than one outcome is possible, then I am ascribing personality to Nature, that is to something that is always everywhere. [An] omnipresent eternal personality which is omnipotent in taking the decisions that are left undetermined by physical law is exactly what in the language of religion is called God.
As quoted by John D. Barrow in The Universe that Discovered Itself (2000), 171.
Science quotes on:  |  Ascribe (18)  |  Call (781)  |  Choice (114)  |  Decision (98)  |  Decisive (25)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Everywhere (98)  |  God (776)  |  Impression (118)  |  Language (308)  |  Law (913)  |  Leave (138)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Omnipotent (13)  |  Omnipresent (3)  |  Outcome (15)  |  Personality (66)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Law (15)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Possible (560)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Realize (157)  |  Religion (369)  |  Say (989)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Undetermined (3)

If I knew something about it, I wouldn’t lecture on it!
As quoted in David C. Cassidy, Beyond Uncertainty: Heisenberg, Quantum Physics, and the Bomb (2009), 86. According to Cassidy, this was the response when Sommerfeld was “once asked how he could lecture on a subject he did not understand.” Footnoted as “WH [Werner Heisenberg] to his father, 15 May 1918.”
Science quotes on:  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lecture (111)

If I make a decision it is a possession. I take pride in it, I tend to defend it and not listen to those who question it. If I make sense, then this is more dynamic, and I listen and I can change it. A decision is something you polish. Sensemaking is a direction for the next period.
Personal communication (13 Jun 1995). In Karl E. Weick, 'The Experience of Theorizing: Sensemaking as Topic and Resource'. Quoted in Ken G. Smith (ed.) and Michael A. Hitt (ed), Great Minds in Management: the Theory of Process Development (2005), 398. Weick writes that Gleason explains how leadership needs 'sensemaking rather than decision making.' As a highly skilled wildland firefighter he would make sense of an unfolding fire, giving directives that are open to revision at any time, so they can be self-correcting, responsive, with a transparent rationale. By contrast, decision making eats up valuable time with polishing the decision to get it 'right' and defending it, and also encourages blind spots.
Science quotes on:  |  Change (639)  |  Decision (98)  |  Defend (32)  |  Direction (185)  |  Dynamic (16)  |  Listen (81)  |  More (2558)  |  Next (238)  |  Period (200)  |  Polish (17)  |  Possession (68)  |  Pride (84)  |  Question (649)  |  Sense (785)  |  Tend (124)

If I set out to prove something, I am no real scientist—I have to learn to follow where the facts lead me—I have to learn to whip my prejudices.
Attributed, as cited in Peter McDonald (ed.), Oxford Dictionary of Medical Quotations (2004), 95. Quoted earlier without citation as “If I want to find truth, I must have an open mind. I have to learn to follow where the facts lead me—I have to learn to whip my prejudices,” in World Order (1948), 14, 76.
Science quotes on:  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Follow (389)  |  Lead (391)  |  Learn (672)  |  Prejudice (96)  |  Prove (261)  |  Real (159)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Set (400)

If in physics there’s something you don’t understand, you can always hide behind the uncharted depths of nature. You can always blame God. You didn’t make it so complex yourself. But if your program doesn’t work, there is no one to hide behind. You cannot hide behind an obstinate nature. If it doesn’t work, you’ve messed up.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Behind (139)  |  Blame (31)  |  Complex (202)  |  Depth (97)  |  God (776)  |  Hide (70)  |  Mess (14)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Obstinate (5)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Program (57)  |  Uncharted (10)  |  Understand (648)  |  Work (1402)

If it is good to teach students about the chemical industry then why is it not good to assign ethical qualities to substances along with their physical and chemical ones? We might for instance say that CS [gas] is a bad chemical because it can only ever be used by a few people with something to protect against many people with nothing to lose. Terylene or indigotin are neutral chemicals. Under capitalism their production is an exploitive process, under socialism they are used for the common good. Penicillin is a good chemical.
Quoted in T. Pateman (ed.), Countercourse (1972), 215.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Bad (185)  |  Capitalism (12)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Common (447)  |  Ethic (39)  |  Ethical (34)  |  Exploitation (14)  |  Gas (89)  |  Good (906)  |  Industry (159)  |  Lose (165)  |  Loss (117)  |  Neutral (15)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Penicillin (18)  |  People (1031)  |  Physical (518)  |  Process (439)  |  Production (190)  |  Protect (65)  |  Protection (41)  |  Quality (139)  |  Say (989)  |  Socialism (4)  |  Student (317)  |  Substance (253)  |  Teach (299)  |  Use (771)  |  Why (491)

If someday they say of me that in my work I have contributed something to the welfare and happiness of my fellow man, I shall be satisfied.
In Quentin R. Skrabec, Jr., George Westinghouse: Gentle Genius (2007), 237.
Science quotes on:  |  Contribution (93)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  Say (989)  |  Someday (15)  |  Welfare (30)  |  Work (1402)

If the Lord Almighty had consulted me before embarking upon his creation, I should have recommended something simpler.
Remarking on the complexity of Ptolemaic model of the universe after it was explained to him.
(circa 1250 A.D.) As atttributed, in John Esten Keller, Alfonso X, El Sabio (1967), Preface.
Science quotes on:  |  Almighty (23)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Creation (350)  |  Explain (334)  |  God (776)  |  Lord (97)  |  Model (106)  |  Ptolemy (19)  |  Recommend (27)  |  Universe (900)

If there is a regulation that says you have to do something—whether it be putting in seat belts, catalytic converters, clean air for coal plants, clean water—the first tack that the lawyers use, among others things, and that companies use, is that it’s going to drive the electricity bill up, drive the cost of cars up, drive everything up. It repeatedly has been demonstrated that once the engineers start thinking about it, it’s actually far less than the original estimates. We should remember that when we hear this again, because you will hear it again.
Talk (Apr 2007) quoted in 'Obama's Energy and Environment Team Includes a Nobel Laureate', Kent Garber, US News website (posted 11 Dec 2008).
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Car (75)  |  Clean (52)  |  Coal (64)  |  Cost (94)  |  Do (1905)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Engineer (136)  |  Estimate (59)  |  Everything (489)  |  First (1302)  |  Hear (144)  |  Innovation (49)  |  Lawyer (27)  |  Money (178)  |  Other (2233)  |  Plant (320)  |  Regulation (25)  |  Remember (189)  |  Say (989)  |  Start (237)  |  Technology (281)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Use (771)  |  Water (503)  |  Will (2350)

If there is a wrong way to do something, then someone will do it.
[Subsequently became known as Murphy's Law: “If anything can go wrong, it will.”]
As quoted in Robert L. Forward, 'Murphy Lives!', Science (Jan-Feb 1983), 83, 78. Short form in J.A. Simpson (ed), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs (1982).
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Error (339)  |  Known (453)  |  Law (913)  |  Murphy�s Law (4)  |  Technology (281)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wrong (246)

If there is anything that we wish to change in a child, we should first examine it and see whether it is not something that could be better changed in ourselves.
Carl Jung
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Better (493)  |  Change (639)  |  Child (333)  |  Examine (84)  |  First (1302)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  See (1094)  |  Wish (216)

If there is no intelligence in the universe, then the universe has created something greater than itself—for it has created you and me.
In 'If A Man Die, Shall He Live again?', More Power To You: Fifty Editorials From Every Week (1917), 219.
Science quotes on:  |  Creation (350)  |  Greater (288)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Universe (900)

If there is one thing I’ve learned in my years on this planet, it’s that the happiest and most fulfilled people I’ve known are those who devoted themselves to something bigger and more profound than merely their own self interest.
From speech (3 Oct 1977) announcing he was donating his papers to Ohio State University. As quoted on the OSU website.
Science quotes on:  |  Bigger (5)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Fulfilled (2)  |  Happiest (2)  |  Interest (416)  |  Known (453)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Mere (86)  |  Merely (315)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  People (1031)  |  Planet (402)  |  Profound (105)  |  Self (268)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Year (963)

If there is something very slightly wrong in our definition of the theories, then the full mathematical rigor may convert these errors into ridiculous conclusions.
Feynman Lectures on Gravitation, edited by Brian Hatfield (2002), 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Convert (22)  |  Definition (238)  |  Error (339)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Ridiculous (24)  |  Rigor (29)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Wrong (246)

If there is such a thing as luck, then I must be the most unlucky fellow in the world. I’ve never once made a lucky strike in all my life. When I get after something that I need, I start finding everything in the world that I don’t need—one damn thing after another. I find ninety-nine things that I don’t need, and then comes number one hundred, and that—at the very last—turns out to be just what I had been looking for.
In Martin André Rosanoff, 'Edison in His Laboratory', Harper’s Magazine (Sep 1932), 406.
Science quotes on:  |  Everything (489)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Find (1014)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Last (425)  |  Life (1870)  |  Looking (191)  |  Luck (44)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Never (1089)  |  Number (710)  |  Start (237)  |  Strike (72)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Turn (454)  |  World (1850)

If there were not something of mind in matter, how could matter change the mind?
In Pamela Weintraub (ed.), 'Through the Looking Glass', The Omni Interviews (1984), 161.
Science quotes on:  |  Change (639)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mind (1377)

If we are still here to witness the destruction of our planet some five billion years or more hence ..., then we will have achieved something so unprecedented in the history of life that we should be willing to sing our swan song with joy.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Achieve (75)  |  Billion (104)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Five (16)  |  History (716)  |  Joy (117)  |  Life (1870)  |  More (2558)  |  Planet (402)  |  Sing (29)  |  Song (41)  |  Still (614)  |  Swan (3)  |  Unprecedented (11)  |  Will (2350)  |  Willing (44)  |  Witness (57)  |  Year (963)

If we drove an automobile the way we try to run civilization, I think we would face backwards, looking through the back window, admiring where we came from, and not caring where we are going. If you want a good life you must look to the future. … I think it is all right to have courses in history. But history is the “gonest” thing in the world. … Let’s keep history, but let’s take a small part of the time and study where we are going. … We can do something about the unmade history.
As quoted in book review, T.A. Boyd, 'Charles F. Kettering: Prophet of Progress', Science (30 Jan 1959), 256.
Science quotes on:  |  Automobile (23)  |  Back (395)  |  Backwards (18)  |  Caring (6)  |  Civilization (220)  |  Course (413)  |  Do (1905)  |  Face (214)  |  Future (467)  |  Good (906)  |  History (716)  |  Life (1870)  |  Look (584)  |  Looking (191)  |  Must (1525)  |  Right (473)  |  Run (158)  |  Small (489)  |  Study (701)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Try (296)  |  Want (504)  |  Way (1214)  |  Window (59)  |  World (1850)

If you are young, then I say: Learn something about statistics as soon as you can. Don’t dismiss it through ignorance or because it calls for thought. … If you are older and already crowned with the laurels of success, see to it that those under your wing who look to you for advice are encouraged to look into this subject. In this way you will show that your arteries are not yet hardened, and you will be able to reap the benefits without doing overmuch work yourself. Whoever you are, if your work calls for the interpretation of data, you may be able to do without statistics, but you won’t do as well.
In Facts from Figures (1951), 463.
Science quotes on:  |  Advice (57)  |  Already (226)  |  Artery (10)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Call (781)  |  Crown (39)  |  Data (162)  |  Dismiss (12)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Encourage (43)  |  Hardened (2)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Laurel (2)  |  Learn (672)  |  Look (584)  |  Older (7)  |  Reap (19)  |  Say (989)  |  See (1094)  |  Show (353)  |  Soon (187)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Subject (543)  |  Success (327)  |  Thought (995)  |  Through (846)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whoever (42)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wing (79)  |  Work (1402)  |  Young (253)

If you do something, it’s worth doing well; except to bureaucrats. to them, if you do something, it’s worth doing cheaply.
Aphorism as given by the fictional character Dezhnev Senior, in Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain (1987), 170.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Worth (172)

If you don’t wake up at three in the morning and want to do something, you’re wasting your time.
As quoted in J. Kim Vandiver and Pagan Kennedy, 'Harold Eugene Edgerton', Biographical Memoirs (National Academy of Sciences, 2005), Vol. 86, 111.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Morning (98)  |  Time (1911)  |  Waking (17)  |  Want (504)  |  Waste (109)

If you dream of something worth doing and then simply go to work on it and don't think anything of personalities, or emotional conflicts, or of money, or of family distractions; if you think of, detail by detail, what you have to do next, it is a wonderful dream even though the end is a long way off, for there are about five thousand steps to be taken before we realize it; and [when you] start taking the first ten, and ... twenty after that, it is amazing how quickly you get through through the four thousand [nine hundred] and ninety. The last ten steps you never seem to work out. But you keep on coming nearer to giving the world something.
Victor K. McElheny, Insisting on the Impossible (1999), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Amazing (35)  |  Coming (114)  |  Conflict (77)  |  Detail (150)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Dream (222)  |  End (603)  |  Family (101)  |  First (1302)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Last (425)  |  Long (778)  |  Money (178)  |  Nearer (45)  |  Never (1089)  |  Next (238)  |  Realize (157)  |  Start (237)  |  Step (234)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Through (846)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)  |  Worth (172)

If you had come to me a hundred years ago, do you think I should have dreamed of the telephone? Why, even now I cannot understand it! I use it every day, I transact half my correspondence by means of it, but I don’t understand it. Thnk of that little stretched disk of iron at the end of a wire repeating in your ear not only sounds, but words—not only words, but all the most delicate and elusive inflections and nuances of tone which separate one human voice from another! Is not that something of a miracle?
Quoted in Harold Begbie in Pall Mall magazine (Jan 1903). In Albert Shaw, The American Monthly Review of Reviews (1903), 27, 232.
Science quotes on:  |  Correspondence (24)  |  Delicate (45)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dream (222)  |  Ear (69)  |  End (603)  |  Human (1512)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Iron (99)  |  Little (717)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Miracle (85)  |  Most (1728)  |  Separate (151)  |  Sound (187)  |  Stretch (39)  |  Telephone (31)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tone (22)  |  Understand (648)  |  Use (771)  |  Why (491)  |  Wire (36)  |  Word (650)  |  Year (963)

If you haven’t measured something, you really don’t know very much about it.
Attributed. As quoted in Arthur R. Upgren, Weather: How It Works and Why It Matters (2008), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Measurement (178)

If you look at a tree and think of it as a design assignment, it would be like asking you to make something that makes oxygen, sequesters carbon, fixes nitrogen, distills water, provides habitat for hundreds of species, accrues solar energy’s fuel, makes complex sugars and food, changes colors with the seasons, creates microclimates, and self-replicates.
In audio segment, 'William McDonough: Godfather of Green', WNYC, Studio 360 broadcast on NPR radio (18 Mar 2008) and archived on the station website.
Science quotes on:  |  Accrue (3)  |  Asking (74)  |  Assignment (12)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Change (639)  |  Chemical Engineering (4)  |  Color (155)  |  Complex (202)  |  Create (245)  |  Creation (350)  |  Design (203)  |  Distillation (11)  |  Energy (373)  |  Fix (34)  |  Food (213)  |  Fuel (39)  |  Habitat (17)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Look (584)  |  Nitrogen (32)  |  Oxygen (77)  |  Season (47)  |  Self (268)  |  Sequester (2)  |  Solar Energy (21)  |  Species (435)  |  Sugar (26)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tree (269)  |  Water (503)

If you were going to risk all that, not just risk the hardship and the pain but risk your life. Put everything on line for a dream, for something that’s worth nothing, that can’t be proved to anybody. You just have the transient moment on a summit and when you come back down to the valley it goes. It is actually a completely illogical thing to do. It is not justifiable by any rational terms. That’s probably why you do it.
The Beckoning Silence
Science quotes on:  |  Actually (27)  |  Anybody (42)  |  Back (395)  |  Completely (137)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Dream (222)  |  Everything (489)  |  Hardship (4)  |  Illogical (2)  |  Justifiable (3)  |  Life (1870)  |  Line (100)  |  Moment (260)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Pain (144)  |  Probably (50)  |  Prove (261)  |  Rational (95)  |  Risk (68)  |  Summit (27)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Transient (13)  |  Valley (37)  |  Why (491)  |  Worth (172)

If, as a chemist, I see a flower, I know all that is involved in synthesizing a flower’s elements. And I know that even the fact that it exists is not something that is natural. It is a miracle.
In Pamela Weintraub (ed.), 'Through the Looking Glass', The Omni Interviews (1984), 161.
Science quotes on:  |  Biochemist (9)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Element (322)  |  Exist (458)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Flower (112)  |  Involved (90)  |  Know (1538)  |  Miracle (85)  |  Natural (810)  |  See (1094)  |  Synthesize (3)

If, then, there must be something eternal, let us see what sort of Being it must be. And to that it is very obvious to Reason, that it must necessarily be a cogitative Being. For it is as impossible to conceive that ever bare incogitative Matter should produce a thinking intelligent Being, as that nothing should of itself produce Matter...
In Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690, 1801), Book 4, Chap. 10, Sec. 10, 114.
Science quotes on:  |  Bare (33)  |  Being (1276)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Matter (821)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Produce (117)  |  Reason (766)  |  See (1094)  |  Thinking (425)

Imagine that … the world is something like a great chess game being played by the gods, and we are observers of the game. … If we watch long enough, we may eventually catch on to a few of the rules…. However, we might not be able to understand why a particular move is made in the game, merely because it is too complicated and our minds are limited…. We must limit ourselves to the more basic question of the rules of the game.
If we know the rules, we consider that we “understand” the world.
In 'Basic Physics', The Feynman Lectures on Physics (1964, 2013), Vol. 1, 2-1.
Science quotes on:  |  Basic (144)  |  Being (1276)  |  Chess (27)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Consider (428)  |  Enough (341)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Game (104)  |  God (776)  |  Great (1610)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Know (1538)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Long (778)  |  Merely (315)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Move (223)  |  Must (1525)  |  Observer (48)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Play (116)  |  Question (649)  |  Rule (307)  |  Understand (648)  |  Watch (118)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)

In 1944 Erwin Schroedinger, stimulated intellectually by Max Delbruck, published a little book called What is life? It was an inspiration to the first of the molecular biologists, and has been, along with Delbruck himself, credited for directing the research during the next decade that solved the mystery of how 'like begat like.' Max was awarded this Prize in 1969, and rejoicing in it, he also lamented that the work for which he was honored before all the peoples of the world was not something which he felt he could share with more than a handful. Samuel Beckett's contributions to literature, being honored at the same time, seemed to Max somehow universally accessible to anyone. But not his. In his lecture here Max imagined his imprisonment in an ivory tower of science.
'The Polymerase Chain Reaction', Nobel Lecture (8 Dec 1993). In Nobel Lectures: Chemistry 1991-1995 (1997), 103.
Science quotes on:  |  Accessible (27)  |  Award (13)  |  Samuel Beckett (3)  |  Being (1276)  |  Biologist (70)  |  Book (413)  |  Call (781)  |  Contribution (93)  |  Credit (24)  |  Decade (66)  |  Max Ludwig Henning Delbrück (20)  |  First (1302)  |  Handful (14)  |  Himself (461)  |  Honor (57)  |  Honour (58)  |  Imprisonment (2)  |  Inspiration (80)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Ivory Tower (5)  |  Lament (11)  |  Lecture (111)  |  Life (1870)  |  Literature (116)  |  Little (717)  |  Molecular Biologist (3)  |  More (2558)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Next (238)  |  Nobel Prize (42)  |  People (1031)  |  Publication (102)  |  Research (753)  |  Erwin Schrödinger (68)  |  Share (82)  |  Simulation (7)  |  Somehow (48)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tower (45)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

In a class I was taking there was one boy who was much older than the rest. He clearly had no motive to work. I told him that, if he could produce for me, accurately to scale, drawings of the pieces of wood required to make a desk like the one he was sitting at, I would try to persuade the Headmaster to let him do woodwork during the mathematics hours—in the course of which, no doubt, he would learn something about measurement and numbers. Next day, he turned up with this task completed to perfection. This I have often found with pupils; it is not so much that they cannot do the work, as that they see no purpose in it.
In Mathematician's Delight (1943), 52.
Science quotes on:  |  Accurate (88)  |  Boy (100)  |  Class (168)  |  Complete (209)  |  Completed (30)  |  Course (413)  |  Desk (13)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Draw (140)  |  Drawing (56)  |  Hour (192)  |  Learn (672)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Motive (62)  |  Next (238)  |  Number (710)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Persuade (11)  |  Pupil (62)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Required (108)  |  Rest (287)  |  Scale (122)  |  See (1094)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Task (152)  |  Try (296)  |  Turn (454)  |  Wood (97)  |  Woodwork (2)  |  Work (1402)

In a great number of programmes I’m not a scientist—I’m simply a commentator. So I should claim no virtue for the fact that [people] seem to trust me, if that is indeed the case. It’s simply that I very seldom talk about something they can’t see. If I say a lion is attacking a wildebeest, they can see it is; if I were to say something about a proton, it might be different.
As quoted in Bill Parry, 'Sir David Attenborough in Conversation', The Biologist (Jun 2010), 57, No. 2, 93.
Science quotes on:  |  Claim (154)  |  Different (595)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Great (1610)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Lion (23)  |  Number (710)  |  People (1031)  |  Proton (23)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientist (881)  |  See (1094)  |  Seldom (68)  |  Trust (72)  |  Virtue (117)  |  Wildebeest (2)

In a sense, of course, probability theory in the form of the simple laws of chance is the key to the analysis of warfare;… My own experience of actual operational research work, has however, shown that its is generally possible to avoid using anything more sophisticated. … In fact the wise operational research worker attempts to concentrate his efforts in finding results which are so obvious as not to need elaborate statistical methods to demonstrate their truth. In this sense advanced probability theory is something one has to know about in order to avoid having to use it.
In 'Operations Research', Physics Today (Nov 1951), 19. As cited by Maurice W. Kirby and Jonathan Rosenhead, 'Patrick Blackett (1897)' in Arjang A. Assad (ed.) and Saul I. Gass (ed.),Profiles in Operations Research: Pioneers and Innovators (2011), 25.
Science quotes on:  |  Actual (118)  |  Advanced (12)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Chance (244)  |  Concentrate (28)  |  Course (413)  |  Demonstrate (79)  |  Effort (243)  |  Elaborate (31)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Finding (34)  |  Form (976)  |  Key (56)  |  Know (1538)  |  Law (913)  |  Method (531)  |  More (2558)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Order (638)  |  Possible (560)  |  Probability (135)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Sense (785)  |  Simple (426)  |  Sophisticated (16)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Use (771)  |  Warfare (12)  |  Wise (143)  |  Work (1402)

In ancient days two aviators procured to themselves wings. Daedalus flew safely through the middle air and was duly honored on his landing. Icarus soared upwards to the sun till the wax melted which bound his wings and his flight ended in fiasco. In weighing their achievements, there is something to be said for Icarus. The classical authorities tell us that he was only “doing a stunt,” but I prefer to think of him as the man who brought to light a serious constructional defect in the flying machines of his day.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Aeronautics (15)  |  Air (366)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Authority (99)  |  Aviator (2)  |  Bind (26)  |  Bound (120)  |  Classical (49)  |  Defect (31)  |  Doing (277)  |  End (603)  |  Fiasco (2)  |  Flight (101)  |  Fly (153)  |  Flying (74)  |  Flying Machine (13)  |  Honor (57)  |  Icarus (2)  |  Light (635)  |  Machine (271)  |  Man (2252)  |  Melt (16)  |  Serious (98)  |  Soar (23)  |  Stunt (7)  |  Sun (407)  |  Tell (344)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Think (1122)  |  Through (846)  |  Two (936)  |  Upward (44)  |  Wax (13)  |  Weigh (51)  |  Wing (79)

In biology, nothing is clear, everything is too complicated, everything is a mess, and just when you think you understand something, you peel off a layer and find deeper complications beneath. Nature is anything but simple.
The Hot Zone
Science quotes on:  |  Beneath (68)  |  Biology (232)  |  Clear (111)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Complication (30)  |  Deep (241)  |  Everything (489)  |  Find (1014)  |  Layer (41)  |  Mess (14)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Peel (6)  |  Simple (426)  |  Think (1122)  |  Understand (648)

In Cairo, I secured a few grains of wheat that had slumbered for more than thirty centuries in an Egyptian tomb. As I looked at them this thought came into my mind: If one of those grains had been planted on the banks of the Nile the year after it grew, and all its lineal descendants had been planted and replanted from that time until now, its progeny would to-day be sufficiently numerous to feed the teeming millions of the world. An unbroken chain of life connects the earliest grains of wheat with the grains that we sow and reap. There is in the grain of wheat an invisible something which has power to discard the body that we see, and from earth and air fashion a new body so much like the old one that we cannot tell the one from the other.…This invisible germ of life can thus pass through three thousand resurrections.
In In His Image (1922), 33.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Bank (31)  |  Body (557)  |  Century (319)  |  Chain (51)  |  Connect (126)  |  Descendant (18)  |  Discard (32)  |  DNA (81)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Egypt (31)  |  Fashion (34)  |  Feeding (7)  |  Germ (54)  |  Grain (50)  |  Growth (200)  |  Invisible (66)  |  Life (1870)  |  Look (584)  |  Million (124)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1273)  |  Nile (5)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Old (499)  |  Other (2233)  |  Pass (241)  |  Plant (320)  |  Planting (4)  |  Power (771)  |  Progeny (16)  |  Reap (19)  |  Resurrection (4)  |  Secured (18)  |  See (1094)  |  Slumber (6)  |  Sow (11)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Teeming (5)  |  Tell (344)  |  Thought (995)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Today (321)  |  Tomb (15)  |  Unbroken (10)  |  Wheat (10)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

In consequence of Darwin's reformed Theory of Descent, we are now in a position to establish scientifically the groundwork of a non-miraculous history of the development of the human race. ... If any person feels the necessity of conceiving the coming into existence of this matter as the work of a supernatural creative power, of the creative force of something outside of matter, we have nothing to say against it. But we must remark, that thereby not even the smallest advantage is gained for a scientific knowledge of nature. Such a conception of an immaterial force, which as the first creates matter, is an article of faith which has nothing whatever to do with human science.
In Ernst Haeckel and E. Ray Lankester (trans.), The History of Creation (1880), Vol. 1, 6-9.
Science quotes on:  |  Advantage (144)  |  Against (332)  |  Coming (114)  |  Conception (160)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Create (245)  |  Creation (350)  |  Creative (144)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Descent (30)  |  Development (441)  |  Do (1905)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Existence (481)  |  Faith (209)  |  Feel (371)  |  First (1302)  |  Force (497)  |  Gain (146)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Race (104)  |  Immaterial (6)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Man (2252)  |  Matter (821)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Outside (141)  |  Person (366)  |  Power (771)  |  Race (278)  |  Reform (22)  |  Reformed (4)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Supernatural (26)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Work (1402)

In going on with these Experiments, how many pretty systems do we build, which we soon find ourselves oblig’d to destroy! If there is no other Use discover’d of Electricity, this, however, is something considerable, that it may help to make a vain Man humble.
Letter to Peter Collinson, 14 Aug 1747. In I. Bernard Cohen (ed.), Benjamin Franklin’s Experiments (1941), 63.
Science quotes on:  |  Build (211)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Discover (571)  |  Do (1905)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Find (1014)  |  Humble (54)  |  Man (2252)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Soon (187)  |  System (545)  |  Use (771)  |  Vain (86)

In history an additional result is commonly produced by human actions beyond that which they aim at and obtain—that which they immediately recognize and desire. They gratify their own interest; but something further is thereby accomplished, latent in the actions in question, though not present to their consciousness, and not included in their design. … This may be called the cunning of reason.
From Vorlesungen über die philosophie der weltgeschichte (1837), as translated from the Third German Edition by J. Sibree (1857), in The Philosophy of History (1857, 1861), 28-29 & 34. Hegel coined the expression List der Vernunft translated as the cunning of reason. In Hegel’s philosophical view, the expression represents a process by which a certain purpose is realized in the history of mankind that is not conscious to the acting man.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Aim (175)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Call (781)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Cunning (17)  |  Design (203)  |  Desire (212)  |  History (716)  |  Human (1512)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Interest (416)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Present (630)  |  Produced (187)  |  Question (649)  |  Reason (766)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Result (700)

In my youth I often asked what could be the use and necessity of smelting by putting powdered charcoal at the bottom of the furnace. Nobody could give me any other reason except that the metal and especially lead, could bury itself in the charcoal and so be protected against the action of the bellows which would calcine or dissipate it. Nevertheless it is evident that this does not answer the question. I accordingly examined the operation of a metallurgical furnace and how it was used. In assaying some litharge [lead oxide], I noticed each time a little charcoal fell into the crucible, I always obtained a bit of lead … I do not think up to the present time foundry-men ever surmised that in the operation of founding with charcoal there was something [phlogiston] which became corporeally united with the metal.
Traité de Soufre (1766), 64. French translation published 1766, first published in German in 1718.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Against (332)  |  Answer (389)  |  Ask (420)  |  Asking (74)  |  Bellows (5)  |  Calcination (4)  |  Charcoal (10)  |  Crucible (8)  |  Dissipate (8)  |  Dissipation (2)  |  Do (1905)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Evident (92)  |  Examination (102)  |  Furnace (13)  |  Lead (391)  |  Litharge (2)  |  Little (717)  |  Metal (88)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Nobody (103)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Operation (221)  |  Other (2233)  |  Phlogiston (9)  |  Powder (9)  |  Present (630)  |  Protect (65)  |  Question (649)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reduction (52)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Use (771)  |  Youth (109)

In Nature we never see anything isolated, but everything in connection with something else which is before it, beside it, under it, and over it.
In James Wood, Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources (1893), 183:24.
Science quotes on:  |  Connection (171)  |  Everything (489)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  See (1094)

In outer space you develop an instant global consciousness, a people orientation, an intense dissatisfaction with the state of the world, and a compulsion to do something about it. From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty. You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, “Look at that, you son of a bitch.”
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Compulsion (19)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Develop (278)  |  Dissatisfaction (13)  |  Do (1905)  |  Drag (8)  |  Global (39)  |  Grab (5)  |  Instant (46)  |  Intense (22)  |  International (40)  |  Look (584)  |  Mile (43)  |  Million (124)  |  Moon (252)  |  Neck (15)  |  Orientation (4)  |  Outer Space (6)  |  People (1031)  |  Petty (9)  |  Politician (40)  |  Politics (122)  |  Quarter (6)  |  Say (989)  |  Son (25)  |  Space (523)  |  State (505)  |  Want (504)  |  World (1850)

In physical science a first essential step in the direction of learning any subject is to find principles of numerical reckoning and practicable methods for measuring some quality connected with it. I often say that when you can measure what you are speaking about, and express it in numbers, you know something about it; but when you cannot measure it, when you cannot express it in numbers, your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind; it may be the beginning of knowledge, but you have scarcely in your thoughts advanced to the stage of science, whatever the matter may be.
Often seen quoted in a condensed form: If you cannot measure it, then it is not science.
From lecture to the Institution of Civil Engineers, London (3 May 1883), 'Electrical Units of Measurement', Popular Lectures and Addresses (1889), Vol. 1, 80-81.
Science quotes on:  |  Beginning (312)  |  Connect (126)  |  Direction (185)  |  Essential (210)  |  Express (192)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Kind (564)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Learning (291)  |  Matter (821)  |  Measure (241)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Method (531)  |  Number (710)  |  Numerical (39)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Principle (530)  |  Quality (139)  |  Reckoning (19)  |  Say (989)  |  Scarcely (75)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Stage (152)  |  Step (234)  |  Subject (543)  |  Thought (995)  |  Whatever (234)

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. It’s very rare that a senator, say, replies, “That’s a good argument. I will now change my political affiliation.”
From keynote address at CSICOP conference, Pasadena, California (3 Apr 1987). Printed in 'The Burden of Skepticism', Skeptical Inquirer (1987), 12, No. 1. Collected in Kendrick Frazier (ed.), The Hundredth Monkey: And Other Paradigms of the Paranormal (1991), 5.
Science quotes on:  |  Argument (145)  |  Change (639)  |  Do (1905)  |  Good (906)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Hear (144)  |  Human (1512)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Never (1089)  |  Old (499)  |  Political (124)  |  Politics (122)  |  Rare (94)  |  Religion (369)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Time (1911)  |  View (496)  |  Will (2350)

In science its main worth is temporary, as a stepping-stone to something beyond. Even the Principia, as Newton with characteristic modesty entitled his great work, is truly but the beginning of a natural philosophy, and no more an ultimate work, than Watt’s steam-engine, or Arkwright's spinning-machine.
Co-author with his brother Augustus William Hare Guesses At Truth, By Two Brothers: Second Edition: With Large Additions (1848), Second Series, 46. (The volume is introduced as “more than three fourths new.” This quote is identified as by Julius; Augustus had died in 1833.)
Science quotes on:  |  Sir Richard Arkwright (3)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Engine (99)  |  Great (1610)  |  Machine (271)  |  Modesty (18)  |  More (2558)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Philosophy (52)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Principia (14)  |  Spinning (18)  |  Spinning Machine (2)  |  Steam (81)  |  Steam Engine (47)  |  Stepping Stone (2)  |  Stone (168)  |  Temporary (24)  |  Title (20)  |  Truly (118)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  James Watt (11)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worth (172)

In science one tries to tell people, in such a way as to be understood by everyone, something that no one ever knew before. But in poetry, it’s the exact opposite.
As quoted, without citation, in Robert Jungk and James Cleugh (trans.), Brighter Than a Thousand Suns: A Personal History of the Atomic Scientists (1958), 22. The writing of poetry by Robert Oppenheimer was being remarked upon by Dirac, as he was talking with him.
Science quotes on:  |  Everyone (35)  |  Exact (75)  |  Know (1538)  |  Opposite (110)  |  People (1031)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Tell (344)  |  Try (296)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understood (155)  |  Way (1214)

In scientific thought we adopt the simplest theory which will explain all the facts under consideration and enable us to predict new facts of the same kind. The catch in this criterion lies in the world “simplest.” It is really an aesthetic canon such as we find implicit in our criticisms of poetry or painting. The layman finds such a law as dx/dt = κ(d²x/dy²) much less simple than “it oozes,” of which it is the mathematical statement. The physicist reverses this judgment, and his statement is certainly the more fruitful of the two, so far as prediction is concerned. It is, however, a statement about something very unfamiliar to the plain man, namely the rate of change of a rate of change.
In 'Science and Theology as Art-Forms', Possible Worlds (1927), 227.
Science quotes on:  |  Adopt (22)  |  Aesthetic (48)  |  Catch (34)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Change (639)  |  Concern (239)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Criterion (28)  |  Criticism (85)  |  Differential Equation (18)  |  Enable (122)  |  Explain (334)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fruitful (61)  |  Implicit (12)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Kind (564)  |  Law (913)  |  Layman (21)  |  Lie (370)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1273)  |  Ooze (2)  |  Painting (46)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Predict (86)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Reverse (33)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Thought (17)  |  Simple (426)  |  Simplest (10)  |  Statement (148)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thought (995)  |  Two (936)  |  Unfamiliar (17)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

In soloing—as in other activities—it is far easier to start something than it is to finish it. Almost every beginner hops off with a whoop of joy, though he is likely to end his flight with something akin to the D.T.’s.
In 20 Hrs., 40 Min. (1928), 55.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Beginner (11)  |  Easier (53)  |  Easy (213)  |  End (603)  |  Finish (62)  |  Flight (101)  |  Joy (117)  |  Other (2233)  |  Solo (2)  |  Start (237)  |  Trembling (4)

In some strange way, any new fact or insight that I may have found has not seemed to me as a “discovery” of mine, but rather something that had always been there and that I had chanced to pick up.
Truth and Beauty: Aesthetics and Motivations in Science (1987, 1990), Preface, ix.
Science quotes on:  |  Discovery (837)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Insight (107)  |  Mine (78)  |  New (1273)  |  Strange (160)  |  Way (1214)

In the 1920s, there was a dinner at which the physicist Robert W. Wood was asked to respond to a toast … “To physics and metaphysics.” Now by metaphysics was meant something like philosophy—truths that you could get to just by thinking about them. Wood took a second, glanced about him, and answered along these lines: The physicist has an idea, he said. The more he thinks it through, the more sense it makes to him. He goes to the scientific literature, and the more he reads, the more promising the idea seems. Thus prepared, he devises an experiment to test the idea. The experiment is painstaking. Many possibilities are eliminated or taken into account; the accuracy of the measurement is refined. At the end of all this work, the experiment is completed and … the idea is shown to be worthless. The physicist then discards the idea, frees his mind (as I was saying a moment ago) from the clutter of error, and moves on to something else. The difference between physics and metaphysics, Wood concluded, is that the metaphysicist has no laboratory.
In 'Wonder and Skepticism', Skeptical Enquirer (Jan-Feb 1995), 19, No. 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Answer (389)  |  Ask (420)  |  Clutter (6)  |  Completed (30)  |  Completion (23)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Devising (7)  |  Difference (355)  |  Dinner (15)  |  Discard (32)  |  Discarding (2)  |  Elimination (26)  |  End (603)  |  Error (339)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Free (239)  |  Freeing (6)  |  Glance (36)  |  Idea (881)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Literature (116)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Metaphysics (53)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Moment (260)  |  More (2558)  |  Move (223)  |  Move On (3)  |  Painstaking (3)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physics (564)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Preparation (60)  |  Promise (72)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Refinement (19)  |  Response (56)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Seeming (10)  |  Sense (785)  |  Test (221)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Through (846)  |  Toast (8)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Wood (97)  |  Robert W. Wood (2)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worthless (22)

In the last four days I have got the spectrum given by Tantalum. Chromium. Manganese. Iron. Nickel. Cobalt. and Copper and part of the Silver spectrum. The chief result is that all the elements give the same kind of spectrum, the result for any metal being quite easy to guess from the results for the others. This shews that the insides of all the atoms are very much alike, and from these results it will be possible to find out something of what the insides are made up of.
Letter to his mother (2 Nov 1913). In J. L. Heilbron (ed.), H. G. J. Moseley: The Life and Letters of an English Physicist 1887-1915 (1974), 209.
Science quotes on:  |  Alike (60)  |  Atom (381)  |  Being (1276)  |  Chief (99)  |  Chromium (2)  |  Cobalt (4)  |  Copper (25)  |  Easy (213)  |  Element (322)  |  Find (1014)  |  Guess (67)  |  Iron (99)  |  Kind (564)  |  Last (425)  |  Manganese (2)  |  Metal (88)  |  Nickel (3)  |  Other (2233)  |  Possible (560)  |  Result (700)  |  Silver (49)  |  Spectrum (35)  |  Tantalum (2)  |  Will (2350)

In the patient who succumbed, the cause of death was evidently something which was not found in the patient who recovered; this something we must determine, and then we can act on the phenomena or recognize and foresee them accurately. But not by statistics shall we succeed in this; never have statistics taught anything, and never can they teach anything about the nature of the phenomenon.
From An Introduction to the Study of Experimental Medicine (1865), as translated by Henry Copley Greene (1957), 138.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Cause (561)  |  Death (406)  |  Determine (152)  |  Evidently (26)  |  Find (1014)  |  Foresee (22)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Patient (209)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Recovery (24)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Success (327)  |  Succumb (6)  |  Teach (299)  |  Teaching (190)

In the space of one hundred and seventy-six years the Lower Mississippi has shortened itself two hundred and forty-two miles. That is an average of a trifle over one mile and a third per year. Therefore, any calm person, who is not blind or idiotic, can see that in the old Oolitic Silurian Period, must a million years ago next November, the Lower Mississippi River was upward of one million three hundred thousand miles long, and stuck out over the Gulf of Mexico like a fishing-rod. And by the same token any person can see that seven hundred and forty-two years from now the Lower Mississippi will be only a mile and three-quarters long, and Cairo and New Orleans will have their streets joined together, and be plodding comfortably along under a single mayor and a mutual board of aldermen. There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.
Life on the Mississippi (1883, 2000), 173.
Science quotes on:  |  Average (89)  |  Blind (98)  |  Calm (32)  |  Conjecture (51)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Fascinating (38)  |  Fishing (20)  |  Gulf (18)  |  Gulf Of Mexico (5)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Investment (15)  |  Long (778)  |  Must (1525)  |  Mutual (54)  |  New (1273)  |  Next (238)  |  Old (499)  |  Period (200)  |  Person (366)  |  Return (133)  |  River (140)  |  See (1094)  |  Silurian (3)  |  Single (365)  |  Space (523)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Together (392)  |  Token (10)  |  Two (936)  |  Upward (44)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

In these days of conflict between ancient and modern studies, there must surely be something to be said for a study which did not begin with Pythagoras, and will not end with Einstein, but is the oldest and the youngest of all.
In A Mathematician's Apology (1940, 2012), 76.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancient (198)  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Conflict (77)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  End (603)  |  Ending (3)  |  Modern (402)  |  Must (1525)  |  Oldest (9)  |  Pythagoras (38)  |  Study (701)  |  Surely (101)  |  Will (2350)

In this great celestial creation, the catastrophy of a world, such as ours, or even the total dissolution of a system of worlds, may possibly be no more to the great Author of Nature, than the most common accident in life with us, and in all probability such final and general Doomsdays may be as frequent there, as even Birthdays or mortality with us upon the earth. This idea has something so cheerful in it, that I know I can never look upon the stars without wondering why the whole world does not become astronomers; and that men endowed with sense and reason should neglect a science they are naturally so much interested in, and so capable of enlarging their understanding, as next to a demonstration must convince them of their immortality, and reconcile them to all those little difficulties incident to human nature, without the least anxiety. All this the vast apparent provision in the starry mansions seem to promise: What ought we then not to do, to preserve our natural birthright to it and to merit such inheritance, which alas we think created all to gratify alone a race of vain-glorious gigantic beings, while they are confined to this world, chained like so many atoms to a grain of sand.
In The Universe and the Stars: Being an Original Theory on the Visible Creation, Founded on the Laws of Nature (1750, 1837), 132.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Alone (324)  |  Anxiety (30)  |  Apparent (85)  |  Astronomer (97)  |  Atom (381)  |  Author (175)  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Birthday (9)  |  Birthright (5)  |  Capable (174)  |  Celestial (53)  |  Cheerful (10)  |  Common (447)  |  Convince (43)  |  Creation (350)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Dissolution (11)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doomsday (5)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Endowed (52)  |  Final (121)  |  General (521)  |  Gigantic (40)  |  Glorious (49)  |  Grain (50)  |  Great (1610)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Nature (71)  |  Idea (881)  |  Inheritance (35)  |  Interest (416)  |  Know (1538)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Look (584)  |  Merit (51)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Neglect (63)  |  Never (1089)  |  Next (238)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Preserve (91)  |  Probability (135)  |  Promise (72)  |  Race (278)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reconcile (19)  |  Sand (63)  |  Sense (785)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  System (545)  |  Think (1122)  |  Total (95)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Vain (86)  |  Vast (188)  |  Whole (756)  |  Whole World (29)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)

In this model, the sun is a very tiny speck of dust indeed—a speck less than a three-thousandth of an inch in diameter ... Think of the sun as something less than a speck of dust in a vast city, of the earth as less than a millionth part of such a speck of dust, and we have perhaps as vivid a picture as the mind can really grasp of the relation of our home in space to the rest of the universe.
In The Universe Around Us (1953), 96.
Science quotes on:  |  City (87)  |  Diameter (28)  |  Dust (68)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Grasping (2)  |  Home (184)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Model (106)  |  Picture (148)  |  Relation (166)  |  Rest (287)  |  Space (523)  |  Speck (25)  |  Sun (407)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tiny (74)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vast (188)  |  Vivid (25)

Influenza is something unique. It behaves epidemiologically in a way different from that of any other known infection.
In W.I.B . Beveridge, Influenza: The Last Great Plague (1977), ix.
Science quotes on:  |  Different (595)  |  Infection (27)  |  Influenza (4)  |  Known (453)  |  Other (2233)  |  Unique (72)  |  Virus (32)  |  Way (1214)

Is evolution a theory, a system or a hypothesis? It is much more: it is a general condition to which all theories, all hypotheses, all systems must bow and which they must satisfy henceforth if they are to be thinkable and true. Evolution is a light illuminating all facts, a curve that all lines must follow. ... The consciousness of each of us is evolution looking at itself and reflecting upon itself....Man is not the center of the universe as once we thought in our simplicity, but something much more wonderful—the arrow pointing the way to the final unification of the world in terms of life. Man alone constitutes the last-born, the freshest, the most complicated, the most subtle of all the successive layers of life. ... The universe has always been in motion and at this moment continues to be in motion. But will it still be in motion tomorrow? ... What makes the world in which we live specifically modern is our discovery in it and around it of evolution. ... Thus in all probability, between our modern earth and the ultimate earth, there stretches an immense period, characterized not by a slowing-down but a speeding up and by the definitive florescence of the forces of evolution along the line of the human shoot.
In The Phenomenon of Man (1975), pp 218, 220, 223, 227, 228, 277.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Arrow (22)  |  Bow (15)  |  Center (35)  |  Characterize (22)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Condition (362)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Continue (179)  |  Curve (49)  |  Definitive (3)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Down (455)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Final (121)  |  Follow (389)  |  Force (497)  |  General (521)  |  Human (1512)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Illuminating (12)  |  Immense (89)  |  Last (425)  |  Layer (41)  |  Life (1870)  |  Light (635)  |  Line (100)  |  Live (650)  |  Looking (191)  |  Man (2252)  |  Modern (402)  |  Moment (260)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motion (320)  |  Must (1525)  |  Period (200)  |  Pointing (4)  |  Probability (135)  |  Reflecting (3)  |  Satisfy (29)  |  Shoot (21)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Still (614)  |  Subtle (37)  |  Successive (73)  |  System (545)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thinkable (5)  |  Thought (995)  |  Tomorrow (63)  |  True (239)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Unification (11)  |  Universe (900)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  World (1850)

It [analysis] lacks at this point such plan and unity that it is really amazing that it can be studied by so many people. The worst is that it has not at all been treated with rigor. There are only a few propositions in higher analysis that have been demonstrated with complete rigor. Everywhere one finds the unfortunate manner of reasoning from the particular to the general, and it is very unusual that with such a method one finds, in spite of everything, only a few of what many be called paradoxes. It is really very interesting to seek the reason.
In my opinion that arises from the fact that the functions with which analysis has until now been occupied can, for the most part, be expressed by means of powers. As soon as others appear, something that, it is true, does not often happen, this no longer works and from false conclusions there flow a mass of incorrect propositions.
From a letter to his professor Hansteen in Christiania, Oslo in Correspondence (1902), 23 . In Umberto Bottazzini and Warren Van Egmond, The Higher Calculus (1986), 87-88.
Science quotes on:  |  Amazing (35)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Arise (162)  |  Call (781)  |  Complete (209)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Everything (489)  |  Everywhere (98)  |  Express (192)  |  Fact (1257)  |  False (105)  |  Find (1014)  |  Flow (89)  |  Function (235)  |  General (521)  |  Happen (282)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Lack (127)  |  Mass (160)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Method (531)  |  Most (1728)  |  Occupied (45)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paradox (54)  |  People (1031)  |  Plan (122)  |  Point (584)  |  Power (771)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Rigor (29)  |  Rigour (Rigor) (2)  |  Seek (218)  |  Soon (187)  |  Spite (55)  |  Unfortunate (19)  |  Unity (81)  |  Unusual (37)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worst (57)

It appears that the extremely important papers that trigger a revolution may not receive a proportionately large number of citations. The normal procedures of referencing are not used for folklore. A real scientific revolution, like any other revolution, is news. The Origin of Species sold out as fast as it could be printed and was denounced from the pulpit almost immediately. Sea-floor spreading has been explained, perhaps not well, in leading newspapers, magazines, books, and most recently in a color motion picture. When your elementary school children talk about something at dinner, you rarely continue to cite it.
'Citations in a Scientific Revolution', in R. Shagam et al., Studies in Earth and Space Sciences: A Memoir in Honor of Harry Hammond Hess (1972), 4.
Science quotes on:  |  Book (413)  |  Children (201)  |  Citation (4)  |  Cite (8)  |  Color (155)  |  Continue (179)  |  Denounce (6)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Folklore (2)  |  Harry Hammond Hess (2)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Large (398)  |  Most (1728)  |  Motion (320)  |  New (1273)  |  News (36)  |  Number (710)  |  Origin (250)  |  Origin Of Species (42)  |  Other (2233)  |  Paper (192)  |  Picture (148)  |  Procedure (48)  |  Pulpit (2)  |  Receive (117)  |  Revolution (133)  |  School (227)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Revolution (13)  |  Sea (326)  |  Sea-Floor Spreading (2)  |  Species (435)  |  Trigger (6)

It does not follow that because something can be counted it therefore should be counted.
In a speech to the Society for College and University Planning, September 1975.
Science quotes on:  |  Count (107)  |  Follow (389)

It has become, in my view, a bit too trendy to regard the acceptance of death as something tantamount to intrinsic dignity. Of course I agree with the preacher of Ecclesiastes that there is a time to love and a time to die - and when my skein runs out I hope to face the end calmly and in my own way. For most situations, however, I prefer the more martial view that death is the ultimate enemy - and I find nothing reproachable in those who rage mightily against the dying of the light.
Bully for Brontosaurus: Reflections on Natural History (1991).
Science quotes on:  |  Acceptance (56)  |  Against (332)  |  Become (821)  |  Biography (254)  |  Course (413)  |  Death (406)  |  Dignity (44)  |  End (603)  |  Enemy (86)  |  Face (214)  |  Find (1014)  |  Hope (321)  |  Intrinsic (18)  |  Light (635)  |  Love (328)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Preacher (13)  |  Regard (312)  |  Run (158)  |  Situation (117)  |  Time (1911)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)

It has been said that computing machines can only carry out the processes that they are instructed to do. This is certainly true in the sense that if they do something other than what they were instructed then they have just made some mistake. It is also true that the intention in constructing these machines in the first instance is to treat them as slaves, giving them only jobs which have been thought out in detail, jobs such that the user of the machine fully understands what in principle is going on all the time. Up till the present machines have only been used in this way. But is it necessary that they should always be used in such a manner? Let us suppose we have set up a machine with certain initial instruction tables, so constructed that these tables might on occasion, if good reason arose, modify those tables. One can imagine that after the machine had been operating for some time, the instructions would have altered out of all recognition, but nevertheless still be such that one would have to admit that the machine was still doing very worthwhile calculations. Possibly it might still be getting results of the type desired when the machine was first set up, but in a much more efficient manner. In such a case one would have to admit that the progress of the machine had not been foreseen when its original instructions were put in. It would be like a pupil who had learnt much from his master, but had added much more by his own work. When this happens I feel that one is obliged to regard the machine as showing intelligence.
Lecture to the London Mathematical Society, 20 February 1947. Quoted in B. E. Carpenter and R. W. Doran (eds.), A. M. Turing's Ace Report of 1946 and Other Papers (1986), 122-3.
Science quotes on:  |  Alter (64)  |  Altered (32)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Carry (130)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Computer (131)  |  Construct (129)  |  Detail (150)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Efficiency (46)  |  Feel (371)  |  First (1302)  |  Good (906)  |  Happen (282)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Instruction (101)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Intention (46)  |  Job (86)  |  Machine (271)  |  Master (182)  |  Mistake (180)  |  More (2558)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Other (2233)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Present (630)  |  Principle (530)  |  Progress (492)  |  Pupil (62)  |  Reason (766)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Regard (312)  |  Result (700)  |  Sense (785)  |  Set (400)  |  Slave (40)  |  Still (614)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Table (105)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Type (171)  |  Understand (648)  |  Way (1214)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worthwhile (18)

It is a melancholy experience for a professional mathematician to find him writing about mathematics. The function of a mathematician is to do something, to prove new theorems, to add to mathematics, and not to talk about what he or other mathematicians have done. Statesmen despise publicists, painters despise art-critics, and physiologists, physicists, or mathematicians have usually similar feelings; there is no scorn more profound, or on the whole more justifiable, than that of men who make for the men who explain. Exposition, criticism, appreciation, is work for second-rate minds.
In A Mathematician's Apology (1940, reprint with Foreward by C.P. Snow 1992), 61 (Hardy's opening lines after Snow's foreward).
Science quotes on:  |  Appreciation (37)  |  Art (680)  |  Criticism (85)  |  Do (1905)  |  Experience (494)  |  Explain (334)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Feelings (52)  |  Find (1014)  |  Function (235)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Melancholy (17)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Painter (30)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physiologist (31)  |  Professional (77)  |  Profound (105)  |  Prove (261)  |  Scorn (12)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Usually (176)  |  Whole (756)  |  Work (1402)  |  Writing (192)

It is a strange feeling which comes over one as he stands in the centre of the tunnel, and knows that a mighty river is rolling on over his head, and that great ships with their thousands of tons burthen, sail over him. ... There is no single work of Art in London (with the exception of St. Paul's Cathedral) which excites so much curiosity and admiration among foreigners as the Tunnel. Great buildings are common to all parts of Europe, but the world has not such another Tunnel as this. There is something grand in the idea of walking under a broad river—making a pathway dry and secure beneath ships and navies!
[About visiting Brunel's Thames Tunnel, the first in the world under a navigable waterway.]
What I Saw in London: or, Men and Things in the Great Metropolis (1853), 168-169.
Science quotes on:  |  Admiration (61)  |  Art (680)  |  Beneath (68)  |  Building (158)  |  Cathedral (27)  |  Centre (31)  |  Common (447)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Dry (65)  |  Exception (74)  |  Feeling (259)  |  First (1302)  |  Great (1610)  |  Idea (881)  |  Know (1538)  |  Making (300)  |  Pathway (15)  |  River (140)  |  Sail (37)  |  Sailing (14)  |  Ship (69)  |  Single (365)  |  Stand (284)  |  Strange (160)  |  Strangeness (10)  |  Thames (6)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Ton (25)  |  Tunnel (13)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

It is admitted by all that a finished or even a competent reasoner is not the work of nature alone; the experience of every day makes it evident that education develops faculties which would otherwise never have manifested their existence. It is, therefore, as necessary to learn to reason before we can expect to be able to reason, as it is to learn to swim or fence, in order to attain either of those arts. Now, something must be reasoned upon, it matters not much what it is, provided it can be reasoned upon with certainty. The properties of mind or matter, or the study of languages, mathematics, or natural history, may be chosen for this purpose. Now of all these, it is desirable to choose the one which admits of the reasoning being verified, that is, in which we can find out by other means, such as measurement and ocular demonstration of all sorts, whether the results are true or not. When the guiding property of the loadstone was first ascertained, and it was necessary to learn how to use this new discovery, and to find out how far it might be relied on, it would have been thought advisable to make many passages between ports that were well known before attempting a voyage of discovery. So it is with our reasoning faculties: it is desirable that their powers should be exerted upon objects of such a nature, that we can tell by other means whether the results which we obtain are true or false, and this before it is safe to trust entirely to reason. Now the mathematics are peculiarly well adapted for this purpose, on the following grounds:
1. Every term is distinctly explained, and has but one meaning, and it is rarely that two words are employed to mean the same thing.
2. The first principles are self-evident, and, though derived from observation, do not require more of it than has been made by children in general.
3. The demonstration is strictly logical, taking nothing for granted except self-evident first principles, resting nothing upon probability, and entirely independent of authority and opinion.
4. When the conclusion is obtained by reasoning, its truth or falsehood can be ascertained, in geometry by actual measurement, in algebra by common arithmetical calculation. This gives confidence, and is absolutely necessary, if, as was said before, reason is not to be the instructor, but the pupil.
5. There are no words whose meanings are so much alike that the ideas which they stand for may be confounded. Between the meaning of terms there is no distinction, except a total distinction, and all adjectives and adverbs expressing difference of degrees are avoided.
In On the Study and Difficulties of Mathematics (1898), chap. 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolutely (41)  |  Actual (118)  |  Adapt (70)  |  Adjective (3)  |  Admit (49)  |  Adverb (3)  |  Algebra (117)  |  Alike (60)  |  Alone (324)  |  Arithmetical (11)  |  Art (680)  |  Ascertain (41)  |  Attain (126)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Authority (99)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Being (1276)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Choose (116)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Common (447)  |  Competent (20)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Confound (21)  |  Degree (277)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Derive (70)  |  Desirable (33)  |  Develop (278)  |  Difference (355)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Distinction (72)  |  Distinctly (5)  |  Do (1905)  |  Education (423)  |  Employ (115)  |  Entirely (36)  |  Evident (92)  |  Exert (40)  |  Existence (481)  |  Expect (203)  |  Experience (494)  |  Explain (334)  |  Express (192)  |  Faculty (76)  |  False (105)  |  Falsehood (30)  |  Far (158)  |  Fence (11)  |  Find (1014)  |  Find Out (25)  |  Finish (62)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  General (521)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Give (208)  |  Grant (76)  |  Ground (222)  |  Guide (107)  |  History (716)  |  Idea (881)  |  Independent (74)  |  Instructor (5)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Language (308)  |  Learn (672)  |  Lodestone (7)  |  Logical (57)  |  Manifest (21)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Meanings (5)  |  Means (587)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Never (1089)  |  New (1273)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Object (438)  |  Observation (593)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Ocular (3)  |  Opinion (291)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Passage (52)  |  Peculiarly (4)  |  Port (2)  |  Power (771)  |  Principle (530)  |  Probability (135)  |  Property (177)  |  Provide (79)  |  Pupil (62)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Rarely (21)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Rely (12)  |  Require (229)  |  Rest (287)  |  Result (700)  |  Safe (61)  |  Same (166)  |  Say (989)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Evident (22)  |  Sort (50)  |  Stand (284)  |  Strictly (13)  |  Study (701)  |  Swim (32)  |  Tell (344)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Total (95)  |  True (239)  |  Trust (72)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Two (936)  |  Use (771)  |  Value Of Mathematics (60)  |  Verify (24)  |  Voyage (13)  |  Word (650)  |  Work (1402)

It is an important thing that people be happy in their work, and if work does not bring happiness there is something wrong
Quoted as the notations of an unnamed student in the auditorium when Councilman made impromptu biographical remarks at his last lecture as a teacher of undergraduates in medicine (19 Dec 1921). As quoted in obituary, 'William Thomas Councilman', by Harvey Cushing, Science (30 Jun 1933), 77, No. 2009, 613-618. Reprinted in National Academy Biographical Memoirs, Vol. 18, 159-160. The transcribed lecture was published privately in a 23-page booklet, A Lecture Delivered to the Second-Year Class of the Harvard Medical School at the Conclusion of the Course in Pathology, Dec. 19, 1921.
Science quotes on:  |  Bring (95)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Happy (108)  |  Important (229)  |  People (1031)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Work (1402)  |  Wrong (246)

It is astonishing how much the word infinitely is misused: everything is infinitely more beautiful, infinitely better, etc. The concept must have something pleasing about it, or its misuse could not have become so general.
Aphorism 133 in Notebook J (1789-1793), as translated by R. J. Hollingdale in Aphorisms (1990). Reprinted as The Waste Books (2000), 155.
Science quotes on:  |  Astonishing (29)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Become (821)  |  Better (493)  |  Concept (242)  |  Everything (489)  |  General (521)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Misuse (12)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Word (650)

It is baffling, I must say, that in our modern world we have such blind trust in science and technology that we all accept what science tells us about everything—until, that is, it comes to climate science. All of a sudden, and with a barrage of sheer intimidation, we are told by powerful groups of deniers that the scientists are wrong and we must abandon all our faith in so much overwhelming scientific evidence. So thank goodness for our young entrepreneurs here this evening, who have the far-sightedness and confidence in what they know is happening to ignore the headless chicken brigade and do something practical to help.
Speech, awards ceremony for green entrepreneurs, Buckingham Palace (30 Jan 2014). As quoted in Benn Quinn, 'Climate Change Sceptics are ‘Headless Chickens’, Says Prince Charles', The Guardian (31 Jan 2014).
Science quotes on:  |  Abandon (73)  |  Accept (198)  |  Acceptance (56)  |  Baffling (5)  |  Barrage (2)  |  Blind (98)  |  Brigade (3)  |  Chicken (12)  |  Climate (102)  |  Climate Change (76)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Do (1905)  |  Entrepreneur (5)  |  Everything (489)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Faith (209)  |  Goodness (26)  |  Happening (59)  |  Help (116)  |  Ignore (52)  |  Ignoring (11)  |  Intimidation (3)  |  Know (1538)  |  Modern (402)  |  Must (1525)  |  Overwhelming (30)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Practical (225)  |  Say (989)  |  Science And Technology (46)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Technology (281)  |  Tell (344)  |  Thank (48)  |  Trust (72)  |  World (1850)  |  Wrong (246)  |  Young (253)

It is characteristic of the unlearned that they are forever proposing something which is old, and because it has recently come to their own attention, supposing it to be new.
Address at Holy Cross College (25 Jun 1919), collected in Have Faith In Massachusetts: A Collection of Speeches and Messages (1919, 2nd Ed.), 231. (This speech was not included in the period covered by the first edition.)
Science quotes on:  |  Attention (196)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Forever (111)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)  |  Recent (78)  |  Supposing (3)  |  Unlearn (11)  |  Unlearned (2)

It is clear, then, that though there may be countless instances of the perishing of unmoved movers, and though many things that move themselves perish and are succeeded by others that come into being, and though one thing that is unmoved moves one thing while another moves another, nevertheless there is something that comprehends them all, and that as something apart from each one of them, and this it is that is the cause of the fact that some things are and others are not and of the continuous process of change; and this causes the motion of the other movers, while they are the causes of the motion of other things. Motion, then, being eternal, the first mover, if there is but one, will be eternal also; if there are more than one, there will be a plurality of such eternal movers.
Aristotle
Physics, 258b, 32-259a, 8. In Jonathan Barnes (ed.), The Complete Works of Aristotle (1984), Vol. 1, 432.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Cause (561)  |  Change (639)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Countless (39)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Fact (1257)  |  First (1302)  |  More (2558)  |  Motion (320)  |  Move (223)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Other (2233)  |  Perish (56)  |  Physics (564)  |  Process (439)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Will (2350)

It is hard to sneak a look at God’s cards. But that he would choose to play dice with the world … is something I cannot believe for a single moment.
On quantum theory. In Letter (21 Mar 1942) to his student-colleague, Cornel Lanczos. In Yale Book of Quotations (2006), 229. Also seen paraphrased as, “I cannot believe that God would choose to play dice with the universe.”
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (615)  |  Choose (116)  |  Dice (21)  |  God (776)  |  Hard (246)  |  Look (584)  |  Moment (260)  |  Play (116)  |  Single (365)  |  Universe (900)  |  World (1850)

It is inconceivable, that inanimate brute matter should, without the mediation of something else, which is not material, operate upon and affect other matter without mutual contact … That gravity should be innate, inherent, and essential to matter, so that one body may act upon another at a distance, through a vacuum, without the mediation of anything else, by and through which their action and force may be conveyed from one to another, is to me so great an absurdity, that I believe no man who has in philosophical matters a competent faculty of thinking, can ever fall into it. Gravity must be caused by an agent, acting constantly according to certain laws; but whether this agent be material or immaterial, I have left to the consideration of my readers.
Third letter to Bentley, 25 Feb 1693. Quoted in The Works of Richard Bentley, D.D. (1838), Vol. 3, 212-3.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurdity (34)  |  According (236)  |  Act (278)  |  Action (342)  |  Agent (73)  |  Body (557)  |  Brute (30)  |  Certain (557)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Contact (66)  |  Distance (171)  |  Essential (210)  |  Fall (243)  |  Force (497)  |  Gravity (140)  |  Great (1610)  |  Immaterial (6)  |  Inherent (43)  |  Innate (14)  |  Law (913)  |  Man (2252)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mediation (4)  |  Must (1525)  |  Mutual (54)  |  Other (2233)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Through (846)  |  Vacuum (41)

It is not so very important for a person to learn facts. For that he does not really need a college. He can learn them from books. The value of an education in a liberal arts college is not the learning of many facts but the training of the mind to think something that cannot be learned from textbooks.
1921, commenting on Thomas Edison’s opinion that a college education is useless, in Einstein: His Life and Times by Philipp Frank (1953).
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Book (413)  |  College (71)  |  Education (423)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Learning (291)  |  Liberal Arts (5)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Person (366)  |  Textbook (39)  |  Think (1122)  |  Training (92)  |  Value (393)

It is odd to think that there is a word for something which, strictly speaking, does not exist, namely, “rest.” We distinguish between living and dead matter; between moving bodies and bodies at rest. This is a primitive point of view. What seems dead, a stone or the proverbial “door-nail,” say, is actually forever in motion. We have merely become accustomed to judge by outward appearances; by the deceptive impressions we get through our senses.
Max Born
The Restless Universe (1935), I.
Science quotes on:  |  Accustom (52)  |  Accustomed (46)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Become (821)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Door (94)  |  Exist (458)  |  Forever (111)  |  Impression (118)  |  Judge (114)  |  Living (492)  |  Matter (821)  |  Merely (315)  |  Motion (320)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Primitive (79)  |  Proverbial (8)  |  Reference Frame (2)  |  Rest (287)  |  Say (989)  |  Sense (785)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Stone (168)  |  Think (1122)  |  Through (846)  |  View (496)  |  Word (650)

It is perhaps difficult sufficiently to emphasise Seeking without disparaging its correlative Finding. But I must risk this, for Finding has a clamorous voice that proclaims its own importance; it is definite and assured, something that we can take hold of —that is what we all want, or think we want. Yet how transitory it proves.
The finding of one generation will not serve for the next. It tarnishes rapidly except it be reserved with an ever-renewed spirit of seeking.
Swarthmore Lecture (1929) at Friends’ House, London, printed in Science and the Unseen World (1929), 87-88.
Science quotes on:  |  Definite (114)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Generation (256)  |  Importance (299)  |  Must (1525)  |  Next (238)  |  Proclaim (31)  |  Prove (261)  |  Rapidly (67)  |  Renew (20)  |  Risk (68)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Think (1122)  |  Want (504)  |  Will (2350)

It is possible that in ten years’ time penicillin itself will be a back number and will be replaced by something better. It is quite certain though that to displace penicillin any newcomer will have to be very, very good.
In 'Truman Hails Fleming For Penicillin Drug', New York Times (26 Jul 1945), 17.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Better (493)  |  Certain (557)  |  Displace (9)  |  Good (906)  |  Number (710)  |  Penicillin (18)  |  Possible (560)  |  Replace (32)  |  Time (1911)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

It is requisite that we should here say something of Magick, which is so linked to Astrology, as being her near Kinswoman, that whoever professes Magick without Astrology, does nothing, but is altogether out of the way.
In The Vanity of the Arts and Sciences (1530), translation (1676), 109.
Science quotes on:  |  Astrology (46)  |  Being (1276)  |  Magic (92)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Say (989)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whoever (42)

It is something to be able to paint a particular picture or to carve a statue and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which morally we can do. To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts.
In Walden: or, Life in the Woods (1854, 1893), 143.
Science quotes on:  |  Affect (19)  |  Art (680)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Carve (5)  |  Day (43)  |  Do (1905)  |  Glorious (49)  |  Highest (19)  |  Look (584)  |  Medium (15)  |  Moral (203)  |  More (2558)  |  Object (438)  |  Paint (22)  |  Picture (148)  |  Quality (139)  |  Statue (17)  |  Through (846)

It is the business of science to offer rational explanations for all the events in the real world, and any scientist who calls on God to explain something is falling down on his job. This applies as much to the start of the expansion as to any other event. If the explanation is not forthcoming at once, the scientist must suspend judgment: but if he is worth his salt he will always maintain that a rational explanation will eventually be found. This is the one piece of dogmatism that a scientist can allow himself—and without it science would be in danger of giving way to superstition every time that a problem defied solution for a few years.
The Mystery of the Expanding Universe (1964), 122.
Science quotes on:  |  Big Bang (45)  |  Business (156)  |  Call (781)  |  Danger (127)  |  Dogmatism (15)  |  Down (455)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Event (222)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Expansion (43)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  God (776)  |  Himself (461)  |  Job (86)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Maintain (105)  |  Must (1525)  |  Offer (142)  |  Other (2233)  |  Problem (731)  |  Rational (95)  |  Salt (48)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Solution (282)  |  Start (237)  |  Superstition (70)  |  Time (1911)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)  |  Worth (172)  |  Year (963)

It is the task of science, as a collective human undertaking, to describe from the external side, (on which alone agreement is possible), such statistical regularity as there is in a world “in which every event has a unique aspect, and to indicate where possible the limits of such description. It is not part of its task to make imaginative interpretation of the internal aspect of reality—what it is like, for example, to be a lion, an ant or an ant hill, a liver cell, or a hydrogen ion. The only qualification is in the field of introspective psychology in which each human being is both observer and observed, and regularities may be established by comparing notes. Science is thus a limited venture. It must act as if all phenomena were deterministic at least in the sense of determinable probabilities. It cannot properly explain the behaviour of an amoeba as due partly to surface and other physical forces and partly to what the amoeba wants to do, with out danger of something like 100 per cent duplication. It must stick to the former. It cannot introduce such principles as creative activity into its interpretation of evolution for similar reasons. The point of view indicated by a consideration of the hierarchy of physical and biological organisms, now being bridged by the concept of the gene, is one in which science deliberately accepts a rigorous limitation of its activities to the description of the external aspects of events. In carrying out this program, the scientist should not, however, deceive himself or others into thinking that he is giving an account of all of reality. The unique inner creative aspect of every event necessarily escapes him.
In 'Gene and Organism', American Naturalist, (1953), 87, 17.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Account (195)  |  Act (278)  |  Activity (218)  |  Agreement (55)  |  Alone (324)  |  Amoeba (21)  |  Ant (34)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Behaviour (42)  |  Being (1276)  |  Biological (137)  |  Both (496)  |  Carrying Out (13)  |  Cell (146)  |  Concept (242)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Creative (144)  |  Danger (127)  |  Deceive (26)  |  Describe (132)  |  Do (1905)  |  Due (143)  |  Escape (85)  |  Event (222)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Explain (334)  |  Field (378)  |  Force (497)  |  Former (138)  |  Gene (105)  |  Hierarchy (17)  |  Himself (461)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Hydrogen (80)  |  Indicate (62)  |  Inner (72)  |  Internal (69)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Introduce (63)  |  Ion (21)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limitation (52)  |  Limited (102)  |  Lion (23)  |  Liver (22)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observed (149)  |  Organism (231)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physical (518)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Possible (560)  |  Principle (530)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Qualification (15)  |  Reality (274)  |  Reason (766)  |  Regularity (40)  |  Rigorous (50)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Sense (785)  |  Side (236)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Surface (223)  |  Task (152)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Undertaking (17)  |  Unique (72)  |  View (496)  |  Want (504)  |  World (1850)

It is true that I am the father [of the H-bomb] in the biological sense that I performed a necessary function and let nature take its course. After that a child had to be born. It might he robust or it might be stillborn, but something had to be born. The process of conception was by no means a pleasure: it was filled with difficulty and anxiety….
As quoted in Robert Coughlan, 'Dr. Edward Teller’s Magnificent Obsession', Life (6 Sep 1954), 72.
Science quotes on:  |  Anxiety (30)  |  Bear (162)  |  Biological (137)  |  Child (333)  |  Conception (160)  |  Course (413)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Father (113)  |  Function (235)  |  Hydrogen Bomb (16)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Perform (123)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Process (439)  |  Robust (7)  |  Sense (785)  |  Stillborn (2)

It is well known that theoretical physicists cannot handle experimental equipment; it breaks whenever they touch it. Pauli was such a good theoretical physicist that something usually broke in the lab whenever he merely stepped across the threshold. A mysterious event that did not seem at first to be connected with Pauli's presence once occurred in Professor J. Franck's laboratory in Göttingen. Early one afternoon, without apparent cause, a complicated apparatus for the study of atomic phenomena collapsed. Franck wrote humorously about this to Pauli at his Zürich address and, after some delay, received an answer in an envelope with a Danish stamp. Pauli wrote that he had gone to visit Bohr and at the time of the mishap in Franck's laboratory his train was stopped for a few minutes at the Göttingen railroad station. You may believe this anecdote or not, but there are many other observations concerning the reality of the Pauli Effect!
From Thirty Years That Shook Physics: The Story of Quantum Theory (1966), 64. Note the so-called Pauli Effect is merely anecdotal to provide humor about supposed parapsychology phenomena in coincidences involving Pauli; it should not be confused with scientifically significant Pauli Exclusion Principle.
Science quotes on:  |  Anecdote (21)  |  Answer (389)  |  Apparatus (70)  |  Apparent (85)  |  Atom (381)  |  Belief (615)  |  Break (109)  |  Cause (561)  |  Collapse (19)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Connect (126)  |  Connection (171)  |  Delay (21)  |  Early (196)  |  Effect (414)  |  Envelope (6)  |  Equipment (45)  |  Event (222)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  First (1302)  |  James Franck (2)  |  Good (906)  |  Handle (29)  |  Humor (10)  |  Known (453)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Merely (315)  |  Minute (129)  |  Mishap (2)  |  Mysterious (83)  |  Observation (593)  |  Other (2233)  |  Wolfgang Pauli (16)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Presence (63)  |  Professor (133)  |  Railroad (36)  |  Reality (274)  |  Stamp (36)  |  Station (30)  |  Step (234)  |  Stopped (3)  |  Study (701)  |  Theoretical Physicist (21)  |  Threshold (11)  |  Time (1911)  |  Touch (146)  |  Train (118)  |  Usually (176)  |  Visit (27)  |  Whenever (81)

It is well to know something of the manners of various peoples, in order more sanely to judge our own, and that we do not think that everything against our modes is ridiculous, and against reason, as those who have seen nothing are accustomed to think.
In Discourse on Method (1637).
Science quotes on:  |  Accustom (52)  |  Accustomed (46)  |  Against (332)  |  Do (1905)  |  Everything (489)  |  Judge (114)  |  Know (1538)  |  More (2558)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Order (638)  |  People (1031)  |  Reason (766)  |  Ridiculous (24)  |  Think (1122)  |  Various (205)

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)  |  Inventiveness (8)  |  Molecular Biology (27)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Outstanding (16)  |  Oxford (16)  |  Produced (187)  |  Right (473)  |  School (227)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Skill (116)  |  Skillful (17)  |  Towering (11)  |  James Watson (33)  |  Young (253)

It may be appropriate to quote a statement of Poincare, who said (partly in jest no doubt) that there must be something mysterious about the normal law since mathematicians think it is a law of nature whereas physicists are convinced that it is a mathematical theorem.
Quoted in Mark Kac, Statistical Independence in Probability, Analysis and Number Theory (1959), 52.
Science quotes on:  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Appropriateness (7)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Jest (5)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Nature (80)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Must (1525)  |  Mysterious (83)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Quotation (19)  |  Quote (46)  |  Statement (148)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Think (1122)

It may well be doubted whether, in all the range of science, there is any field so fascinating to the explorer—so rich in hidden treasures—so fruitful in delightful surprises—as that of Pure Mathematics. The charm lies chiefly, I think, in the absolute certainty of its results; for that is what, beyond all mental treasures, the human intellect craves for. Let us only be sure of something! More light, more light!
Written without pseudonym as Charles L. Dodgson. Opening remarks in Introduction to A New Theory of Parallels (1888, 1890), xv.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Charm (54)  |  Chiefly (47)  |  Crave (10)  |  Delightful (18)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Explorer (30)  |  Fascinate (12)  |  Fascinating (38)  |  Field (378)  |  Fruitful (61)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Intellect (32)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lie (370)  |  Light (635)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mental (179)  |  More (2558)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Mathematics (72)  |  Range (104)  |  Result (700)  |  Science And Mathematics (10)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Think (1122)  |  Treasure (59)

It may well be doubted whether, in all the range of Science, there is any field so fascinating to the explorer—so rich in hidden treasures—so fruitful in delightful surprises—as that of Pure Mathematics. The charm lies chiefly, I think, in the absolute certainty of its results: for that is what, beyond all mental treasures, the human intellect craves for. Let us only be sure of something! More light, more light … “And if our fate be death, give light and let us die” This is the cry that, through all the ages, is going up from perplexed Humanity, and Science has little else to offer, that will really meet the demands of its votaries, than the conclusions of Pure Mathematics.
Opening of 'Introduction', A New Theory of Parallels (1890), xv. As a non-fiction work, the author’s name on the title page of this book was Charles Lutwidge Dodgson. Being better known for his works of fiction as Lewis Carroll, all quotes relating to this one person, published under either name, are gathered on this single web page under his pen name.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Age (509)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Charm (54)  |  Chiefly (47)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Crave (10)  |  Cry (30)  |  Death (406)  |  Delightful (18)  |  Demand (131)  |  Die (94)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Estimates of Mathematics (30)  |  Explorer (30)  |  Fascinating (38)  |  Fate (76)  |  Field (378)  |  Fruitful (61)  |  Give (208)  |  Hide (70)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Intellect (32)  |  Humanity (186)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Let (64)  |  Lie (370)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mental (179)  |  More (2558)  |  Offer (142)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Mathematics (72)  |  Range (104)  |  Result (700)  |  Rich (66)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Think (1122)  |  Through (846)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Votary (3)  |  Will (2350)

It might be going too far to say that the modern scientific movement was tainted from its birth; but I think it would be true to say that it was born in an unhealthy neighborhood and at an inauspicious hour. Its triumphs may have been too rapid and purchased at too high a price: reconsideration, and something like repentance, may be required.
In The Abolition of Man (1978).
Science quotes on:  |  Birth (154)  |  High (370)  |  Hour (192)  |  Modern (402)  |  Movement (162)  |  Neighborhood (12)  |  Price (57)  |  Reconsideration (3)  |  Required (108)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Taint (10)  |  Tainted (5)  |  Think (1122)  |  Triumph (76)

It must be understood that prime matter, and form as well, is neither generated nor corrupted, because every generation is from something to something. Now that from which generation proceeds is matter, and that to which it proceeds is form. So that, if matter or form were generated, there would be a matter for matter and a form for form, endlessly. Whence, there is generation only of the composite, properly speaking.
De Principiis Naturae (On the Principles of Nature) [before 1256], Chap. 2, Sec. 12, trans. J. Bobik, Aquinas on Nature and Form and the Elements: A Translation and Interpretation of the de Principiis Naturae and the De Mixtione Elementorum of St. Thomas Aquinas (1998), 29. Alternate translation: “We should note that prime matter, and even form, are neither generated nor corrupted, inasmuch as every generation is from something to something. That from which generation arises is matter; that to which it proceeds is form. If, therefore, matter and form were generated, there would have to be a matter of matter and a form of form ad infinitum. Hence, properly speaking, only composites are generated.” In Forrest E. Baird and Walter Arnold Kaufmann, Philosophic Classics: Volume II: Medieval Philosophy (1997), 398.
Science quotes on:  |  Form (976)  |  Generation (256)  |  Matter (821)  |  Must (1525)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Understood (155)

It turned out that the buckyball, the soccer ball, was something of a Rosetta stone of an infinite new class of molecules.
From interview with National Public Radio (2000), quoted and cited in Nell GreenfieldBoyce, '‘Buckyball’ Nobel Laureate Richard Smalley Dies', All Things Considered (31 Oct 2005). Transcript on NPR website.
Science quotes on:  |  Ball (64)  |  Buckyball (5)  |  Class (168)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Molecule (185)  |  New (1273)  |  Rosetta Stone (4)  |  Soccer (3)  |  Stone (168)  |  Turn (454)

It was cold. Space, the air we breathed, the yellow rocks, were deadly cold. There was something ultimate, passionless, and eternal in this cold. It came to us as a single constant note from the depths of space. We stood on the very boundary of life and death.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Breath (61)  |  Breathe (49)  |  Cold (115)  |  Constant (148)  |  Deadly (21)  |  Death (406)  |  Depth (97)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Life (1870)  |  Note (39)  |  Rock (176)  |  Single (365)  |  Space (523)  |  Stand (284)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Yellow (31)

It was quite the most incredible event that has ever happened to me in my life. It was almost as incredible as if you fired a 15-inch shell at a piece of tissue paper and it came back and hit you.
[Recalling in 1936 the discovery of the nucleus in 1909, when some alpha particles were observed instead of travelling through a very thin gold foil were seen to rebound backward, as if striking something much more massive than the particles themselves.]
Quoted in Abraham Pais, Inward Bound (1986), 189, from E. N. da C. Andrade, Rutherford and the nature of the atom, (1964) 111.
Science quotes on:  |  Alpha Particle (5)  |  Autobiography (58)  |  Back (395)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Event (222)  |  Gold (101)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Incredible (43)  |  Life (1870)  |  Massive (9)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nucleus (54)  |  Observed (149)  |  Paper (192)  |  Particle (200)  |  Shell (69)  |  Striking (48)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Through (846)  |  Tissue (51)  |  Travelling (17)

It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it.
From Letter (24 Mar 1954) in Einstein archives. Quoted by Helen Dukas and Banesh Hoffman, Albert Einstein: The Human Side (1979, 2013), 43. Dukas was Einstein’s personal secretary for 28 years, so she knew his philosophy well.
Science quotes on:  |  Admiration (61)  |  Agnostic (10)  |  Being (1276)  |  Call (781)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Course (413)  |  Deny (71)  |  Do (1905)  |  Express (192)  |  God (776)  |  Lie (370)  |  Never (1089)  |  Personal (75)  |  Read (308)  |  Religious (134)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Structure (365)  |  Unbounded (5)  |  World (1850)

It’s becoming clear that in a sense the cosmos provides the only laboratory where sufficiently extreme conditions are ever achieved to test new ideas on particle physics. The energies in the Big Bang were far higher than we can ever achieve on Earth. So by looking at evidence for the Big Bang, and by studying things like neutron stars, we are in effect learning something about fundamental physics.
From editted transcript of BBC Radio 3 interview, collected in Lewis Wolpert and Alison Richards, A Passion For Science (1988), 33.
Science quotes on:  |  Bang (29)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Big Bang (45)  |  Condition (362)  |  Cosmos (64)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Effect (414)  |  Energy (373)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Extreme (78)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Idea (881)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Learning (291)  |  Looking (191)  |  Neutron (23)  |  Neutron Star (3)  |  New (1273)  |  Particle (200)  |  Particle Physics (13)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Sense (785)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Study (701)  |  Studying (70)  |  Test (221)  |  Thing (1914)

It’s important natural history isn’t seen as something that is “out there”, which you have to travel to. It’s right there in your garden. Public awareness of the natural history of the world as a whole has never been as great. But it’s important to know about species close to home.
As reported by Adam Lusher in 'Sir David Attenborough', Daily Mail (28 Feb 2014).
Science quotes on:  |  Awareness (42)  |  Close (77)  |  Garden (64)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  Home (184)  |  Important (229)  |  Know (1538)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Never (1089)  |  Public (100)  |  Right (473)  |  Species (435)  |  Travel (125)  |  Whole (756)  |  World (1850)

It’s no trick to get the right answer when you have all the data. The real creative trick is to get the right answer when you have only half of the data in hand and half of it is wrong and you don't know which half is wrong. When you get the right answer under these circumstances, you are doing something creative.
In autobiography, Following the Trail of Light: A Scientific Odyssey (1992), 134.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Creative (144)  |  Data (162)  |  Doing (277)  |  Half (63)  |  Know (1538)  |  Right (473)  |  Trick (36)  |  Wrong (246)

It’s that moment, that brief epiphany when the universe opens up and shows us something, and in that instant we get just a sense of an order greater than Heaven and, as yet at least, beyond the grasp of Stephen Hawking.
Quoted in Kim Lim (ed.), 1,001 Pearls of Spiritual Wisdom: Words to Enrich, Inspire, and Guide Your Life (2014), 109
Science quotes on:  |  Beyond (316)  |  Brief (37)  |  Grasp (65)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greater (288)  |  Stephen W. Hawking (62)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Instant (46)  |  Least (75)  |  Moment (260)  |  Open (277)  |  Order (638)  |  Sense (785)  |  Show (353)  |  Universe (900)

It’s very dangerous to invent something in our times; ostentatious men of the other world, who are hostile to innovations, roam about angrily. To live in peace, one has to stay away from innovations and new ideas. Innovations, like trees, attract the most destructive lightnings to themselves.
From the play Galileo Galilei (2001) .
Science quotes on:  |  Attract (25)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Hostility (16)  |  Idea (881)  |  Innovation (49)  |  Invention (400)  |  Lightning (49)  |  Live (650)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Peace (116)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tree (269)  |  World (1850)

Keep on going and the chances are you will stumble on something, perhaps when you are least expecting it. I have never heard of anyone stumbling on something sitting down.
Science quotes on:  |  Chance (244)  |  Down (455)  |  Never (1089)  |  Research (753)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Stumble (19)  |  Will (2350)

Knowing is not understanding. There is a great difference between knowing and understanding: you can know a lot about something and not really understand it.
Science quotes on:  |  Difference (355)  |  Great (1610)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lot (151)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)

Knowledge is necessary too. A child with great intuition could not grow up to become something worthwhile in life without some knowledge. However there comes a point in everyone’s life where only intuition can make the leap ahead, without knowing precisely how.
As recollected from a visit some months earlier, and quoted in William Miller, 'Old Man’s Advice to Youth: “Never Lose a Holy Curiosity”', Life (2 May 1955), 64.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Child (333)  |  Great (1610)  |  Grow (247)  |  Grow Up (9)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Leap (57)  |  Life (1870)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Point (584)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Worthwhile (18)

Knowledge once gained casts a faint light beyond its own immediate boundaries. There is no discovery so limited as not to illuminate something beyond itself.
In 'On the Methods and Tendencies of Physical Investigation', Scientific Addresses (1870), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Beyond (316)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Cast (69)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Faint (10)  |  Gain (146)  |  Illumination (15)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Itself (7)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Light (635)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)

Kriegman says … “Think binary. When matter meets antimatter, both vanish, into pure energy. But both existed; I mean, there was a condition we’ll call ‘existence.’ Think of one and minus one. Together they add up to zero, nothing, nada, niente, right? Picture them together, then picture them separating—peeling apart. … Now you have something, you have two somethings, where once you had nothing.”
In Roger's Version (1986), 304.
Science quotes on:  |  Anti-Matter (4)  |  Binary (12)  |  Both (496)  |  Call (781)  |  Condition (362)  |  Energy (373)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Minus One (4)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Picture (148)  |  Pure (299)  |  Right (473)  |  Say (989)  |  Separation (60)  |  Think (1122)  |  Together (392)  |  Two (936)  |  Vanishing (11)  |  Zero (38)

Lagrange, in one of the later years of his life, imagined that he had overcome the difficulty (of the parallel axiom). He went so far as to write a paper, which he took with him to the Institute, and began to read it. But in the first paragraph something struck him that he had not observed: he muttered: 'Il faut que j'y songe encore', and put the paper in his pocket.' [I must think about it again]
Budget of Paradoxes (1872), 173.
Science quotes on:  |  Axiom (65)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  First (1302)  |  Count Joseph-Louis de Lagrange (26)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Must (1525)  |  Observed (149)  |  Overcome (40)  |  Paper (192)  |  Parallel (46)  |  Read (308)  |  Think (1122)  |  Write (250)  |  Year (963)

Language is simply alive, like an organism. We all tell each other this, in fact, when we speak of living languages, and I think we mean something more than an abstract metaphor. We mean alive. Words are the cells of language, moving the great body, on legs. Language grows and evolves, leaving fossils behind. The individual words are like different species of animals. Mutations occur. Words fuse, and then mate. Hybrid words and wild varieties or compound words are the progeny. Some mixed words are dominated by one parent while the other is recessive. The way a word is used this year is its phenotype, but it has deeply immutable meanings, often hidden, which is its genotype.... The separate languages of the Indo-European family were at one time, perhaps five thousand years ago, maybe much longer, a single language. The separation of the speakers by migrations had effects on language comparable to the speciation observed by Darwin on various islands of the Galapagos. Languages became different species, retaining enough resemblance to an original ancestor so that the family resemblance can still be seen.
in 'Living Language,' The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher, (1974, 1984), 106.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Alive (97)  |  Ancestor (63)  |  Animal (651)  |  Behind (139)  |  Body (557)  |  Compound (117)  |  Different (595)  |  Effect (414)  |  Enough (341)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Family (101)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Galapagos (5)  |  Genotype (8)  |  Great (1610)  |  Grow (247)  |  Hybrid (14)  |  Immutable (26)  |  Individual (420)  |  Island (49)  |  Language (308)  |  Leg (35)  |  Living (492)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Metaphor (37)  |  Migration (12)  |  More (2558)  |  Mutation (40)  |  Observed (149)  |  Occur (151)  |  Organism (231)  |  Other (2233)  |  Parent (80)  |  Phenotype (5)  |  Progeny (16)  |  Recessive (6)  |  Resemblance (39)  |  Separate (151)  |  Separation (60)  |  Single (365)  |  Speak (240)  |  Species (435)  |  Still (614)  |  Tell (344)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Time (1911)  |  Various (205)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wild (96)  |  Word (650)  |  Year (963)

Laws of Serendi[ity:
(1) In order to discover anything, you must be looking for something.
(2) If you wish to make an improved product, you must already be engaged in making an inferior one.
In Dr. N Sreedharan, Quotations of Wit and Wisdom (2007), 18.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Inferior (37)  |  Law (913)  |  Looking (191)  |  Making (300)  |  Must (1525)  |  Order (638)  |  Product (166)  |  Wish (216)

Leave the beaten track occasionally and dive into the woods. Every time you do so you will be certain to find something that you have never seen before. Of course, it will be a little thing, but do not ignore it. Follow it up, explore all around it: one discovery will lead to another, and before you know it, you will have something worth thinking about to occupy your mind. All really big discoveries are the results of thought.
Address (22 May 1914) to the graduating class of the Friends’ School, Washington, D.C. Printed in 'Discovery and Invention', The National Geographic Magazine (1914), 25, 650.
Science quotes on:  |  Beaten Track (4)  |  Certain (557)  |  Course (413)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Dive (13)  |  Do (1905)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Find (1014)  |  Follow (389)  |  Ignore (52)  |  Know (1538)  |  Lead (391)  |  Leave (138)  |  Little (717)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Never (1089)  |  Occupy (27)  |  Result (700)  |  See (1094)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Track (42)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wood (97)  |  Woods (15)  |  Worth (172)

Lecturing after a fashion is easy enough ; teaching is a very different affair. ... The transmission of ideas from one mind to another, in a simple unequivocal form, is not always easy ; but in teaching, the object is not merely to convey the idea, but to give a lively and lasting impression; something that should not merely cause the retention of the image, but in such connection as to excite another process, ' thought.'
Memoirs of John Abernethy (1854), 253.
Science quotes on:  |  Cause (561)  |  Connection (171)  |  Different (595)  |  Easy (213)  |  Enough (341)  |  Form (976)  |  Idea (881)  |  Image (97)  |  Impression (118)  |  Lively (17)  |  Merely (315)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Object (438)  |  Process (439)  |  Simple (426)  |  Teaching (190)  |  Thought (995)  |  Transmission (34)

Let us now declare the means whereby our understanding can rise to knowledge without fear of error. There are two such means: intuition and deduction. By intuition I mean not the varying testimony of the senses, nor the deductive judgment of imagination naturally extravagant, but the conception of an attentive mind so distinct and so clear that no doubt remains to it with regard to that which it comprehends; or, what amounts to the same thing, the self-evidencing conception of a sound and attentive mind, a conception which springs from the light of reason alone, and is more certain, because more simple, than deduction itself. …
It may perhaps be asked why to intuition we add this other mode of knowing, by deduction, that is to say, the process which, from something of which we have certain knowledge, draws consequences which necessarily follow therefrom. But we are obliged to admit this second step; for there are a great many things which, without being evident of themselves, nevertheless bear the marks of certainty if only they are deduced from true and incontestable principles by a continuous and uninterrupted movement of thought, with distinct intuition of each thing; just as we know that the last link of a long chain holds to the first, although we can not take in with one glance of the eye the intermediate links, provided that, after having run over them in succession, we can recall them all, each as being joined to its fellows, from the first up to the last. Thus we distinguish intuition from deduction, inasmuch as in the latter case there is conceived a certain progress or succession, while it is not so in the former; … whence it follows that primary propositions, derived immediately from principles, may be said to be known, according to the way we view them, now by intuition, now by deduction; although the principles themselves can be known only by intuition, the remote consequences only by deduction.
In Rules for the Direction of the Mind, Philosophy of Descartes. [Torrey] (1892), 64-65.
Science quotes on:  |  Accord (36)  |  According (236)  |  Add (42)  |  Admit (49)  |  Alone (324)  |  Amount (153)  |  Ask (420)  |  Attentive (15)  |  Bear (162)  |  Being (1276)  |  Case (102)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Chain (51)  |  Clear (111)  |  Comprehend (44)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Conception (160)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Continuous (83)  |  Declare (48)  |  Deduce (27)  |  Deduction (90)  |  Deductive (13)  |  Derive (70)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Draw (140)  |  Error (339)  |  Evident (92)  |  Extravagant (10)  |  Eye (440)  |  Fear (212)  |  Fellow (88)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Former (138)  |  Glance (36)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hold (96)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Inasmuch (5)  |  Incontestable (3)  |  Intermediate (38)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Join (32)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Last (425)  |  Latter (21)  |  Let (64)  |  Light (635)  |  Link (48)  |  Long (778)  |  Mark (47)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mode (43)  |  More (2558)  |  Movement (162)  |  Naturally (11)  |  Nature Of Mathematics (80)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Obliged (6)  |  Other (2233)  |  Primary (82)  |  Principle (530)  |  Process (439)  |  Progress (492)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Provide (79)  |  Reason (766)  |  Recall (11)  |  Regard (312)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remote (86)  |  Rise (169)  |  Run (158)  |  Same (166)  |  Say (989)  |  Second (66)  |  Self (268)  |  Sense (785)  |  Simple (426)  |  Sound (187)  |  Spring (140)  |  Step (234)  |  Succession (80)  |  Testimony (21)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Therefrom (2)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  True (239)  |  Two (936)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Uninterrupted (7)  |  Vary (27)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whereby (2)  |  Why (491)

Life is a thin narrowness of taken-for-granted, a plank over a canyon in a fog. There is something under our feet, the taken-for-granted. A table is a table, food is food, we are we—because we don’t question these things. And science is the enemy because it is the questioner. Faith saves our souls alive by giving us a universe of the taken-for-granted.
From a 1923 journal entry. As quoted in The Ghost in the Little House, ch. 7, by William V. Holtz (1993).
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (97)  |  Canyon (9)  |  Enemy (86)  |  Faith (209)  |  Fog (10)  |  Food (213)  |  Foot (65)  |  Give (208)  |  Grant (76)  |  Life (1870)  |  Narrowness (2)  |  Plank (4)  |  Question (649)  |  Save (126)  |  Soul (235)  |  Table (105)  |  Thin (18)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Universe (900)

Life is not a chain of events but an area—something spreading out from a hidden centre and welling at once toward all points of the compass.
The Gentle Art of Tramping (1926), 193.
Science quotes on:  |  Centre (31)  |  Chain (51)  |  Compass (37)  |  Event (222)  |  Hide (70)  |  Life (1870)  |  Point (584)  |  Spreading (5)

Life is not easy for any of us, but what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted in something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained.
Letter to brother (1894). In Eve Curie, Madame Curie: a Biography by Eve Curie (1937, 2007), 158.
Science quotes on:  |  Attain (126)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Cost (94)  |  Easy (213)  |  Gift (105)  |  Gifted (25)  |  Life (1870)  |  Must (1525)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Perseverance (24)  |  Self-Confidence (11)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Whatever (234)

Like taxes, radioactivity has long been with us and in increasing amounts; it is not to be hated and feared, but accepted and controlled. Radiation is dangerous, let there be no mistake about that—but the modern world abounds in dangerous substances and situations too numerous to mention. ... Consider radiation as something to be treated with respect, avoided when practicable, and accepted when inevitable.
Recommending the same view towards radiation as the risks of automobile travel.
While in the Office of Naval Research. In Must we Hide? (1949), 44.
Science quotes on:  |  Abound (17)  |  Accept (198)  |  Amount (153)  |  Automobile (23)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Consider (428)  |  Control (182)  |  Danger (127)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Fear (212)  |  Hate (68)  |  Increase (225)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Long (778)  |  Mention (84)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Modern (402)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Radiation (48)  |  Radioactivity (33)  |  Respect (212)  |  Risk (68)  |  Situation (117)  |  Substance (253)  |  Tax (27)  |  Travel (125)  |  View (496)  |  World (1850)

Long lives are not necessarily pleasurable…. We will be lucky if we can postpone the search for new technologies for a while, until we have discovered some satisfactory things to do with the extra time. Something will surely have to be found to take the place of sitting on the porch re-examining one’s watch.
In 'The Long Habit', The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher (1974), 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Discover (571)  |  Do (1905)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Long (778)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  New (1273)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Porch (2)  |  Postpone (5)  |  Search (175)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Surely (101)  |  Technology (281)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Watch (118)  |  Will (2350)

Looking back … over the long and labyrinthine path which finally led to the discovery [of the quantum theory], I am vividly reminded of Goethe’s saying that men will always be making mistakes as long as they are striving after something.
From Nobel Prize acceptance speech (2 Jun 1920), as quoted and translated by James Murphy in 'Introduction: Max Planck: a Biographical Sketch', in Max Planck and James Murphy (trans.), Where is Science Going (1932), 23. This passage of Planck’s speech is translated very differently for the Nobel Committee. See elsewhere on this web page, beginning, “When I look back…”.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Error (339)  |  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (150)  |  Labyrinth (12)  |  Lead (391)  |  Long (778)  |  Looking (191)  |  Making (300)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Path (159)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Reminded (2)  |  Strive (53)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Vivid (25)  |  Vividly (11)  |  Will (2350)

Lord Kelvin was so satisfied with this triumph of science that he declared himself to be as certain of the existence of the ether as a man can be about anything.... “When you can measure what you are speaking about, and express it in numbers, you know something about it....” Thus did Lord Kelvin lay down the law. And though quite wrong, this time he has the support of official modern Science. It is NOT true that when you can measure what you are speaking about, you know something about it. The fact that you can measure something doesn't even prove that that something exists.... Take the ether, for example: didn't they measure the ratio of its elasticity to its density?
In Science is a Sacred Cow (1950), 69-70; 85.
Science quotes on:  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Declared (24)  |  Density (25)  |  Down (455)  |  Elasticity (8)  |  Ether (37)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Express (192)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Himself (461)  |  Baron William Thomson Kelvin (74)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Law (913)  |  Lord (97)  |  Man (2252)  |  Measure (241)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Science (55)  |  Number (710)  |  Proof (304)  |  Prove (261)  |  Ratio (41)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Support (151)  |  Time (1911)  |  Triumph (76)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Wrong (246)

MAGNET, n. Something acted upon by magnetism.
MAGNETISM, n. Something acting upon a magnet.
The two definitions immediately foregoing are condensed from the works of one thousand eminent scientists, who have illuminated the subject with a great white light, to the inexpressible advancement of human knowledge.
The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce (1911), Vol. 7, The Devil's Dictionary,  208.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Advancement (63)  |  Definition (238)  |  Foregoing (3)  |  Great (1610)  |  Human (1512)  |  Humour (116)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Light (635)  |  Magnet (22)  |  Magnetism (43)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Subject (543)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Two (936)  |  White (132)  |  White Light (5)  |  Work (1402)

Man has an inalienable right to die of something.
Anonymous
'Quack cures for cancer', Cardiff Mail (20 Oct 1923).
Science quotes on:  |  Death (406)  |  Man (2252)  |  Right (473)

Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with bad ones.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Absence (21)  |  Animal (651)  |  Bad (185)  |  Belief (615)  |  Credulous (9)  |  Good (906)  |  Ground (222)  |  Man (2252)  |  Must (1525)  |  Satisfied (23)  |  Will (2350)

Man is a part of nature, not something contrasted with nature. His thoughts and his bodily movements follow the same laws that describe the motions of stars and atoms.
Opening of What I Believe (1925), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (381)  |  Body (557)  |  Contrast (45)  |  Describe (132)  |  Follow (389)  |  Law (913)  |  Man (2252)  |  Motion (320)  |  Movement (162)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Part (235)  |  Same (166)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Thought (995)

Man is no new-begot child of the ape, bred of a struggle for existence upon brutish lines—nor should the belief that such is his origin, oft dinned into his ears by scientists, influence his conduct. Were he to regard himself as an extremely ancient type, distinguished chiefly by the qualities of his mind, and to look upon the existing Primates as the failures of his line, as his misguided and brutish collaterals, rather than as his ancestors, I think it would be something gained for the ethical outlook of Homo—and also it would be consistent with present knowledge.
The Origin of Man (1918), a pamphlet published by The Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge, reprinted in Arthur Dendy (ed.), Animal Life and Human Progress (1919), 131.
Science quotes on:  |  Ancestor (63)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Ape (54)  |  Belief (615)  |  Chiefly (47)  |  Child (333)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Consistent (50)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Ear (69)  |  Ethical (34)  |  Existence (481)  |  Failure (176)  |  Gain (146)  |  Himself (461)  |  Homo Sapiens (23)  |  Human Progress (18)  |  Influence (231)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Look (584)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  New (1273)  |  Origin (250)  |  Origin Of Man (9)  |  Outlook (32)  |  Present (630)  |  Primate (11)  |  Regard (312)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Think (1122)  |  Type (171)

Many errors, of a truth, consist merely in the application of the wrong names of things. For if a man says that the lines which are drawn from the centre of the circle to the circumference are not equal, he understands by the circle, at all events for the time, something else than mathematicians understand by it.
In 'Prop. 47: The human mind possesses an adequate knowledge of the eternal and infinite essence of God', Ethic, translated by William Hale White (1883), 93-94. Collected in The English and Foreign Philosophical Library, Vol. 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Application (257)  |  Center (35)  |  Circle (117)  |  Circumference (23)  |  Consist (223)  |  Definition (238)  |  Drawing (56)  |  Else (4)  |  Equal (88)  |  Error (339)  |  Event (222)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Merely (315)  |  Name (359)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Say (989)  |  French Saying (67)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Wrong (246)

Mathematical proofs are essentially of three different types: pre-formal; formal; post-formal. Roughly the first and third prove something about that sometimes clear and empirical, sometimes vague and ‘quasi-empirical’ stuff, which is the real though rather evasive subject of mathematics.
In Mathematics, Science and Epistemology (1980), Vol. 2, 69.
Science quotes on:  |  Clear (111)  |  Different (595)  |  Empirical (58)  |  Essential (210)  |  First (1302)  |  Formal (37)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Proof (304)  |  Prove (261)  |  Real (159)  |  Subject (543)  |  Type (171)  |  Vague (50)

Mathematicians are like a certain type of Frenchman: when you talk to them they translate it into their own language, and then it soon turns into something completely different.
Maxims and Reflections (1998), trans. E. Stopp, 162.
Science quotes on:  |  Certain (557)  |  Completely (137)  |  Different (595)  |  Language (308)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Soon (187)  |  Translate (21)  |  Turn (454)  |  Type (171)

Mathematicians are like Frenchmen: whatever you say to them they translate into their own language and forthwith it is something entirely different.
From Maximen und Reflexionen (1907), Vol. 21, 266, Maxim 1279. Translation as quoted in George Edward Martin, The Foundations of Geometry and the Non-Euclidean Plane (1982), 94. From the original German, “Mathematiker sind eine Art Franzosen: redet man zu ihnen, so übersetzen sie es in ihre Sprache, und dann ist es alsobald ganz etwas anderes.”
Science quotes on:  |  Different (595)  |  Entirely (36)  |  Forthwith (2)  |  Frenchman (4)  |  Language (308)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Say (989)  |  Translate (21)  |  Whatever (234)

Mathematics seems to endow one with something like a new sense.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Endow (17)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  New (1273)  |  Seem (150)  |  Sense (785)

May the Gods confound that man who first disclosed the hours, and who first, in fact, erected a sun-dial here; who, for wretched me, minced the day up into pieces. For when I was a boy, this stomach was the sun-dial, one much better and truer than all of these; when that used to warn me to eat. Except when there was nothing to eat. Now, even when there is something to eat, it’s not eaten, unless the sun chooses; and to such a degree now, in fact, is the city filled with sun-dials, that the greater part of the people are creeping along the streets shrunk up with famine.
Plautus
A fragment, preserved in the works of Aulus Gellius, as translated by Henry Thomas Riley, in The Comedies of Plautus (1890), Vol. 2, 517.
Science quotes on:  |  Better (493)  |  Boy (100)  |  Choose (116)  |  City (87)  |  Confound (21)  |  Day (43)  |  Degree (277)  |  Dial (9)  |  Eat (108)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Famine (18)  |  First (1302)  |  God (776)  |  Greater (288)  |  Hour (192)  |  Man (2252)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  People (1031)  |  Stomach (40)  |  Sun (407)  |  Sundial (6)  |  Time (1911)  |  Wretched (8)

Men, my brothers, men the workers, ever reaping something new,
That which they have done but earnest of the things which they shall do.
Stanza in poem 'Locksley Hall' (1842) in The Complete Works of Alfred Tennyson (1880), 64.
Science quotes on:  |  Brother (47)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Earnest (3)  |  Man (2252)  |  New (1273)  |  Reaping (4)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Worker (34)

Metaphysics may be, after all, only the art of being sure of something that is not so and logic only the art of going wrong with confidence.
In The Modern Temper (1929), 228. The second part of this quote is often seen as a sentence by itself, and a number of authors cite it incorrectly. For those invalid attributions, see quote beginning “Logic is only the art…” on the Joseph Wood Krutch Quotes page of this website.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Being (1276)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Going (6)  |  Logic (311)  |  Metaphysics (53)  |  Sure (15)  |  Wrong (246)

Method means that arrangement of subject matter which makes it most effective in use. Never is method something outside of the material.
Democracy and Education: an Introduction to the Philosophy of Education (1916), 194.
Science quotes on:  |  Arrangement (93)  |  Education (423)  |  Effective (68)  |  Effectiveness (13)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Method (531)  |  Most (1728)  |  Never (1089)  |  Outside (141)  |  Subject (543)  |  Use (771)

More discoveries have arisen from intense observation of very limited material than from statistics applied to large groups. The value of the latter lies mainly in testing hypotheses arising from the former. While observing one should cultivate a speculative, contemplative attitude of mind and search for clues to be followed up. Training in observation follows the same principles as training in any activity. At first one must do things consciously and laboriously, but with practice the activities gradually become automatic and unconscious and a habit is established. Effective scientific observation also requires a good background, for only by being familiar with the usual can we notice something as being unusual or unexplained.
The Art of Scientific Investigation (1950), 101.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Applied (176)  |  Arising (22)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Background (44)  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Effective (68)  |  Experiment (736)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Former (138)  |  Good (906)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Habit (174)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Large (398)  |  Lie (370)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Material (366)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Notice (81)  |  Observation (593)  |  Practice (212)  |  Principle (530)  |  Require (229)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Search (175)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Training (92)  |  Unexplained (8)  |  Unusual (37)  |  Value (393)

Most people like to believe something is or is not true. Great scientists tolerate ambiguity very well. They believe the theory enough to go ahead; they doubt it enough to notice the errors and faults so they can step forward and create the new replacement theory. If you believe too much you’ll never notice the flaws; if you doubt too much you won’t get started. It requires a lovely balance.
'You and Your Research', Bell Communications Research Colloquium Seminar, 7 Mar 1986.
Science quotes on:  |  Ambiguity (17)  |  Balance (82)  |  Belief (615)  |  Create (245)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Enough (341)  |  Error (339)  |  Fault (58)  |  Flaw (18)  |  Forward (104)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatness (55)  |  Most (1728)  |  Never (1089)  |  New (1273)  |  Notice (81)  |  People (1031)  |  Replacement (13)  |  Require (229)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Start (237)  |  Step (234)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Toleration (7)  |  Truth (1109)

Mother: He’s been depressed. All of a sudden, he can’t do anything.
Doctor: Why are you depressed, Alvy?
Mother: Tell Dr. Flicker. It’s something he read.
Doctor: Something he read, huh?
Alvy: The universe is expanding.
Doctor: The universe is expanding?
Alvy: Well, the universe is everything, and if it’s expanding, someday it will break apart and that would be the end of everything!
Mother: What is that your business? He stopped doing his homework.
Alvy: What’s the point?
With co-author Marshall Brickman, Annie Hall (1973).
Science quotes on:  |  Break (109)  |  Business (156)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Doing (277)  |  End (603)  |  Everything (489)  |  Mother (116)  |  Point (584)  |  Read (308)  |  Someday (15)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Tell (344)  |  Universe (900)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)

Mutations and chromosomal changes arise in every sufficiently studied organism with a certain finite frequency, and thus constantly and unremittingly supply the raw materials for evolution. But evolution involves something more than origin of mutations. Mutations and chromosomal changes are only the first stage, or level, of the evolutionary process, governed entirely by the laws of the physiology of individuals. Once produced, mutations are injected in the genetic composition of the population, where their further fate is determined by the dynamic regularities of the physiology of populations. A mutation may be lost or increased in frequency in generations immediately following its origin, and this (in the case of recessive mutations) without regard to the beneficial or deleterious effects of the mutation. The influences of selection, migration, and geographical isolation then mold the genetic structure of populations into new shapes, in conformity with the secular environment and the ecology, especially the breeding habits, of the species. This is the second level of the evolutionary process, on which the impact of the environment produces historical changes in the living population.
Genetics and Origin of Species (1937), 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Arise (162)  |  Breeding (21)  |  Certain (557)  |  Change (639)  |  Chromosome (23)  |  Composition (86)  |  Ecology (81)  |  Effect (414)  |  Environment (239)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fate (76)  |  Finite (60)  |  First (1302)  |  Frequency (25)  |  Generation (256)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genetics (105)  |  Govern (66)  |  Habit (174)  |  Historical (70)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Impact (45)  |  Individual (420)  |  Influence (231)  |  Injection (9)  |  Involve (93)  |  Isolation (32)  |  Law (913)  |  Living (492)  |  Material (366)  |  Migration (12)  |  Mold (37)  |  More (2558)  |  Mutation (40)  |  New (1273)  |  Organism (231)  |  Origin (250)  |  Origin Of Species (42)  |  Physiology (101)  |  Population (115)  |  Process (439)  |  Produced (187)  |  Raw (28)  |  Recessive (6)  |  Regard (312)  |  Secular (11)  |  Selection (130)  |  Species (435)  |  Stage (152)  |  Structure (365)  |  Supply (100)

My first view - a panorama of brilliant deep blue ocean, shot with shades of green and gray and white - was of atolls and clouds. Close to the window I could see that this Pacific scene in motion was rimmed by the great curved limb of the Earth. It had a thin halo of blue held close, and beyond, black space. I held my breath, but something was missing - I felt strangely unfulfilled. Here was a tremendous visual spectacle, but viewed in silence. There was no grand musical accompaniment; no triumphant, inspired sonata or symphony. Each one of us must write the music of this sphere for ourselves.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Beyond (316)  |  Black (46)  |  Blue (63)  |  Breath (61)  |  Brilliant (57)  |  Close (77)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Curve (49)  |  Deep (241)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Feel (371)  |  First (1302)  |  Grand (29)  |  Gray (9)  |  Great (1610)  |  Green (65)  |  Halo (7)  |  Hold (96)  |  Inspire (58)  |  Limb (9)  |  Miss (51)  |  Missing (21)  |  Motion (320)  |  Music (133)  |  Musical (10)  |  Must (1525)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Pacific (4)  |  Panorama (5)  |  Rim (5)  |  Scene (36)  |  See (1094)  |  Shade (35)  |  Shoot (21)  |  Silence (62)  |  Sonata (2)  |  Space (523)  |  Spectacle (35)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Strangely (5)  |  Symphony (10)  |  Thin (18)  |  Tremendous (29)  |  Triumphant (10)  |  Unfulfilled (3)  |  View (496)  |  Visual (16)  |  White (132)  |  Window (59)  |  Write (250)

My mother, my dad and I left Cuba when I was two [January, 1959]. Castro had taken control by then, and life for many ordinary people had become very difficult. My dad had worked [as a personal bodyguard for the wife of Cuban president Batista], so he was a marked man. We moved to Miami, which is about as close to Cuba as you can get without being there. It’s a Cuba-centric society. I think a lot of Cubans moved to the US thinking everything would be perfect. Personally, I have to say that those early years were not particularly happy. A lot of people didn’t want us around, and I can remember seeing signs that said: “No children. No pets. No Cubans.” Things were not made easier by the fact that Dad had begun working for the US government. At the time he couldn’t really tell us what he was doing, because it was some sort of top-secret operation. He just said he wanted to fight against what was happening back at home. [Estefan’s father was one of the many Cuban exiles taking part in the ill-fated, anti-Castro Bay of Pigs invasion to overthrow dictator Fidel Castro.] One night, Dad disappeared. I think he was so worried about telling my mother he was going that he just left her a note. There were rumors something was happening back home, but we didn’t really know where Dad had gone. It was a scary time for many Cubans. A lot of men were involved—lots of families were left without sons and fathers. By the time we found out what my dad had been doing, the attempted coup had taken place, on April 17, 1961. Initially he’d been training in Central America, but after the coup attempt he was captured and spent the next two years as a political prisoner in Cuba. That was probably the worst time for my mother and me. Not knowing what was going to happen to Dad. I was only a kid, but I had worked out where my dad was. My mother was trying to keep it a secret, so she used to tell me Dad was on a farm. Of course, I thought that she didn’t know what had really happened to him, so I used to keep up the pretense that Dad really was working on a farm. We used to do this whole pretending thing every day, trying to protect each other. Those two years had a terrible effect on my mother. She was very nervous, just going from church to church. Always carrying her rosary beads, praying her little heart out. She had her religion, and I had my music. Music was in our family. My mother was a singer, and on my father’s side there was a violinist and a pianist. My grandmother was a poet.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  America (143)  |  April (9)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Back (395)  |  Bad (185)  |  Bay Of Pigs (2)  |  Become (821)  |  Begin (275)  |  Being (1276)  |  Capture (11)  |  Carry (130)  |  Fidel Castro (3)  |  Central (81)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Church (64)  |  Close (77)  |  Control (182)  |  Coup (2)  |  Course (413)  |  Cuba (2)  |  Dad (4)  |  Dictator (3)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Early (196)  |  Easier (53)  |  Easy (213)  |  Effect (414)  |  Everything (489)  |  Exile (6)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Family (101)  |  Farm (28)  |  Father (113)  |  Fight (49)  |  Find (1014)  |  Government (116)  |  Grandmother (4)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Happening (59)  |  Happy (108)  |  Heart (243)  |  Home (184)  |  Invasion (9)  |  Involve (93)  |  Involved (90)  |  Keep (104)  |  Kid (18)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Leave (138)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Lot (151)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mark (47)  |  Marked (55)  |  Mother (116)  |  Move (223)  |  Music (133)  |  Nervous (7)  |  Next (238)  |  Night (133)  |  Note (39)  |  Of Course (22)  |  Operation (221)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Other (2233)  |  Overthrow (5)  |  Part (235)  |  Particularly (21)  |  People (1031)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Personal (75)  |  Personally (7)  |  Pet (10)  |  Pianist (2)  |  Place (192)  |  Poet (97)  |  Political (124)  |  Pray (19)  |  President (36)  |  Pretence (7)  |  Pretend (18)  |  Prisoner (8)  |  Probably (50)  |  Protect (65)  |  Really (77)  |  Religion (369)  |  Remember (189)  |  Rumour (2)  |  Say (989)  |  Scary (3)  |  Secret (216)  |  See (1094)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Side (236)  |  Sign (63)  |  Society (350)  |  Son (25)  |  Sort (50)  |  Spend (97)  |  Spent (85)  |  Tell (344)  |  Terrible (41)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Top (100)  |  Training (92)  |  Try (296)  |  Trying (144)  |  Two (936)  |  Want (504)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wife (41)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worry (34)  |  Worst (57)  |  Year (963)

My original decision to devote myself to science was a direct result of the discovery which has never ceased to fill me with enthusiasm since my early youth—the comprehension of the far from obvious fact that the laws of human reasoning coincide with the laws governing the sequences of the impressions we receive from the world about us; that, therefore, pure reasoning can enable man to gain an insight into the mechanism of the latter. In this connection, it is of paramount importance that the outside world is something independent from man, something absolute, and the quest for the laws which apply to this absolute appeared to me as the most sublime scientific pursuit in life.
'A Scientific Autobiography' (1948), in Scientific Autobiography and Other Papers, trans. Frank Gaynor (1950), 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Appearance (145)  |  Application (257)  |  Apply (170)  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Conincidence (4)  |  Connection (171)  |  Decision (98)  |  Devotion (37)  |  Direct (228)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Early (196)  |  Enable (122)  |  Enthusiasm (59)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Fill (67)  |  Gain (146)  |  Governing (20)  |  Human (1512)  |  Importance (299)  |  Impression (118)  |  Independence (37)  |  Insight (107)  |  Law (913)  |  Life (1870)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  Most (1728)  |  Myself (211)  |  Never (1089)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Original (61)  |  Outside (141)  |  Paramount (11)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Quest (39)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Receive (117)  |  Result (700)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Sequence (68)  |  Sublime (50)  |  World (1850)  |  Youth (109)

My thesis is that what we call 'science' is differentiated from the older myths not by being something distinct from a myth, but by being accompanied by a second-order tradition—that of critically discussing the myth. … In a certain sense, science is myth-making just as religion is.
Conjectures and Refutations: the Growth of Scientific Knowledge (2002), 170-171.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Call (781)  |  Certain (557)  |  Criticism (85)  |  Differentiation (28)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Making (300)  |  Myth (58)  |  Order (638)  |  Religion (369)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Sense (785)  |  Thesis (17)  |  Tradition (76)

My view of the matter, for what it is worth, is that there is no such thing as a logical method of having new ideas, or a logical reconstruction of this process. My view may be expressed by saying that every discovery contains an “irrational element,” or “a creative intuition,” in Bergson's sense. In a similar way Einstein speaks of the “search for those highly universal laws … from which a picture of the world can be obtained by pure deduction. There is no logical path.” he says, “leading to these … laws. They can only be reached by intuition, based upon something like an intellectual love (Einfühlung) of the objects of experience.”
In The Logic of Scientific Discovery: Logik Der Forschung (1959, 2002), 8.
Science quotes on:  |  Creative (144)  |  Deduction (90)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  Element (322)  |  Experience (494)  |  Express (192)  |  Idea (881)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Law (913)  |  Love (328)  |  Matter (821)  |  Method (531)  |  New (1273)  |  Object (438)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Path (159)  |  Picture (148)  |  Process (439)  |  Pure (299)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reconstruction (16)  |  Say (989)  |  Search (175)  |  Sense (785)  |  Speak (240)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Universal (198)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)  |  Worth (172)

Neither is there a smallest part of what is small, but there is always a smaller (for it is impossible that what is should cease to be). Likewise there is always something larger than what is large.
Simplicius, Commentary on Aristotle’s Physics, 164, 17-9. In G. S. Kirk, J. E. Raven and M. Schofield (eds.), The Presocratic Philosophers: A Critical History with a Selection of Texts (1983), p. 360.
Science quotes on:  |  Aristotle (179)  |  Atom (381)  |  Cease (81)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Large (398)  |  Small (489)

Never be afraid to try something new. Remember, amateurs built the Ark, professionals built the Titanic.
Anonymous
Ralph Keyes, in The Quote Verifier: Who Said What, Where, and When (2007), 116, states “This is a new saw that floats about in search of an originator.” It was seen, for example, in the her advice column, shortly before Abby stopped writing her column. A variant, with only the “amateurs” and “professionals" clauses, appears as early 1984 in The World Economy, Vol. 7, 406.
Science quotes on:  |  Afraid (24)  |  Amateur (22)  |  Ark (6)  |  Build (211)  |  Never (1089)  |  New (1273)  |  Professional (77)  |  Remember (189)  |  Titanic (4)  |  Try (296)

Never say there is nothing beautiful in the world anymore. There is always something to make you wonder in the shape of a tree, the trembling of a leaf.
In The Schweitzer Album: A Portrait in Words and Pictures (1965), 39.
Science quotes on:  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Leaf (73)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Say (989)  |  Shape (77)  |  Tree (269)  |  Trembling (4)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Wondering (3)  |  World (1850)

Newton was the greatest creative genius physics has ever seen. None of the other candidates for the superlative (Einstein, Maxwell, Boltzmann, Gibbs, and Feynman) has matched Newton’s combined achievements as theoretician, experimentalist, and mathematician. … If you were to become a time traveler and meet Newton on a trip back to the seventeenth century, you might find him something like the performer who first exasperates everyone in sight and then goes on stage and sings like an angel.
In Great Physicists (2001), 39.
Science quotes on:  |  17th Century (20)  |  Achievement (187)  |  Angel (47)  |  Back (395)  |  Become (821)  |  Ludwig Eduard Boltzmann (25)  |  Candidate (8)  |  Century (319)  |  Creative (144)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Albert Einstein (624)  |  Experimentalist (20)  |  Richard P. Feynman (125)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Genius (301)  |  Gibbs_Josiah (2)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Match (30)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  James Clerk Maxwell (91)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Other (2233)  |  Performer (2)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Sight (135)  |  Sing (29)  |  Stage (152)  |  Superlative (4)  |  Theorist (44)  |  Time (1911)  |  Time Travel (4)  |  Traveler (33)

Newton was the greatest creative genius physics has ever seen. None of the other candidates for the superlative (Einstein, Maxwell, Boltzmann, Gibbs, and Feynman) has matched Newton’s combined achievements as theoretician, experimentalist, and mathematician. … If you were to become a time traveler and meet Newton on a trip back to the seventeenth century, you might find him something like the performer who first exasperates everyone in sight and then goes on stage and sings like an angel.
In Great Physicists (2001), 39.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Angel (47)  |  Back (395)  |  Become (821)  |  Candidate (8)  |  Century (319)  |  Creative (144)  |  Einstein (101)  |  Experimentalist (20)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Genius (301)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Match (30)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Sight (135)  |  Stage (152)  |  Time (1911)  |  Traveler (33)

No engineer can go upon a new work and not find something peculiar, that will demand his careful reflection, and the deliberate consideration of any advice that he may receive; and nothing so fully reveals his incapacity as a pretentious assumption of knowledge, claiming to understand everything.
In Railway Property: A Treatise on the Construction and Management of Railways (1866), 247.
Science quotes on:  |  Advice (57)  |  Assumption (96)  |  Care (203)  |  Claim (154)  |  Claiming (8)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Deliberate (19)  |  Demand (131)  |  Engineer (136)  |  Everything (489)  |  Find (1014)  |  Incapacity (3)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  New (1273)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Pretentious (4)  |  Receive (117)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Revelation (51)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

No hypothesis concerning the nature of this 'something' shall be advanced thereby or based thereon. Therefore it appears as most simple to use the last syllable 'gen' taken from Darwin's well-known word pangene since it alone is of interest to use, in order thereby to replace the poor, more ambiguous word, 'Anlage'. Thus, we will say for 'das pangene' and 'die pangene' simply 'Das Gen' and 'Die Gene,' The word Gen is fully free from every hypothesis; it expresses only the safely proved fact that in any case many properties of organisms are conditioned by separable and hence independent 'Zustiinde,' 'Grundlagen,' 'Anlagen'—in short what we will call 'just genes'—which occur specifically in the gametes.
Elemente der Exakten Erblichkeitslehre (1909), 124. Trans. G. E. Allen and quoted in G. E. Allen, Thomas Hunt Morgan: The Man and His Science (1978), 209-10 (Footnote 79).
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Ambiguous (14)  |  Call (781)  |  Condition (362)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Free (239)  |  Gamete (5)  |  Gene (105)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Interest (416)  |  Known (453)  |  Last (425)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Occur (151)  |  Order (638)  |  Organism (231)  |  Poor (139)  |  Say (989)  |  Short (200)  |  Simple (426)  |  Use (771)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)

No matter how correct a mathematical theorem may appear to be, one ought never to be satisfied that there was not something imperfect about it until it also gives the impression of being beautiful.
As quoted in Desmond MacHale. Comic Sections (1993), 107, without citation. Please contact the Webmaster if you know the primary source.
Science quotes on:  |  Appear (122)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Being (1276)  |  Correct (95)  |  Imperfect (46)  |  Impression (118)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Matter (821)  |  Never (1089)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  Theorem (116)

No one believes an hypothesis except its originator but everyone believes an experiment except the experimenter. Most people are ready to believe something based on experiment but the experimenter knows the many little things that could have gone wrong in the experiment. For this reason the discoverer of a new fact seldom feels quite so confident of it as others do. On the other hand other people are usually critical of an hypothesis, whereas the originator identifies himself with it and is liable to become devoted to it.
The Art of Scientific Investigation (1950), 47.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Confident (25)  |  Critical (73)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Discoverer (43)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimenter (40)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Feel (371)  |  Himself (461)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Know (1538)  |  Little (717)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Originator (7)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1031)  |  Reason (766)  |  Seldom (68)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Usually (176)  |  Wrong (246)

No one can take from us the joy of the first becoming aware of something, the so-called discovery. But if we also demand the honor, it can be utterly spoiled for us, for we are usually not the first. What does discovery mean, and who can say that he has discovered this or that? After all it’s pure idiocy to brag about priority; for it’s simply unconscious conceit, not to admit frankly that one is a plagiarist.
Epigraph to Lancelot Law Whyte, The Unconscious before Freud (1960).
Science quotes on:  |  Becoming (96)  |  Call (781)  |  Conceit (15)  |  Demand (131)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  First (1302)  |  Honor (57)  |  Joy (117)  |  Mean (810)  |  Plagiarism (10)  |  Priority (11)  |  Pure (299)  |  Say (989)  |  So-Called (71)  |  Usually (176)

No true geologist holds by the development hypothesis;—it has been resigned to sciolists and smatterers;—and there is but one other alternative. They began to be, through the miracle of creation. From the evidence furnished by these rocks we are shut down either to belief in miracle, or to something else infinitely harder of reception, and as thoroughly unsupported by testimony as it is contrary to experience. Hume is at length answered by the severe truths of the stony science.
The Foot-prints of the Creator: Or, The Asterolepis of Stromness (1850, 1859), 301.
Science quotes on:  |  Alternative (32)  |  Answer (389)  |  Belief (615)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Creation (350)  |  Development (441)  |  Down (455)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Experience (494)  |  Furnish (97)  |  Geologist (82)  |   David Hume (34)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Miracle (85)  |  Other (2233)  |  Reception (16)  |  Rock (176)  |  Sciolist (2)  |  Shut (41)  |  Superficial (12)  |  Testimony (21)  |  Thoroughly (67)  |  Through (846)  |  Truth (1109)

Nobody, I suppose, could devote many years to the study of chemical kinetics without being deeply conscious of the fascination of time and change: this is something that goes outside science into poetry; but science, subject to the rigid necessity of always seeking closer approximations to the truth, itself contains many poetical elements.
From Nobel Lecture (11 Dec 1956), collected in Nobel Lectures in Chemistry (1999), 474.
Science quotes on:  |  Approximation (32)  |  Being (1276)  |  Change (639)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Closer (43)  |  Conscious (46)  |  Contain (68)  |  Element (322)  |  Fascination (35)  |  Kinetic (12)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Nobody (103)  |  Outside (141)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Rigid (24)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Seek (218)  |  Study (701)  |  Subject (543)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Year (963)

None of the myriad scientific papers I’d read prepared me for the patience and diligence that go into scientific research. None had prepared me for the acute attention to minutiae that keeps science accurate, and scientific integrity intact. Or for the tedium. … I accepted the idea that finding out you don’t like something can be invaluable.
Recalling undergraduate junior year tropical biology program exploring Costa Rica’s forest jungles. In 'Concentration Crisis', Brown Alumni Magazine (Jul-Aug 2007)
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Accurate (88)  |  Attention (196)  |  Diligence (22)  |  Idea (881)  |  Intact (9)  |  Integrity (21)  |  Invaluable (11)  |  Minutiae (7)  |  Myriad (32)  |  Paper (192)  |  Patience (58)  |  Prepare (44)  |  Read (308)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Tedium (3)

Nonmathematical people sometimes ask me, “You know math, huh? Tell me something I’ve always wondered, What is infinity divided by infinity?” I can only reply, “The words you just uttered do not make sense. That was not a mathematical sentence. You spoke of ‘infinity’ as if it were a number. It’s not. You may as well ask, 'What is truth divided by beauty?’ I have no clue. I only know how to divide numbers. ‘Infinity,’ ‘truth,’ ‘beauty’—those are not numbers.”
From Prime Obsession: Bernhard Riemann and the Greatest Unsolved Problem in Mathematics (2003), 16.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Divide (77)  |  Divided (50)  |  Do (1905)  |  Infinity (96)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Number (710)  |  People (1031)  |  Question (649)  |  Reply (58)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sentence (35)  |  Tell (344)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Word (650)

Nothing can so quickly blur and distort the facts as desire—the wish to use the facts for some purpose of your own—and nothing can so surely destroy the truth. As soon as the witness wants to prove something he is no longer impartial and his evidence is no longer to be trusted.
From 'Getting at the Truth', The Saturday Review (19 Sep 1953), 36, No. 38, 12. Excerpted in Meta Riley Emberger and Marian Ross Hall, Scientific Writing (1955), 400.
Science quotes on:  |  Blur (8)  |  Desire (212)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Distort (22)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Impartial (4)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Prove (261)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Soon (187)  |  Surely (101)  |  Trust (72)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Use (771)  |  Want (504)  |  Wish (216)  |  Witness (57)

Nothing in the entire universe ever perishes, believe me, but things vary, and adopt a new form. The phrase “being born” is used for beginning to be something different from what one was before, while “dying” means ceasing to be the same. Though this thing may pass into that, and that into this, yet the sums of things remains unchanged.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Adopt (22)  |  Bear (162)  |  Begin (275)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belief (615)  |  Cease (81)  |  Die (94)  |  Different (595)  |  Entire (50)  |  Form (976)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  New (1273)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Pass (241)  |  Perish (56)  |  Phrase (61)  |  Remain (355)  |  Same (166)  |  Sum (103)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Unchanged (4)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vary (27)

Now I feel as if I should succeed in doing something in mathematics, although I cannot see why it is so very important… The knowledge doesn’t make life any sweeter or happier, does it?
In Letter (29 May 1898), at age almost 18, to Mrs. Lawrence Hutton, excerpted in The Story of My Life: With her Letters (1887-1901) (1903, 1921), 242.
Science quotes on:  |  Doing (277)  |  Feel (371)  |  Happy (108)  |  Important (229)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  See (1094)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Sweet (40)  |  Why (491)

Now this supreme wisdom, united to goodness that is no less infinite, cannot but have chosen the best. For as a lesser evil is a kind of good, even so a lesser good is a kind of evil if it stands in the way of a greater good; and the would be something to correct in the actions of God if it were possible to the better. As in mathematics, when there is no maximum nor minimum, in short nothing distinguished, everything is done equally, or when that is not nothing at all is done: so it may be said likewise in respect of perfect wisdom, which is no less orderly than mathematics, that if there were not the best (optimum) among all possible worlds, God would not have produced any.
Theodicy: Essays on the Goodness of God and Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil (1710), 128.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Best (467)  |  Better (493)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Equally (129)  |  Everything (489)  |  Evil (122)  |  God (776)  |  Good (906)  |  Goodness (26)  |  Greater (288)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Kind (564)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Maximum (16)  |  Minimum (13)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Orderly (38)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Possible (560)  |  Produced (187)  |  Respect (212)  |  Short (200)  |  Stand (284)  |  Supreme (73)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wisdom (235)  |  World (1850)

Now, all causes of natural effects must be expressed by means of lines, angles and figures, for otherwise it is impossible to grasp their explanation. This is evident as follows. A natural agent multiplies its power from itself to the recipient, whether it acts on sense or on matter. This power is sometimes called species, sometimes a likeness, and it is the same thing whatever it may be called; and the agent sends the same power into sense and into matter, or into its own contrary, as heat sends the same thing into the sense of touch and into a cold body. For it does not act, by deliberation and choice, and therefore it acts in a single manner whatever it encounters, whether sense or something insensitive, whether something animate or inanimate. But the effects are diversified by the diversity of the recipient, for when this power is received by the senses, it produces an effect that is somehow spiritual and noble; on the other hand, when it is received by matter, it produces a material effect. Thus the sun produces different effects in different recipients by the same power, for it cakes mud and melts ice.
De Uneis, Angulis et Figuris seu Fractionibus Reflexionibus Radiorum (On Lines, Angles and Figures or On the Refraction and Reflection of Rays) [1230/31], trans. D. C. Lindberg, quoted in E. Grant (ed.), A Source Book in Medieval Science (1974), 385-6.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Agent (73)  |  Body (557)  |  Call (781)  |  Cause (561)  |  Choice (114)  |  Cold (115)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Deliberation (5)  |  Different (595)  |  Diversity (75)  |  Effect (414)  |  Evident (92)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Express (192)  |  Figure (162)  |  Follow (389)  |  Heat (180)  |  Ice (58)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Light (635)  |  Likeness (18)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mud (26)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Noble (93)  |  Optics (24)  |  Other (2233)  |  Power (771)  |  Sense (785)  |  Single (365)  |  Somehow (48)  |  Species (435)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Sun (407)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Touch (146)  |  Whatever (234)

Now, it may be stretching an analogy to compare epidemics of cholera—caused by a known agent—with that epidemic of violent crime which is destroying our cities. It is unlikely that our social problems can be traced to a single, clearly defined cause in the sense that a bacterial disease is ‘caused’ by a microbe. But, I daresay, social science is about as advanced in the late twentieth century as bacteriological science was in the mid nineteenth century. Our forerunners knew something about cholera; they sensed that its spread was associated with misdirected sewage, filth, and the influx of alien poor into crowded, urban tenements. And we know something about street crime; nowhere has it been reported that a member of the New York Stock Exchange has robbed ... at the point of a gun. Indeed, I am naively confident that an enlightened social scientist of the next century will be able to point out that we had available to us at least some of the clues to the cause of urban crime.
'Cholera at the Harvey,' Woods Hole Cantata: Essays on Science and Society (1985).
Science quotes on:  |  19th Century (41)  |  20th Century (40)  |  Advance (298)  |  Agent (73)  |  Alien (35)  |  Analogy (76)  |  Associate (25)  |  Available (80)  |  Bacteria (50)  |  Cause (561)  |  Century (319)  |  Cholera (7)  |  City (87)  |  Clearly (45)  |  Clue (20)  |  Compare (76)  |  Confident (25)  |  Crime (39)  |  Crowd (25)  |  Define (53)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Disease (340)  |  Enlighten (32)  |  Enlightened (25)  |  Epidemic (8)  |  Exchange (38)  |  Filth (5)  |  Forerunner (4)  |  Gun (10)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Influx (2)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Late (119)  |  Member (42)  |  Microbe (30)  |  Misdirect (2)  |  New (1273)  |  New York (17)  |  Next (238)  |  Nowhere (28)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Out (9)  |  Poor (139)  |  Problem (731)  |  Report (42)  |  Rob (6)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sewage (9)  |  Single (365)  |  Social (261)  |  Social Science (37)  |  Social Scientist (5)  |  Spread (86)  |  Stock Exchange (2)  |  Street (25)  |  Stretch (39)  |  Teenager (6)  |  Trace (109)  |  Unlikely (15)  |  Urban (12)  |  Violent (17)  |  Will (2350)

Observe the practice of many physicians; do not implicitly believe the mere assertion of your master; be something better than servile learner; go forth yourselves to see and compare!
In Armand Trousseau, as translated by P. Victor and John Rose Cormack, Lectures on Clinical Medicine: Delivered at the Hôtel-Dieu, Paris (1873), Vol. 1, 40.
Science quotes on:  |  Assertion (35)  |  Belief (615)  |  Better (493)  |  Compare (76)  |  Do (1905)  |  Implicit (12)  |  Learner (10)  |  Master (182)  |  Mere (86)  |  Observe (179)  |  Physician (284)  |  Practice (212)  |  See (1094)  |  Servile (3)  |  Yourself (7)

Occurrences that other men would have noted only with the most casual interest became for Whitney exciting opportunities to experiment. Once he became disturbed by a scientist's seemingly endless pursuit of irrelevant details in the course of an experiment, and criticized this as being as pointless as grabbing beans out of a pot, recording the numbers, and then analyzing the results. Later that day, after he had gone home, his simile began to intrigue him, and he asked himself whether it would really be pointless to count beans gathered in such a random manner. Another man might well have dismissed this as an idle fancy, but to Whitney an opportunity to conduct an experiment was not to be overlooked. Accordingly, he set a pot of beans beside his bed, and for several days each night before retiring he would take as many beans as he could grasp in one hand and make a note of how many were in the handful. After several days had passed he was intrigued to find that the results were not as unrewarding as he had expected. He found that each handful contained more beans than the one before, indicating that with practice he was learning to grasp more and more beans. “This might be called research in morphology, the science of animal structure,” he mused. “My hand was becoming webbed … so I said to myself: never label a real experiment useless, it may reveal something unthought of but worth knowing.”
'Willis Rodney Whitney', National Academy of Sciences, Biographical Memoirs (1960), 358-359.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Ask (420)  |  Bean (3)  |  Becoming (96)  |  Being (1276)  |  Call (781)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Count (107)  |  Course (413)  |  Criticism (85)  |  Detail (150)  |  Dismissal (2)  |  Disturb (31)  |  Disturbed (15)  |  Endless (60)  |  Exciting (50)  |  Expect (203)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fancy (50)  |  Find (1014)  |  Gather (76)  |  Grab (5)  |  Hand (149)  |  Handful (14)  |  Himself (461)  |  Home (184)  |  Idle (34)  |  Idleness (15)  |  Interest (416)  |  Intrigued (4)  |  Irrelevance (4)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Label (11)  |  Learning (291)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Morphology (22)  |  Most (1728)  |  Myself (211)  |  Never (1089)  |  Number (710)  |  Occurrence (53)  |  Opportunity (95)  |  Other (2233)  |  Overlook (33)  |  Pass (241)  |  Pointless (7)  |  Pot (4)  |  Practice (212)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Random (42)  |  Recording (13)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Revelation (51)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Seemingly (28)  |  Set (400)  |  Simile (8)  |  Structure (365)  |  Uselessness (22)  |  Worth (172)

Of the Passive Principle, and Material Cause of the Small Pox ... Nature, in the first compounding and forming of us, hath laid into the Substance and Constitution of each something equivalent to Ovula, of various distinct Kinds, productive of all the contagious, venomous Fevers, we can possibly have as long as we live.
Exanthematologia: Or, An Attempt to Give a Rational Account of Eruptive Fevers, Especially of the Measles and SmallPox (1730), Part II, 'Of the Small-Pox', 175. In Ludvig Hektoen, 'Thomas Fuller 1654-1734: Country Physician and Pioneer Exponent of Specificness in Infection and Immunity', read to the Society (8 Nov 1921), published in Bulletin of the Society of Medical History of Chicago (Mar 1922), 2, 329, or in reprint form, p. 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Cause (561)  |  Constitution (78)  |  Disease (340)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Equivalent (46)  |  Fever (34)  |  First (1302)  |  Forming (42)  |  Germ (54)  |  Kind (564)  |  Live (650)  |  Long (778)  |  Material (366)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Principle (530)  |  Productive (37)  |  Small (489)  |  Smallpox (14)  |  Substance (253)  |  Various (205)

On foundations we believe in the reality of mathematics, but of course, when philosophers attack us with their paradoxes, we rush to hide behind formalism and say 'mathematics is just a combination of meaningless symbols,'... Finally we are left in peace to go back to our mathematics and do it as we have always done, with the feeling each mathematician has that he is working with something real. The sensation is probably an illusion, but it is very convenient.
'The Work of Nicholas Bourbaki'American Mathematical Monthly (1970), 77, 134. In Carl C. Gaither, Alma E. Cavazos-Gaither, Mathematically Speaking: a Dictionary of Quotations (), 194.
Science quotes on:  |  Attack (86)  |  Back (395)  |  Behind (139)  |  Combination (150)  |  Convenience (54)  |  Course (413)  |  Do (1905)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Formalism (7)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Hide (70)  |  Illusion (68)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Paradox (54)  |  Peace (116)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Reality (274)  |  Say (989)  |  Sensation (60)  |  Symbol (100)

On the contrary, God was always invented to explain mystery. God is always invented to explain those things that you do not understand. Now when you finally discover how something works, you get some laws which you're taking away from God; you don't need him anymore. But you need him for the other mysteries. So therefore you leave him to create the universe because we haven't figured that out yet; you need him for understanding those things which you don't believe the laws will explain, such as consciousness, or why you only live to a certain length of time—life and death—stuff like that. God is always associated with those things that you do not understand. Therefore, I don't think that the laws can be considered to be like God because they have been figured out.
Quoted in P. C. W. Davies and Julian Brown (eds.), Superstrings: A Theory of Everything? (1988), 208-9.
Science quotes on:  |  Certain (557)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Consider (428)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Create (245)  |  Death (406)  |  Discover (571)  |  Do (1905)  |  Explain (334)  |  God (776)  |  Law (913)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Other (2233)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Universe (900)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

Once human beings realize something can be done, they’re not satisfied until they’ve done it.
Cease Fire (1958). In Gary Westfahl, Science Fiction Quotations: From the Inner Mind to the Outer Limits (2006), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Being (1276)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Realize (157)  |  Research (753)

Once we thought, journalists and readers alike, that if we put together enough “facts” and gave them a fast stir, we would come up with something that, at least by the standards of short-order cooks, could be called the truth.
In 'How Journalists Regard Their Field', Christian Science Monitor (23 Jan 1985).
Science quotes on:  |  Alike (60)  |  Call (781)  |  Cook (20)  |  Enough (341)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Journalist (8)  |  Order (638)  |  Short (200)  |  Stir (23)  |  Thought (995)  |  Together (392)  |  Truth (1109)

Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, wearing stripes with plaid comes easy.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Easy (213)  |  Expand (56)  |  Matter (821)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Plaid (2)  |  Stripe (4)  |  Universe (900)  |  Wear (20)

One can be deluded in favor of a proposition as well as against it. Reasons are often and for the most part only expositions of pretensions designed to give a coloring of legitimacy and rationality to something we would have done in any case.
Aphorism 50 in Notebook C (1772-1773), as translated by R.J. Hollingdale in Aphorisms (1990). Reprinted as The Waste Books (2000), 41.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Deluded (7)  |  Delusion (26)  |  Design (203)  |  Exposition (16)  |  Favor (69)  |  Legitimacy (5)  |  Most (1728)  |  Pretension (6)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Rationality (25)  |  Reason (766)

One day when the whole family had gone to a circus to see some extraordinary performing apes, I remained alone with my microscope, observing the life in the mobile cells of a transparent star-fish larva, when a new thought suddenly flashed across my brain. It struck me that similar cells might serve in the defence of the organism against intruders. Feeling that there was in this something of surpassing interest, I felt so excited that I began striding up and down the room and even went to the seashore in order to collect my thoughts.
I said to myself that, if my supposition was true, a splinter introduced into the body of a star-fish larva, devoid of blood-vessels or of a nervous system, should soon be surrounded by mobile cells as is to be observed in a man who runs a splinter into his finger. This was no sooner said than done.
There was a small garden to our dwelling, in which we had a few days previously organised a 'Christmas tree' for the children on a little tangerine tree; I fetched from it a few rose thorns and introduced them at once under the skin of some beautiful star-fish larvae as transparent as water.
I was too excited to sleep that night in the expectation of the result of my experiment, and very early the next morning I ascertained that it had fully succeeded.
That experiment formed the basis of the phagocyte theory, to the development of which I devoted the next twenty-five years of my life.
In Olga Metchnikoff, Life of Elie Metchnikoff 1845-1916 (1921), 116-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Alone (324)  |  Ape (54)  |  Ascertain (41)  |  Basis (180)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Blood (144)  |  Body (557)  |  Brain (281)  |  Cell (146)  |  Children (201)  |  Christmas (13)  |  Circus (3)  |  Defence (16)  |  Development (441)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Down (455)  |  Early (196)  |  Expectation (67)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  Family (101)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Fish (130)  |  Flash (49)  |  Form (976)  |  Garden (64)  |  Interest (416)  |  Introduce (63)  |  Larva (8)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Man (2252)  |  Microscope (85)  |  Morning (98)  |  Myself (211)  |  Nerve (82)  |  Nervous System (35)  |  New (1273)  |  Next (238)  |  Observed (149)  |  Order (638)  |  Organism (231)  |  Phagocyte (2)  |  Remain (355)  |  Result (700)  |  Rose (36)  |  Run (158)  |  Seashore (7)  |  See (1094)  |  Skin (48)  |  Sleep (81)  |  Small (489)  |  Soon (187)  |  Star (460)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Supposition (50)  |  Surpassing (12)  |  System (545)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thought (995)  |  Transparent (16)  |  Tree (269)  |  Vessel (63)  |  Water (503)  |  Whole (756)  |  Year (963)

One has to do something new in order to see something new.
Aphorism from Notebook J (1789).
Science quotes on:  |  Discover (571)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  New (1273)  |  Order (638)  |  See (1094)

One might talk about the sanity of the atom
the sanity of space
the sanity of the electron
the sanity of water—
For it is all alive
and has something comparable to that which we call sanity in ourselves.
The only oneness is the oneness of sanity.
'The Sane Universe', David Herbert Lawrence, The Works of D.H. Lawrence (1994), 428.
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (97)  |  Atom (381)  |  Call (781)  |  Electron (96)  |  Oneness (6)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Poem (104)  |  Space (523)  |  Water (503)

One of my guiding principles is don’t do anything that other people are doing. Always do something a little different if you can. The concept is that if you do it a little differently there is a greater potential for reward than if you the same thing that other people are doing. I think that this kind of goal for one’s work, having obviously the maximum risk, would have the maximum reward no matter what the field may be.
In transcript of a video history interview with Seymour Cray by David K. Allison at the National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution, (9 May 1995), 29.
Science quotes on:  |  Concept (242)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Field (378)  |  Goal (155)  |  Greater (288)  |  Guide (107)  |  Kind (564)  |  Little (717)  |  Matter (821)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1031)  |  Potential (75)  |  Principle (530)  |  Reward (72)  |  Risk (68)  |  Same (166)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Work (1402)

One of the greatest experimental scientists of the time who was really doing something, William Harvey, said that what Bacon said science was, was the science that a lord-chancellor would do. He [Bacon] spoke of making observations, but omitted the vital factor of judgment about what to observe and what to pay attention to.
From address (1966) at the 14th Annual Convention of the National Science Teachers Association, New York City, printed in 'What is science?', The Physics Teacher (1969), 7, No. 6, 321.
Science quotes on:  |  Attention (196)  |  Sir Francis Bacon (188)  |  Chancellor (8)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  Factor (47)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  William Harvey (30)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Lord (97)  |  Making (300)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observe (179)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Time (1911)  |  Vital (89)

Only by strict specialization can the scientific worker become fully conscious, for once and perhaps never again in his lifetime, that he has achieved something that will endure. A really definitive and good accomplishment is today always a specialized accomplishment.
Max Weber
From a Speech (1918) presented at Munich University, published in 1919, and collected in 'Wissenschaft als Beruf', Gessammelte Aufsätze zur Wissenschaftslehre (1922), 524-525. As given in H.H. Gerth and C. Wright-Mills (translators and eds.), 'Science as a Vocation', Max Weber: Essays in Sociology (1946), 135.
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Achieve (75)  |  Become (821)  |  Conscious (46)  |  Definitive (3)  |  Endure (21)  |  Good (906)  |  Lifetime (40)  |  Never (1089)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Specialization (24)  |  Today (321)  |  Will (2350)

Order is not sufficient. What is required, is something much more complex. It is order entering upon novelty; so that the massiveness of order does not degenerate into mere repetition; and so that the novelty is always reflected upon a background of system.
Alfred North Whitehead, David Ray Griffin (ed.), Donald W. Sherburne (ed.), Process and Reality: an Essay in Cosmology (2nd Ed.,1979), 339.
Science quotes on:  |  Background (44)  |  Chaos (99)  |  Complex (202)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Degenerate (14)  |  More (2558)  |  Novelty (31)  |  Order (638)  |  Repetition (29)  |  Required (108)  |  Requirement (66)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  System (545)

Our environment may and should mean something towards us which is not to be measured with the tools of the physicist or described by the metrical symbols of the mathematician.
Swarthmore Lecture (1929) at Friends’ House, London, printed in Science and the Unseen World (1929), 47.
Science quotes on:  |  Environment (239)  |  Mean (810)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Tool (129)

Our treasure lies in the beehives of our knowledge. We are perpetually on our way thither, being by nature winged insects and honey gatherers of the mind. The only thing that lies close to our heart is the desire to bring something home to the hive.
The Genealogy of Morals (1887), as translated by Francis Golffing (1956), 149. In another translation, by Maudemarie Clark and Alan J. Swensen, it appears as: “It has rightly been said: ‘where your treasure is, there will your heart be also’; our treasure is where the beehives of our knowledge stand. We are forever underway towards them, as born winged animals and honey-gathers of the spirit, concerned will all our heart about only one thing—"bringing home" something.”
Science quotes on:  |  Beehive (2)  |  Being (1276)  |  Desire (212)  |  Heart (243)  |  Home (184)  |  Honey (15)  |  Insect (89)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lie (370)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Perpetually (20)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Treasure (59)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wing (79)

Pain is a sensation produced by something contrary to the course of nature and this sensation is set up by one of two circumstances: either a very sudden change of the temperament (or the bad effect of a contrary temperament) or a solution of continuity.
Avicenna
'A General Discussion of the Causes of Pain', in The Canon of Medicine, adapted by L. Bakhtiar (1999), 246.
Science quotes on:  |  Bad (185)  |  Change (639)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Continuity (39)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Course (413)  |  Effect (414)  |  Health (210)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Pain (144)  |  Produced (187)  |  Sensation (60)  |  Set (400)  |  Solution (282)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Temperament (18)  |  Two (936)

Part of the charm in solving a differential equation is in the feeling that we are getting something for nothing. So little information appears to go into the solution that there is a sense of surprise over the extensive results that are derived.
Co-author with Jules Alphonse Larrivee, Mathematics and Computers (1957), 40.
Science quotes on:  |  Appear (122)  |  Charm (54)  |  Derived (5)  |  Differential Equation (18)  |  Equation (138)  |  Extensive (34)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Information (173)  |  Little (717)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Result (700)  |  Sense (785)  |  Solution (282)  |  Solve (145)  |  Surprise (91)

People ask, “Is the science going to run ahead of the ethics?” I don't think that’s always the problem. I think it’s that the science runs ahead of the politics. Bioethics can alert people to something coming down the road, but it doesn't mean policy and politicians are going to pay attention. They tend to respond when there’s an immediate crisis. The job of the ethicist, in some ways, is to warn or be prophetic. You can yell loudly, but you can’t necessarily get everybody to leave the cinema, so to speak.
Interview by Karen Pallarito in The Scientist (Jan 2008), supplement, 74.
Science quotes on:  |  Alert (13)  |  Ask (420)  |  Attention (196)  |  Bioethics (12)  |  Coming (114)  |  Crisis (25)  |  Down (455)  |  Ethic (39)  |  Ethics (53)  |  Everybody (72)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Job (86)  |  Mean (810)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  People (1031)  |  Politician (40)  |  Politics (122)  |  Problem (731)  |  Run (158)  |  Speak (240)  |  Tend (124)  |  Think (1122)  |  Way (1214)

People know they are lacking something, they are constantly wanting some kind of spiritual guidance.
Quoted in Kim Lim (ed.), 1,001 Pearls of Spiritual Wisdom: Words to Enrich, Inspire, and Guide Your Life (2014), 13
Science quotes on:  |  Constantly (27)  |  Guidance (30)  |  Kind (564)  |  Know (1538)  |  Lack (127)  |  People (1031)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Want (504)

Perhaps five or even ten per cent of men can do something rather well. It is a tiny minority who can do anything really well, and the number of men who can do two things well is negligible. If a man has any genuine talent, he should be ready to make almost any sacrifice in order to cultivate it to the full.
In A Mathematician's Apology (1940, 2012), 53.
Science quotes on:  |  Cultivation (36)  |  Do (1905)  |  Full (68)  |  Genuine (54)  |  Man (2252)  |  Minority (24)  |  Negligible (5)  |  Number (710)  |  Order (638)  |  Ready (43)  |  Sacrifice (58)  |  Talent (99)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Tiny (74)  |  Two (936)

Perhaps the most surprising thing about mathematics is that it is so surprising. The rules which we make up at the beginning seem ordinary and inevitable, but it is impossible to foresee their consequences. These have only been found out by long study, extending over many centuries. Much of our knowledge is due to a comparatively few great mathematicians such as Newton, Euler, Gauss, or Riemann; few careers can have been more satisfying than theirs. They have contributed something to human thought even more lasting than great literature, since it is independent of language.
Quoted in a space filler, without citation, in The Pentagon: A Mathematics Magazine for Students (Fall 1951), 11, No. 1, 12. Primary source needed (can you help).
Science quotes on:  |  Beginning (312)  |  Career (86)  |  Century (319)  |  Consequence (220)  |  Contribute (30)  |  Due (143)  |  Leonhard Euler (35)  |  Few (15)  |  Foresee (22)  |  Carl Friedrich Gauss (79)  |  Great (1610)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Thought (7)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Independent (74)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Language (308)  |  Literature (116)  |  Long (778)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Bernhard Riemann (7)  |  Rule (307)  |  Satisfy (29)  |  Study (701)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)

Perhaps the strongest bond of sympathy between mathematics and poetry, however, is the endless invention of each. Dr. Johnson remarked, “The essence of poetry is invention; such invention as, by producing something unexpected, surprises and delights”; but he might have said the same of mathematics.
In 'The Poetry of Mathematics', The Mathematics Teacher (May 1926), 19, No. 5, 295.
Science quotes on:  |  Bond (46)  |  Delight (111)  |  Endless (60)  |  Essence (85)  |  Invention (400)  |  Samuel Johnson (51)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Produce (117)  |  Remark (28)  |  Strong (182)  |  Strongest (38)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Sympathy (35)  |  Unexpected (55)

Physicians still retain something of their priestly origin; they would gladly do what they forbid.
Quoted in Frank Heynick, Jews and Medicine: An Epic Saga (2002), 293.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Forbid (14)  |  Origin (250)  |  Physician (284)  |  Retain (57)  |  Still (614)

Physicists and astronomers see their own implications in the world being round, but to me it means that only one-third of the world is asleep at any given time and the other two-thirds is up to something.
Dean Rusk
Speech to American Bar Association, Atlanta, Ga. (22 Oct 1964), quoted in The Atlanta Constitution (23 Oct 1964), 10. In James H. Billington, Respectfully Quoted (2010), 380.
Science quotes on:  |  Asleep (4)  |  Astronomer (97)  |  Being (1276)  |  Implication (25)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Round (26)  |  See (1094)  |  Time (1911)  |  Two (936)  |  World (1850)

Physicists often quote from T. H. White’s epic novel The Once and Future King, where a society of ants declares, “Everything not forbidden is compulsory.” In other words, if there isn't a basic principle of physics forbidding time travel, then time travel is necessarily a physical possibility. (The reason for this is the uncertainty principle. Unless something is forbidden, quantum effects and fluctuations will eventually make it possible if we wait long enough. Thus, unless there is a law forbidding it, it will eventually occur.)
In Parallel Worlds: a Journey Through Creation, Higher Dimensions, and the Future of the Cosmos (2006), 136.
Science quotes on:  |  Ant (34)  |  Basic (144)  |  Compulsory (8)  |  Declaration (10)  |  Declare (48)  |  Effect (414)  |  Enough (341)  |  Epic (12)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Everything (489)  |  Fluctuation (15)  |  Forbid (14)  |  Forbidden (18)  |  Future (467)  |  Law (913)  |  Long (778)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Novel (35)  |  Occur (151)  |  Occurrence (53)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physicists (2)  |  Physics (564)  |  Possibility (172)  |  Possible (560)  |  Principle (530)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Quote (46)  |  Reason (766)  |  Society (350)  |  Time (1911)  |  Time Travel (4)  |  Travel (125)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Uncertainty Principle (9)  |  Wait (66)  |  White (132)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)

Physics is very muddled again at the moment; it is much too hard for me anyway, and I wish I were a movie comedian or something like that and had never heard anything about physics.
Letter to R. Kronig (21 May 1925). Quoted in R. Kronig, 'The Turning Point', in M. Fierz and V. F. Weisskopf (eds.), Theoretical Physics in the Twentieth Century. A Memorial Volume to Wolfgang Pauli (1960),as trans. in M. Klein, Letters on Wave Mechanics, x.
Science quotes on:  |  Hard (246)  |  Hearing (50)  |  Moment (260)  |  Movie (21)  |  Never (1089)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Wish (216)

Physio-philosophy has to show how, and in accordance indeed with what laws, the Material took its origin; and, therefore, how something derived its existence from nothing. It has to portray the first periods of the world's development from nothing; how the elements and heavenly bodies originated; in what method by self-evolution into higher and manifold forms, they separated into minerals, became finally organic, and in Man attained self-consciousness.
In Lorenz Oken, trans. by Alfred Tulk, Elements of Physiophilosophy (1847), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Accordance (10)  |  Attain (126)  |  Body (557)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Creation (350)  |  Definition (238)  |  Derivation (15)  |  Development (441)  |  Element (322)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Existence (481)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Law (913)  |  Man (2252)  |  Manifold (23)  |  Material (366)  |  Method (531)  |  Mineral (66)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Organic (161)  |  Origin (250)  |  Origination (7)  |  Period (200)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Portrayal (2)  |  Self (268)  |  Separation (60)  |  Show (353)  |  Showing (6)  |  World (1850)

Poincaré was a vigorous opponent of the theory that all mathematics can be rewritten in terms of the most elementary notions of classical logic; something more than logic, he believed, makes mathematics what it is.
In Men of Mathematics (1937), 552.
Science quotes on:  |  Classical (49)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Logic (311)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Notion (120)  |  Opponent (23)  |  Henri Poincaré (99)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Theory (1015)

Preconceived ideas are like searchlights which illumine the path of experimenter and serve him as a guide to interrogate nature. They become a danger only if he transforms them into fixed ideas – this is why I should like to see these profound words inscribed on the threshold of all the temples of science: “The greatest derangement of the mind is to believe in something because one wishes it to be so.”
Speech (8 Jul 1876), to the French Academy of Medicine. As translated in René J. Dubos, Louis Pasteur, Free Lance of Science (1950, 1986), 376. Date of speech identified in Maurice B. Strauss, Familiar Medical Quotations (1968), 502.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Belief (615)  |  Danger (127)  |  Derangement (2)  |  Experimenter (40)  |  Fixed (17)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Guide (107)  |  Idea (881)  |  Illuminate (26)  |  Interrogate (4)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Path (159)  |  Preconceive (3)  |  Profound (105)  |  Searchlight (5)  |  See (1094)  |  Temple (45)  |  Threshold (11)  |  Transform (74)  |  Why (491)  |  Wish (216)  |  Word (650)

Pride is a sense of worth derived from something that is not organically part of us, while self-esteem derives from the potentialities and achievements of the self. We are proud when we identify ourselves with an imaginary self, a leader, a holy cause, a collective body or possessions. There is fear and intolerance in pride; it is sensitive and uncompromising. The less promise and potency in the self, the more imperative is the need for pride. The core of pride is self-rejection.
In The Passionate State of Mind (1955), 23.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Body (557)  |  Cause (561)  |  Collective (24)  |  Core (20)  |  Derive (70)  |  Fear (212)  |  Holy (35)  |  Identify (13)  |  Imaginary (16)  |  Imperative (16)  |  Intolerance (8)  |  Leader (51)  |  Less (105)  |  More (2558)  |  Need (320)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Part (235)  |  Possession (68)  |  Potency (10)  |  Potentiality (9)  |  Pride (84)  |  Promise (72)  |  Rejection (36)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Esteem (7)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sensitive (15)  |  Uncompromising (2)  |  Worth (172)

Probably every physicist would believe in a creation [of the universe] if the Bible had not unfortunately said something about it many years ago and made it seem old fashioned.
'Continuous Creation and the Edge of Space', New Republic (1951), 124, 21-2.
Science quotes on:  |  Creation (350)  |  Old (499)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Unfortunately (40)  |  Universe (900)  |  Year (963)

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)  |  Posterity (29)  |  Product (166)  |  Psychoanalysis (37)  |  Radical (28)  |  Structure (365)  |  Stupendous (13)  |  Terminal (2)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Trick (36)  |  Unsound (5)  |  Vast (188)  |  Zeppelin (4)

Relatively few benefits have flowed to the people who live closest to the more than 3,000 protected areas that have been established in tropical countries during the past 50 years. For this reason, the preservation of biodiversity is often thought of as something that poor people are asked to do to fulfill the wishes of rich people living in comfort thousands of miles away.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Area (33)  |  Ask (420)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Biodiversity (25)  |  Close (77)  |  Comfort (64)  |  Country (269)  |  Do (1905)  |  Establish (63)  |  Flow (89)  |  Fulfill (19)  |  Live (650)  |  Living (492)  |  Mile (43)  |  More (2558)  |  Often (109)  |  Past (355)  |  People (1031)  |  Poor (139)  |  Preservation (39)  |  Protect (65)  |  Reason (766)  |  Relatively (8)  |  Rich (66)  |  Thought (995)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Tropical (9)  |  Wish (216)  |  Year (963)

Religion is something left over from the infancy of our intelligence, it will fade away as we adopt read on and science as our guidelines.
Unverified. Included here to provide this caution that it is widely attributed on the web, but without citation. Webmaster has not found it in a major book of quotations. If you know the primary source, please contact Webmaster.
Science quotes on:  |  Adopt (22)  |  Fade (12)  |  Guideline (4)  |  Infancy (14)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Left (15)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Religion (369)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Will (2350)

Religions are tough. Either they make no contentions which are subject to disproof or they quickly redesign doctrine after disproof. … near the core of the religious experience is something remarkably resistant to rational inquiry.
From 'A Sunday Sermon', in Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science (1975, 2011), 332-333.
Science quotes on:  |  Contention (14)  |  Core (20)  |  Doctrine (81)  |  Experience (494)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Rational (95)  |  Religion (369)  |  Religious (134)  |  Remarkable (50)  |  Resistance (41)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Subject (543)  |  Tough (22)

Removing the teeth will cure something, including the foolish belief that removing the teeth will cure everything.
Anonymous
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (615)  |  Cure (124)  |  Dentistry (3)  |  Everything (489)  |  Foolish (41)  |  Teeth (43)  |  Tooth (32)  |  Will (2350)

Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns, there are things we know we know.
We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don't know we don't know. ... And each year, we discover a few more of those unknown unknowns.
Answering a question concerning Iraq, on the facts about weapons of mass destruction, at a Press Conference, NATO Headquarters, Brussels, Belgium (6 June 2002). From transcript on U.S. Department of Defense website.
Science quotes on:  |  Discover (571)  |  Do (1905)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  More (2558)  |  Report (42)  |  Say (989)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Year (963)

Science aims at constructing a world which shall be symbolic of the world of commonplace experience. It is not at all necessary that every individual symbol that is used should represent something in common experience or even something explicable in terms of common experience. The man in the street is always making this demand for concrete explanation of the things referred to in science; but of necessity he must be disappointed. It is like our experience in learning to read. That which is written in a book is symbolic of a story in real life. The whole intention of the book is that ultimately a reader will identify some symbol, say BREAD, with one of the conceptions of familiar life. But it is mischievous to attempt such identifications prematurely, before the letters are strung into words and the words into sentences. The symbol A is not the counterpart of anything in familiar life.
From 'Introduction', The Nature of the Physical World (1928), xiii.
Science quotes on:  |  Aim (175)  |  Attempt (266)  |  Book (413)  |  Bread (42)  |  Common (447)  |  Commonplace (24)  |  Conception (160)  |  Concrete (55)  |  Counterpart (11)  |  Demand (131)  |  Disappoint (14)  |  Experience (494)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Identification (20)  |  Individual (420)  |  Intention (46)  |  Learning (291)  |  Letter (117)  |  Life (1870)  |  Making (300)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mischievous (12)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Read (308)  |  Represent (157)  |  Say (989)  |  Story (122)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Ultimately (56)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)

Science can be interpreted effectively only for those who have more than the usual intelligence and innate curiosity. These will work hard if given the chance and if they find they acquire something by so doing.
(1940). Epigraph, without citation, in I. Bernard Cohen, Science, Servant of Man: A Layman's Primer for the Age of Science (1948), xi. Also seen epigraph, without citation in Science Digest (1950), 28, 17.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquire (46)  |  Chance (244)  |  Curiosity (138)  |  Doing (277)  |  Effective (68)  |  Find (1014)  |  Hard (246)  |  Innate (14)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Interpret (25)  |  More (2558)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)  |  Work Hard (14)

Science cannot answer the deepest questions. As soon as you ask why is there something instead of nothing, you have gone beyond science.
As quoted in John Noble Wilford, 'Sizing up the Cosmos: An Astronomers Quest', New York Times (12 Mar 1991), C10.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Ask (420)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Deep (241)  |  Instead (23)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Question (649)  |  Soon (187)  |  Why (491)

Science develops best when its concepts and conclusions are integrated into the broader human culture and its concerns for ultimate meaning and value. Scientists cannot, therefore, hold themselves entirely aloof from the sorts of issues dealt with by philosophers and theologians. By devoting to these issues something of the energy and care they give to their research in science, they can help others realize more fully the human potentialities of their discoveries. They can also come to appreciate for themselves that these discoveries cannot be a genuine substitute for knowledge of the truly ultimate.
In Letter (1 Jun 1988) to Father George V. Coyne, Director of the Vatican Observatory. On vatican.va website.
Science quotes on:  |  Appreciate (67)  |  Best (467)  |  Care (203)  |  Concept (242)  |  Concern (239)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Culture (157)  |  Develop (278)  |  Energy (373)  |  Genuine (54)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Culture (10)  |  Integrated (10)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Meaning (244)  |  More (2558)  |  Other (2233)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Realize (157)  |  Research (753)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Substitute (47)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Theologian (23)  |  Truly (118)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Value (393)

Science is founded on uncertainty. Each time we learn something new and surprising, the astonishment comes with the realization that we were wrong before.
In 'On Science and Certainty', Discover Magazine (Oct 1980), 58.
Science quotes on:  |  Astonishment (30)  |  Before (8)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  New (1273)  |  Realization (44)  |  Surprising (4)  |  Time (1911)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Wrong (246)

Science is knowledge certain and evident in itself, or by the principles from which it is deducted, or with which it is certainly connected. It is subjective, as existing in the mind; objective, as embodied in truths; speculative, as leading to do something, as in practical science.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Connect (126)  |  Do (1905)  |  Embody (18)  |  Evident (92)  |  Exist (458)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lead (391)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Objective (96)  |  Practical (225)  |  Principle (530)  |  Speculative (12)  |  Subjective (20)  |  Truth (1109)

Science is like sex: sometimes something useful comes out, but that is not the reason we are doing it.
Anonymous
This, and variations, appear in various places attributed (highly likely incorrectly) to Richard Feynman, but without any primary source citation. For example, see John Lloyd and John Mitchinson, If Ignorance Is Bliss, Why Aren't There More Happy People? : Smart Quotes for Dumb Times (2009), 274. It is also very suspicious that no example, readily found on the internet, is dated earlier than 2000, yet such a salacious remark surely would have seen the light of day long before that! Also seen worded beginning with: "Physics is….” If you know any instance of this quote published before 2000, please contact Webmaster.
Science quotes on:  |  Doing (277)  |  Physics (564)  |  Quip (81)  |  Reason (766)  |  Sex (68)  |  Sometime (4)  |  Useful (260)

Science is not about control. It is about cultivating a perpetual sense of wonder in the face of something that forever grows one step richer and subtler than our latest theory about it. It is about reverence, not mastery.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Control (182)  |  Cultivate (24)  |  Face (214)  |  Forever (111)  |  Grow (247)  |  Late (119)  |  Mastery (36)  |  Perpetual (59)  |  Reverence (29)  |  Rich (66)  |  Sense (785)  |  Step (234)  |  Subtl (2)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Wonder (251)

Science is not, as so many seem to think, something apart, which has to do with telescopes, retorts, and test-tubes, and especially with nasty smells, but it is a way of searching out by observation, trial and classification; whether the phenomena investigated be the outcome of human activities, or of the more direct workings of nature's laws. Its methods admit of nothing untidy or slip-shod; its keynote is accuracy and its goal is truth.
The University of Utopia (1918), 17.
Science quotes on:  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Classification (102)  |  Direct (228)  |  Do (1905)  |  Goal (155)  |  Human (1512)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Keynote (2)  |  Law (913)  |  Method (531)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Observation (593)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Smell (29)  |  Telescope (106)  |  Test (221)  |  Think (1122)  |  Trial (59)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Way (1214)

Science is the only truth and it is the great lie. It knows nothing, and people think it knows everything. It is misrepresented. People think that science is electricity, automobilism, and dirigible balloons. It is something very different. It is life devouring itself. It is the sensibility transformed into intelligence. It is the need to know stifling the need to live. It is the genius of knowledge vivisecting the vital genius.
repr. In Selected Writings, ed. and trans. by Glen S. Burne (1966). 'Art and Science,' Promenades Philosophiques (1905-1909).
Science quotes on:  |  Balloon (16)  |  Devour (29)  |  Different (595)  |  Dirigible (2)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Everything (489)  |  Genius (301)  |  Great (1610)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lie (370)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Misrepresentation (5)  |  Need (320)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  People (1031)  |  Sensibility (5)  |  Stifle (5)  |  Think (1122)  |  Transform (74)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Vital (89)

Science is the study of the admitted laws of existence, which cannot prove a universal negative about whether those laws could ever be suspended by something admittedly above them. It is as if we were to say that a lawyer was so deeply learned in the American Constitution that he knew there could never be a revolution in America..
From 'The Early Bird in History',The Thing: Why I Am Catholic (1929), 207. In Collected Works (1990), Vol. 3, 296.
Science quotes on:  |  Above (7)  |  Admitted (3)  |  Admittedly (2)  |  America (143)  |  Constitution (78)  |  Existence (481)  |  Law (913)  |  Lawyer (27)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Negative (66)  |  Never (1089)  |  Prove (261)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Say (989)  |  Study (701)  |  Suspended (5)  |  Universal (198)

Science is uncertain. Theories are subject to revision; observations are open to a variety of interpretations, and scientists quarrel amongst themselves. This is disillusioning for those untrained in the scientific method, who thus turn to the rigid certainty of the Bible instead. There is something comfortable about a view that allows for no deviation and that spares you the painful necessity of having to think.
The 'Threat' of Creationism. In Ashley Montagu (ed.), Science and Creationism (1984), 192.
Science quotes on:  |  Bible (105)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Comfort (64)  |  Creationist (16)  |  Deviation (21)  |  Disillusionment (2)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Method (531)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Observation (593)  |  Open (277)  |  Quarrel (10)  |  Religion (369)  |  Revision (7)  |  Rigid (24)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Subject (543)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Turn (454)  |  Uncertain (45)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Untrained (2)  |  Variety (138)  |  View (496)

Science must have originated in the feeling of something being wrong.
In James Wood, Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources (1893), 382:29.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Must (1525)  |  Wrong (246)

Scientists are people of very dissimilar temperaments doing different things in very different ways. Among scientists are collectors, classifiers and compulsive tidiers-up; many are detectives by temperament and many are explorers; some are artists and others artisans. There are poets–scientists and philosopher–scientists and even a few mystics. ... and most people who are in fact scientists could easily have been something else instead.
'Hypothesis and Imagination', The Art of the Soluble (1967), 132.
Science quotes on:  |  Artist (97)  |  Detective (11)  |  Different (595)  |  Doing (277)  |  Explorer (30)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Men Of Science (147)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mystic (23)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1031)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Temperament (18)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Way (1214)

Sir Hermann Bondi once wrote that so-called scientific progress does not consist so much in an advancement in science but rather in taking something that beforehand was not science and making it become a part of science itself.
As stated, without quotation marks, in Vittorio Mathieu and Paolo Rossi, Scientific Culture in the Contemporary World (1979), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Advancement (63)  |  Become (821)  |  Sir Hermann Bondi (22)  |  Call (781)  |  Consist (223)  |  Making (300)  |  Progress (492)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Progress (14)  |  So-Called (71)

So why fret and care that the actual version of the destined deed was done by an upper class English gentleman who had circumnavigated the globe as a vigorous youth, lost his dearest daughter and his waning faith at the same time, wrote the greatest treatise ever composed on the taxonomy of barnacles, and eventually grew a white beard, lived as a country squire just south of London, and never again traveled far enough even to cross the English Channel? We care for the same reason that we love okapis, delight in the fossil evidence of trilobites, and mourn the passage of the dodo. We care because the broad events that had to happen, happened to happen in a certain particular way. And something unspeakably holy –I don’t know how else to say this–underlies our discovery and confirmation of the actual details that made our world and also, in realms of contingency, assured the minutiae of its construction in the manner we know, and not in any one of a trillion other ways, nearly all of which would not have included the evolution of a scribe to record the beauty, the cruelty, the fascination, and the mystery.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Actual (118)  |  Assure (16)  |  Beard (8)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Broad (28)  |  Care (203)  |  Certain (557)  |  Channel (23)  |  Class (168)  |  Compose (20)  |  Confirmation (25)  |  Construction (114)  |  Contingency (11)  |  Country (269)  |  Cross (20)  |  Cruelty (24)  |  Daughter (30)  |  Deed (34)  |  Delight (111)  |  Destined (42)  |  Detail (150)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Dodo (7)  |  English (35)  |  Enough (341)  |  Event (222)  |  Eventually (64)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Faith (209)  |  Far (158)  |  Fascination (35)  |  Fossil (143)  |  Fret (3)  |  Gentleman (26)  |  Globe (51)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Grow (247)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Holy (35)  |  Include (93)  |  Know (1538)  |  Live (650)  |  London (15)  |  Lose (165)  |  Love (328)  |  Manner (62)  |  Minutiae (7)  |  Mourn (3)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Never (1089)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particular (80)  |  Passage (52)  |  Realm (87)  |  Reason (766)  |  Record (161)  |  Same (166)  |  Say (989)  |  Scribe (3)  |  South (39)  |  Taxonomy (19)  |  Time (1911)  |  Travel (125)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Trillion (4)  |  Trilobite (6)  |  Underlie (19)  |  Underly (3)  |  Unspeakably (3)  |  Upper (4)  |  Version (7)  |  Vigorous (21)  |  Wane (2)  |  Way (1214)  |  White (132)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)  |  Write (250)  |  Youth (109)

Sociobiology is not just any statement that biology, genetics, and evolutionary theory have something to do with human behavior. Sociobiology is a specific theory about the nature of genetic and evolutionary input into human behavior. It rests upon the view that natural selection is a virtually omnipotent architect, constructing organisms part by part as best solutions to problems of life in local environments. It fragments organisms into “traits,” explains their existence as a set of best solutions, and argues that each trait is a product of natural selection operating “for” the form or behavior in question. Applied to humans, it must view specific behaviors (not just general potentials) as adaptations built by natural selection and rooted in genetic determinants, for natural selection is a theory of genetic change. Thus, we are presented with unproved and unprovable speculations about the adaptive and genetic basis of specific human behaviors: why some (or all) people are aggressive, xenophobic, religious, acquisitive, or homosexual.
In Hen's Teeth and Horses Toes (1983, 2010), 242-243.
Science quotes on:  |  Adaptation (59)  |  Aggression (10)  |  Applied (176)  |  Architect (32)  |  Basis (180)  |  Behavior (95)  |  Best (467)  |  Biology (232)  |  Change (639)  |  Do (1905)  |  Environment (239)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Existence (481)  |  Explain (334)  |  Form (976)  |  Fragment (58)  |  General (521)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genetics (105)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Behavior (10)  |  Life (1870)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Selection (98)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Omnipotent (13)  |  Organism (231)  |  People (1031)  |  Potential (75)  |  Present (630)  |  Problem (731)  |  Product (166)  |  Question (649)  |  Religious (134)  |  Rest (287)  |  Root (121)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Selection (130)  |  Set (400)  |  Sociobiology (5)  |  Solution (282)  |  Solution. (53)  |  Specific (98)  |  Speculation (137)  |  Statement (148)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Trait (23)  |  View (496)  |  Why (491)

Some men have thousands of reasons why they cannot do something, when all they need is one reason why they can.
In 'Things I’ve Been Thinking About', The American Magazine (July 1937), Vol. 124, No. 1, pages 50, 51, 102-11.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Reason (766)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Why (491)

Some see a clear line between genetic enhancement and other ways that people seek improvement in their children and themselves. Genetic manipulation seems somehow worse—more intrusive, more sinister—than other ways of enhancing performance and seeking success. But, morally speaking, the difference is less significant than it seems. Bioengineering gives us reason to question the low-tech, high-pressure child-rearing practices we commonly accept. The hyperparenting familiar in our time represents an anxious excess of mastery and dominion that misses the sense of life as a gift. This draws it disturbingly close to eugenics... Was the old eugenics objectionable only insofar as it was coercive? Or is there something inherently wrong with the resolve to deliberately design our progeny’s traits... But removing coercion does not vindicate eugenics. The problem with eugenics and genetic engineering is that they represent a one-sided triumph of willfulness over giftedness, of dominion over reverence, of molding over beholding.
Michael J. Sandel, 'The Case Against Perfection', The Atlantic Monthly (Apr 2004).
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Bioengineering (5)  |  Bioethics (12)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Design (203)  |  Difference (355)  |  Draw (140)  |  Engineering (188)  |  Enhancement (5)  |  Eugenics (6)  |  Excess (23)  |  Genetic (110)  |  Genetic Engineering (16)  |  Gift (105)  |  High (370)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Life (1870)  |  Low (86)  |  Manipulation (19)  |  Mastery (36)  |  More (2558)  |  Old (499)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1031)  |  Performance (51)  |  Practice (212)  |  Pressure (69)  |  Problem (731)  |  Progeny (16)  |  Question (649)  |  Reason (766)  |  Represent (157)  |  Resolve (43)  |  See (1094)  |  Seek (218)  |  Sense (785)  |  Significant (78)  |  Somehow (48)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Sports (3)  |  Success (327)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Time (1911)  |  Triumph (76)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wrong (246)

Something is as little explained by means of a distinctive vital force as the attraction between iron and magnet is explained by means of the name magnetism. We must therefore firmly insist that in the organic natural sciences, and thus also in botany, absolutely nothing has yet been explained and the entire field is still open to investigation as long as we have not succeeded in reducing the phenomena to physical and chemical laws.
Grundzüge der Wissenschaftlichen Botanik nebst einer Methodologischen Einleitung als Anleitung zum Studium der Planze [Principles of Scientific Botany] (1842-3), Vol. 1, 49. Trans. Kenneth L. Caneva, Robert Mayer and the Conservation of Energy (1993), 108.
Science quotes on:  |  Attraction (61)  |  Botany (63)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Distinctive (25)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Field (378)  |  Force (497)  |  Insistence (12)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Iron (99)  |  Law (913)  |  Little (717)  |  Long (778)  |  Magnet (22)  |  Magnetism (43)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Must (1525)  |  Name (359)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Science (133)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Open (277)  |  Organic (161)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physics (564)  |  Reduction (52)  |  Still (614)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Sucess (2)  |  Vital (89)  |  Vital Force (7)

Something is wanting to science until it has been humanised.
In James Wood, Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources (1893), 399:18.

Something to remember. If you have remembered every word in this article, your memory will have recorded about 150 000 bits of information. Thus, the order in your brain will have increased by about 150 000 units. However, while you have been reading the article, you will have converted about 300 000 joules of ordered energy, in the form of food, into disordered energy, in the form of heat which you lose to the air around you by convection and sweat. This will increase the disorder of the Universe by about 3 x 1024 units, about 20 million million million times the increase in order because you remember my article.
An afterword to his three-page article discussing thermodynamics and entropy, in 'The Direction of Time', New Scientist (9 Jul 1987), 49.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Article (22)  |  Bit (21)  |  Brain (281)  |  Convection (3)  |  Convert (22)  |  Disorder (45)  |  Energy (373)  |  Food (213)  |  Form (976)  |  Heat (180)  |  Increase (225)  |  Information (173)  |  Joule (3)  |  Lose (165)  |  Memory (144)  |  Million (124)  |  Order (638)  |  Reading (136)  |  Record (161)  |  Remember (189)  |  Sweat (17)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)

Something unknown is doing we don’t know what—that is what our theory amounts to.
Expressing the quantum theory description of an electron has no familiar conception of a real form. In The Nature Of The Physical World (1928), 291.
Science quotes on:  |  Amount (153)  |  Doing (277)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Unknown (195)

Something will have gone out of us as a people if we ever let the remaining wilderness be destroyed; if we permit the last virgin forests to be turned into comic books and plastic cigarette cases; if we drive the few remaining members of the wild species into zoos or to extinction; if we pollute the last clean air and dirty the last clean streams and push our paved roads through the last of the silence, so that never again will Americans be free in their own country from the noise, the exhausts, the stinks of human and automotive waste.
Letter (3 Dec 1960) written to David E. Pesonen of the Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Commission. Collected in 'Coda: Wilderness Letter', The Sound of Mountain Water: The Changing American West (1969), 146.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  American (56)  |  Book (413)  |  Case (102)  |  Cigarette (26)  |  Clean (52)  |  Comic (5)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Country (269)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Dirty (17)  |  Drive (61)  |  Exhaust (22)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Forest (161)  |  Free (239)  |  Human (1512)  |  Last (425)  |  Let (64)  |  Member (42)  |  Never (1089)  |  Noise (40)  |  Pave (8)  |  People (1031)  |  Permit (61)  |  Plastic (30)  |  Pollution (53)  |  Push (66)  |  Remain (355)  |  Remaining (45)  |  Road (71)  |  Silence (62)  |  Species (435)  |  Stink (8)  |  Stream (83)  |  Through (846)  |  Turn (454)  |  Virgin (11)  |  Waste (109)  |  Wild (96)  |  Wilderness (57)  |  Will (2350)  |  Zoo (9)

Sometimes an idea hangs on, not because it is good, or even seductive, but because it has been around a long time, or constantly repeated. If one wants to verify something written in the newspaper, should one buy 100 more copies of the paper to check it?
As quoted Gordon Younger Craig and John Hewett Hull, James Hutton: Present and Future (1999), 21
Science quotes on:  |  Check (26)  |  Good (906)  |  Hang (46)  |  Idea (881)  |  Long (778)  |  More (2558)  |  Newspaper (39)  |  Paper (192)  |  Repeated (5)  |  Seductive (4)  |  Time (1911)  |  Verify (24)  |  Want (504)  |  Write (250)

Sooner or later in every talk, [David] Brower describes the creation of the world. He invites his listeners to consider the six days of Genesis as a figure of speech for what has in fact been 4 billion years. On this scale, one day equals something like six hundred and sixty-six million years, and thus, all day Monday and until Tuesday noon, creation was busy getting the world going. Life began Tuesday noon, and the beautiful organic wholeness of it developed over the next four days. At 4 p.m. Saturday, the big reptiles came on. At three minutes before midnight on the last day, man appeared. At one-fourth of a second before midnight Christ arrived. At one-fortieth of a second before midnight, the Industrial Revolution began. We are surrounded with people who think that what we have been doing for that one-fortieth of a second can go on indefinitely. They are considered normal, but they are stark. raving mad.
In Encounters with the Archdruid (1971), 79-80.
Science quotes on:  |  Appear (122)  |  Arrive (40)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Begin (275)  |  Big (55)  |  Billion (104)  |  Brower (2)  |  Busy (32)  |  Christ (17)  |  Consider (428)  |  Creation (350)  |  David (6)  |  Describe (132)  |  Develop (278)  |  Doing (277)  |  Equal (88)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Figure (162)  |   Genesis (26)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Indefinitely (10)  |  Industrial Revolution (10)  |  Invite (10)  |  Last (425)  |  Late (119)  |  Life (1870)  |  Listener (7)  |  Mad (54)  |  Man (2252)  |  Midnight (12)  |  Million (124)  |  Minute (129)  |  Monday (3)  |  Next (238)  |  Noon (14)  |  Normal (29)  |  Organic (161)  |  P (2)  |  People (1031)  |  Reptile (33)  |  Revolution (133)  |  Saturday (11)  |  Scale (122)  |  Second (66)  |  Sooner (6)  |  Speech (66)  |  Stark (3)  |  Surround (33)  |  Talk (108)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tuesday (3)  |  Wholeness (9)  |  World (1850)  |  Year (963)

Sophie Germain proved to the world that even a woman can accomplish something in the most rigorous and abstract of sciences and for that reason would well have deserved an honorary degree.
Quoted in G. Waldo Dunnington, Carl Friedrich Gauss: Titan of Science (2004), 68.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Degree (277)  |  Sophie Germain (4)  |  Most (1728)  |  Reason (766)  |  Rigorous (50)  |  Woman (160)  |  World (1850)

Space exploration is risky. It’s hard. And actually, let me say here that I feel like we need to take on more risk than we have been in space exploration. The public doesn’t like risk, and they hate failure. But failures happen. They shouldn’t happen for stupid reasons. But if they happen when you were trying something risky, you learn. That teaches you something. At least it should. And you try harder next time.
On the failure of the Cosmos-1 solar sail (Jun 2005).
Science quotes on:  |  Exploration (161)  |  Failure (176)  |  Feel (371)  |  Happen (282)  |  Hard (246)  |  Hate (68)  |  Learn (672)  |  More (2558)  |  Next (238)  |  Reason (766)  |  Risk (68)  |  Say (989)  |  Space (523)  |  Space Exploration (15)  |  Stupid (38)  |  Teach (299)  |  Time (1911)  |  Try (296)  |  Trying (144)

Space travel is at the frontier of my profession. It is going to be accomplished and I want to be in on it. There is also an element of simple duty involved. I am convinced that I have something to give this project.
As he wrote in an article for Life (14 Sep 1959), 38.
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Convince (43)  |  Duty (71)  |  Element (322)  |  Frontier (41)  |  Give (208)  |  Involve (93)  |  Involved (90)  |  Profession (108)  |  Project (77)  |  Simple (426)  |  Space (523)  |  Space Travel (23)  |  Travel (125)  |  Want (504)

Spaf's First Law of System Administration: If your position in an organization includes responsibility for security, but does not include corresponding authority, then your role in the organization is to take the blame when something happens. You should make sure your resume is up-to-date.
From 'Quotable Spaf' on his faculty webpage at purdue.com.
Science quotes on:  |  Administrator (11)  |  Authority (99)  |  Blame (31)  |  Corresponding (3)  |  First (1302)  |  Happen (282)  |  Include (93)  |  Law (913)  |  Organization (120)  |  Position (83)  |  Responsibility (71)  |  Resume (4)  |  Role (86)  |  Security (51)  |  System (545)

Speaking of libraries: A big open-stack academic or public library is no small pleasure to work in. You’re, say, trying to do a piece on something in Nevada, and you go down to C Floor, deep in the earth, and out to what a miner would call a remote working face. You find 10995.497S just where the card catalog and the online computer thought it would be, but that is only the initial nick. The book you knew about has led you to others you did not know about. To the ceiling the shelves are loaded with books about Nevada. You pull them down, one at a time, and sit on the floor and look them over until you are sitting on a pile five feet high, at which point you are late home for dinner and you get up and walk away. It’s an incomparable boon to research, all that; but it is also a reason why there are almost no large open-stack libraries left in the world.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Academic (20)  |  Big (55)  |  Book (413)  |  Boon (7)  |  C (2)  |  Call (781)  |  Card (5)  |  Catalog (5)  |  Ceiling (5)  |  Computer (131)  |  Deep (241)  |  Dinner (15)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Face (214)  |  Find (1014)  |  Five (16)  |  Floor (21)  |  Foot (65)  |  Get Up (5)  |  High (370)  |  Home (184)  |  Incomparable (14)  |  Initial (17)  |  Know (1538)  |  Large (398)  |  Late (119)  |  Lead (391)  |  Leave (138)  |  Library (53)  |  Load (12)  |  Look (584)  |  Miner (9)  |  Nick (2)  |  Online (4)  |  Open (277)  |  Other (2233)  |  Piece (39)  |  Pile (12)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Point (584)  |  Public (100)  |  Pull (43)  |  Reason (766)  |  Remote (86)  |  Research (753)  |  Say (989)  |  Shelve (2)  |  Sit (51)  |  Sitting (44)  |  Small (489)  |  Speak (240)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Try (296)  |  Trying (144)  |  Walk (138)  |  Why (491)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

Spherical space is not very easy to imagine. We have to think of the properties of the surface of a sphere—the two-dimensional case—and try to conceive something similar applied to three-dimensional space. Stationing ourselves at a point let us draw a series of spheres of successively greater radii. The surface of a sphere of radius r should be proportional to r2; but in spherical space the areas of the more distant spheres begin to fall below the proper proportion. There is not so much room out there as we expected to find. Ultimately we reach a sphere of biggest possible area, and beyond it the areas begin to decrease. The last sphere of all shrinks to a point—our antipodes. Is there nothing beyond this? Is there a kind of boundary there? There is nothing beyond and yet there is no boundary. On the earth’s surface there is nothing beyond our own antipodes but there is no boundary there
In Space, Time and Gravitation: An Outline of the General Relativity Theory (1920, 1921), 158-159.
Science quotes on:  |  Applied (176)  |  Begin (275)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Boundary (55)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Draw (140)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Easy (213)  |  Expect (203)  |  Fall (243)  |  Find (1014)  |  Greater (288)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Kind (564)  |  Last (425)  |  More (2558)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Point (584)  |  Possible (560)  |  Proper (150)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Reach (286)  |  Series (153)  |  Shrink (23)  |  Space (523)  |  Sphere (118)  |  Surface (223)  |  Think (1122)  |  Three-Dimensional (11)  |  Try (296)  |  Two (936)  |  Ultimately (56)

Standing now in diffused light, with the wind at my back, I experience suddenly a feeling of completeness–not a feeling of having achieved something or of being stronger than everyone who was ever here before, not a feeling of having arrived at the ultimate point, not a feeling of supremacy. Just a breath of happiness deep inside my mind and my breast. The summit seemed suddenly to me to be a refuge, and I had not expected to find any refuge up here. Looking at the steep, sharp ridges below us, I have the impression that to have come later would have been too late. Everything we now say to one another, we only say out of embarrassment. I don’t think anymore. As I pull the tape recorder, trancelike, from my rucksack, and switch it on wanting to record a few appropriate phrases, tears again well into my eyes. “Now we are on the summit of Everest,” I begin, “it is so cold that we cannot take photographs…” I cannot go on, I am immediately shaken with sobs. I can neither talk nor think, feeling only how this momentous experience changes everything. To reach only a few meters below the summit would have required the same amount of effort, the same anxiety and burden of sorrow, but a feeling like this, an eruption of feeling, is only possible on the summit itself.
In Everest: Expedition to the Ultimate (1979), 180.
Science quotes on:  |  Achieve (75)  |  Amount (153)  |  Anxiety (30)  |  Anymore (5)  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Arrive (40)  |  Back (395)  |  Begin (275)  |  Being (1276)  |  Below (26)  |  Breast (9)  |  Breath (61)  |  Burden (30)  |  Change (639)  |  Cold (115)  |  Completeness (19)  |  Deep (241)  |  Diffuse (5)  |  Effort (243)  |  Embarrassment (5)  |  Eruption (10)  |  Everest (10)  |  Everyone (35)  |  Everything (489)  |  Expect (203)  |  Experience (494)  |  Eye (440)  |  Feel (371)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Find (1014)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Impression (118)  |  Inside (30)  |  Late (119)  |  Light (635)  |  Looking (191)  |  Meter (9)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Momentous (7)  |  Photograph (23)  |  Phrase (61)  |  Point (584)  |  Possible (560)  |  Pull (43)  |  Reach (286)  |  Record (161)  |  Recorder (5)  |  Refuge (15)  |  Require (229)  |  Required (108)  |  Ridge (9)  |  Rucksack (3)  |  Same (166)  |  Say (989)  |  Seem (150)  |  Shake (43)  |  Sharp (17)  |  Sorrow (21)  |  Stand (284)  |  Steep (7)  |  Strong (182)  |  Stronger (36)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Summit (27)  |  Supremacy (4)  |  Switch (10)  |  Talk (108)  |  Tape (5)  |  Tear (48)  |  Think (1122)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Want (504)  |  Wind (141)

Statistics, one may hope, will improve gradually, and become good for something. Meanwhile, it is to be feared the crabbed satirist was partly right, as things go: “A judicious man,” says he, “looks at Statistics, not to get knowledge, but to save himself from having ignorance foisted on him.”
In Chartism (1839, 1840), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Fear (212)  |  Good (906)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Himself (461)  |  Hope (321)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Look (584)  |  Man (2252)  |  Right (473)  |  Save (126)  |  Say (989)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Will (2350)

Stay in college, get the knowledge. And stay there until you’re through. If they can make penicillin out of moldy bread, they can sure make something out of you.
Advice to a young person to continue his education.
From address to students at New School for Social Research, New York City, 'Words of the Week',Jet (3 Jan 1980), 57, No. 16, 32.
Science quotes on:  |  Advice (57)  |  Bread (42)  |  College (71)  |  Continue (179)  |  Education (423)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Mold (37)  |  Penicillin (18)  |  Person (366)  |  Through (846)  |  Young (253)

Strictly speaking, it is really scandalous that science has not yet clarified the nature of number. It might be excusable that there is still no generally accepted definition of number, if at least there were general agreement on the matter itself. However, science has not even decided on whether number is an assemblage of things, or a figure drawn on the blackboard by the hand of man; whether it is something psychical, about whose generation psychology must give information, or whether it is a logical structure; whether it is created and can vanish, or whether it is eternal. It is not known whether the propositions of arithmetic deal with those structures composed of calcium carbonate [chalk] or with non-physical entities. There is as little agreement in this matter as there is regarding the meaning of the word “equal” and the equality sign. Therefore, science does not know the thought content which is attached to its propositions; it does not know what it deals with; it is completely in the dark regarding their proper nature. Isn’t this scandalous?
From opening paragraph of 'Vorwort', Über die Zahlen des Herrn H. Schubert (1899), iii. ('Foreword', On the Numbers of Mr. H. Schubert). Translated by Theodore J. Benac in Friedrich Waismann, Introduction to Mathematical Thinking: The Formation of Concepts in Modern Mathematics (1959, 2003), 107. Webmaster added “[chalk]”.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  Agreement (55)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Assemblage (17)  |  Attach (57)  |  Attached (36)  |  Blackboard (11)  |  Calcium (8)  |  Calcium Carbonate (2)  |  Chalk (9)  |  Clarify (3)  |  Completely (137)  |  Compose (20)  |  Content (75)  |  Create (245)  |  Dark (145)  |  Deal (192)  |  Decide (50)  |  Definition (238)  |  Draw (140)  |  Entity (37)  |  Equal (88)  |  Equality (34)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Figure (162)  |  General (521)  |  Generation (256)  |  Information (173)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Little (717)  |  Logic (311)  |  Man (2252)  |  Matter (821)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Number (710)  |  Physical (518)  |  Proper (150)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Scandal (5)  |  Sign (63)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Still (614)  |  Structure (365)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Vanish (19)  |  Word (650)

Strictly speaking, the observed death rate for the human condition is something like 93%—that is, around 93% of all humans have died. This means the death rate among humans who were not members of The Beatles is significantly higher than the 50% death rate among humans who were.
On website what-if.xkcd.com
Science quotes on:  |  Condition (362)  |  Death (406)  |  Higher (37)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Condition (6)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Observed (149)  |  Rate (31)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Statistics (170)

Study of the scientific world cannot prescribe the orientation of something which is excluded from the scientific world.
Swarthmore Lecture (1929) at Friends’ House, London, printed in Science and the Unseen World (1929), 43.
Science quotes on:  |  Scientific (955)  |  Study (701)  |  World (1850)

Suppose an individual believes something with his whole heart; suppose further that he has a commitment to this belief and he has taken irrevocable actions because of it; finally, suppose that he is presented with evidence, unequivocal and undeniable evidence, that his belief is wrong: what will happen? The individual will frequently emerge, not only unshaken, but even more convinced of the truth of his beliefs than ever before. Indeed, he may even show a new fervor for convincing and converting other people to his view.
In When Prophecy Fails (1956), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Belief (615)  |  Commitment (28)  |  Convert (22)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Convinced (23)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Fervor (8)  |  Happen (282)  |  Heart (243)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Individual (420)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1031)  |  Present (630)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Show (353)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Truth (1109)  |  View (496)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wrong (246)

Suppose it were perfectly certain that the life and fortune of every one of us would, one day or other, depend upon his winning or losing a game of chess. Don't you think that we should all consider it to be a primary duty to learn at least the names and the moves of the pieces; to have a notion of a gambit, and a keen eye for all the means of giving and getting out of check? Do you not think that we should look with a disapprobation amounting to scorn upon the father who allowed his son, or the state which allowed its members, to grow up without knowing a pawn from a knight?
Yet, it is a very plain and elementary truth that the life, the fortune, and the happiness of every one of us, and, more or less, of those who are connected with us, do depend upon our knowing something of the rules of a game infinitely more difficult and complicated than chess. It is a game which has been played for untold ages, every man and woman of us being one of the two players in a game of his or her own. The chess-board is the world, the pieces are the phenomena of the universe, the rules of the game are what we call the laws of nature. The player on the other side is hidden from us. We know that his play is always fair, just, and patient. But also we know, to our cost, that he never overlooks a mistake, or makes the smallest allowance for ignorance. To the man who plays well the highest stakes are paid with that sort of overflowing generosity with which the strong shows delight in strength. And one who plays ill is checkmated—without haste, but without remorse.
Address to the South London Working Men’s College. 'A Liberal Education; and Where to Find It', in David Masson, (ed.), Macmillan’s Magazine (Mar 1868), 17, 369. Also in 'A Liberal Education and Where to Find it' (1868). In Collected Essays (1893), Vol. 3, 82.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Allowance (6)  |  Being (1276)  |  Call (781)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Check (26)  |  Checkmate (2)  |  Chess (27)  |  Chessboard (2)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Complication (30)  |  Connect (126)  |  Consider (428)  |  Cost (94)  |  Delight (111)  |  Depend (238)  |  Dependence (46)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Disapprobation (2)  |  Do (1905)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Eye (440)  |  Father (113)  |  Fortune (50)  |  Game (104)  |  Generosity (7)  |  Grow (247)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Haste (6)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Ill (12)  |  Infinity (96)  |  Knight (6)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Law (913)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learning (291)  |  Life (1870)  |  Look (584)  |  Loss (117)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Member (42)  |  Mistake (180)  |  More (2558)  |  More Or Less (71)  |  Move (223)  |  Name (359)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Notion (120)  |  Other (2233)  |  Overlook (33)  |  Patient (209)  |  Pawn (2)  |  Payment (6)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Player (9)  |  Primary (82)  |  Remorse (9)  |  Rule (307)  |  Scorn (12)  |  Show (353)  |  Side (236)  |  Son (25)  |  Stake (20)  |  State (505)  |  Strength (139)  |  Strong (182)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Think (1122)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Two (936)  |  Universe (900)  |  Win (53)  |  Winning (19)  |  Woman (160)  |  World (1850)

Suppose there is something which a person cannot understand. He happens to notice the similarity of this something to some other thing which he understands quite well. By comparing them he may come to understand the thing which he could not understand up to that moment. If his understanding turns out to be appropriate and nobody else has ever come to such an understanding, he can claim that his thinking was really creative.
Creativity and Intuition: A Physicist Looks at East and West (1973), 114.
Science quotes on:  |  Appropriate (61)  |  Claim (154)  |  Creative (144)  |  Happen (282)  |  Moment (260)  |  Nobody (103)  |  Notice (81)  |  Other (2233)  |  Person (366)  |  Similarity (32)  |  Suppose (158)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Turn (454)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)

Surely something is wanting in our conception of the universe. We know positive and negative electricity, north and south magnetism, and why not some extra terrestrial matter related to terrestrial matter, as the source is to the sink. … Worlds may have formed of this stuff, with element and compounds possessing identical properties with our own, indistinguishable from them until they are brought into each other’s vicinity. … Astronomy, the oldest and most juvenile of the sciences, may still have some surprises in store. May anti-matter be commended to its care! … Do dreams ever come true?
[Purely whimsical prediction long before the 1932 discovery of the positron, the antiparticle of the electron.]
'Potential Matter—A Holiday Dream', Letter to the Editor, Nature (18 Aug 1898), 58, No. 1503, 367. Quoted in Edward Robert Harrison, Cosmology: the Science of the Universe (2000), 433.
Science quotes on:  |  Anti-Matter (4)  |  Antiparticle (4)  |  Astronomy (251)  |  Care (203)  |  Commend (7)  |  Commendation (3)  |  Compound (117)  |  Conception (160)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dream (222)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Electron (96)  |  Element (322)  |  Form (976)  |  Identical (55)  |  Juvenile (4)  |  Know (1538)  |  Long (778)  |  Magnetism (43)  |  Matter (821)  |  Most (1728)  |  Negative (66)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Oldest (9)  |  Other (2233)  |  Positive (98)  |  Positron (4)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Purely (111)  |  Sink (38)  |  Source (101)  |  South (39)  |  Still (614)  |  Store (49)  |  Surely (101)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Terrestrial (62)  |  Universe (900)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)

Surgery is always second best. If you can so something else, it’s better. Surgery is limited. It is operating on someone who has no place else to go.
'The Best Hope of All', Time (3 May 1963)
Science quotes on:  |  Best (467)  |  Better (493)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Surgery (54)

Technology, when misused, poisons air, soil, water and lives. But a world without technology would be prey to something worse: the impersonal ruthlessness of the natural order, in which the health of a species depends on relentless sacrifice of the weak.
Editorial, 'Nature As Demon', (29 Aug 1986), A26.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Depend (238)  |  Dependance (4)  |  Health (210)  |  Impersonal (5)  |  Live (650)  |  Misuse (12)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Order (6)  |  Order (638)  |  Poison (46)  |  Prey (13)  |  Relentless (9)  |  Ruthlessness (3)  |  Sacrifice (58)  |  Soil (98)  |  Species (435)  |  Technology (281)  |  Water (503)  |  Weak (73)  |  World (1850)  |  Worse (25)

That brain of mine is something more than merely mortal; as time will show; (if only my breathing & some other etceteras do not make too rapid a progress towards instead of from mortality).
Before ten years are over, the Devil’s in it if I haven’t sucked out some of the life-blood from the mysteries of this universe, in a way that no purely mortal lips or brains could do.
In letter to Charles Babbage (5 Jul 1843). British Library Additional Manuscripts, MSS 37192, folio 349. As quoted and cited in Dorothy Stein (ed.), 'This First Child of Mine', Ada: A Life and a Legacy (1985), 110.
Science quotes on:  |  Autobiography (58)  |  Blood (144)  |  Brain (281)  |  Breathing (23)  |  Devil (34)  |  Do (1905)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lifeblood (4)  |  Merely (315)  |  Mine (78)  |  More (2558)  |  Mortal (55)  |  Mortality (16)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Other (2233)  |  Progress (492)  |  Purely (111)  |  Show (353)  |  Suck (8)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)  |  Way (1214)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

The ‘mad idea’ which will lie at the basis of a future fundamental physical theory will come from a realization that physical meaning has some mathematical form not previously associated with reality. From this point of view the problem of the ‘mad idea’ is the problem of choosing, not of generating, the right idea. One should not understand that too literally. In the 1960s it was said (in a certain connection) that the most important discovery of recent years in physics was the complex numbers. The author [Yuri Manin] has something like that in mind.
Mathematics and Physics (1981), Foreward. Reprinted in Mathematics as Metaphor: Selected Essays of Yuri I. Manin (2007), 90.
Science quotes on:  |  Associate (25)  |  Author (175)  |  Basis (180)  |  Certain (557)  |  Choose (116)  |  Complex (202)  |  Complex Number (3)  |  Complex Numbers (2)  |  Connection (171)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Form (976)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Future (467)  |  Generate (16)  |  Idea (881)  |  Important (229)  |  Lie (370)  |  Literally (30)  |  Mad (54)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Number (710)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physics (564)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Previously (12)  |  Problem (731)  |  Reality (274)  |  Realization (44)  |  Recent (78)  |  Right (473)  |  Say (989)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Understand (648)  |  View (496)  |  Will (2350)  |  Year (963)

The “hairy quadruped furnished with a tail and, pointed ears, probably arboreal in his habits,” this good fellow carried hidden in his nature, apparently, something destined to develop into a necessity for humane letters.
'Literature and Science', delivered as a lecture during Arnold's tour of the United States in 1883 and published in Discourses in America (1885). Taken from M. H. Abrams (ed.), The Norton Anthology of English Literature (1993), Vol. 2, 1441.
Science quotes on:  |  Arboreal (8)  |  Destined (42)  |  Develop (278)  |  Ear (69)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Furnish (97)  |  Good (906)  |  Habit (174)  |  Humane (19)  |  Letter (117)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Point (584)

The act of smelling something, anything, is remarkably like the act of thinking. Immediately at the moment of perception, you can feel the mind going to work, sending the odor around from place to place, setting off complex repertories through the brain, polling one center after another for signs of recognition, for old memories and old connection.
In Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony (1984), 42.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Brain (281)  |  Complex (202)  |  Connection (171)  |  Feel (371)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Moment (260)  |  Odor (11)  |  Old (499)  |  Perception (97)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Sense (785)  |  Setting (44)  |  Smell (29)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Through (846)  |  Work (1402)

The aim of scientific work is truth. While we internally recognise something as true, we judge, and while we utter judgements, we assert.
In Manuscripts 2 (after 1879). As cited and translated by Ivor Grattan-Guinness in The Search for Mathematical Roots, 1870-1940 (2011), 177.
Science quotes on:  |  Aim (175)  |  Assert (69)  |  Judge (114)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Work (1402)

The American Businessman has a problem: if he comes up with something new, the Russians invent it six months later and the Japanese make it cheaper.
Anonymous
In E.C. McKenzie, 14,000 Quips and Quotes for Speakers, Writers, Editors, Preachers, and Teachers (1990), 58.
Science quotes on:  |  American (56)  |  Cheaper (6)  |  Invention (400)  |  Japanese (7)  |  Month (91)  |  New (1273)  |  Problem (731)  |  Russian (3)

The animals of the Burgess Shale are holy objects–in the unconventional sense that this word conveys in some cultures. We do not place them on pedestals and worship from afar. We climb mountains and dynamite hillsides to find them. We quarry them, split them, carve them, draw them, and dissect them, struggling to wrest their secrets. We vilify and curse them for their damnable intransigence. They are grubby little creatures of a sea floor 530 million years old, but we greet them with awe because they are the Old Ones, and they are trying to tell us something.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Afar (7)  |  Animal (651)  |  Awe (43)  |  Carve (5)  |  Climb (39)  |  Convey (17)  |  Creature (242)  |  Culture (157)  |  Curse (20)  |  Dissection (35)  |  Do (1905)  |  Draw (140)  |  Dynamite (8)  |  Find (1014)  |  Floor (21)  |  Greet (7)  |  Hillside (4)  |  Holy (35)  |  Intransigence (2)  |  Little (717)  |  Million (124)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Object (438)  |  Old (499)  |  Pedestal (3)  |  Place (192)  |  Quarry (14)  |  Sea (326)  |  Secret (216)  |  Sense (785)  |  Split (15)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Tell (344)  |  Try (296)  |  Trying (144)  |  Unconventional (4)  |  Vilify (2)  |  Word (650)  |  Worship (32)  |  Wrest (3)  |  Year (963)

The biggest thrill of my life was finding out something that nobody in the world ever knew before. Another gratification is a recognition of the fact that you really do understand a lot of things that go on in the world that most people don’t—like planets moving around the sun.
In interview, Rushworth M. Kidder, 'Grounded in Space Science', Christian Science Monitor (22 Dec 1989).
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Finding Out (6)  |  Gratification (22)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lot (151)  |  Most (1728)  |  Move (223)  |  Nobody (103)  |  People (1031)  |  Planet (402)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Solar System (81)  |  Sun (407)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thrill (26)  |  Understand (648)  |  World (1850)

The bitterness of the potion, and the abhorrence of the patient are necessary circumstances to the operation. It must be something to trouble and disturb the stomach that must purge and cure it.
In Tryon Edwards (ed.), A Dictionary of Thoughts (1908), 339.
Science quotes on:  |  Abhorrence (8)  |  Bitterness (4)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Circumstances (108)  |  Cure (124)  |  Disturb (31)  |  Disturbance (34)  |  Medicine (392)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Operation (221)  |  Patient (209)  |  Potion (3)  |  Purge (11)  |  Stomach (40)  |  Trouble (117)

The chief thing in life is to do something—to work.
As quoted in Edward J. Wheeler (ed.), 'The Demeanor of John D. Rockefeller, Jr., Under Fire,' Current Opinion (Jul 1914), 57, No. 1, 21. This quote was one out of a collation in the article, “from his many talks to the Bible Class he formerly conducted and from various interviews.”
Science quotes on:  |  Chief (99)  |  Do (1905)  |  Life (1870)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Work (1402)

The conception of the atom stems from the concepts of subject and substance: there has to be “something” to account for any action. The atom is the last descendant of the concept of the soul.
Epigraph, without citation, in Edward C. Stark, Essential Chemistry (1979), 97. Also without citation in Isaac Asimov and Jason A. Shulman (eds.), Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 32. Webmaster has not yet been able to identify the primary source (can you help?).
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Action (342)  |  Atom (381)  |  Concept (242)  |  Conception (160)  |  Descendant (18)  |  Last (425)  |  Soul (235)  |  Stem (31)  |  Subject (543)  |  Substance (253)

The conditions of the earth’s core are starlike. From their study can physicists of the future tell us something more of the true nature of the stars?
Science quotes on:  |  Condition (362)  |  Core (20)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Future (467)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Study (701)  |  Tell (344)

The constant conditions which are maintained in the body might be termed equilibria. That word, however, has come to have fairly exact meaning as applied to relatively simple physico-chemical states, in closed systems, where known forces are balanced. The coordinated physiological processes which maintain most of the steady states in the organism are so complex and so peculiar to living beings—involving, as they may, the brain and nerves, the heart, lungs, kidneys and spleen, all working cooperatively—that I have suggested a special designation for these states, homeostasis. The word does not imply something set and immobile, a stagnation. It means a condition—a condition which may vary, but which is relatively constant.
In The Wisdom of the Body (1932), 24.
Science quotes on:  |  Applied (176)  |  Being (1276)  |  Body (557)  |  Brain (281)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Closed (38)  |  Complex (202)  |  Condition (362)  |  Constant (148)  |  Designation (13)  |  Force (497)  |  Heart (243)  |  Homeostasis (2)  |  Kidney (19)  |  Known (453)  |  Living (492)  |  Lung (37)  |  Maintain (105)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Means (587)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nerve (82)  |  Organism (231)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Physiological (64)  |  Physiology (101)  |  Set (400)  |  Simple (426)  |  Special (188)  |  State (505)  |  Steady (45)  |  System (545)  |  Term (357)  |  Word (650)

The contest [between the wave and particle theories of light] is something like one between a shark and a tiger, each is supreme in its own element but helpless in that of the other.
In Fison Memorial Lecture (7 May 1925) at Guy’s Hospital Medical School, London, published as The Structure of Light: The Fison Memorial Lecture 1925 (1925), 15.
Science quotes on:  |  Contest (6)  |  Element (322)  |  Helpless (14)  |  Light (635)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  Shark (11)  |  Supreme (73)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Tiger (7)  |  Wave (112)

The desire for truth so prominent in the quest of science, a reaching out of the spirit from its isolation to something beyond, a response to beauty in nature and art, an Inner Light of conviction and guidance—are these as much a part of our being as our sensitivity to sense impressions?
Swarthmore Lecture (1929) at Friends’ House, London, printed in Science and the Unseen World (1929), 42-43.
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Being (1276)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Desire (212)  |  Guidance (30)  |  Impression (118)  |  Inner (72)  |  Isolation (32)  |  Light (635)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Quest (39)  |  Response (56)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sensitivity (10)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Truth (1109)

The determining cause of most wars in the past has been, and probably will be of all wars in the future, the uncertainty of the result; war is acknowledged to be a challenge to the Unknown, it is often spoken of as an appeal to the God of Battles. The province of science is to foretell; this is true of every department of science. And the time must come—how soon we do not know—when the real science of war, something quite different from the application of science to the means of war, will make it possible to foresee with certainty the issue of a projected war. That will mark the end of battles; for however strong the spirit of contention, no nation will spend its money in a fight in which it knows it must lose.
Times Literary Supplement (28 Nov 1902), 353-4.
Science quotes on:  |  Application (257)  |  Cause (561)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Challenge (91)  |  Contention (14)  |  Department (93)  |  Different (595)  |  Do (1905)  |  End (603)  |  Foresee (22)  |  Foretell (12)  |  Future (467)  |  God (776)  |  Know (1538)  |  Lose (165)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Money (178)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nation (208)  |  Past (355)  |  Possible (560)  |  Project (77)  |  Province (37)  |  Result (700)  |  Soon (187)  |  Spend (97)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Strong (182)  |  Time (1911)  |  Uncertainty (58)  |  Unknown (195)  |  War (233)  |  Will (2350)

The difficulty really is psychological and exists in the perpetual torment that results from your saying to yourself, “But how can it be like that?” which is a reflection of uncontrolled but utterly vain desire to see it in terms of something familiar. … If you will simply admit that maybe [Nature] does behave like this, you will find her a delightful, entrancing thing. Do not keep saying to yourself, if you can possible avoid it, "But how can it be like that?" because you will get 'down the drain', into a blind alley from which nobody has escaped. Nobody knows how it can be like that.
[About wave-particle duality.]
'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), 129.
Science quotes on:  |  Admit (49)  |  Avoid (123)  |  Behave (18)  |  Blind (98)  |  Blind Alley (4)  |  Delightful (18)  |  Desire (212)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Drain (12)  |  Entrancing (2)  |  Escape (85)  |  Exist (458)  |  Familiar (47)  |  Find (1014)  |  Know (1538)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nobody (103)  |  Particle (200)  |  Perpetual (59)  |  Possible (560)  |  Psychological (42)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Result (700)  |  See (1094)  |  Term (357)  |  Terms (184)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Torment (18)  |  Uncontrolled (2)  |  Vain (86)  |  Wave (112)  |  Wave-Particle Duality (3)  |  Will (2350)

The experiment left no doubt that, as far as accuracy of measurement went, the resistance disappeared. At the same time, however, something unexpected occurred. The disappearance did not take place gradually but abruptly. From 1/500 the resistance at 4.2K, it could be established that the resistance had become less than a thousand-millionth part of that at normal temperature. Thus the mercury at 4.2K has entered a new state, which, owing to its particular electrical properties, can be called the state of superconductivity.
'Investigations into the Properties of Substances at low Temperatures, which have led, amongst other Things, to the Preparation of Liquid Helium', Nobel Lecture (11 Dec 1913). In Nobel Lectures in Physics 1901-1921 (1967), 333.
Science quotes on:  |  Accuracy (81)  |  Become (821)  |  Call (781)  |  Disappear (84)  |  Disappearance (28)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Electrical (57)  |  Electricity (168)  |  Enter (145)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Mercury (54)  |  New (1273)  |  Owing (39)  |  Resistance (41)  |  State (505)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Time (1911)  |  Unexpected (55)

The explosive component in the contemporary scene is not the clamor of the masses but the self-righteous claims of a multitude of graduates from schools and universities. This army of scribes is clamoring for a society in which planning, regulation, and supervision are paramount and the prerogative of the educated. They hanker for the scribe’s golden age, for a return to something like the scribe-dominated societies of ancient Egypt, China, and Europe of the Middle Ages. There is little doubt that the present trend in the new and renovated countries toward social regimentation stems partly from the need to create adequate employment for a large number of scribes. And since the tempo of the production of the literate is continually increasing, the prospect is of ever-swelling bureaucracies.
In 'Scribe, Writer, and Rebel', The Ordeal of Change (1963), 109.
Science quotes on:  |  Adequate (50)  |  Age (509)  |  Ancient (198)  |  Ancient Egypt (4)  |  Army (35)  |  Bureaucracy (8)  |  China (27)  |  Claim (154)  |  Clamor (7)  |  Clamoring (2)  |  Component (51)  |  Contemporary (33)  |  Continually (17)  |  Country (269)  |  Create (245)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Educate (14)  |  Egypt (31)  |  Employment (34)  |  Europe (50)  |  Explosive (24)  |  Golden (47)  |  Golden Age (11)  |  Graduate (32)  |  Increase (225)  |  Large (398)  |  Literate (2)  |  Little (717)  |  Mass (160)  |  Middle Age (19)  |  Middle Ages (12)  |  Multitude (50)  |  Need (320)  |  New (1273)  |  Number (710)  |  Paramount (11)  |  Partly (5)  |  Plan (122)  |  Planning (21)  |  Prerogative (3)  |  Present (630)  |  Production (190)  |  Prospect (31)  |  Regimentation (2)  |  Regulation (25)  |  Renovate (3)  |  Return (133)  |  Scene (36)  |  School (227)  |  Scribe (3)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Righteous (2)  |  Social (261)  |  Society (350)  |  Stem (31)  |  Supervision (4)  |  Tempo (3)  |  Toward (45)  |  Trend (23)  |  University (130)

The fact that something is far-fetched is no reason why it should not be true; it cannot be as far-fetched as the fact that something exists.
In The Decline and Fall of Science (1976), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Exist (458)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Reason (766)  |  True (239)  |  Why (491)

The fact that stares one in the face is that people of the greatest sincerity and of all levels of intelligence differ and have always differed in their religious beliefs. Since at most one faith can be true, it follows that human beings are extremely liable to believe firmly and honestly in something untrue in the field of revealed religion. One would have expected this obvious fact to lead to some humility, to some thought that however deep one's faith, one may conceivably be mistaken. Nothing is further from the believer, any believer, than this elementary humility. All in his power … must have his faith rammed down their throats. In many cases children are indeed indoctrinated with the disgraceful thought that they belong to the one group with superior knowledge who alone have a private wire to the office of the Almighty, all others being less fortunate than they themselves.
From 'Religion is a Good Thing', collected in R. Duncan and M. Wesson-Smith (eds.) Lying Truths: A Critical Scruting of Current Beliefs and Conventions (1979), 205. As quoted in Paul Davies, God and the New Physics (1984), 6-7.
Science quotes on:  |  Almighty (23)  |  Alone (324)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belief (615)  |  Believer (26)  |  Belong (168)  |  Children (201)  |  Deep (241)  |  Differ (88)  |  Down (455)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Expect (203)  |  Face (214)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Faith (209)  |  Field (378)  |  Follow (389)  |  Fortunate (31)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Honestly (10)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Humility (31)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lead (391)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Office (71)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1031)  |  Power (771)  |  Religion (369)  |  Religious (134)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Revealed (59)  |  Sincerity (8)  |  Superior (88)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Thought (995)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Untrue (12)  |  Wire (36)

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. He who knows it not and can no longer wonder, no longer feel amazement, is as good as dead, a snuffed-out candle. It was the experience of mystery–even if mixed with fear–that engendered religion. A knowledge of the existence of something we cannot penetrate, of the manifestations of the profoundest reason and the most radiant beauty, which are only accessible to our reason in their most elementary forms–it is this knowledge and this emotion that constitute the truly religious attitude; in this sense, and in this alone, I am a deeply religious man.
From 'What I Believe: Living Philosophies XIII', Forum and Century (Oct 1930), 84, No. 4, 193-194. Alan Harris (trans.), The World as I See It (1956, 1993), 5.
Science quotes on:  |  Accessible (27)  |  Alone (324)  |  Amazement (19)  |  Art (680)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Candle (32)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Cradle (19)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Emotion (106)  |  Existence (481)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fear (212)  |  Feel (371)  |  Form (976)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Good (906)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Man (2252)  |  Manifestation (61)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mysterious (83)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  Radiant (15)  |  Reason (766)  |  Religion (369)  |  Religious (134)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Sense (785)  |  Stand (284)  |  Thing (1914)  |  True Science (25)  |  Truly (118)  |  Wonder (251)

The fascination of any search after truth lies not in the attainment, which at best is found to be very relative, but in the pursuit, where all the powers of the mind and character are brought into play and are absorbed by the task. One feels oneself in contact with something that is infinite and one finds joy that is beyond expression in sounding the abyss of science and the secrets of the infinite mind.
In Isabel Fothergill Smith, The Stone Lady: a Memoir of Florence Bascom (1981). Cited in Earth Sciences History: Journal of the History of the Earth Sciences Society (992), Vols. 11-12, 39.
Science quotes on:  |  Absorb (54)  |  Absorption (13)  |  Abyss (30)  |  Attainment (48)  |  Best (467)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Character (259)  |  Contact (66)  |  Expression (181)  |  Fascination (35)  |  Feel (371)  |  Find (1014)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Infinity (96)  |  Joy (117)  |  Lie (370)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Oneself (33)  |  Power (771)  |  Pursuit (128)  |  Search (175)  |  Secret (216)  |  Sounding (2)  |  Task (152)  |  Truth (1109)

The first question which you will ask and which I must try to answer is this, “What is the use of climbing Mount Everest ?” and my answer must at once be, “It is no use.” There is not the slightest prospect of any gain whatsoever. Oh, we may learn a little about the behavior of the human body at high altitudes, and possibly medical men may turn our observation to some account for the purposes of aviation. But otherwise nothing will come of it. We shall not bring back a single bit of gold or silver, not a gem, nor any coal or iron. We shall not find a single foot of earth that can be planted with crops to raise food. It’s no use. So, if you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won’t see why we go. What we get from this adventure is just sheer joy. And joy is, after all, the end of life. We do not live to eat and make money. We eat and make money to be able to enjoy life. That is what life means and what life is for.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Adventure (69)  |  Altitude (5)  |  Answer (389)  |  Ask (420)  |  Aviation (8)  |  Back (395)  |  Behavior (95)  |  Bit (21)  |  Body (557)  |  Bring (95)  |  Challenge (91)  |  Climb (39)  |  Coal (64)  |  Crop (26)  |  Do (1905)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Eat (108)  |  End (603)  |  Enjoy (48)  |  Find (1014)  |  First (1302)  |  Food (213)  |  Foot (65)  |  Forever (111)  |  Gain (146)  |  Gem (17)  |  Gold (101)  |  High (370)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Body (34)  |  Iron (99)  |  Joy (117)  |  Learn (672)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Live (650)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Medical (31)  |  Meet (36)  |  Money (178)  |  Mount (43)  |  Mount Everest (6)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Observation (593)  |  Otherwise (26)  |  Plant (320)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Prospect (31)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Question (649)  |  Raise (38)  |  Respond (14)  |  See (1094)  |  Sheer (9)  |  Silver (49)  |  Single (365)  |  Slight (32)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Try (296)  |  Turn (454)  |  Understand (648)  |  Upward (44)  |  Use (771)  |  Whatsoever (41)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)

The first thing the intellect does with an object is to class it along with something else. But any object that is infinitely important to us and awakens our devotion feels to us also as if it must be sui generis and unique. Probably a crab would be filled with a sense of personal outrage if it could hear us class it without ado or apology as a crustacean, and thus dispose of it. 'I am no such thing,' it would say; 'I am MYSELF, MYSELF alone.
The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature (1902), 9.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Apology (8)  |  Class (168)  |  Classification (102)  |  Crab (6)  |  Crustacean (3)  |  Devotion (37)  |  Feel (371)  |  First (1302)  |  Hear (144)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Must (1525)  |  Myself (211)  |  Object (438)  |  Say (989)  |  Sense (785)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Unique (72)

The flights of the imagination which occur to the pure mathematician are in general so much better described in his formulas than in words, that it is not remarkable to find the subject treated by outsiders as something essentially cold and uninteresting— … the only successful attempt to invest mathematical reasoning with a halo of glory—that made in this section by Prof. Sylvester—is known to a comparative few, …
In Presidential Address British Association for the Advancement of Science (1871), Nature Vol. 4, 271,
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (266)  |  Better (493)  |  Cold (115)  |  Comparative (14)  |  Describe (132)  |  Essentially (15)  |  Find (1014)  |  Flight (101)  |  Formula (102)  |  General (521)  |  Glory (66)  |  Halo (7)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Invest (20)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Modern Mathematics (50)  |  Occur (151)  |  Outsider (7)  |  Prof (2)  |  Pure (299)  |  Reason (766)  |  Reasoning (212)  |  Remarkable (50)  |  Section (11)  |  Subject (543)  |  Successful (134)  |  James Joseph Sylvester (58)  |  Treat (38)  |  Uninteresting (9)  |  Word (650)

The fundamental essence of science, which I think we've lost in our education system, is poking something with a stick and seeing what happens. Embrace that process of inquiry.
Science quotes on:  |  Education (423)  |  Embrace (47)  |  Essence (85)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Happen (282)  |  Inquiry (88)  |  Lose (165)  |  Poke (5)  |  Process (439)  |  See (1094)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Stick (27)  |  System (545)  |  Think (1122)

The future … [is] something which everyone reaches at the rate of sixty minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.
In The Screwtape Letters & Screwtape Proposes a Toast (1961), 130.
Science quotes on:  |  Everyone (35)  |  Future (467)  |  Hour (192)  |  Minute (129)  |  Rate (31)  |  Reach (286)  |  Time (1911)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Whoever (42)

The goal of Computer Science is to build something that will last at least until we've finished building it.
Source uncertain. Usually seen on the web, identified as Anonymous (and, rarely, attributed to Carl William Brown.) If you know a primary print source, please contact Webmaster.
Science quotes on:  |  Build (211)  |  Building (158)  |  Computer (131)  |  Computer Science (11)  |  Finish (62)  |  Goal (155)  |  Last (425)  |  Will (2350)

The great use of a life is to spend it for something that outlasts it.
In Letter to W. Lutoslawski (13 Nov 1900). Collected in Ralph Barton Perry (ed.), The Thought and Character of William James: As Revealed in Unpublished Correspondence and Notes, Together with His Published Writings Vol.2 (1935), 289. Footnote for cite of Letter from The Thought and Character of William James: Briefer Version (1948, 1964), 247.
Science quotes on:  |  Doing (277)  |  Great (1610)  |  Life (1870)  |  Outlast (3)  |  Spend (97)  |  Use (771)  |  Will (2350)

The greatest mystery is why there is something instead of nothing, and the greatest something is this thing we call life.
In Through a Window by Alan Lightman and Roberta Brawer (1990).
Science quotes on:  |  Call (781)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Life (1870)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Why (491)

The history of the living world can be summarized as the elaboration of ever more perfect eyes within a cosmos in which there is always something more to be seen.
In The Phenomenon of Man (1955).
Science quotes on:  |  Cosmos (64)  |  Elaboration (11)  |  Eye (440)  |  History (716)  |  Living (492)  |  More (2558)  |  Perfect (223)  |  World (1850)

The human mind prefers something which it can recognize to something for which it has no name, and, whereas thousands of persons carry field glasses to bring horses, ships, or steeples close to them, only a few carry even the simplest pocket microscope. Yet a small microscope will reveal wonders a thousand times more thrilling than anything which Alice saw behind the looking-glass.
In The World Was My Garden (1938, 1941), 11.
Science quotes on:  |  Behind (139)  |  Carry (130)  |  Field (378)  |  Glass (94)  |  Horse (78)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Looking (191)  |  Microscope (85)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Name (359)  |  Person (366)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Saw (160)  |  Ship (69)  |  Small (489)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Time (1911)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wonder (251)

The human understanding is unquiet; it cannot stop or rest, and still presses onward, but in vain. Therefore it is that we cannot conceive of any end or limit to the world, but always as of necessity it occurs to us that there is something beyond... But he is no less an unskilled and shallow philosopher who seeks causes of that which is most general, than he who in things subordinate and subaltern omits to do so
From Aphorism 48, Novum Organum, Book I (1620). Collected in James Spedding (ed.), The Works of Francis Bacon (1858), Vol. 4, 57.
Science quotes on:  |  Beyond (316)  |  Cause (561)  |  Conceive (100)  |  Do (1905)  |  End (603)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  General (521)  |  Human (1512)  |  Limit (294)  |  Most (1728)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Occur (151)  |  Omit (12)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Rest (287)  |  Seek (218)  |  Still (614)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Unskilled (4)  |  Vain (86)  |  World (1850)

The increase of disorder or entropy with time is one example of what is called an arrow of time something that gives a direction to time and distinguishes the past from the future. There are at least three different directions of time. First, there is the thermodynamic arrow of time—the direction of time in which disorder or entropy increases. Second, there is the psychological arrow of time. This is the direction in which we feel time passes—the direction of time in which we remember the past, but not the future. Third, there is the cosmological arrow of time. This is the direction of time in which the universe is expanding rather than contracting.
In 'The Direction of Time', New Scientist (9 Jul 1987), 46.
Science quotes on:  |  Arrow (22)  |  Arrow Of Time (2)  |  Call (781)  |  Contract (11)  |  Cosmological (11)  |  Different (595)  |  Direction (185)  |  Disorder (45)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Entropy (46)  |  Expand (56)  |  Feel (371)  |  First (1302)  |  Future (467)  |  Increase (225)  |  Past (355)  |  Psychological (42)  |  Remember (189)  |  Thermodynamics (40)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)

The inventor and the research man are confused because they both examine results of physical or chemical operations. But they are exact opposites, mirror images of one another. The research man does something and does not care [exactly] what it is that happens, he measures whatever it is. The inventor wants something to happen, but does not care how it happens or what it is that happens if it is not what he wants.
Aphorism listed Frederick Seitz, The Cosmic Inventor: Reginald Aubrey Fessenden (1866-1932) (1999), 54, being Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, Held at Philadelphia For Promoting Useful Knowledge, Vol. 86, Pt. 6.
Science quotes on:  |  Both (496)  |  Care (203)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Exactness (29)  |  Examination (102)  |  Examine (84)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happening (59)  |  Image (97)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Man (2252)  |  Measure (241)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Mirror (43)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Physical (518)  |  Research (753)  |  Researcher (36)  |  Result (700)  |  Want (504)  |  Whatever (234)

The investigation of the truth is in one way hard, in another easy. An indication of this is found in the fact that no one is able to attain the truth adequately, while, on the other hand, no one fails entirely, but every one says something true about the nature of things, and while individually they contribute little or nothing to the truth, by the union of all a considerable amount is amassed. Therefore, since the truth seems to be like the proverbial door, which no one can fail to hit, in this way it is easy, but the fact that we can have a whole truth and not the particular part we aim at shows the difficulty of it. Perhaps, as difficulties are of two kinds, the cause of the present difficulty is not in the facts but in us.
Aristotle
Metaphysics, 993a, 30-993b, 9. In Jonathan Barnes (ed.), The Complete Works of Aristotle (1984), Vol. 2, 1569-70.
Science quotes on:  |  Aim (175)  |  Amass (6)  |  Amount (153)  |  Attain (126)  |  Cause (561)  |  Considerable (75)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Door (94)  |  Easy (213)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Facts (553)  |  Fail (191)  |  Hard (246)  |  Indication (33)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Kind (564)  |  Little (717)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nature Of Things (30)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Other (2233)  |  Present (630)  |  Proverbial (8)  |  Say (989)  |  Show (353)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Two (936)  |  Union (52)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whole (756)

The Johns Hopkins University certifies that John Wentworth Doe does not know anything but Biochemistry. Please pay no attention to any pronouncements he may make on any other subject, particularly when he joins with others of his kind to save the world from something or other. However, he worked hard for this degree and is potentially a most valuable citizen. Please treat him kindly.
[An imaginary academic diploma reworded to give a more realistic view of the value of the training of scientists.]
'Our Splintered Learning and the Nature of Scientists', Science (15 Apr 1955), 121, 516.
Science quotes on:  |  Attention (196)  |  Biochemistry (50)  |  Citizen (52)  |  Degree (277)  |  Diploma (2)  |  Hard (246)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Johns Hopkins (7)  |  Johns Hopkins University (2)  |  Kind (564)  |  Kindness (14)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Other (2233)  |  Please (68)  |  Potential (75)  |  Pronouncement (2)  |  Realistic (6)  |  Save (126)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Subject (543)  |  Training (92)  |  University (130)  |  Value (393)  |  View (496)  |  Work (1402)  |  World (1850)

The known is finite, the unknown infinite; intellectually we stand on an islet in the midst of an illimitable ocean of inexplicability. Our business in every generation is to reclaim a little more land, to add something to the extent and the solidity of our possessions. And even a cursory glance at the history of the biological sciences during the last quarter of a century is sufficient to justify the assertion, that the most potent instrument for the extension of the realm of natural knowledge which has come into men’s hands, since the publication of Newton's ‘Principia’, is Darwin's ‘Origin of Species.’
From concluding remarks to a chapter by Thomas Huxley, 'On the Reception of the ‘Origin of Species’', the last chapter in Charles Darwin and Francis Darwin (ed.), The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin (1887), Vol. 1, 557.
Science quotes on:  |  Biological (137)  |  Business (156)  |  Century (319)  |  Extension (60)  |  Extent (142)  |  Finite (60)  |  Generation (256)  |  Glance (36)  |  History (716)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Instrument (158)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Last (425)  |  Little (717)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Natural (810)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Origin (250)  |  Possession (68)  |  Potent (15)  |  Principia (14)  |  Publication (102)  |  Realm (87)  |  Species (435)  |  Stand (284)  |  Sufficient (133)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Unknown (195)

The law of conservation of energy tells us we can't get something for nothing, but we refuse to believe it.
In Isaac Asimov's Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 75.
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (615)  |  Conservation (187)  |  Conservation Of Energy (30)  |  Energy (373)  |  Law (913)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Refuse (45)  |  Tell (344)

The least thing contains something of the unknown. Let us find it. To describe a fire that flames and a tree in a field, we must remain facing that fire and that tree until they no longer resemble, to us, any other tree, or fire. This is the way we become original.
From 'Le Roman', Pierre et Jean (1888), as translated by Alexina Loranger in 'Introduction: The Novel', Pierre et Jean (Peter and John) (1890), 39. The opening words are quoted from Gustave Flaubert. From the original French, “La moindre chose contient un peu d’inconnu. Trouvons-le. Pour décrire un feu qui flambe et un arbre dans une plaine, demeurons en face de ce feu et de cet arbre jusqu’à ce 'qu’ils ne ressemblent plus, pour nous, à aucun autre arbre et à aucun autre feu. C’est de cette façon qu’on devient original.” [Because “devient” is present tense, where the original text gave “became”, the present tense “become” has been substituted in the above quote by Webmaster.]
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Contain (68)  |  Describe (132)  |  Face (214)  |  Field (378)  |  Find (1014)  |  Fire (203)  |  Flame (44)  |  Least (75)  |  Long (778)  |  Must (1525)  |  Observation (593)  |  Original (61)  |  Originality (21)  |  Other (2233)  |  Remain (355)  |  Research (753)  |  Resemble (65)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Tree (269)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Way (1214)

The Lincoln Highway is to be something more than a road. It will be a road with a personality, a distinctive work of which the Americans of future generations can point with pride - an economic but also artistic triumph. (1914)
Science quotes on:  |  America (143)  |  Artistic (24)  |  Distinctive (25)  |  Economic (84)  |  Future (467)  |  Generation (256)  |  Lincoln Highway (4)  |  More (2558)  |  Personality (66)  |  Point (584)  |  Pride (84)  |  Road (71)  |  Triumph (76)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

The losses of the natural world are our loss, their silence silences something within the human mind. Human language is lit with animal life: we play cats-cradle or have hare-brained ideas; we speak of badgering, or outfoxing someone; to squirrel something away and to ferret it out. … When our experience of the wild world shrinks, we no longer fathom the depths of our own words; language loses its lustre and vividness.
In 'Fifty Years On, the Silence of Rachel Carson’s Spring Consumes Us', The Guardian (25 Sep 2012),
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Animal Life (21)  |  Badger (2)  |  Brain (281)  |  Cat (52)  |  Cradle (19)  |  Depth (97)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fathom (15)  |  Fox (9)  |  Hare (3)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Idea (881)  |  Language (308)  |  Life (1870)  |  Lose (165)  |  Loss (117)  |  Lustre (3)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural World (33)  |  Play (116)  |  Shrink (23)  |  Silence (62)  |  Speak (240)  |  Squirrel (11)  |  Wild (96)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)

The man in the street will, therefore, twist the statement that the scientist has come to the end of meaning into the statement that the scientist has penetrated as far as he can with the tools at his command, and that there is something beyond the ken of the scientist. This imagined beyond, which the scientist has proved he cannot penetrate, will become the playground of the imagination of every mystic and dreamer. The existence of such a domain will be made the basis of an orgy of rationalizing. It will be made the substance of the soul; the spirits of the dead will populate it; God will lurk in its shadows; the principle of vital processes will have its seat here; and it will be the medium of telepathic communication. One group will find in the failure of the physical law of cause and effect the solution of the age-long problem of the freedom of the will; and on the other hand the atheist will find the justification of his contention that chance rules the universe.
Reflections of a Physicist (1950),102-3.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Atheist (16)  |  Basis (180)  |  Become (821)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Cause (561)  |  Cause And Effect (21)  |  Chance (244)  |  Command (60)  |  Communication (101)  |  Contention (14)  |  Domain (72)  |  Dreamer (14)  |  Effect (414)  |  End (603)  |  Existence (481)  |  Failure (176)  |  Find (1014)  |  Freedom (145)  |  God (776)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Justification (52)  |  Law (913)  |  Long (778)  |  Man (2252)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Mystic (23)  |  Other (2233)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Law (15)  |  Playground (6)  |  Principle (530)  |  Problem (731)  |  Rule (307)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Shadow (73)  |  Solution (282)  |  Soul (235)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Statement (148)  |  Substance (253)  |  Tool (129)  |  Twist (10)  |  Universe (900)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Vital (89)  |  Will (2350)

The man of science appears to be the only man who has something to say just now, and the only man who does not know how to say it.
In Fielding Hudson Garrison, An Introduction to the History of Medicine (1929), 16.
Science quotes on:  |  Know (1538)  |  Man (2252)  |  Men Of Science (147)  |  Publication (102)  |  Say (989)  |  Something To Say (4)

The manner of Demoivre’s death has a certain interest for psychologists. Shortly before it, he declared that it was necessary for him to sleep some ten minutes or a quarter of an hour longer each day than the preceding one: the day after he had thus reached a total of something over twenty-three hours he slept up to the limit of twenty-four hours, and then died in his sleep.
In History of Mathematics (3rd Ed., 1901), 394.
Science quotes on:  |  Anecdote (21)  |  Certain (557)  |  Day (43)  |  Death (406)  |  Declare (48)  |  Declared (24)  |  Hour (192)  |  Interest (416)  |  Limit (294)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Minute (129)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Psychologist (26)  |  Reach (286)  |  Sleep (81)  |  Total (95)

The mind is a vagrant thing ... Thinking is not analogous to a person working in a laboratory who invents something on company time.
Answering criticism that the book for which he won a Pulitzer Prize was written in the years he had been employed at the Smithsonian. He specified that did not write on the premises there, but only at home outside of working hours.
Quoted by Barbara Gamarekian in 'Working Profile: Daniel J. Boorstin. Helping the Library of Congress Fulfill Its Mission', New York Times (8 Jul 1983), B6.
Science quotes on:  |  Book (413)  |  Company (63)  |  Criticism (85)  |  Employ (115)  |  Home (184)  |  Hour (192)  |  Invention (400)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Outside (141)  |  Person (366)  |  Premise (40)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Time (1911)  |  Vagrant (5)  |  Workplace (2)  |  Write (250)  |  Year (963)

The moment man first picked up a stone or a branch to use as a tool, he altered irrevocably the balance between him and his environment. From this point on, the way in which the world around him changed was different. It was no longer regular or predictable. New objects appeared that were not recognizable as a mutation of something that existed before, and as each one merged it altered the environment not for one season, but for ever.
from Introduction to Connections by James Burke, Macmillan (1978)
Science quotes on:  |  Alter (64)  |  Altered (32)  |  Altering (3)  |  Balance (82)  |  Branch (155)  |  Change (639)  |  Different (595)  |  Environment (239)  |  Exist (458)  |  First (1302)  |  Irrevocable (3)  |  Man (2252)  |  Moment (260)  |  Mutation (40)  |  New (1273)  |  Object (438)  |  Point (584)  |  Prediction (89)  |  Recognition (93)  |  Regular (48)  |  Season (47)  |  Stone (168)  |  Tool (129)  |  Use (771)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)

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)  |  Impressed (39)  |  Impression (118)  |  More (2558)  |  Plain (34)  |  Saw (160)  |  See (1094)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Soul (235)  |  Tell (344)  |  Telling (24)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)

The most beautiful and deepest experience a man can have is the sense of the mysterious. It is the underlying principle of religion as well as all serious endeavour in art and science. He who never had this experience seems to me, if not dead, then at least blind. To sense that behind anything that can be experienced there is a something that our mind cannot grasp and whose beauty and sublimity reaches us only indirectly and as a feeble reflection, this is religiousness.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Art (680)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Behind (139)  |  Blind (98)  |  Dead (65)  |  Deep (241)  |  Endeavor (74)  |  Endeavour (63)  |  Experience (494)  |  Feeble (28)  |  Grasp (65)  |  Indirectly (7)  |  Least (75)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mysterious (83)  |  Never (1089)  |  Principle (530)  |  Reach (286)  |  Reflection (93)  |  Religion (369)  |  Religiousness (3)  |  Seem (150)  |  Sense (785)  |  Serious (98)  |  Sublimity (6)  |  Underlying (33)

The most remarkable thing was his [Clifford’s] great strength as compared with his weight, as shown in some exercises. At one time he could pull up on the bar with either hand, which is well known to be one of the greatest feats of strength. His nerve at dangerous heights was extraordinary. I am appalled now to think that he climbed up and sat on the cross bars of the weathercock on a church tower, and when by way of doing something worse I went up and hung by my toes to the bars he did the same.
Anonymous
Quoted from a letter by one of Clifford’s friends to F. Pollock, in Clifford’s Lectures and Essays (1901), Vol. 1, Introduction, 8.
Science quotes on:  |  Appalled (3)  |  Badly (32)  |  Bar (9)  |  Church (64)  |  William Kingdon Clifford (23)  |  Climb (39)  |  Compare (76)  |  Cross (20)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Doing (277)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Extraordinary (83)  |  Feat (11)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Hand (149)  |  Hang (46)  |  Height (33)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Mathematicians and Anecdotes (141)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nerve (82)  |  Pull (43)  |  Remarkable (50)  |  Same (166)  |  Show (353)  |  Sit (51)  |  Strength (139)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Toe (8)  |  Tower (45)  |  Way (1214)  |  Weight (140)

The native hospital in Tunis was the focal point of my research. Often, when going to the hospital, I had to step over the bodies of typhus patients who were awaiting admission to the hospital and had fallen exhausted at the door. We had observed a certain phenomenon at the hospital, of which no one recognized the significance, and which drew my attention. In those days typhus patients were accommodated in the open medical wards. Before reaching the door of the wards they spread contagion. They transmitted the disease to the families that sheltered them, and doctors visiting them were also infected. The administrative staff admitting the patients, the personnel responsible for taking their clothes and linen, and the laundry staff were also contaminated. In spite of this, once admitted to the general ward the typhus patient did not contaminate any of the other patients, the nurses or the doctors. I took this observation as my guide. I asked myself what happened between the entrance to the hospital and the wards. This is what happened: the typhus patient was stripped of his clothes and linen, shaved and washed. The contagious agent was therefore something attached to his skin and clothing, something which soap and water could remove. It could only be the louse. It was the louse.
'Investigations on Typhus', Nobel lecture, 1928. In Nobel Lectures: Physiology or Medicine 1922-1941 (1965), 181.
Science quotes on:  |  Admission (17)  |  Agent (73)  |  Ask (420)  |  Attach (57)  |  Attached (36)  |  Attention (196)  |  Certain (557)  |  Clothes (11)  |  Contagion (9)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Disease (340)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Door (94)  |  Entrance (16)  |  General (521)  |  Guide (107)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Hospital (45)  |  Linen (8)  |  Louse (6)  |  Myself (211)  |  Native (41)  |  Nurse (33)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observed (149)  |  Open (277)  |  Other (2233)  |  Patient (209)  |  Phenomenon (334)  |  Point (584)  |  Remove (50)  |  Research (753)  |  Shave (2)  |  Shelter (23)  |  Significance (114)  |  Skin (48)  |  Soap (11)  |  Spite (55)  |  Spread (86)  |  Step (234)  |  Typhus (2)  |  Ward (7)  |  Wash (23)  |  Water (503)

The nature of matter, or body considered in general, consists not in its being something which is hard or heavy or coloured, or which affects the senses in any way, but simply in its being something which is extended in length, breadth and depth.
Principles of Philosophy (1644), trans. V. R. and R. P. Miller (1983), 40.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Body (557)  |  Breadth (15)  |  Consider (428)  |  Consist (223)  |  Depth (97)  |  Extend (129)  |  General (521)  |  Hard (246)  |  Matter (821)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Sense (785)  |  Way (1214)

The night before Easter Sunday of that year (1920) I awoke, turned on the light, and jotted down a few notes on a tiny slip of thin paper. Then I fell asleep again. It occurred to me at six o’clock in the morning that during the night I had written down something most important, but I was unable to decipher the scrawl. The next night, at three o’clock, the idea returned. It was the design of an experiment to determine whether the hypothesis of chemical transmission that I had uttered seventeen years ago was correct. I got up immediately, went to the laboratory, and performed a simple experiment on a frog heart according to the nocturnal design. I have to describe this experiment briefly since its results became the foundation of the theory of chemical transmission of the nervous impulse. The hearts of two frogs were isolated, the first with its nerves, the second without. Both hearts were attached to Straub cannulas filled with a little Ringer solution. The vagus nerve of the first heart was stimulated for a few minutes. Then the Ringer solution that had been in the first heart during the stimulation of the vagus was transferred to the second heart. It slowed and its beats diminished just as if its vagus had been stimulated. Similarly, when the accelerator nerve was stimulated and the Ringer from this period transferred, the second heart speeded up and its beats increased. These results unequivocally proved that the nerves do not influence the heart directly but liberate from their terminals specific chemical substances which, in their turn, cause the well-known modifications of the function of the heart characteristic of the stimulation of its nerves.
'An Autobiographic Sketch', Perspectives in Biology and Medicine (1960), 4, 17.
Science quotes on:  |  Accelerator (11)  |  According (236)  |  Attach (57)  |  Attached (36)  |  Autobiography (58)  |  Beat (42)  |  Both (496)  |  Cause (561)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Chemical (303)  |  Clock (51)  |  Describe (132)  |  Design (203)  |  Determine (152)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Easter (4)  |  Experiment (736)  |  First (1302)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Frog (44)  |  Function (235)  |  Heart (243)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Idea (881)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Impulse (52)  |  Influence (231)  |  Known (453)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Minute (129)  |  Modification (57)  |  Morning (98)  |  Most (1728)  |  Nerve (82)  |  Next (238)  |  Paper (192)  |  Perform (123)  |  Period (200)  |  Result (700)  |  Return (133)  |  Scrawl (3)  |  Simple (426)  |  Sleep (81)  |  Slow (108)  |  Solution (282)  |  Specific (98)  |  Speed (66)  |  Stimulation (18)  |  Substance (253)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Tiny (74)  |  Transmission (34)  |  Turn (454)  |  Two (936)  |  Year (963)

The number of stars making up the Milky Way is about 10¹¹ or something like the number of raindrops falling in Hyde Park in a day’s heavy rain.
From review of Harlow Shapley, Of Stars and Men in 'Man and his Universe', New Scientist (12 Mar 1959), 594,
Science quotes on:  |  Day (43)  |  Fall (243)  |  Heavy (24)  |  Making (300)  |  Milky Way (29)  |  Number (710)  |  Rain (70)  |  Raindrop (4)  |  Star (460)  |  Stars (304)  |  Way (1214)

The object of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid.
as quoted in New Scientist, 1990.
Science quotes on:  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mouth (54)  |  Object (438)  |  Shut (41)  |  Solid (119)

The only similarity between the car and the human body is that if something is seriously wrong with the design of the former you can send it back to its maker.
A Sense of Asher (1972), 86.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Body (557)  |  Car (75)  |  Design (203)  |  Former (138)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Body (34)  |  Maker (34)  |  Similarity (32)  |  Wrong (246)

The other line of argument, which leads to the opposite conclusion, arises from looking at artificial automata. Everyone knows that a machine tool is more complicated than the elements which can be made with it, and that, generally speaking, an automaton A, which can make an automaton B, must contain a complete description of B, and also rules on how to behave while effecting the synthesis. So, one gets a very strong impression that complication, or productive potentiality in an organization, is degenerative, that an organization which synthesizes something is necessarily more complicated, of a higher order, than the organization it synthesizes. This conclusion, arrived at by considering artificial automaton, is clearly opposite to our early conclusion, arrived at by considering living organisms.
From lecture series on self-replicating machines at the University of Illinois, Lecture 5 (Dec 1949), 'Re-evaluation of the Problems of Complicated Automata—Problems of Hierarchy and Evolution', Theory of Self-Reproducing Automata (1966).
Science quotes on:  |  Argument (145)  |  Arise (162)  |  Artificial (38)  |  Automaton (12)  |  Complete (209)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Complication (30)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Contain (68)  |  Degenerative (2)  |  Description (89)  |  Early (196)  |  Element (322)  |  Impression (118)  |  Know (1538)  |  Lead (391)  |  Living (492)  |  Looking (191)  |  Machine (271)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Order (638)  |  Organism (231)  |  Organization (120)  |  Other (2233)  |  Potentiality (9)  |  Productive (37)  |  Rule (307)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Strong (182)  |  Synthesis (58)  |  Tool (129)

The point [is] largely scientific in character …[concerning] the methods which can be invented or adopted or discovered to enable the Earth to control the Air, to enable defence from the ground to exercise control—indeed dominance—upon aeroplanes high above its surface. … science is always able to provide something. We were told that it was impossible to grapple with submarines, but methods were found … Many things were adopted in war which we were told were technically impossible, but patience, perseverance, and above all the spur of necessity under war conditions, made men’s brains act with greater vigour, and science responded to the demands.
[Remarks made in the House of Commons on 7 June 1935. His speculation was later proved correct with the subsequent development of radar during World War II, which was vital in the air defence of Britain.]
Quoting himself in The Second World War: The Gathering Storm (1948, 1986), Vol. 1, 134.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Air (366)  |  Airplane (43)  |  Brain (281)  |  Britain (26)  |  Character (259)  |  Common (447)  |  Condition (362)  |  Control (182)  |  Defence (16)  |  Defense (26)  |  Demand (131)  |  Development (441)  |  Discover (571)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enable (122)  |  Exercise (113)  |  Grapple (11)  |  Greater (288)  |  Ground (222)  |  High (370)  |  House (143)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Invention (400)  |  Method (531)  |  Necessity (197)  |  Patience (58)  |  Perseverance (24)  |  Point (584)  |  Radar (9)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Sonar (2)  |  Speculation (137)  |  Submarine (12)  |  Subsequent (34)  |  Surface (223)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Vigour (18)  |  Vital (89)  |  War (233)  |  World (1850)

The point of philosophy is to start with something so simple as not to seem worth stating and to end with something so paradoxical that no one will believe it
The Philosophy of Logical Atomism (1959), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  End (603)  |  Paradox (54)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Point (584)  |  Simple (426)  |  Start (237)  |  Will (2350)  |  Worth (172)

The problem [evolution] presented itself to me, and something led me to think of the positive checks described by Malthus in his Essay on Population, a work I had read several years before, and which had made a deep and permanent impression on my mind. These checks—war, disease, famine, and the like—must, it occurred to me, act on animals as well as man. Then I thought of the enormously rapid multiplication of animals, causing these checks to be much more effective in them than in the case of man; and while pondering vaguely on this fact, there suddenly flashed upon me the idea of the survival of the fittest—that the individuals removed by these checks must be on the whole inferior to those that survived. I sketched the draft of my paper … and sent it by the next post to Mr. Darwin.
In 'Introductory Note to Chapter II in Present Edition', Natural Selection and Tropical Nature Essays on Descriptive and Theoretical Biology (1891, New ed. 1895), 20.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Animal (651)  |  Cause (561)  |  Check (26)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Deep (241)  |  Disease (340)  |  Draft (6)  |  Effective (68)  |  Essay (27)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Famine (18)  |  Flash (49)  |  Idea (881)  |  Impression (118)  |  Individual (420)  |  Inferior (37)  |  Thomas Robert Malthus (13)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Multiplication (46)  |  Must (1525)  |  Next (238)  |  Paper (192)  |  Permanent (67)  |  Ponder (15)  |  Population (115)  |  Positive (98)  |  Present (630)  |  Problem (731)  |  Rapid (37)  |  Read (308)  |  Remove (50)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Survival (105)  |  Survival Of The Fittest (43)  |  Survive (87)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  War (233)  |  Whole (756)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)

The problem is that people think faith is something to be admired. In fact, faith means you believe in something for which you have no evidence.
In God and the Folly of Faith: The Incompatibility of Science (2012), 18.
Science quotes on:  |  Admiration (61)  |  Belief (615)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Faith (209)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  People (1031)  |  Problem (731)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Think (1122)

The professor may choose familiar topics as a starting point. The students collect material, work problems, observe regularities, frame hypotheses, discover and prove theorems for themselves. … the student knows what he is doing and where he is going; he is secure in his mastery of the subject, strengthened in confidence of himself. He has had the experience of discovering mathematics. He no longer thinks of mathematics as static dogma learned by rote. He sees mathematics as something growing and developing, mathematical concepts as something continually revised and enriched in the light of new knowledge. The course may have covered a very limited region, but it should leave the student ready to explore further on his own.
In A Concrete Approach to Abstract Algebra (1959), 1-2.
Science quotes on:  |  Choose (116)  |  Collect (19)  |  Concept (242)  |  Confidence (75)  |  Course (413)  |  Develop (278)  |  Discover (571)  |  Dogma (49)  |  Doing (277)  |  Enrich (27)  |  Experience (494)  |  Exploration (161)  |  Familiar (47)  |  Frame (26)  |  Growing (99)  |  Himself (461)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Light (635)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Mastery (36)  |  Material (366)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  New (1273)  |  Observe (179)  |  Point (584)  |  Problem (731)  |  Professor (133)  |  Prove (261)  |  Ready (43)  |  Regularity (40)  |  Revise (6)  |  Rote (5)  |  Secure (23)  |  See (1094)  |  Starting Point (16)  |  Static (9)  |  Strengthen (25)  |  Student (317)  |  Subject (543)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Think (1122)  |  Topic (23)  |  Work (1402)

The public does not need to be convinced that there is something in mathematics.
In A Mathematician's Apology (1940, 2012), 63-65.
Science quotes on:  |  Convincing (9)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Need (320)  |  Public (100)

The pupils have got to be made to feel that they are studying something, and are not merely executing intellectual minuets.
In 'The Aims of Education', The Aims of Education and Other Essays (1929), 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Education (423)  |  Feel (371)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Merely (315)  |  Pupil (62)  |  Study (701)  |  Studying (70)

The real purpose of scientific method is to make sure Nature hasn’t misled you into thinking you know something you don’t actually know. There’s not a mechanic or scientist or technician alive who hasn’t suffered from that one so much that he’s not instinctively on guard. … If you get careless or go romanticizing scientific information, giving it a flourish here and there, Nature will soon make a complete fool out of you.
In Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An inquiry into Values (1974), 100-101.
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (97)  |  Careless (5)  |  Complete (209)  |  Flourish (34)  |  Fool (121)  |  Information (173)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Method (531)  |  Mislead (6)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Romanticize (2)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Soon (187)  |  Technician (9)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Will (2350)

The reason it is so hard to attain to something good in any of the arts and sciences is that it involves attaining to a certain stipulated point; to do something badly according to a predetermined rule would be just as hard, if indeed it would then still deserve to be called bad.
Aphorism 53 in Notebook C (1772-1773), as translated by R.J. Hollingdale in Aphorisms (1990). Reprinted as The Waste Books (2000), 42.
Science quotes on:  |  According (236)  |  Art (680)  |  Attain (126)  |  Attainment (48)  |  Bad (185)  |  Badly (32)  |  Call (781)  |  Certain (557)  |  Deserve (65)  |  Do (1905)  |  Good (906)  |  Hard (246)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Involve (93)  |  Point (584)  |  Predetermined (3)  |  Reason (766)  |  Rule (307)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Still (614)

The respect which in all ages and countries has ever been paid to inventors seems, indeed, to rest on something more profound than mere gratitude for the benefits which they have been the means of conferring on mankind; and to imply, if it does not express, a consciousness that by the grand and original conceptions of their minds they approach somewhat more nearly than their fellows to the qualities and pre-eminence of a higher order of being.
The Origin and Progress of the Mechanical Inventions of James Watt (1854), Vol.1, 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Approach (112)  |  Being (1276)  |  Benefit (123)  |  Conception (160)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Eminence (25)  |  Express (192)  |  Fellow (88)  |  Gratitude (14)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Order (638)  |  Pre-eminence (4)  |  Profound (105)  |  Respect (212)  |  Rest (287)

The result is that a generation of physicists is growing up who have never exercised any particular degree of individual initiative, who have had no opportunity to experience its satisfactions or its possibilities, and who regard cooperative work in large teams as the normal thing. It is a natural corollary for them to feel that the objectives of these large teams must be something of large social significance.
In 'Science and Freedom: Reflections of a Physicist', Isis, 1947, 37, 130.
Science quotes on:  |  Cooperation (38)  |  Degree (277)  |  Experience (494)  |  Feel (371)  |  Generation (256)  |  Growing (99)  |  Individual (420)  |  Initiative (17)  |  Large (398)  |  Must (1525)  |  Natural (810)  |  Never (1089)  |  Objective (96)  |  Opportunity (95)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Regard (312)  |  Result (700)  |  Satisfaction (76)  |  Significance (114)  |  Social (261)  |  Team (17)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Work (1402)

The scientist … must always be prepared to deal with the unknown. It is an essential part of science that you should be able to describe matters in a way where you can say something without knowing everything.
From Assumption and Myth in Physical Theory (1967), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Deal (192)  |  Describe (132)  |  Essential (210)  |  Everything (489)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Matter (821)  |  Must (1525)  |  Prepared (5)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Unknown (195)  |  Way (1214)

The scientist is not much given to talking of the riddle of the universe. “Riddle” is not a scientific term. The conception of a riddle is “something which can he solved.” And hence the scientist does not use that popular phrase. We don’t know the why of anything. On that matter we are no further advanced than was the cavedweller. The scientist is contented if he can contribute something toward the knowledge of what is and how it is.
As quoted in 'Electricity Will Keep The World From Freezing Up', New York Times (12 Nov 1911), SM4.
Science quotes on:  |  Advanced (12)  |  Conception (160)  |  Contribute (30)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Matter (821)  |  Phrase (61)  |  Popular (34)  |  Riddle (28)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Solution (282)  |  Talking (76)  |  Term (357)  |  Universe (900)  |  Use (771)  |  Why (491)

The series is divergent, therefore we may be able to do something with it.
Epigraph without citation, in Morris Kline (ed.), Mathematical Thought From Ancient to Modern Times (1990), Vol. 3, 107.
Science quotes on:  |  Divergent (6)  |  Do (1905)  |  Series (153)

The seventeenth century witnessed the birth of modern science as we know it today. This science was something new, based on a direct confrontation of nature by experiment and observation. But there was another feature of the new science—a dependence on numbers, on real numbers of actual experience.
From The Triumph of Numbers: How Counting Shaped Modern Life (2005), 37.
Science quotes on:  |  17th Century (20)  |  Actual (118)  |  Birth (154)  |  Century (319)  |  Confrontation (7)  |  Dependence (46)  |  Direct (228)  |  Experience (494)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Feature (49)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Science (55)  |  Nature (2017)  |  New (1273)  |  Number (710)  |  Observation (593)  |  Real (159)  |  Today (321)  |  Witness (57)

The Sierra Club is a very good and a very powerful force for conservation and, as a matter of fact, has grown faster since I left than it was growing while I was there! It must be doing something right.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Conservation (187)  |  Doing (277)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Fast (49)  |  Faster (50)  |  Force (497)  |  Good (906)  |  Grow (247)  |  Growing (99)  |  Leave (138)  |  Matter (821)  |  Must (1525)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Right (473)  |  Sierra Club (2)

The smallest particles of matter were said [by Plato] to be right-angled triangles which, after combining in pairs, ... joined together into the regular bodies of solid geometry; cubes, tetrahedrons, octahedrons and icosahedrons. These four bodies were said to be the building blocks of the four elements, earth, fire, air and water ... [The] whole thing seemed to be wild speculation. ... Even so, I was enthralled by the idea that the smallest particles of matter must reduce to some mathematical form ... The most important result of it all, perhaps, was the conviction that, in order to interpret the material world we need to know something about its smallest parts.
[Recalling how as a teenager at school, he found Plato's Timaeus to be a memorable poetic and beautiful view of atoms.]
In Werner Heisenberg and A.J. Pomerans (trans.) The Physicist's Conception of Nature (1958), 58-59. Quoted in Jagdish Mehra and Helmut Rechenberg, The Historical Development of Quantum Theory (2001), Vol. 2, 12. Cited in Mauro Dardo, Nobel Laureates and Twentieth-Century Physics (2004), 178.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Atom (381)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Body (557)  |  Building (158)  |  Building Block (9)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Cube (14)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Element (322)  |  Fire (203)  |  Form (976)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Idea (881)  |  Importance (299)  |  Interpretation (89)  |  Know (1538)  |  Material (366)  |  Material World (8)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Matter (821)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Order (638)  |  Pair (10)  |  Particle (200)  |  Plato (80)  |  Reduce (100)  |  Regular (48)  |  Result (700)  |  Right (473)  |  School (227)  |  Solid (119)  |  Solid Geometry (2)  |  Speculation (137)  |  Tetrahedron (4)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Together (392)  |  Triangle (20)  |  View (496)  |  Water (503)  |  Whole (756)  |  Wild (96)  |  World (1850)

The spectral density of black body radiation ... represents something absolute, and since the search for the absolutes has always appeared to me to be the highest form of research, I applied myself vigorously to its solution.
In Michael Dudley Sturge , Statistical and Thermal Physics (2003), 201.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Applied (176)  |  Biography (254)  |  Black Body (2)  |  Body (557)  |  Density (25)  |  Form (976)  |  Myself (211)  |  Radiation (48)  |  Represent (157)  |  Research (753)  |  Search (175)  |  Solution (282)

The statistics of nihilism … “No matter how many times something new has been observed, it cannot be believed until it has been observed again.” I have also reduced my attitude toward this form of statistics to an axiom: “No matter how bad a thing you say about it, it is not bad enough.”
In Seeing Red: Redshifts, Cosmology and Academic Science (1998), 75.
Science quotes on:  |  Attitude (84)  |  Axiom (65)  |  Bad (185)  |  Belief (615)  |  Enough (341)  |  Form (976)  |  Matter (821)  |  New (1273)  |  Nihilism (3)  |  Observe (179)  |  Observed (149)  |  Say (989)  |  Statistics (170)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)

The study of Nature is intercourse with the highest mind. You should never trifle with Nature. At her lowest her works are the works of the highest powers, the highest something in the universe, in whichever way we look at it… This is the charm of Study from Nature itself; she brings us back to absolute truth wherever we wander.
Lecture at a teaching laboratory on Penikese Island, Buzzard's Bay. Quoted from the lecture notes by David Starr Jordan, Science Sketches (1911), 147. Last sentence included with the quote in Peter Haring Judd (ed.), Affection: Ninety Years of Family Letters, 1850s-1930s: Haring, White, Griggs, Judd Families of New York and Waterbury, Connecticut (206), 102, where it is also noted that this comes from what must have been one of his last lectures since Agassiz died shortly thereafter.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Back (395)  |  Charm (54)  |  Intercourse (5)  |  Look (584)  |  Lowest (10)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  Power (771)  |  Study (701)  |  Trifle (18)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Universe (900)  |  Wander (44)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wherever (51)  |  Work (1402)

The study of the theory of a physical science should be preceded by some general experimental acquaintance therewith, in order to secure the inimitable advantage of a personal acquaintance with something real and living.
Opening sentence of Electromagnetic Theory (1892), Vol. 2, 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquaintance (38)  |  Advantage (144)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Experimental (193)  |  General (521)  |  Inimitable (6)  |  Living (492)  |  Order (638)  |  Personal (75)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Precede (23)  |  Real (159)  |  Study (701)  |  Theory (1015)

The symptoms or the sufferings generally considered to be inevitable and incident to the disease are very often not symptoms of the disease at all, but of something quite different—of the want of fresh air, or of light, or of warmth, or of quiet, or of cleanliness, or of punctuality and care in the administration of diet, of each or of all of these.
In Notes on Nursing: What It Is and What It Is Not (1859), 5.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Care (203)  |  Cleanliness (6)  |  Consider (428)  |  Diet (56)  |  Different (595)  |  Disease (340)  |  Fresh (69)  |  Inevitable (53)  |  Light (635)  |  Punctuality (2)  |  Quiet (37)  |  Suffering (68)  |  Symptom (38)  |  Want (504)  |  Warmth (21)

The test of a preacher is that his congregation goes away saying, not, “What a lovely sermon!” but “I will do something.”
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Congregation (3)  |  Do (1905)  |  Lovely (12)  |  Preacher (13)  |  Say (989)  |  Sermon (9)  |  Test (221)  |  Will (2350)

The test of science is not whether you are reasonable—there would not be much of physics if that was the case—the test is whether it works. And the great point about Newton’s theory of gravitation was that it worked, that you could actually say something about the motion of the moon without knowing very much about the constitution of the Earth.
From Assumption and Myth in Physical Theory (1967), 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Actually (27)  |  Constitution (78)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Gravitation (72)  |  Great (1610)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Moon (252)  |  Motion (320)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Point (584)  |  Reasonable (29)  |  Say (989)  |  Test (221)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Theory Of Gravitation (6)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worked (2)

The Theory of Groups is a branch of mathematics in which one does something to something and then compares the result with the result obtained from doing the same thing to something else, or something else to the same thing.
In J.R. Newman (ed.) The World of Mathematics (1956), Vol. 3, 1534.
Science quotes on:  |  Branch (155)  |  Compare (76)  |  Doing (277)  |  Group (83)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Obtain (164)  |  Result (700)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Thing (1914)

The thing about electronic games is that they are basically repetitive. After a while, the children get bored. They need something different. [Meccano construction toy kits] offer creativity, a notion of mechanics, discovery of the world around you.
As quoted in by Hugh Schofield in web article 'Meccano Revives French Production' (23 Dec 2010).
Science quotes on:  |  Boredom (11)  |  Child (333)  |  Children (201)  |  Construction (114)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Electronics (21)  |  Game (104)  |  Kit (2)  |  Meccano (5)  |  Mechanic (120)  |  Mechanics (137)  |  Notion (120)  |  Offer (142)  |  Repetition (29)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Toy (22)  |  World (1850)

The ultimate test of man's conscience may be his willingness to sacrifice something today for future generations whose words of thanks will not be heard.
Former governor of Wisconsin, Founder of Earth Day.
Science quotes on:  |  Conscience (52)  |  Future (467)  |  Generation (256)  |  Hearing (50)  |  Man (2252)  |  Sacrifice (58)  |  Test (221)  |  Thank (48)  |  Thanks (26)  |  Today (321)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Will (2350)  |  Willingness (10)  |  Word (650)

The universe is of the nature of a thought or sensation in a universal Mind… To put the conclusion crudely—the stuff of the world is mind-stuff. As is often the way with crude statements, I shall have to explain that by “mind” I do not exactly mean mind and by “stuff” I do not at all mean stuff. Still that is about as near as we can get to the idea in a simple phrase. The mind-stuff of the world is something more general than our individual conscious minds; but we may think of its nature as not altogether foreign to feelings in our consciousness… Having granted this, the mental activity of the part of world constituting ourselves occasions no great surprise; it is known to us by direct self-knowledge, and we do not explain it away as something other than we know it to be—or rather, it knows itself to be.
From Gifford Lecture, Edinburgh, (1927), 'Reality', collected in The Nature of the Physical World (1928), 276.
Science quotes on:  |  Activity (218)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Crude (32)  |  Direct (228)  |  Do (1905)  |  Explain (334)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Feelings (52)  |  Foreign (45)  |  General (521)  |  Grant (76)  |  Great (1610)  |  Idea (881)  |  Individual (420)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Mean (810)  |  Mental (179)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Phrase (61)  |  Self (268)  |  Sensation (60)  |  Simple (426)  |  Statement (148)  |  Still (614)  |  Surprise (91)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Universal (198)  |  Universe (900)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)

The universe, then, has no circumference, for, if it had a center and a circumference, it would thus have in itself its beginning and its end, and the universe itself would be terminated by relation to something else; there would be outside the universe another thing and a place—but all this contains no truth.
Science quotes on:  |  Beginning (312)  |  Center (35)  |  Circumference (23)  |  End (603)  |  Outside (141)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Universe (900)

The University is a Mecca to which students come with something less than perfect faith. It is important that students bring a certain ragamuffin, barefoot irreverence to their studies; they are not here to worship what is known, but to question it.
From The Ascent of Man (1973,2011), 275.
Science quotes on:  |  Barefoot (2)  |  Bring (95)  |  Certain (557)  |  Faith (209)  |  Importance (299)  |  Irreverence (3)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Mecca (3)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Perfection (131)  |  Question (649)  |  Ragamuffin (2)  |  Student (317)  |  Study (701)  |  University (130)  |  Worship (32)

The veneration, wherewith Men are imbued for what they call Nature, has been a discouraging impediment to the Empire of Man over the inferior Creatures of God. For many have not only look’d upon it, as an impossible thing to compass, but as something impious to attempt.
A Free Enquiry into the Vulgarly Received Notion of Nature Made in an Essay, Address'd to a Friend (1686), 18-9.
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (266)  |  Call (781)  |  Compass (37)  |  Creature (242)  |  God (776)  |  Impediment (12)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Inferior (37)  |  Look (584)  |  Man (2252)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Thing (1914)

The vitality of thought is in adventure. Idea's won't keep. Something must be done about them. When the idea is new, its custodians have fervour, live for it, and, if need be, die for it. Their inheritors receive the idea, perhaps now strong and successful, but without inheriting the fervour; so the idea settles down to a comfortable middle age, turns senile, and dies.
In Alfred North Whitehead and Lucien Price (ed.), Dialogues of Alfred North Whitehead (1954, 1977), 100.
Science quotes on:  |  Adventure (69)  |  Age (509)  |  Comfortable (13)  |  Custodian (3)  |  Die (94)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Fervor (8)  |  Idea (881)  |  Inherit (35)  |  Keep (104)  |  Live (650)  |  Middle Age (19)  |  Must (1525)  |  New (1273)  |  Receive (117)  |  Settle (23)  |  Strong (182)  |  Successful (134)  |  Thought (995)  |  Turn (454)  |  Vitality (24)

The way you learn anything is that something fails, and you figure out how not to have it fail again.
From Interview (1 Sep 2009), for the NASA Glenn History Collection, Oral History Collection, Cleveland, Ohio. As quoted an cited in Robert S. Arrighi, Pursuit of Power: NASA’s Propulsion and Systems Laboratory No. 1 and 2 (2012), 82. This quote is widely seen on the web, often incorrectly attributed to Arrighi, who was only the author of the book in which the quote by Kobak was given.
Science quotes on:  |  Engineering (188)  |  Fail (191)  |  Failure (176)  |  Figure (162)  |  Figure Out (7)  |  Learn (672)  |  Way (1214)

The weather is warm
The sun is out
There are people all around
The waves come flowing
And hits the shore
But makes so little sound
The wind is blowing
Oh so softly
The sand between my feet
The dolphins jump
The people watch
They even take a seat
I fly around
Watching from above
Today is like everyday
That is something I love
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Blow (45)  |  Blowing (22)  |  Dolphin (9)  |  Everyday (32)  |  Flow (89)  |  Fly (153)  |  Foot (65)  |  Hit (20)  |  Jump (31)  |  Little (717)  |  Love (328)  |  People (1031)  |  Sand (63)  |  Seat (7)  |  Shore (25)  |  Softly (6)  |  Sound (187)  |  Sun (407)  |  Today (321)  |  Warm (74)  |  Watch (118)  |  Wave (112)  |  Weather (49)  |  Wind (141)

The whole question of imagination in science is often misunderstood by people in other disciplines. They try to test our imagination in the following way. They say, “Here is a picture of some people in a situation. What do you imagine will happen next?” When we say, “I can’t imagine,” they may think we have a weak imagination. They overlook the fact that whatever we are allowed to imagine in science must be consistent with everything else we know; that the electric fields and the waves we talk about are not just some happy thoughts which we are free to make as we wish, but ideas which must be consistent with all the laws of physics we know. We can’t allow ourselves to seriously imagine things which are obviously in contradiction to the laws of nature. And so our kind of imagination is quite a difficult game. One has to have the imagination to think of something that has never been seen before, never been heard of before. At the same time the thoughts are restricted in a strait jacket, so to speak, limited by the conditions that come from our knowledge of the way nature really is. The problem of creating something which is new, but which is consistent with everything which has been seen before, is one of extreme difficulty
In The Feynman Lectures in Physics (1964), Vol. 2, Lecture 20, p.20-10 to p.20-11.
Science quotes on:  |  Allow (51)  |  Condition (362)  |  Consistent (50)  |  Contradiction (69)  |  Create (245)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Discipline (85)  |  Do (1905)  |  Electric (76)  |  Electric Field (3)  |  Everything (489)  |  Extreme (78)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Field (378)  |  Free (239)  |  Game (104)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happy (108)  |  Idea (881)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Kind (564)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Law (913)  |  Law Of Physics (5)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Misunderstand (3)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Never (1089)  |  New (1273)  |  Next (238)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Overlook (33)  |  People (1031)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Picture (148)  |  Problem (731)  |  Question (649)  |  Say (989)  |  Situation (117)  |  Speak (240)  |  Test (221)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Try (296)  |  Wave (112)  |  Way (1214)  |  Weak (73)  |  Whatever (234)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wish (216)

The wild gas, the fixed air is plainly broke loose: but we ought to suspend our judgments until the first effervescence is a little subsided, till the liquor is cleared, and until we see something deeper than the agitation of the troubled and frothy surface.
[About the “spirit of liberty;” alluding to Priestley’s Observations on Air]
Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), 8.
Science quotes on:  |  Agitation (10)  |  Air (366)  |  Break (109)  |  Carbon Dioxide (25)  |  Clearing (2)  |  First (1302)  |  Fixed Air (2)  |  Gas (89)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Liberty (29)  |  Liquor (6)  |  Little (717)  |  Loose (14)  |  Observation (593)  |  Joseph Priestley (16)  |  See (1094)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Subsidence (2)  |  Surface (223)  |  Suspension (7)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Wild (96)  |  Wildness (6)

The word “mathematics” is a Greek word and, by origin, it means “something that has been learned or understood,” or perhaps “acquired knowledge,” or perhaps even, somewhat against grammar, “acquirable knowledge,” that is, “learnable knowledge,” that is, “knowledge acquirable by learning.”
'Why Mathematics Grows', Journal of the History of Ideas (Jan-Mar 1965), 26, No. 1, 4. In Salomon Bochner and Robert Clifford Gunning (ed.) Collected Papers of Salomon Bochner (1992), Vol. 4, 192.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquired (77)  |  Acquiring (5)  |  Against (332)  |  Definition (238)  |  Grammar (15)  |  Greek (109)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Learning (291)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Means (587)  |  Origin (250)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Understood (155)  |  Word (650)

The word, “Vitamine,” served as a catchword which meant something even to the uninitiated, and it was not by mere accident that just at that time, research developed so markedly in this direction. Our view as to the fortunate choice of this name is strengthened, on the one hand, because it has become popular (and a badly chosen catchword, like a folksong without feeling, can never become popular), and on the other, because of the untiring efforts of other workers to introduce a varied nomenclature, for example, “accessory food factors, food hormones, water-soluble B and fat-soluble A, nutramine, and auximone” (for plants). Some of these designations are certainly not better, while others are much worse than “Vitamine.”
The Vitamines translated by Harry Ennis Dubin (1922), 18.
Science quotes on:  |  Accident (92)  |  Badly (32)  |  Become (821)  |  Better (493)  |  Catchword (3)  |  Certainly (185)  |  Choice (114)  |  Chosen (48)  |  Designation (13)  |  Develop (278)  |  Direction (185)  |  Effort (243)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Food (213)  |  Fortunate (31)  |  Hormone (11)  |  Introduce (63)  |  Name (359)  |  Never (1089)  |  Nomencalture (4)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Other (2233)  |  Plant (320)  |  Popularity (4)  |  Research (753)  |  Soluble (5)  |  Time (1911)  |  View (496)  |  Vitamin (13)  |  Water (503)  |  Word (650)

The world is very complicated and it is clearly impossible for the human mind to understand it completely. Man has therefore devised an artifice which permits the complicated nature of the world to be blamed on something which is called accidental and thus permits him to abstract a domain in which simple laws can be found.
In Floyd Merrell, Unthinking Thinking: Jorge Luis Borges, Mathematics, and the New Physics (1991), 156.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Accident (92)  |  Accidental (31)  |  Artifice (4)  |  Blame (31)  |  Call (781)  |  Completely (137)  |  Completeness (19)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Complication (30)  |  Devising (7)  |  Domain (72)  |  Find (1014)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Law (913)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Permit (61)  |  Simple (426)  |  Simplicity (175)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  World (1850)

There are in this world optimists who feel that any symbol that starts off with an integral sign must necessarily denote something that will have every property that they should like an integral to possess. This of course is quite annoying to us rigorous mathematicians; what is even more annoying is that by doing so they often come up with the right answer.
In 'Integrals Devised for Special Purposes', Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society (1963), 69, 611.
Science quotes on:  |  Annoy (5)  |  Answer (389)  |  Course (413)  |  Denote (6)  |  Doing (277)  |  Feel (371)  |  Integral (26)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Of Course (22)  |  Often (109)  |  Optimist (8)  |  Possess (157)  |  Property (177)  |  Right (473)  |  Rigorous (50)  |  Sign (63)  |  Start (237)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Will (2350)  |  World (1850)

There are something like ten million million million million million million million million million million million million million million (1 with eighty zeroes after it) particles in the region of the universe that we can observe. Where did they all come from? The answer is that, in quantum theory, particles can be created out of energy in the form of particle/antiparticle pairs. But that just raises the question of where the energy came from. The answer is that the total energy of the universe is exactly zero. The matter in the universe is made out of positive energy. However, the matter is all attracting itself by gravity. Two pieces of matter that are close to each other have less energy than the same two pieces a long way apart, because you have to expend energy to separate them against the gravitational force that is pulling them together. Thus, in a sense, the gravitational field has negative energy. In the case of a universe that is approximately uniform in space, one can show that this negative gravitational energy exactly cancels the positive energy represented by the matter. So the total energy of the universe is zero.
A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes (1988), 129.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Answer (389)  |  Antiparticle (4)  |  Energy (373)  |  Field (378)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Gravity (140)  |  Long (778)  |  Matter (821)  |  Negative (66)  |  Nuclear Particle (2)  |  Observe (179)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  Positive (98)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Question (649)  |  Represent (157)  |  Sense (785)  |  Separate (151)  |  Show (353)  |  Space (523)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Together (392)  |  Total (95)  |  Two (936)  |  Universe (900)  |  Way (1214)  |  Zero (38)

There are things out there that are very simple and you never think would work. … Wikipedia is one of those that it would never occur to me that something like that would work. … But it does work. … People who have taken fairly simple ideas, … at a certain scale and after they gain a certain amount of momentum, they can really take off and work. And that’s really an amazing thing.
Guest Lecture, UC Berkeley, 'Search Engines, Technology, and Business' (3 Oct 2005). At 1:13 in the YouTube video.
Science quotes on:  |  Amazing (35)  |  Amount (153)  |  Certain (557)  |  Gain (146)  |  Idea (881)  |  Momentum (10)  |  Never (1089)  |  Occur (151)  |  People (1031)  |  Scale (122)  |  Simple (426)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Work (1402)

There have, however, always been men of high and disciplined spirituality who have insisted on their direct experience of something greater than themselves. Their conviction of the reality of a spiritual life apart from and transcending the life of the body may not lend itself to scientific proof or disproof; nevertheless the remarkable transformation in personality seen in those who rightfully lay claim to such experience is as objective as tomorrow's sunrise. Millions of lesser men draw strength from the contacts they can make through prayer and meditation with this aspect of the inner life.
at a convention of scientists in 1967 at the University of Notre Dame
Science quotes on:  |  Aspect (129)  |  Body (557)  |  Claim (154)  |  Contact (66)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Direct (228)  |  Draw (140)  |  Experience (494)  |  Greater (288)  |  High (370)  |  Inner (72)  |  Life (1870)  |  Meditation (19)  |  Nevertheless (90)  |  Objective (96)  |  Personality (66)  |  Prayer (30)  |  Proof (304)  |  Reality (274)  |  Religion (369)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Strength (139)  |  Sunrise (14)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Through (846)  |  Tomorrow (63)  |  Transformation (72)

There is a conservation of matter and of energy, there may be a conservation of life; or if not of life, of something which transcends life.
Christopher: A Study in Human Personality (1918), 68.
Science quotes on:  |  Conservation (187)  |  Conservation Of Energy (30)  |  Conservation Of Matter (7)  |  Energy (373)  |  Life (1870)  |  Matter (821)  |  Transcend (27)

There is a theory that creativity arises when individuals are out of sync with their environment. To put it simply, people who fit in with their communities have insufficient motivation to risk their psyches in creating something truly new, while those who are out of sync are driven by the constant need to prove their worth.
In 'Beyond the Soapsuds Universe', Discover Magazine (1997). The author explains (in a blog found online) that this “idea comes from a theory by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, who wrote a book called Flow: the Psychology of Optimal Experience. You do need someone to come in from outside. One of the theories about why mathematicians do their best work when they’re young is because they’re not yet educated enough to know what seems obviously wrong. So they try new things.”
Science quotes on:  |  Arise (162)  |  Arising (22)  |  Community (111)  |  Constant (148)  |  Creating (7)  |  Creativity (84)  |  Driven (4)  |  Environment (239)  |  Fit (139)  |  Individual (420)  |  Insufficient (10)  |  Motivation (28)  |  Need (320)  |  New (1273)  |  People (1031)  |  Proof (304)  |  Prove (261)  |  Psyche (9)  |  Risk (68)  |  Sync (2)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Truly (118)  |  Worth (172)

There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
In The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (1980), facing p. 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Anyone (38)  |  Bizarre (6)  |  Disappear (84)  |  Discover (571)  |  Exactly (14)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Inexplicable (8)  |  Instantly (20)  |  More (2558)  |  Replace (32)  |  State (505)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Universe (900)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)

There is more evidence to prove that saltiness [of the sea] is due to the admixture of some substance ... It is this stuff which makes salt water heavy (it weighs more than fresh water) and thick. The difference in consistency is such that ships with the same cargo very nearly sink in a river when they are quite fit to navigate in the sea. This circumstance has before now caused loss to shippers freighting their ships in a river. That the thicker consistency is due to an admixture of something is proved by the fact that if you make strong brine by the admixture of salt, eggs, even when they are full, float in it. It almost becomes like mud; such a quantity of earthy matter is there in the sea.
[Aristotle recognised the different density of fresh (river) or salty (sea) water. He describes an experiment using an egg (which sinks in fresh water) that floats in a strong brine solution.]
Aristotle
Meteorology (350 B.C.), Book II, translated by E. W. Webster. Internet Classics Archive, (classics.mit.edu).
Science quotes on:  |  Admixture (2)  |  Become (821)  |  Brine (3)  |  Buoyancy (7)  |  Cargo (6)  |  Circumstance (139)  |  Consistency (31)  |  Density (25)  |  Describe (132)  |  Difference (355)  |  Different (595)  |  Due (143)  |  Egg (71)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Fit (139)  |  Float (31)  |  Fresh (69)  |  Loss (117)  |  Matter (821)  |  More (2558)  |  Mud (26)  |  Navigate (4)  |  Navigation (26)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Prove (261)  |  Quantity (136)  |  River (140)  |  Salt (48)  |  Sea (326)  |  Ship (69)  |  Sink (38)  |  Sinking (6)  |  Solution (282)  |  Strong (182)  |  Substance (253)  |  Water (503)  |  Weigh (51)

There is no smallest among the small and no largest among the large; but always something still smaller and something still larger.
Quoted in Eli Maor, To Infinity and Beyond (1991), 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Large (398)  |  Largest (39)  |  Size (62)  |  Small (489)  |  Still (614)

There is no spiritual copyright in scientific discoveries, unless they should happen to be quite mistaken. Only in making a blunder does a scientist do something which, conceivably, no one might ever do again.
In Pluto’s Republic (1976).
Science quotes on:  |  Blunder (21)  |  Copyright (3)  |  Do (1905)  |  Happen (282)  |  Making (300)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Spiritual (94)

There is no story in my life. It has always been just one step at a time—one thing which I have tried to do as well as I could and which has led on to something else. It has all been in the day’s work.
Told to an interviewer in her late seventies. As quoted in Joan T. Mark, A Stranger in Her Native Land: Alice Fletcher and the American Indians (1988), 355.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Life (1870)  |  Step (234)  |  Story (122)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Try (296)  |  Work (1402)

There is nothing mysterious, as some have tried to maintain, about the applicability of mathematics. What we get by abstraction from something can be returned.
In Introduction to the Foundations of Mathematics (1952), 175.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstraction (48)  |  Maintain (105)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mysterious (83)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Return (133)

There is one experiment which I always like to try, because it proves something whichever way it goes. A solution of iodine in water is shaken with bone-black, filtered and tested with starch paste. If the colorless solution does not turn the starch blue, the experiment shows how completely charcoal extracts iodine from aqueous solution. If the starch turns blue, the experiment shows that the solution, though apparently colorless, still contains iodine which can be detected by means of a sensitive starch test.
Applied Colloid Chemistry (1921), 111.
Science quotes on:  |  Aqueous (8)  |  Bone (101)  |  Charcoal (10)  |  Completely (137)  |  Detect (45)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Extract (40)  |  Iodine (7)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Paste (4)  |  Prove (261)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Show (353)  |  Solution (282)  |  Still (614)  |  Test (221)  |  Try (296)  |  Turn (454)  |  Water (503)  |  Way (1214)

There is something breathtaking about the basic laws of crystals. They are in no sense a discovery of the human mind; they just “are” — they exist quite independently of us.
(Jan 1967). As quoted in Michele Emmer and ‎Doris Schattschneider, M.C. Escher’s Legacy: A Centennial Celebration (2007), 102.
Science quotes on:  |  Basic (144)  |  Breathtaking (4)  |  Crystal (71)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Exist (458)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Independently (24)  |  Law (913)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Sense (785)

There is something haunting in the light of the moon; it has all the dispassionateness of a disembodied soul, and something of its inconceivable mystery.
In Lord Jim (1900), 230.
Science quotes on:  |  Disembodied (6)  |  Dispassionate (9)  |  Haunting (3)  |  Inconceivable (13)  |  Light (635)  |  Moon (252)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Soul (235)

There is something irreversible about acquiring knowledge; and the simulation of the search for it differs in a most profound way from the reality.
In Physics in the Contemporary World (1949), 20.
Science quotes on:  |  Differ (88)  |  Difference (355)  |  Irreversible (12)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Most (1728)  |  Profound (105)  |  Reality (274)  |  Search (175)  |  Simulation (7)  |  Way (1214)

There is something particularly human about using tools; the first and most important tool being language.
Epigraph in Isaac Asimov’s Book of Science and Nature Quotations (1988), 125.
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  First (1302)  |  Human (1512)  |  Important (229)  |  Language (308)  |  Linguistics (39)  |  Most (1728)  |  Particularly (21)  |  Tool (129)

There is something sublime in the secrecy in which the really great deeds of the mathematician are done. No popular applause follows the act; neither contemporary nor succeeding generations of the people understand it. The geometer must be tried by his peers, and those who truly deserve the title of geometer or analyst have usually been unable to find so many as twelve living peers to form a jury. Archimedes so far outstripped his competitors in the race, that more than a thousand years elapsed before any man appeared, able to sit in judgment on his work, and to say how far he had really gone. And in judging of those men whose names are worthy of being mentioned in connection with his,—Galileo, Descartes, Leibnitz, Newton, and the mathematicians created by Leibnitz and Newton’s calculus,—we are forced to depend upon their testimony of one another. They are too far above our reach for us to judge of them.
In 'Imagination in Mathematics', North American Review, 86, 223.
Science quotes on:  |  Act (278)  |  Analyst (8)  |  Appear (122)  |  Applause (9)  |  Archimedes (63)  |  Being (1276)  |  Calculus (65)  |  Competitor (4)  |  Connection (171)  |  Contemporary (33)  |  Create (245)  |  Deed (34)  |  Depend (238)  |  René Descartes (83)  |  Deserve (65)  |  Elapse (3)  |  Far (158)  |  Find (1014)  |  Follow (389)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Galileo Galilei (134)  |  Generation (256)  |  Geometer (24)  |  Great (1610)  |  Judge (114)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Jury (3)  |  Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (51)  |  Live (650)  |  Living (492)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mention (84)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Name (359)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Outstrip (4)  |  Peer (13)  |  People (1031)  |  Popular (34)  |  Race (278)  |  Reach (286)  |  Really (77)  |  Say (989)  |  Secrecy (2)  |  Sit (51)  |  Sublime (50)  |  Succeed (114)  |  Succeeding (14)  |  Testimony (21)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Title (20)  |  Truly (118)  |  Try (296)  |  Unable (25)  |  Understand (648)  |  Usually (176)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worthy (35)  |  Year (963)

There is still a difference between something and nothing, but it is purely geometrical and there is nothing behind the geometry.
In The Mathematical Magic Show (1977), 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Behind (139)  |  Difference (355)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Purely (111)  |  Still (614)

There is symbolic as well as actual beauty in the migration of the birds, the ebb and flow of the tides, the folded bud ready for the spring. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature—the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after the winter.
In The Sense of Wonder (1956, 1965), 88-89.
Science quotes on:  |  Actual (118)  |  Assurance (17)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Bird (163)  |  Bud (6)  |  Dawn (31)  |  Ebb (4)  |  Flow (89)  |  Fold (9)  |  Heal (7)  |  Healing (28)  |  Infinite (243)  |  Migration (12)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Night (133)  |  Ready (43)  |  Refrain (9)  |  Repeat (44)  |  Spring (140)  |  Symbol (100)  |  Tide (37)  |  Winter (46)

There might have been a hundred or a thousand life-bearing planets, had the course of evolution of the universe been a little different, or there might have been none at all. They would probably add, that, as life and man have been produced, that shows that their production was possible; and therefore, if not now then at some other time, if not here then in some other planet of some other sun, we should be sure to have come into existence; or if not precisely the same as we are, then something a little better or a little worse.
From Conclusion to Man's Place in the Universe: A Study of the Results of Scientific Research (1903), 315.
Science quotes on:  |  Actually (27)  |  Appear (122)  |  Belief (615)  |  Better (493)  |  Body (557)  |  Complexity (121)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Control (182)  |  Course (413)  |  Different (595)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Essentially (15)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Existence (481)  |  Force (497)  |  Hold (96)  |  Holding (3)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Larger (14)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Man (2252)  |  Marvellous (25)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Other (2233)  |  Planet (402)  |  Possible (560)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Probably (50)  |  Produced (187)  |  Product (166)  |  Production (190)  |  Show (353)  |  Sun (407)  |  Superior (88)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Time (1911)  |  Universe (900)

There ought to be something about computers and artificial intelligence [in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations]. Surely somebody somewhere said something memorable.
Quoted in Boston Globe (3 Jan1989).
Science quotes on:  |  Artificial Intelligence (12)  |  Computer (131)  |  Intelligence (218)  |  Quotation (19)  |  Quote (46)  |  Surely (101)

There remains something subtle, intangible and inexplicable. Veneration for this force beyond anything that we can comprehend is my religion.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Beyond (316)  |  Comprehend (44)  |  Force (497)  |  Inexplicable (8)  |  Intangible (6)  |  Religion (369)  |  Remain (355)  |  Subtle (37)  |  Veneration (2)

There was a loudspeaker that reported on the time left before the blast: “T-minus ten minutes”—something like that. The last few seconds were counted off one by one. We had all turned away. At zero there was the flash. I counted and then turned around. The first thing I saw was a yellow-orange fireball that kept getting larger. As it grew, it turned more orange and then red. A mushroom-shaped cloud of glowing magenta began to rise over the desert where the explosion had been. My first thought was, “My God, that is beautiful!”
(1982).
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Blast (13)  |  Cloud (111)  |  Count (107)  |  Desert (59)  |  Explosion (51)  |  Fireball (3)  |  First (1302)  |  Flash (49)  |  Glow (15)  |  God (776)  |  Last (425)  |  Minute (129)  |  More (2558)  |  Mushroom (4)  |  Orange (15)  |  Rise (169)  |  Saw (160)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Turn (454)  |  Yellow (31)  |  Zero (38)

There’s a certain exuberance that comes from being out there on the edge of technology, where things are not certain, where there is some risk, and where you make something work.
As quoted in Douglas Martin, 'Joseph Gavin, Who Helped Put First Man on Moon, Dies at 90', New York Times (4 Nov 2010).
Science quotes on:  |  Being (1276)  |  Certain (557)  |  Edge (51)  |  Exuberance (3)  |  Risk (68)  |  Technology (281)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Work (1402)

There’s always something to do in the space program. It’s so varied. You don’t do the same thing twice in any given moment of any day.
As quoted in 'John W. Young', New York Times (13 Apr 1981), A10.
Science quotes on:  |  Do (1905)  |  Moment (260)  |  Space (523)  |  Space Program (9)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Varied (6)

There’s something about a pious man such as he. He will cheerfully cut your throat if it suits him, but he will hesitate to endanger the welfare of your immaterial and problematical soul.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Cheerfully (2)  |  Cut (116)  |  Endanger (3)  |  Hesitate (24)  |  Immaterial (6)  |  Man (2252)  |  Pious (4)  |  Soul (235)  |  Suit (12)  |  Throat (10)  |  Welfare (30)  |  Will (2350)

They think that differential equations are not reality. Hearing some colleagues speak, it’s as though theoretical physics was just playing house with plastic building blocks. This absurd idea has gained currency, and now people seem to feel that theoretical physicists are little more than dreamers locked away ivory towers. They think our games, our little houses, bear no relation to their everyday worries, their interests, their problems, or their welfare. But I’m going to tell you something, and I want you to take it as a ground rule for this course. From now on I will be filling this board with equations. … And when I'm done, I want you to do the following: look at those numbers, all those little numbers and Greek letters on the board, and repeat to yourselves, “This is reality,” repeat it over and over.
Zig Zag, trans. Lisa Dillman (2008), 63.
Science quotes on:  |  Absurd (60)  |  Bear (162)  |  Board (13)  |  Building (158)  |  Building Block (9)  |  Colleague (51)  |  Course (413)  |  Differential Equation (18)  |  Do (1905)  |  Dreamer (14)  |  Equation (138)  |  Everyday (32)  |  Feel (371)  |  Gain (146)  |  Game (104)  |  Greek (109)  |  Ground (222)  |  Hearing (50)  |  House (143)  |  Idea (881)  |  Interest (416)  |  Ivory Tower (5)  |  Letter (117)  |  Little (717)  |  Look (584)  |  More (2558)  |  Number (710)  |  People (1031)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physicist (270)  |  Physics (564)  |  Plastic (30)  |  Playing (42)  |  Problem (731)  |  Reality (274)  |  Repeat (44)  |  Rule (307)  |  Speak (240)  |  Tell (344)  |  Theoretical Physicist (21)  |  Theoretical Physics (26)  |  Think (1122)  |  Tower (45)  |  Want (504)  |  Welfare (30)  |  Will (2350)  |  Worry (34)

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)  |  Posterity (29)  |  Prefer (27)  |  Receive (117)  |  Remember (189)  |  Way (1214)

This Academy [at Lagado] is not an entire single Building, but a Continuation of several Houses on both Sides of a Street; which growing waste, was purchased and applied to that Use.
I was received very kindly by the Warden, and went for many Days to the Academy. Every Room hath in it ' one or more Projectors; and I believe I could not be in fewer than five Hundred Rooms.
The first Man I saw was of a meagre Aspect, with sooty Hands and Face, his Hair and Beard long, ragged and singed in several Places. His Clothes, Shirt, and Skin were all of the same Colour. He had been Eight Years upon a Project for extracting Sun-Beams out of Cucumbers, which were to be put into Vials hermetically sealed, and let out to warm the Air in raw inclement Summers. He told me, he did not doubt in Eight Years more, that he should be able to supply the Governor's Gardens with Sunshine at a reasonable Rate; but he complained that his Stock was low, and interested me to give him something as an Encouragement to Ingenuity, especially since this had been a very dear Season for Cucumbers. I made him a small Present, for my Lord had furnished me with Money on purpose, because he knew their Practice of begging from all who go to see them.
I saw another at work to calcine Ice into Gunpowder; who likewise shewed me a Treatise he had written concerning the Malleability of Fire, which he intended to publish.
There was a most ingenious Architect who had contrived a new Method for building Houses, by beginning at the Roof, and working downwards to the Foundation; which he justified to me by the life Practice of those two prudent Insects the Bee and the Spider.
In another Apartment I was highly pleased with a Projector, who had found a device of plowing the Ground with Hogs, to save the Charges of Plows, Cattle, and Labour. The Method is this: In an Acre of Ground you bury at six Inches Distance, and eight deep, a quantity of Acorns, Dates, Chestnuts, and other Masts or Vegetables whereof these Animals are fondest; then you drive six Hundred or more of them into the Field, where in a few Days they will root up the whole Ground in search of their Food, and make it fit for sowing, at the same time manuring it with their Dung. It is true, upon Experiment they found the Charge and Trouble very great, and they had little or no Crop. However, it is not doubted that this Invention may be capable of great Improvement.
I had hitherto seen only one Side of the Academy, the other being appropriated to the Advancers of speculative Learning.
Some were condensing Air into a dry tangible Substance, by extracting the Nitre, and letting the acqueous or fluid Particles percolate: Others softening Marble for Pillows and Pin-cushions. Another was, by a certain Composition of Gums, Minerals, and Vegetables outwardly applied, to prevent the Growth of Wool upon two young lambs; and he hoped in a reasonable Time to propagate the Breed of naked Sheep all over the Kingdom.
Gulliver's Travels (1726, Penguin ed. 1967), Part III, Chap. 5, 223.
Science quotes on:  |  Academy (37)  |  Acorn (5)  |  Acre (13)  |  Air (366)  |  Animal (651)  |  Applied (176)  |  Architect (32)  |  Aspect (129)  |  Beam (26)  |  Bee (44)  |  Beginning (312)  |  Being (1276)  |  Both (496)  |  Breed (26)  |  Building (158)  |  Capable (174)  |  Cattle (18)  |  Certain (557)  |  Charge (63)  |  Chestnut (2)  |  Composition (86)  |  Continuation (20)  |  Crop (26)  |  Cucumber (4)  |  Date (14)  |  Deep (241)  |  Device (71)  |  Distance (171)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Dry (65)  |  Dung (10)  |  Encouragement (27)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Face (214)  |  Field (378)  |  Fire (203)  |  First (1302)  |  Fit (139)  |  Fluid (54)  |  Food (213)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Furnish (97)  |  Garden (64)  |  Governor (13)  |  Great (1610)  |  Ground (222)  |  Growing (99)  |  Growth (200)  |  Gunpowder (18)  |  Hermetic Seal (2)  |  Hog (4)  |  House (143)  |  Hundred (240)  |  Ice (58)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Ingenious (55)  |  Ingenuity (42)  |  Insect (89)  |  Interest (416)  |  Invention (400)  |  Kingdom (80)  |  Labor (200)  |  Lamb (6)  |  Learning (291)  |  Life (1870)  |  Little (717)  |  Long (778)  |  Lord (97)  |  Low (86)  |  Man (2252)  |  Marble (21)  |  Mast (3)  |  Method (531)  |  Mineral (66)  |  Money (178)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Particle (200)  |  Pillow (4)  |  Pin (20)  |  Plow (7)  |  Practice (212)  |  Present (630)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Project (77)  |  Projector (3)  |  Publish (42)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Raw (28)  |  Root (121)  |  Save (126)  |  Saw (160)  |  Seal (19)  |  Search (175)  |  Season (47)  |  See (1094)  |  Sheep (13)  |  Side (236)  |  Single (365)  |  Skin (48)  |  Small (489)  |  Soot (11)  |  Sowing (9)  |  Spider (14)  |  Substance (253)  |  Summer (56)  |  Sun (407)  |  Sunbeam (3)  |  Supply (100)  |  Tangible (15)  |  Time (1911)  |  Treatise (46)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Two (936)  |  Use (771)  |  Vegetable (49)  |  Vial (4)  |  Warm (74)  |  Warmth (21)  |  Waste (109)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wool (4)  |  Work (1402)  |  Year (963)  |  Young (253)

This also explains how it is that truths which have been recognised are at first tacitly admitted, and then gradually spread, so that the very thing which was obstinately denied appears at last as something quite natural.
In The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe (1906), 187.
Science quotes on:  |  Admit (49)  |  Appear (122)  |  Deny (71)  |  Explain (334)  |  First (1302)  |  Gradually (102)  |  Last (425)  |  Natural (810)  |  Obstinately (2)  |  Spread (86)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Truth (1109)

This is often the way it is in physics—our mistake is not that we take our theories too seriously, but that we do not take them seriously enough. It is always hard to realize that these numbers and equations we play with at our desks have something to do with the real world.
In The First Three Minutes: A Modern View of the Origin of the Universe (1977, Rev. ed. 1993), 131-132.
Science quotes on:  |  Desk (13)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enough (341)  |  Equation (138)  |  Hard (246)  |  Mistake (180)  |  Number (710)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Play (116)  |  Real World (15)  |  Realize (157)  |  Seriously (20)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)

This notion that “science” is something that belongs in a separate compartment of its own, apart from everyday life, is one that I should like to challenge. We live in a scientific age; yet we assume that knowledge of science is the prerogative of only a small number of human beings, isolated and priest-like in their laboratories. This is not true. It cannot be true. The materials of science are the materials of life itself. Science is part of the reality of living; it is the what, the how, and the why of everything in our experience. It is impossible to understand man without understanding his environment and the forces that have molded him physically and mentally.
Address upon receiving National Book Award at reception, Hotel Commodore, New York (27 Jan 1952). As cited in Linda Lear, Rachel Carson: Witness for Nature (1997), 218-219.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belong (168)  |  Belonging (36)  |  Challenge (91)  |  Environment (239)  |  Everyday (32)  |  Everyday Life (15)  |  Everything (489)  |  Experience (494)  |  Force (497)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Being (185)  |  Impossibility (60)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Isolation (32)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Living (492)  |  Man (2252)  |  Material (366)  |  Mental (179)  |  Mold (37)  |  Notion (120)  |  Number (710)  |  Physical (518)  |  Prerogative (3)  |  Priest (29)  |  Reality (274)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Separate (151)  |  Small (489)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Understand (648)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Why (491)

This quality of genius is, sometimes, difficult to be distinguished from talent, because high genius includes talent. It is talent, and something more. The usual distinction between genius and talent is, that one represents creative thought, the other practical skill: one invents, the other applies. But the truth is, that high genius applies its own inventions better than talent alone can do. A man who has mastered the higher mathematics, does not, on that account, lose his knowledge of arithmetic. Hannibal, Napoleon, Shakespeare, Newton, Scott, Burke, Arkwright, were they not men of talent as well as men of genius?
In 'Genius', Wellman’s Miscellany (Dec 1871), 4, No. 6, 203.
Science quotes on:  |  Account (195)  |  Alone (324)  |  Apply (170)  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Sir Richard Arkwright (3)  |  Better (493)  |  Emperor Napoléon Bonaparte (20)  |  Edmund Burke (14)  |  Creative (144)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Distinction (72)  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Distinguished (84)  |  Do (1905)  |  Genius (301)  |  High (370)  |  Include (93)  |  Invention (400)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lose (165)  |  Man (2252)  |  Master (182)  |  Mastery (36)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  More (2558)  |  Napoleon (16)  |  Sir Isaac Newton (363)  |  Other (2233)  |  Practical (225)  |  Quality (139)  |  Represent (157)  |  Scott_Walter (2)  |  William Shakespeare (109)  |  Skill (116)  |  Talent (99)  |  Thought (995)  |  Truth (1109)

Those who understand the steam engine and the electric telegraph spend their lives in trying to replace them with something better.
In 'Maxims for Revolutionists: Civilization', in Man and Superman (1903), 241.
Science quotes on:  |  Better (493)  |  Electric (76)  |  Engine (99)  |  Invention (400)  |  Live (650)  |  Spend (97)  |  Steam (81)  |  Steam Engine (47)  |  Telegraph (45)  |  Trying (144)  |  Understand (648)

Though genius isn't something that can be produced arbitrarily, it is freely willed—like wit, love, and faith, which one day will have to become arts and sciences. You should demand genius from everyone, but not expect it. A Kantian would call this the categorical imperative of genius.
Critical Fragment 16 in Friedrich Schlegel's Lucinde and the Fragments (1971), 144.
Science quotes on:  |  Arbitrary (27)  |  Art (680)  |  Become (821)  |  Call (781)  |  Demand (131)  |  Expect (203)  |  Expectation (67)  |  Faith (209)  |  Free Will (15)  |  Genius (301)  |  Imperative (16)  |  Immanuel Kant (50)  |  Love (328)  |  Produced (187)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wit (61)

Time is that which is measured by a clock. This is a sound way of looking at things. A quantity like time, or any other physical measurement, does not exist in a completely abstract way. We find no sense in talking about something unless we specify how we measure it. It is the definition by the method of measuring a quantity that is the one sure way of avoiding talking nonsense about this kind of thing.
From Relativity and Common Sense: A New Approach to Einstein (1980), 65.
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Avoiding (2)  |  Clock (51)  |  Completely (137)  |  Definition (238)  |  Exist (458)  |  Find (1014)  |  Kind (564)  |  Looking (191)  |  Measure (241)  |  Measured (2)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Method (531)  |  Nonsense (48)  |  Other (2233)  |  Physical (518)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Sense (785)  |  Sound (187)  |  Specify (6)  |  Talking (76)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  Way (1214)

To a person uninstructed in natural history, his country or sea-side stroll is a walk through a gallery filled with wonderful works of art, nine-tenths of which have their faces turned to the wall. Teach him something of natural history, and you place in his hands a catalogue of those which are worth turning around. Surely our innocent pleasures are not so abundant in this life, that we can afford to despise this or any other source of them.
On the Educational Value of the Natural History Sciences' (1854). In Collected Essays (1893). Vol. 3, 63.
Science quotes on:  |  Abundant (23)  |  Art (680)  |  Country (269)  |  Education (423)  |  Face (214)  |  Gallery (7)  |  History (716)  |  Life (1870)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Other (2233)  |  Person (366)  |  Pleasure (191)  |  Sea (326)  |  Side (236)  |  Surely (101)  |  Teach (299)  |  Through (846)  |  Turn (454)  |  Walk (138)  |  Wall (71)  |  Wonderful (155)  |  Work (1402)  |  Worth (172)

To be always poring over the same Object, dulls the Intellects and tires the Mind, which is delighted and improved by a Variety: and therefore it ought, at times, to be relaxed from the more severe mathematical Contemplations, and to be employed upon something more light and agreeable, as Poetry, Physic, History, &c
In Dr. Boerhaave's Academical Lectures on the Theory of Physic (1746), Vol. 6, 264.
Science quotes on:  |  Agreeable (20)  |  Contemplation (75)  |  Delight (111)  |  Dull (58)  |  Employ (115)  |  Employed (3)  |  Health (210)  |  History (716)  |  Improve (64)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Light (635)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Object (438)  |  Physic (515)  |  Poetry (150)  |  Severe (17)  |  Time (1911)  |  Tire (7)  |  Variety (138)

To find the cause of our ills in something outside ourselves, something specific that can be spotted and eliminated, is a diagnosis that cannot fail to appeal. To say that the cause of our troubles is not in us but in the Jews, and pass immediately to the extermination of the Jews, is a prescription likely to find a wide acceptance.
In The Passionate State of Mind (1955), 79.
Science quotes on:  |  Acceptance (56)  |  Appeal (46)  |  Cause (561)  |  Diagnosis (65)  |  Eliminate (25)  |  Extermination (14)  |  Fail (191)  |  Find (1014)  |  Immediately (115)  |  Jew (11)  |  Likely (36)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Outside (141)  |  Pass (241)  |  Prescription (18)  |  Say (989)  |  Specific (98)  |  Spot (19)  |  Trouble (117)  |  Wide (97)

To her friends said the Bright one in chatter,
“I have learned something new about matter:
My speed was so great,
Much increased was my weight,
Yet I failed to become any fatter!”
Collected in Baring-Gould, The Lure of the Limerick: An Uninhibited History (1967), 6. As cited in John de Pillis, 777 Mathematical Conversation Starters, 277.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Bright (81)  |  Chatter (3)  |  Fail (191)  |  Friend (180)  |  Great (1610)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Limerick (7)  |  Matter (821)  |  New (1273)  |  Relativity (91)  |  Speed (66)  |  Weight (140)

To inquisitive minds like yours and mine the reflection that the quantity of human knowledge bears no proportion to the quantity of human ignorance must be in one view rather pleasing, viz., that though we are to live forever we may be continually amused and delighted with learning something new.
In letter to Dr. Ingenhouz. Quoted in Theodore Diller, Franklin's Contribution to Medicine (1912), 65. The source gives no specific cite for the letter, and Webmaster has found the quote in no other book checked, so authenticity is in question.
Science quotes on:  |  Amusement (37)  |  Bear (162)  |  Continually (17)  |  Delight (111)  |  Forever (111)  |  Human (1512)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Inquisitiveness (6)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Learning (291)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mine (78)  |  Must (1525)  |  New (1273)  |  Proportion (140)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Reflection (93)  |  View (496)

To introduce something altogether new would mean to begin all over, to become ignorant again, and to run the old, old risk of failing to learn.
Isaac Asimov, Patricia S. Warrick, Martin Harry Greenberg, Machines That Think: The Best Science Fiction Stories About Robots and Computers? (1984), 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Begin (275)  |  Fail (191)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Ignorant (91)  |  Introduce (63)  |  Learn (672)  |  Mean (810)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)  |  Risk (68)  |  Run (158)

To invent an airplane is nothing. To build one is something. But to fly is everything.
Quoted in Mark Eppler The Wright Way (2003), 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Airplane (43)  |  Build (211)  |  Everything (489)  |  Fly (153)  |  Invention (400)  |  Nothing (1000)

To me education is a leading out of what is already there in the pupil’s soul. To Miss Mackay it is a putting in of something that is not there, and that is not what I call education, I call it intrusion.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Already (226)  |  Call (781)  |  Education (423)  |  Intrusion (3)  |  Lead (391)  |  Miss (51)  |  Pupil (62)  |  Soul (235)

To me, it [the 1962 space flight of Friendship 7] is not something that happened a long time ago. It seems like a couple of days ago, really. It’s a rare day I don’t think about it, relive it in my mind. I can remember every switch I flipped, every move I made, every word I spoke and every word spoken to me. Clear as a bell.
As reported by Howard Wilkinson in 'John Glenn Had the Stuff U.S. Heroes are Made of', The Cincinnati Enquirer (20 Feb 2002).
Science quotes on:  |  Bell (35)  |  Flight (101)  |  Friendship (18)  |  Friendship 7 (3)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Long (778)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Move (223)  |  Rare (94)  |  Relive (2)  |  Remember (189)  |  Space (523)  |  Space Flight (26)  |  Switch (10)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  Word (650)

To me, there is no greater calling. If I can inspire young people to dedicate themselves to the good of mankind, I’ve accomplished something.
As quoted by Howard Wilkinson in 'John Glenn Had the Stuff U.S. Heroes are Made of', The Cincinnati Enquirer (20 Feb 2002), explaining his pride and interest in helping the goals of the John H. Glenn Institute for Public Service and Public Policy, at Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio.
Science quotes on:  |  Accomplishment (102)  |  Calling (3)  |  Dedicate (12)  |  Good (906)  |  Greater (288)  |  Inspire (58)  |  Mankind (356)  |  People (1031)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Young (253)

To mess around with Ebola is an easy way to die. Better to work with something safer, such as anthrax.
The Hot Zone
Science quotes on:  |  Anthrax (2)  |  Better (493)  |  Die (94)  |  Easy (213)  |  Mess (14)  |  Safe (61)  |  Way (1214)  |  Work (1402)

To prove to an indignant questioner on the spur of the moment that the work I do was useful seemed a thankless task and I gave it up. I turned to him with a smile and finished, “To tell you the truth we don’t do it because it is useful but because it’s amusing.” The answer was thought of and given in a moment: it came from deep down in my soul, and the results were as admirable from my point of view as unexpected. My audience was clearly on my side. Prolonged and hearty applause greeted my confession. My questioner retired shaking his head over my wickedness and the newspapers next day, with obvious approval, came out with headlines “Scientist Does It Because It’s Amusing!” And if that is not the best reason why a scientist should do his work, I want to know what is. Would it be any good to ask a mother what practical use her baby is? That, as I say, was the first evening I ever spent in the United States and from that moment I felt at home. I realised that all talk about science purely for its practical and wealth-producing results is as idle in this country as in England. Practical results will follow right enough. No real knowledge is sterile. The most useless investigation may prove to have the most startling practical importance: Wireless telegraphy might not yet have come if Clerk Maxwell had been drawn away from his obviously “useless” equations to do something of more practical importance. Large branches of chemistry would have remained obscure had Willard Gibbs not spent his time at mathematical calculations which only about two men of his generation could understand. With this faith in the ultimate usefulness of all real knowledge a man may proceed to devote himself to a study of first causes without apology, and without hope of immediate return.
A.V. Hill
From lecture to a scientific society in Philadelphia on “The Mechanism of the Muscle” given by invitation after he received a Nobel Prize for that work. The quote is Hill’s response to a post-talk audience question asking disapprovingly what practical use the speaker thought there was in his research. The above quoted answer, in brief, is—for the intellectual curiosity. As quoted about Hill by Bernard Katz in his own autobiographical chapter, 'Sir Bernard Katz', collected in Larry R. Squire (ed.), The History of Neuroscience in Autobiography (1996), Vol. 1, 350-351. Two excerpts from the above have been highlighted as standalone quotes here in this same quote collection for A. V. Hill. They begin “All talk about science…” and “The most useless investigation may prove…”.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Apology (8)  |  Ask (420)  |  Audience (28)  |  Baby (29)  |  Best (467)  |  Calculation (134)  |  Cause (561)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Clerk (13)  |  Confession (9)  |  Country (269)  |  Deep (241)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Enough (341)  |  Equation (138)  |  Faith (209)  |  Finish (62)  |  First (1302)  |  Follow (389)  |  Generation (256)  |  J. Willard Gibbs (9)  |  Good (906)  |  Headline (8)  |  Himself (461)  |  Home (184)  |  Hope (321)  |  Idle (34)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Importance (299)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Large (398)  |  Man (2252)  |  Maxwell (42)  |  James Clerk Maxwell (91)  |  Moment (260)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Mother (116)  |  Next (238)  |  Obscure (66)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Point (584)  |  Point Of View (85)  |  Practical (225)  |  Proceed (134)  |  Prolong (29)  |  Prove (261)  |  Purely (111)  |  Reason (766)  |  Remain (355)  |  Research (753)  |  Result (700)  |  Return (133)  |  Right (473)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Side (236)  |  Smile (34)  |  Soul (235)  |  Spent (85)  |  Startling (15)  |  State (505)  |  Sterile (24)  |  Study (701)  |  Task (152)  |  Tell (344)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Turn (454)  |  Two (936)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Understand (648)  |  Unexpected (55)  |  Use (771)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)  |  View (496)  |  Want (504)  |  Wealth (100)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)  |  Work (1402)

To regulate something always requires two opposing factors. You cannot regulate by a single factor. To give an example, the traffic in the streets could not be controlled by a green light or a red light alone. It needs a green light and a red light as well. The ratio between retine and promine determines whether there is any motion, any growth, or not. Two different inclinations have to be there in readiness to make the cells proliferate.
In Ralph W. Moss, Free Radical (1988), 186.
Science quotes on:  |  Alone (324)  |  Cell (146)  |  Determination (80)  |  Determine (152)  |  Different (595)  |  Green (65)  |  Growth (200)  |  Inclination (36)  |  Light (635)  |  Motion (320)  |  Opposite (110)  |  Ratio (41)  |  Readiness (9)  |  Red (38)  |  Regulation (25)  |  Require (229)  |  Single (365)  |  Street (25)  |  Traffic (10)  |  Two (936)

To say that mind is a product or function of protoplasm, or of its molecular changes, is to use words to which we can attach no clear conception. You cannot have, in the whole, what does not exist in any of the parts; and those who argue thus should put forth a definite conception of matter, with clearly enunciated properties, and show, that the necessary result of a certain complex arrangement of the elements or atoms of that matter, will be the production of self-consciousness. There is no escape from this dilemma—either all matter is conscious, or consciousness is something distinct from matter, and in the latter case, its presence in material forms is a proof of the existence of conscious beings, outside of, and independent of, what we term matter. The foregoing considerations lead us to the very important conclusion, that matter is essentially force, and nothing but force; that matter, as popularly understood, does not exist, and is, in fact, philosophically inconceivable. When we touch matter, we only really experience sensations of resistance, implying repulsive force; and no other sense can give us such apparently solid proofs of the reality of matter, as touch does. This conclusion, if kept constantly present in the mind, will be found to have a most important bearing on almost every high scientific and philosophical problem, and especially on such as relate to our own conscious existence.
In 'The Limits of Natural Selection as Applied to Man', last chapter of Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection (1870), 365-366.
Science quotes on:  |  Apparently (22)  |  Argue (25)  |  Arrangement (93)  |  Atom (381)  |  Attach (57)  |  Bearing (10)  |  Being (1276)  |  Case (102)  |  Certain (557)  |  Change (639)  |  Clear (111)  |  Clearly (45)  |  Complex (202)  |  Conception (160)  |  Conclusion (266)  |  Conscious (46)  |  Consciousness (132)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Constantly (27)  |  Definite (114)  |  Dilemma (11)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Element (322)  |  Escape (85)  |  Especially (31)  |  Essentially (15)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Experience (494)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Force (497)  |  Foregoing (3)  |  Form (976)  |  Forth (14)  |  Found (11)  |  Function (235)  |  Give (208)  |  High (370)  |  Important (229)  |  Inconceivable (13)  |  Independent (74)  |  Latter (21)  |  Lead (391)  |  Material (366)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Molecular (7)  |  Most (1728)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outside (141)  |  Part (235)  |  Philosophical (24)  |  Presence (63)  |  Present (630)  |  Problem (731)  |  Product (166)  |  Production (190)  |  Proof (304)  |  Property (177)  |  Protoplasm (13)  |  Reality (274)  |  Really (77)  |  Relate (26)  |  Repulsive (7)  |  Resistance (41)  |  Result (700)  |  Say (989)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Consciousness (2)  |  Sensation (60)  |  Sense (785)  |  Show (353)  |  Solid (119)  |  Term (357)  |  Touch (146)  |  Understood (155)  |  Use (771)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)  |  Word (650)

To show, therefore, that we are capable of knowing, i.e. being certain that there is a God, and how we may come by this certainty, I think we need go no further than ourselves, and that undoubted knowledge we have of our own existence... For man knows that he himself exists... If any one pretends to be so sceptical as to deny his own existence, (for really to doubt of it is manifestly impossible,) let him for me enjoy his beloved happiness of being nothing, until hunger or some other pain convince him of the contrary... He knows also that nothing cannot produce a being; therefore something must have existed from eternity... Next, it is evident, that what had its being and beginning from another, must also have all that which is in and belongs to its being from another too. All the powers it has must be owing to and received from the same source. This eternal source, then, of all being must also be the source and original of all power; and so this eternal Being must be also the most powerful... And most knowing. Again, a man finds in himself perception and knowledge. We have then got one step further; and we are certain now that there is not only some being, but some knowing, intelligent being in the world. There was a time, then, when there was no knowing being, and when knowledge began to be; or else there has been also a knowing being from eternity...And therefore God.
Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690), book 4, ch. 10, sec 19.
Science quotes on:  |  Beginning (312)  |  Being (1276)  |  Belong (168)  |  Capable (174)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Convince (43)  |  Deny (71)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Eternal (113)  |  Eternity (64)  |  Evident (92)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Find (1014)  |  God (776)  |  Happiness (126)  |  Himself (461)  |  Hunger (23)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Man (2252)  |  Manifestly (11)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Next (238)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Owing (39)  |  Pain (144)  |  Perception (97)  |  Power (771)  |  Powerful (145)  |  Show (353)  |  Step (234)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)  |  World (1850)

To solve a problem means to reduce it to something simpler than itself.
In 'On Groups', Prelude to Mathematics (1955), 203.
Science quotes on:  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Problem (731)  |  Reduce (100)  |  Simple (426)  |  Solve (145)

To throw in a fair game at Hazards only three-spots, when something great is at stake, or some business is the hazard, is a natural occurrence and deserves to be so deemed; and even when they come up the same way for a second time if the throw be repeated. If the third and fourth plays are the same, surely there is occasion for suspicion on the part of a prudent man.
from De Vita Propria Liber
Science quotes on:  |  Business (156)  |  Deserve (65)  |  Game (104)  |  Great (1610)  |  Hazard (21)  |  Man (2252)  |  Natural (810)  |  Occasion (87)  |  Occurrence (53)  |  Probability (135)  |  Prudent (6)  |  Surely (101)  |  Suspicion (36)  |  Time (1911)  |  Way (1214)

To us, men of the West, a very strange thing happened at the turn of the century; without noticing it, we lost science, or at least the thing that had been called by that name for the last four centuries. What we now have in place of it is something different, radically different, and we don’t know what it is. Nobody knows what it is.
From La Science et Nous (1941), translated as 'Classical Science and After', in Richard Rees (ed.), On Science, Necessity and the Love of God (1968), as quoted and cited in Robert Andrews, The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations (1993), 809-810. Also seen translated as, “Something happened to the people of the Western world at the beginning of the century, something quite strange: we lost science without even being aware of it, or at least, what had been called science for the last four centuries. What we now have under this name is something else, something radically different, and we do not know what it is. Probably no one knows what it is”, collected in Simone Weil: Late Philosophical Writings (2015), Chap. 10.
Science quotes on:  |  Call (781)  |  Century (319)  |  Different (595)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Least (75)  |  Lose (165)  |  Name (359)  |  Nobody (103)  |  Notice (81)  |  Place (192)  |  Radically (5)  |  Strange (160)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Turn (454)  |  West (21)

Truth and falsity, indeed understanding, is not necessarily something purely intellectual, remote from feelings and attitudes. ... It is in the total conduct of men rather than in their statements that truth or falsehood lives, more in what a man does, in his real reaction to other men and to things, in his will to do them justice, to live at one with them. Here lies the inner connection between truth and justice. In the realm of behavior and action, the problem recurs as to the difference between piece and part.
From 'On Truth', collected in Mary Henle (ed.), Documents of Gestalt Psychology (1961), 28.
Science quotes on:  |  Action (342)  |  Attitude (84)  |  Behavior (95)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Connection (171)  |  Difference (355)  |  Do (1905)  |  Falsehood (30)  |  Falsity (16)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Feelings (52)  |  Indeed (323)  |  Inner (72)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Justice (40)  |  Lie (370)  |  Life (1870)  |  Live (650)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Other (2233)  |  Part (235)  |  Piece (39)  |  Problem (731)  |  Purely (111)  |  Reaction (106)  |  Real (159)  |  Realm (87)  |  Recur (4)  |  Remote (86)  |  Statement (148)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Total (95)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Will (2350)

Truth is something that we can attempt to doubt, and then perhaps, after much exertion, discover that part of the doubt is not justified.
Quoted in Bill Becker, 'Pioneer of the Atom', New York Times Sunday Magazine (20 Oct 1957), 52.
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (266)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Exertion (17)  |  Justification (52)  |  Part (235)  |  Truth (1109)

Try and penetrate with our limited means the secrets of nature and you will find that, behind all the discernible concatenations, there remains something subtle, intangible and inexplicable. Veneration for this force beyond anything that we can comprehend is my religion. To that extent I am, in point of fact, religious.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Behind (139)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Comprehend (44)  |  Discernible (9)  |  Extent (142)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Find (1014)  |  Force (497)  |  Inexplicable (8)  |  Intangible (6)  |  Limit (294)  |  Limited (102)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Penetrate (68)  |  Point (584)  |  Religion (369)  |  Religious (134)  |  Remain (355)  |  Secret (216)  |  Subtle (37)  |  Try (296)  |  Veneration (2)  |  Will (2350)

Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Everything (489)  |  Learn (672)  |  Try (296)

Unless a man has talents to make something of himself, freedom is an irksome burden. Of what avail is freedom to choose if the self be ineffectual? We join a mass movement to escape individual responsibility, or, in the words of the ardent young Nazi, “to be free from freedom.”
In The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements (1951), 30.
Science quotes on:  |  Ardent (6)  |  Avail (4)  |  Burden (30)  |  Choose (116)  |  Escape (85)  |  Free (239)  |  Freedom (145)  |  Himself (461)  |  Individual (420)  |  Join (32)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mass (160)  |  Movement (162)  |  Nazi (10)  |  Responsibility (71)  |  Self (268)  |  Talent (99)  |  Word (650)  |  Young (253)

Until that afternoon, my thoughts on planetary atmospheres had been wholly concerned with atmospheric analysis as a method of life detection and nothing more. Now that I knew the composition of the Martian atmosphere was so different from that of our own, my mind filled with wonderings about the nature of the Earth. If the air is burning, what sustains it at a constant composition? I also wondered about the supply of fuel and the removal of the products of combustion. It came to me suddenly, just like a flash of enlightenment, that to persist and keep stable, something must be regulating the atmosphere and so keeping it at its constant composition. Moreover, if most of the gases came from living organisms, then life at the surface must be doing the regulation.
Homage to Gaia: The Life of an Independent Scholar (2000), 253.
Science quotes on:  |  Air (366)  |  Analysis (244)  |  Atmosphere (117)  |  Burning (49)  |  Combustion (22)  |  Composition (86)  |  Concern (239)  |  Constant (148)  |  Detection (19)  |  Different (595)  |  Doing (277)  |  Earth (1076)  |  Enlightenment (21)  |  Extraterrestrial Life (20)  |  Flash (49)  |  Fuel (39)  |  Gaia (15)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Mars (47)  |  Method (531)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Organism (231)  |  Planet (402)  |  Planetary (29)  |  Product (166)  |  Regulation (25)  |  Stable (32)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Supply (100)  |  Surface (223)  |  Sustain (52)  |  Thought (995)  |  Wholly (88)  |  Wonder (251)

Vannevar Bush has said that there is no more thrilling experience for a man than to be able to state that he has learned something no other person in the world has ever known before him. … I have been lucky enough to be included in such an event.
From address to the 101st Meeting of the American Astronomical Society, Gainesville, Florida (27 Dec 1958). Printed in 'An Account of the Discovery of Jupiter as a Radio Source', The Astronomical Journal (Mar 1959), 64, No. 2, 37.
Science quotes on:  |  Vannevar Bush (16)  |  Enough (341)  |  Event (222)  |  Experience (494)  |  Known (453)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Lucky (13)  |  Man (2252)  |  More (2558)  |  Other (2233)  |  Person (366)  |  State (505)  |  Thrill (26)  |  World (1850)

We … find a number of quotations illustrating the use of the word [probability], most of them taken from philosophical works. I shall only refer to a few examples: “The probable is something which lies midway between truth and error” (Thomasius, 1688); “An assertion, of which the contrary is not completely self-contradictory or impossible, is called probable” (Reimarus). Kant says: “That which, if it were held as truth, would be more than half certain, is called probable.”
In Probability, Statistics, and Truth (1939), 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Assertion (35)  |  Call (781)  |  Certain (557)  |  Completely (137)  |  Contradictory (8)  |  Contrary (143)  |  Definition (238)  |  Error (339)  |  Find (1014)  |  Half (63)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Immanuel Kant (50)  |  Lie (370)  |  Midway (4)  |  More (2558)  |  Most (1728)  |  Number (710)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Probability (135)  |  Quotation (19)  |  Say (989)  |  Self (268)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Use (771)  |  Word (650)  |  Work (1402)

We all agree now - by “we” I mean intelligent people under sixty - that a work of art is like a rose. A rose is not beautiful because it is like something else. Neither is a work of art. Roses and works of art are beautiful in themselves.
In Since Cezanne (1922), 40.
Science quotes on:  |  Agree (31)  |  Art (680)  |  Beautiful (271)  |  Intelligent (108)  |  Mean (810)  |  People (1031)  |  Rise (169)  |  Rose (36)  |  Sixty (6)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Work (1402)

We all felt the majesty of the body. In a very short period of time we had seen something that was bigger than each of us. A lot of people, even those who were not religious, were reverent and attributed the success to God. As we saw the artificial heart beat in Dr. Clark, the feeling was not aren't we great, but aren't we small.
[Comment after surgery for the world's first human implant of a total artificial heart in the chest of dentist Dr. Barney Clark ]
Quoted by Lawrence K. Altman in “Clark's Surgeon Was ‘Worried To Death’&rdquo, New York Times (12 Apr 1983), C2.
Science quotes on:  |  Artificial Heart (4)  |  Beat (42)  |  Body (557)  |  Clark_Barney (3)  |  Dentist (4)  |  Feeling (259)  |  First (1302)  |  God (776)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatness (55)  |  Heart (243)  |  Human (1512)  |  Humility (31)  |  Lot (151)  |  Majesty (21)  |  People (1031)  |  Period (200)  |  Religious (134)  |  Reverence (29)  |  Saw (160)  |  Science And Religion (337)  |  Short (200)  |  Small (489)  |  Smallness (7)  |  Success (327)  |  Surgery (54)  |  Time (1911)  |  Total (95)  |  World (1850)

We are concerned to understand the motivation for the development of pure mathematics, and it will not do simply to point to aesthetic qualities in the subject and leave it at that. It must be remembered that there is far more excitement to be had from creating something than from appreciating it after it has been created. Let there be no mistake about it, the fact that the mathematician is bound down by the rules of logic can no more prevent him from being creative than the properties of paint can prevent the artist. … We must remember that the mathematician not only finds the solutions to his problems, he creates the problems themselves.
In A Signpost to Mathematics (1951), 19. As quoted and cited in William L. Schaaf, 'Memorabilia Mathematica', The Mathematics Teacher (Mar 1957), 50, No. 3, 230. Note that this paper incorrectly attributes “A.H. Head”.
Science quotes on:  |  Aesthetic (48)  |  Appreciate (67)  |  Artist (97)  |  Being (1276)  |  Bound (120)  |  Concern (239)  |  Create (245)  |  Creative (144)  |  Development (441)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Excitement (61)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Far (158)  |  Find (1014)  |  Logic (311)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mistake (180)  |  More (2558)  |  Motivation (28)  |  Must (1525)  |  Paint (22)  |  Point (584)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Problem (731)  |  Property (177)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Mathematics (72)  |  Quality (139)  |  Remember (189)  |  Rule (307)  |  Solution (282)  |  Solution. (53)  |  Subject (543)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Understand (648)  |  Will (2350)

We are more than just flesh and bones. There’s a certain spiritual nature and something of the mind that we can’t measure.… With all our sophisticated equipment, we cannot monitor or define it, and yet it’s there.
Quoted in Kim Lim (ed.), 1,001 Pearls of Spiritual Wisdom: Words to Enrich, Inspire, and Guide Your Life (2014), 44
Science quotes on:  |  Bone (101)  |  Certain (557)  |  Define (53)  |  Equipment (45)  |  Flesh (28)  |  Measure (241)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Monitor (10)  |  More (2558)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Sophisticated (16)  |  Spiritual (94)

We are stuck with technology when all we really want is just stuff that works. How do you recognize something that is still technology? A good clue is if it comes with a manual.
In The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time (2002), 115.
Science quotes on:  |  Clue (20)  |  Do (1905)  |  Good (906)  |  Manual (7)  |  Recognize (136)  |  Still (614)  |  Stuff (24)  |  Technology (281)  |  Want (504)  |  Work (1402)

We can learn a lot from living organisms. An organism is a pretty complicated thing, which can tolerate surgery, which can tolerate injury, which can tolerate all kinds of perturbation provided they are not too great and do not come too suddenly. There’s something we call trauma, however. We don’t really understand what it is—but organisations can suffer from it too.
From interview with Graham Chedd, 'The Lady Gets Her Way', New Scientist (5 Jul 1973), 59, No. 853, 16.
Science quotes on:  |  Call (781)  |  Complicated (117)  |  Do (1905)  |  Great (1610)  |  Injury (36)  |  Kind (564)  |  Learn (672)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Lot (151)  |  Organisation (7)  |  Organism (231)  |  Perturbation (7)  |  Sudden (70)  |  Suddenly (91)  |  Suffer (43)  |  Surgery (54)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Tolerate (8)  |  Trauma (2)  |  Understand (648)

We cannot but think there is something like a fallacy in Mr. Buckle’s theory that the advance of mankind is necessarily in the direction of science, and not in that of morals.
In 'Dante', The Writings of James Russell Lowell: Literary Essays (1890), 254. [The reclusive Henry Thomas Buckle (1821-1862) began writing his History of Civilization, trying to construct a science of society on the basis of inductions from history. —Webmaster]
Science quotes on:  |  Advance (298)  |  Buckle (5)  |  Direction (185)  |  Fallacy (31)  |  Mankind (356)  |  Moral (203)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Think (1122)

We do not ask what hope of gain makes a little bird warble, since we know that it takes delight in singing because it is for that very singing that the bird was made, so there is no need to ask why the human mind undertakes such toil in seeking out these secrets of the heavens. ... And just as other animals, and the human body, are sustained by food and drink, so the very spirit of Man, which is something distinct from Man, is nourished, is increased, and in a sense grows up on this diet of knowledge, and is more like the dead than the living if it is touched by no desire for these things.
Mysterium Cosmographicum. Translated by A. M. Duncan in The Secret of the Universe (1981), 55.
Science quotes on:  |  Animal (651)  |  Ask (420)  |  Asking (74)  |  Bird (163)  |  Body (557)  |  Dead (65)  |  Delight (111)  |  Desire (212)  |  Diet (56)  |  Distinct (98)  |  Distinction (72)  |  Do (1905)  |  Drink (56)  |  Food (213)  |  Gain (146)  |  Grow (247)  |  Heaven (266)  |  Heavens (125)  |  Hope (321)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Body (34)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Increase (225)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Little (717)  |  Living (492)  |  Made (14)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Need (320)  |  Nourishment (26)  |  Other (2233)  |  Secret (216)  |  Seeking (31)  |  Sense (785)  |  Singing (19)  |  Spirit (278)  |  Sustain (52)  |  Sustenance (5)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Toil (29)  |  Touch (146)  |  Undertake (35)  |  Undertaking (17)  |  Why (491)

We do not doubt to assert, that air does not serve for the motion of the lungs, but rather to communicate something to the blood ... It is very likely that it is the fine nitrous particles, with which the air abounds, that are communicated to the blood through the lungs.
Tractatus duo. Quorum prior agit de respiratione: alter de rachitude (1668), 43. Quoted in Robert G. Frank Jr., Harvey and the Oxford Physiologists (1980), 228.
Science quotes on:  |  Abound (17)  |  Air (366)  |  Assert (69)  |  Blood (144)  |  Communicate (39)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Lung (37)  |  Motion (320)  |  Particle (200)  |  Through (846)

We don’t teach our students enough of the intellectual content of experiments—their novelty and their capacity for opening new fields… . My own view is that you take these things personally. You do an experiment because your own philosophy makes you want to know the result. It’s too hard, and life is too short, to spend your time doing something because someone else has said it’s important. You must feel the thing yourself—feel that it will change your outlook and your way of life.
In Bernstein, 'Profiles: Physicists: I', The New Yorker (13 Oct 1975), 108.
Science quotes on:  |  Capacity (105)  |  Change (639)  |  Content (75)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Enough (341)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Feel (371)  |  Field (378)  |  Hard (246)  |  Important (229)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Intellectual (258)  |  Know (1538)  |  Life (1870)  |  Must (1525)  |  New (1273)  |  Novelty (31)  |  Outlook (32)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Result (700)  |  Science And Education (17)  |  Short (200)  |  Spend (97)  |  Student (317)  |  Teach (299)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Time (1911)  |  View (496)  |  Want (504)  |  Way (1214)  |  Way Of Life (15)  |  Will (2350)

We don't know what we are talking about. Many of us believed that string theory was a very dramatic break with our previous notions of quantum theory. But now we learn that string theory, well, is not that much of a break. The state of physics today is like it was when we were mystified by radioactivity. They were missing something absolutely fundamental. We are missing perhaps something as profound as they were back then.
Closing address to the 23rd Solvay Conference in Physics, Brussels, Belgium (Dec 2005). Quoted in Ashok Sengupta, Chaos, Nonlinearity, Complexity: The Dynamical Paradigm of Nature (2006), vii. Cite in Alfred B. Bortz, Physics: Decade by Decade (2007), 206.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolutely (41)  |  Back (395)  |  Belief (615)  |  Break (109)  |  Dramatic (19)  |  Fundamental (264)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Learn (672)  |  Missing (21)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Notion (120)  |  Physic (515)  |  Physics (564)  |  Previous (17)  |  Profound (105)  |  Quantum (118)  |  Quantum Theory (67)  |  Radioactivity (33)  |  State (505)  |  String Theory (14)  |  Talking (76)  |  Theory (1015)  |  Today (321)

We find no sense in talking about something unless we specify how we measure it; a definition by the method of measuring a quantity is the one sure way of avoiding talking nonsense...
in Relativity and Common Sense (1964)
Science quotes on:  |  Definition (238)  |  Find (1014)  |  Measure (241)  |  Measurement (178)  |  Method (531)  |  Nonsense (48)  |  Quantity (136)  |  Sense (785)  |  Talking (76)  |  Way (1214)

We have no organ at all for knowledge, for ‘truth’: we ‘know’ (or believe or imagine) precisely as much as may be useful in the interest of the human herd, the species: and even what is here called ‘usefulness’ is in the end only a belief, something imagined and perhaps precisely that most fatal piece of stupidity by which we shall one day perish.
Sämtliche Werke: Kritische Studienausgabe, vol. 3, p. 593, eds. Giorgio Colli and Mazzino Montinari, Berlin, de Gruyter (1980). The Gay Science, second edition, 'Fifth Book: We Fearless Ones,' section 354 (1887).
Science quotes on:  |  Belief (615)  |  Call (781)  |  End (603)  |  Fatal (14)  |  Herd (17)  |  Human (1512)  |  Imagine (176)  |  Interest (416)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Most (1728)  |  Organ (118)  |  Perish (56)  |  Piece (39)  |  Precisely (93)  |  Species (435)  |  Stupidity (40)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)

We have to come back to something like ordinary language after all when we want to talk “about” mathematics!
As co-author with Bertha Swirles Jeffreys, in Methods of Mathematical Physics (1946, 1999), 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Back (395)  |  Language (308)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Ordinary (167)  |  Talk (108)  |  Want (504)

We intend to say something about the structure of the atom but lack a language in which we can make ourselves understood. We are in much the same position as a sailor, marooned on a remote island where conditions differ radically from anything he has ever known and where, to make things worse, the natives speak a completely alien tongue.
In conversation during first meeting with Werner Heisenberg (summer 1920), as quoted in William H. Cropper, Great Physicists: The Life and Times of Leading Physicists from Galileo to Hawking (2001), 249-250.
Science quotes on:  |  Alien (35)  |  Atom (381)  |  Completely (137)  |  Condition (362)  |  Differ (88)  |  Difference (355)  |  Island (49)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Lack (127)  |  Language (308)  |  Native (41)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Radically (5)  |  Remote (86)  |  Sailor (21)  |  Say (989)  |  Speak (240)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Structure (365)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Tongue (44)  |  Understanding (527)  |  Understood (155)

We modern chemists, the witnesses and workers of this “Age of Chemistry,” can learn something from the old alchemy, full as it was of errors and fantasies! … Let the Past furnish us a warning against too much phantasy in modern chemistry.
From 'What Can the Modern Chemist Learn From the Old Alchemy?', Introductory Lecture (1917), delivered at Cornell University, written in German, translated by L.F. Audrieth, and published in Salts, Acids, and Bases: Electrolytes Stereochemistry (1929), 1-2, as Vol. 4 of the George Fisher Baker Non-Resident Lectureship in Chemistry at Cornell University.
Science quotes on:  |  Against (332)  |  Age (509)  |  Alchemy (31)  |  Chemist (169)  |  Chemistry (376)  |  Error (339)  |  Fantasy (15)  |  Full (68)  |  Furnish (97)  |  Learn (672)  |  Modern (402)  |  Old (499)  |  Past (355)  |  Warning (18)  |  Witness (57)  |  Worker (34)

We must draw our standards from the natural world. … We must honor with the humility of the wise the bounds of that natural world and the mystery which lies beyond them, admitting that there is something in the order of being which evidently exceeds all our competence.
In speech 'Politics and Conscience' written upon receiving an honorary degree from the University of Toulouse, delivered by Tom Stoppard because Havel was forbidden to travel abroad. First published in Czech, collected in The Natural World as Political Problem: Essays on Modern Man (1984). As translated by Erazim Kohák and Roger Scruton in Salisbury Review (Jan 1985), No. 2.
Science quotes on:  |  Admit (49)  |  Being (1276)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Bound (120)  |  Competence (13)  |  Draw (140)  |  Evidently (26)  |  Exceed (10)  |  Honor (57)  |  Humility (31)  |  Lie (370)  |  Must (1525)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural World (33)  |  Order (638)  |  Standard (64)  |  Wise (143)  |  World (1850)

We need to be realistic. There is very little we can do now to stop the ice from disappearing from the North Pole in the Summer. And we probably cannot prevent the melting of the permafrost and the resulting release of methane. In addition, I fear that we may be too late to help the oceans maintain their ability to absorb carbon dioxide. But there is something we can do—and it could make the whole difference and buy us time to develop the necessary low carbon economies. We can halt the destruction of the world’s rainforests—and even restore parts of them—in order to ensure that the forests do what they are so good at—in other words storing carbon naturally. This is a far easier, cheaper and quicker option than imagining we can rely on as yet unproven technology to capture carbon at a cost of some $50 per tonne or, for that matter, imagining we can achieve what is necessary through plantation timber.
Presidential Lecture (3 Nov 2008) at the Presidential Palace, Jakarta, Indonesia. On the Prince of Wales website.
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Absorb (54)  |  Absorbing (3)  |  Addition (70)  |  Carbon (68)  |  Carbon Dioxide (25)  |  Cheaper (6)  |  Climate Change (76)  |  Cost (94)  |  Deforestation (50)  |  Destruction (135)  |  Develop (278)  |  Development (441)  |  Difference (355)  |  Disappearance (28)  |  Do (1905)  |  Easier (53)  |  Economy (59)  |  Ensure (27)  |  Fear (212)  |  Forest (161)  |  Global Warming (29)  |  Good (906)  |  Halt (10)  |  Ice (58)  |  Late (119)  |  Little (717)  |  Low (86)  |  Maintain (105)  |  Matter (821)  |  Melting (6)  |  Methane (9)  |  Natural (810)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Necessity (197)  |  North Pole (5)  |  Ocean (216)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Plantation (2)  |  Pole (49)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Prevention (37)  |  Rain Forest (34)  |  Realism (7)  |  Release (31)  |  Restore (12)  |  Result (700)  |  Stop (89)  |  Storage (6)  |  Summer (56)  |  Technology (281)  |  Through (846)  |  Timber (8)  |  Time (1911)  |  Unproven (5)  |  Whole (756)  |  Word (650)  |  World (1850)

We run carelessly to the precipice, after we have put something before us to prevent us seeing it.
In Pensées (1670), Section 10, No. 5. As translated in Blaise Pascal and W.F. Trotter (trans.), 'Thoughts', No. 183, collected in Charles W. Eliot (ed.), The Harvard Classics (1910), Vol. 48, 67. Translated as “…to prevent us from seeing it,” in W.H. Auden and L. Kronenberger (eds.) The Viking Book of Aphorisms (1966), 58. From the original French, “Nous courons sans souci dans le précipice, après que nous avons mis quelque chose devant nous pour nous empêcher de le voir,” in Ernest Havet (ed.), Pensées de Pascal (1892), 255.
Science quotes on:  |  Careless (5)  |  Precipice (3)  |  Prevent (98)  |  Run (158)  |  See (1094)  |  Seeing (143)

We say in general that the material of all stone is either some form of Earth or some form of Water. For one or the other of these elements predominates in stones; and even in stones in which some form of Water seems to predominate, something of Earth is also important. Evidence of this is that nearly all kinds of stones sink in water.
From De Mineralibus (c.1261-1263), as translated by Dorothy Wyckoff, Book of Minerals (1967), 12.
Science quotes on:  |  Earth (1076)  |  Element (322)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Form (976)  |  General (521)  |  Important (229)  |  Kind (564)  |  Material (366)  |  Mineralogy (24)  |  Nearly (137)  |  Other (2233)  |  Predominate (7)  |  Say (989)  |  Sink (38)  |  Stone (168)  |  Water (503)

We speak of it [astrology] as an extinct science; yet let but an eclipse of the sun happen, or a comet visit the evening sky, and in a moment we all believe in astrology. In vain do you tell the gazers on such spectacles that a solar eclipse is only the moon acting for the time as a candle-extinguisher to the sun, and give them bits of smoked glass to look through, and draw diagrams on the blackboard to explain it all. They listen composedly, and seem convinced, but in their secret hearts they are saying—“What though you can see it through a glass darkly, and draw it on a blackboard, does that show that it has no moral significance? You can draw a gallows or a guillotine, or write the Ten Commandments on a blackboard, but does that deprive them of meaning?” And so with the comet. No man will believe that the splendid stranger is hurrying through the sky solely on a momentous errand of his own. No! he is plainly signalling, with that flashing sword of his, something of importance to men,—something at all events that, if we could make it out, would be found of huge concern to us.
From 'Introductory Lecture on Technology for 1858-59', published as The Progress of the Telegraph (1859), 19-20.
Science quotes on:  |  Astrology (46)  |  Blackboard (11)  |  Candle (32)  |  Comet (65)  |  Commandment (8)  |  Concern (239)  |  Deprive (14)  |  Diagram (20)  |  Do (1905)  |  Draw (140)  |  Eclipse (25)  |  Event (222)  |  Explain (334)  |  Extinct (25)  |  Glass (94)  |  Guillotine (5)  |  Happen (282)  |  Heart (243)  |  Importance (299)  |  Listen (81)  |  Look (584)  |  Man (2252)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Moment (260)  |  Momentous (7)  |  Moon (252)  |  Moral (203)  |  Secret (216)  |  See (1094)  |  Show (353)  |  Significance (114)  |  Sky (174)  |  Speak (240)  |  Spectacle (35)  |  Spectacles (10)  |  Splendid (23)  |  Sun (407)  |  Tell (344)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Vain (86)  |  Will (2350)  |  Write (250)

We think of something that has four legs and wags its tail as being alive. We look at a rock and say it’s not living. Yet when we get down to the no man’s land of virus particles and replicating molecules, we are hard put to define what is living and what is non-living.
From interview, 'The Seeds of Life', in The Omni Interviews (1984), 4.
Science quotes on:  |  Alive (97)  |  Being (1276)  |  Define (53)  |  Down (455)  |  Hard (246)  |  Leg (35)  |  Life (1870)  |  Living (492)  |  Look (584)  |  Man (2252)  |  Molecule (185)  |  Non-Living (3)  |  Particle (200)  |  Replicating (3)  |  Rock (176)  |  Say (989)  |  Tail (21)  |  Think (1122)  |  Virus (32)

What about the magical number seven? What about the seven wonders of the world, the seven seas, the seven deadly sins, the seven daughters of Atlas in the Pleiades, the seven ages of man, the seven levels of hell, the seven primary colors, the seven notes of the musical scale, and the seven days of the week? What about the seven-point rating scale, the seven categories for absolute judgment, the seven objects in the span of attention, and the seven digits in the span of immediate memory? For the present I propose to withhold judgment. Perhaps there is something deep and profound behind all these sevens, something just calling out for us to discover it. But I suspect that it is only a pernicious, Pythagorean coincidence.
The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two (1956), 42-3.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolute (153)  |  Age (509)  |  Attention (196)  |  Behind (139)  |  Coincidence (20)  |  Color (155)  |  Daughter (30)  |  Deadly (21)  |  Deep (241)  |  Discover (571)  |  Immediate (98)  |  Judgment (140)  |  Magic (92)  |  Man (2252)  |  Memory (144)  |  Number (710)  |  Object (438)  |  Pernicious (9)  |  Pleiades (4)  |  Point (584)  |  Present (630)  |  Primary (82)  |  Profound (105)  |  Pythagoras (38)  |  Scale (122)  |  Sea (326)  |  Seven (5)  |  Sin (45)  |  Week (73)  |  Wonder (251)  |  World (1850)

What happened to those Ice Age beasts? What caused the mammoth and mastodon and wooly rhinoceros to pay the ultimate Darwinian penalty, while bison and musk ox survived? Why didn't the fauna of Africa suffer the kinds of losses evident in other regions of the world? And if something like climatic change caused the extinction of North America's Pleistocene horse, how have feral horses managed to reestablish themselves on the western range?
(1986)
Science quotes on:  |  Africa (38)  |  Age (509)  |  America (143)  |  Beast (58)  |  Change (639)  |  Climate Change (76)  |  Charles Darwin (322)  |  Evident (92)  |  Extinction (80)  |  Fauna (13)  |  Happen (282)  |  Happened (88)  |  Horse (78)  |  Ice (58)  |  Ice Age (10)  |  Kind (564)  |  Loss (117)  |  Mammoth (9)  |  Mastodon (4)  |  Musk (2)  |  North America (5)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ox (5)  |  Penalty (7)  |  Pleistocene (4)  |  Range (104)  |  Rhinoceros (2)  |  Suffer (43)  |  Survive (87)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Western (45)  |  Why (491)  |  World (1850)

What I may attempt is to dispel the feeling that in using the eye of the body or the eye of the soul, and incorporating what is thereby revealed in our conception of reality, we are doing something irrational and disobeying the leading of truth which as scientists we are pledged to serve.
Swarthmore Lecture (1929) at Friends’ House, London, printed in Science and the Unseen World (1929), 49.
Science quotes on:  |  Attempt (266)  |  Body (557)  |  Conception (160)  |  Doing (277)  |  Eye (440)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Reality (274)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Revealed (59)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Soul (235)  |  Truth (1109)

What I then got hold of, something frightful and dangerous, a problem with horns but not necessarily a bull, in any case a new problem—today I should say that it was the problem of science itself, science considered for the first time as problematic, as questionable. But the book in which my youthful courage and suspicion found an outlet—what an impossible book had to result from a task so uncongenial to youth! Constructed from a lot of immature, overgreen personal experiences, all of them close to the limits of communication, presented in the context of art—for the problem of science cannot be recognized in the context of science—a book perhaps for artists who also have an analytic and retrospective penchant (in other words, an exceptional type of artist for whom one might have to look far and wide and really would not care to look) …
In The Birth of Tragedy (1872). Collected in Friedrich Nietzsche and Walter Kaufmann (trans.), The Birth of Tragedy and The Case of Wagner (1967), 18.
Science quotes on:  |  Analysis (244)  |  Art (680)  |  Artist (97)  |  Book (413)  |  Bull (3)  |  Care (203)  |  Communication (101)  |  Consider (428)  |  Construct (129)  |  Context (31)  |  Courage (82)  |  Dangerous (108)  |  Exceptional (19)  |  Experience (494)  |  First (1302)  |  Frightful (3)  |  Horn (18)  |  Immature (4)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Limit (294)  |  Look (584)  |  Lot (151)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Outlet (3)  |  Present (630)  |  Problem (731)  |  Questionable (3)  |  Result (700)  |  Say (989)  |  Suspicion (36)  |  Task (152)  |  Time (1911)  |  Today (321)  |  Type (171)  |  Uncongenial (2)  |  Wide (97)  |  Word (650)  |  Youth (109)

What is peculiar and new to the [19th] century, differentiating it from all its predecessors, is its technology. It was not merely the introduction of some great isolated inventions. It is impossible not to feel that something more than that was involved. … The process of change was slow, unconscious, and unexpected. In the nineteeth century, the process became quick, conscious, and expected. … The whole change has arisen from the new scientific information. Science, conceived not so much in its principles as in its results, is an obvious storehouse of ideas for utilisation. … Also, it is a great mistake to think that the bare scientific idea is the required invention, so that it has only to be picked up and used. An intense period of imaginative design lies between. One element in the new method is just the discovery of how to set about bridging the gap between the scientific ideas, and the ultimate product. It is a process of disciplined attack upon one difficulty after another This discipline of knowledge applies beyond technology to pure science, and beyond science to general scholarship. It represents the change from amateurs to professionals. … But the full self-conscious realisation of the power of professionalism in knowledge in all its departments, and of the way to produce the professionals, and of the importance of knowledge to the advance of technology, and of the methods by which abstract knowledge can be connected with technology, and of the boundless possibilities of technological advance,—the realisation of all these things was first completely attained in the nineteeth century.
In Science and the Modern World (1925, 1997), 96.
Science quotes on:  |  19th Century (41)  |  Abstract (141)  |  Advance (298)  |  Amateur (22)  |  Attack (86)  |  Attain (126)  |  Bare (33)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Boundless (28)  |  Century (319)  |  Change (639)  |  Completely (137)  |  Connect (126)  |  Conscious (46)  |  Department (93)  |  Design (203)  |  Differentiate (19)  |  Difficulty (201)  |  Discipline (85)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Element (322)  |  Expect (203)  |  Expected (5)  |  Feel (371)  |  First (1302)  |  Gap (36)  |  General (521)  |  Great (1610)  |  Idea (881)  |  Ideal (110)  |  Imagination (349)  |  Importance (299)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Information (173)  |  Introduction (37)  |  Invention (400)  |  Involved (90)  |  Isolated (15)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Lie (370)  |  Merely (315)  |  Method (531)  |  Mistake (180)  |  More (2558)  |  New (1273)  |  Obvious (128)  |  Peculiar (115)  |  Period (200)  |  Power (771)  |  Predecessor (29)  |  Principle (530)  |  Process (439)  |  Product (166)  |  Professional (77)  |  Pure (299)  |  Pure Science (30)  |  Realisation (4)  |  Represent (157)  |  Required (108)  |  Result (700)  |  Scholarship (22)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Self (268)  |  Set (400)  |  Slow (108)  |  Storehouse (6)  |  Technological (62)  |  Technology (281)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Think (1122)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Unconscious (24)  |  Unexpected (55)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whole (756)

What is there in a name? It is merely an empty basket, until you put something into it.
Passages From the Life of a Philosopher (1864), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Empty (82)  |  Merely (315)  |  Name (359)

What is this subject, which may be called indifferently either mathematics or logic? Is there any way in which we can define it? Certain characteristics of the subject are clear. To begin with, we do not, in this subject, deal with particular things or particular properties: we deal formally with what can be said about any thing or any property. We are prepared to say that one and one are two, but not that Socrates and Plato are two, because, in our capacity of logicians or pure mathematicians, we have never heard of Socrates or Plato. A world in which there were no such individuals would still be a world in which one and one are two. It is not open to us, as pure mathematicians or logicians, to mention anything at all, because, if we do so we introduce something irrelevant and not formal.
In Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy (1920), 196-197.
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Call (781)  |  Capacity (105)  |  Certain (557)  |  Characteristic (154)  |  Clear (111)  |  Deal (192)  |  Do (1905)  |  Formal (37)  |  Hear (144)  |  Individual (420)  |  Introduce (63)  |  Irrelevant (11)  |  Logic (311)  |  Logician (18)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mention (84)  |  Never (1089)  |  Open (277)  |  Particular (80)  |  Plato (80)  |  Prepare (44)  |  Property (177)  |  Pure (299)  |  Say (989)  |   Socrates, (17)  |  Still (614)  |  Subject (543)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Two (936)  |  Way (1214)  |  World (1850)

What the founders of modern science, among them Galileo, had to do, was not to criticize and to combat certain faulty theories, and to correct or to replace them by better ones. They had to do something quite different. They had to destroy one world and to replace it by another. They had to reshape the framework of our intellect itself, to restate and to reform its concepts, to evolve a new approach to Being, a new concept of knowledge, a new concept of science—and even to replace a pretty natural approach, that of common sense, by another which is not natural at all.
In 'Galileo and Plato', Journal of the History of Ideas (1943), 405.
Science quotes on:  |  Approach (112)  |  Being (1276)  |  Better (493)  |  Certain (557)  |  Combat (16)  |  Common (447)  |  Common Sense (136)  |  Concept (242)  |  Criticize (7)  |  Destroy (189)  |  Different (595)  |  Do (1905)  |  Founder (26)  |  Framework (33)  |  Galileo Galilei (134)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Modern (402)  |  Modern Science (55)  |  Natural (810)  |  New (1273)  |  Reform (22)  |  Scientific Revolution (13)  |  Sense (785)  |  Theory (1015)  |  World (1850)

What we do may be small, but it has a certain character of permanence and to have produced anything of the slightest permanent interest, whether it be a copy of verses or a geometrical theorem, is to have done something utterly beyond the powers of the vast majority of men.
From Inaugural Lecture, Oxford (1920). Recalled in A Mathematician’s Apology (1940, 1967), 76.
Science quotes on:  |  Beyond (316)  |  Certain (557)  |  Character (259)  |  Copy (34)  |  Do (1905)  |  Geometry (271)  |  Interest (416)  |  Majority (68)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Permanence (26)  |  Permanent (67)  |  Power (771)  |  Produced (187)  |  Production (190)  |  Small (489)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Utterly (15)  |  Vast (188)  |  Verse (11)

Whatever universe a professor believes in must at any rate be a universe that lends itself to lengthy discourse. A universe definable in two sentences is something for which the professorial intellect has no use. No faith in anything of that cheap kind!
First of eight lectures on ‘Pragmatism: A New Name For an Old Way of Thinking’ given at the Lowell Institute, Boston and the Departments of Philosophy and Psychology, Columbia University. In The Popular Science Monthly (Mar 1907), 193.
Science quotes on:  |  Anything (9)  |  Belief (615)  |  Cheap (13)  |  Definition (238)  |  Discourse (19)  |  Faith (209)  |  Intellect (251)  |  Kind (564)  |  Lengthy (3)  |  Must (1525)  |  Professor (133)  |  Sentence (35)  |  Two (936)  |  Universe (900)  |  Use (771)  |  Whatever (234)

When a man of science speaks of his “data,” he knows very well in practice what he means. Certain experiments have been conducted, and have yielded certain observed results, which have been recorded. But when we try to define a “datum” theoretically, the task is not altogether easy. A datum, obviously, must be a fact known by perception. But it is very difficult to arrive at a fact in which there is no element of inference, and yet it would seem improper to call something a “datum” if it involved inferences as well as observation. This constitutes a problem. …
In The Analysis of Matter (1954).
Science quotes on:  |  Call (781)  |  Certain (557)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Constitute (99)  |  Data (162)  |  Datum (3)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Easy (213)  |  Element (322)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Fact (1257)  |  Inference (45)  |  Involved (90)  |  Know (1538)  |  Known (453)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Must (1525)  |  Observation (593)  |  Observed (149)  |  Perception (97)  |  Practice (212)  |  Problem (731)  |  Record (161)  |  Result (700)  |  Speak (240)  |  Task (152)  |  Try (296)  |  Yield (86)

When a man teaches something he does not know to somebody else who has no aptitude for it, and gives him a certificate of proficiency, the latter has completed the education of a gentleman.
'Maxims for Revolutionists: Education', in Man and Superman (1903), 229-230.
Science quotes on:  |  Aptitude (19)  |  Certificate (3)  |  Completed (30)  |  Education (423)  |  Gentleman (26)  |  Know (1538)  |  Man (2252)

When a philosopher says something that is true then it is trivial. When he says something that is not trivial then it is false.
Science quotes on:  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Say (989)  |  Trivial (59)  |  Truth (1109)

When a scientist says something, his colleagues must ask themselves only whether it is true. When a politician says something, his colleagues must first of all ask, 'Why does he say it?'
The Voice of Dolphins (1961), 25-26. In Don K. Price, The Scientific Estate (1965), 9.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Colleague (51)  |  First (1302)  |  Must (1525)  |  Politician (40)  |  Say (989)  |  Science And Politics (16)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Themselves (433)  |  Why (491)

When a thing is said to be not worth refuting you may be sure that either it is flagrantly stupid—in which case all comment is superfluous—or it is something formidable, the very crux of the problem.
In Tragic Sense of Life (1913), translated by John Ernest Crawford Flitch (1954), 99.
Science quotes on:  |  Problem (731)  |  Stupid (38)  |  Superfluous (21)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Truth (1109)  |  Worth (172)

When adults first become conscious of something new, they usually either attack or try to escape from it ... Attack includes such mild forms as ridicule, and escape includes merely putting out of mind.
The Art of Scientific Investigation (1950), 65.
Science quotes on:  |  Attack (86)  |  Become (821)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Escape (85)  |  First (1302)  |  Form (976)  |  Include (93)  |  Merely (315)  |  Mild (7)  |  Mind (1377)  |  New (1273)  |  Ridicule (23)  |  Try (296)  |  Usually (176)

When asked what it was like to set about proving something, the mathematician likened proving a theorem to seeing the peak of a mountain and trying to climb to the top. One establishes a base camp and begins scaling the mountain’s sheer face, encountering obstacles at every turn, often retracing one’s steps and struggling every foot of the journey. Finally when the top is reached, one stands examining the peak, taking in the view of the surrounding countryside and then noting the automobile road up the other side!
Space-filler in The Two-Year College Mathematics Journal (Nov 1980), 11, No. 5, 295.
Science quotes on:  |  Ask (420)  |  Automobile (23)  |  Base (120)  |  Begin (275)  |  Camp (12)  |  Climb (39)  |  Countryside (5)  |  Encounter (23)  |  Establish (63)  |  Examine (84)  |  Face (214)  |  Journey (48)  |  Mathematician (407)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Obstacle (42)  |  Other (2233)  |  Peak (20)  |  Prove (261)  |  Reach (286)  |  Retrace (3)  |  Road (71)  |  Scale (122)  |  Seeing (143)  |  Set (400)  |  Sheer (9)  |  Side (236)  |  Stand (284)  |  Step (234)  |  Struggle (111)  |  Surrounding (13)  |  Theorem (116)  |  Top (100)  |  Trying (144)  |  Turn (454)  |  View (496)

When Galileo caused balls, the weights of which he had himself previously determined, to roll down an inclined plane; when Torricelli made the air carry a weight which he had calculated beforehand to be equal to that of a definite volume of water; or in more recent times, when Stahl changed metal into lime, and lime back into metal, by withdrawing something and then restoring it, a light broke upon all students of nature. They learned that reason has insight only into that which it produces after a plan of its own, and that it must not allow itself to be kept, as it were, in nature's leading-strings, but must itself show the way with principles of judgement based upon fixed laws, constraining nature to give answer to questions of reason's own determining. Accidental observations, made in obedience to no previously thought-out plan, can never be made to yield a necessary law, which alone reason is concerned to discover.
Critique of Pure Reason (1781), trans. Norman Kemp Smith (1929), 20.
Science quotes on:  |  Accidental (31)  |  Air (366)  |  Alone (324)  |  Answer (389)  |  Back (395)  |  Ball (64)  |  Carry (130)  |  Concern (239)  |  Definite (114)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Down (455)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Galileo Galilei (134)  |  Himself (461)  |  Inclined (41)  |  Insight (107)  |  Judgement (8)  |  Law (913)  |  Learn (672)  |  Learned (235)  |  Light (635)  |  Metal (88)  |  More (2558)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Necessary (370)  |  Never (1089)  |  Obedience (20)  |  Observation (593)  |  Plan (122)  |  Principle (530)  |  Question (649)  |  Reason (766)  |  Recent (78)  |  Roll (41)  |  Show (353)  |  Georg Ernst Stahl (9)  |  Student (317)  |  Thought (995)  |  Time (1911)  |   Evangelista Torricelli, (6)  |  Water (503)  |  Way (1214)  |  Weight (140)  |  Yield (86)

When I received the Nobel Prize, the only big lump sum of money I have ever seen, I had to do something with it. The easiest way to drop this hot potato was to invest it, to buy shares. I knew that World War II was coming and I was afraid that if I had shares which rise in case of war, I would wish for war. So I asked my agent to buy shares which go down in the event of war. This he did. I lost my money and saved my soul.
In The Crazy Ape (1970), 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Agent (73)  |  Ask (420)  |  Asking (74)  |  Buy (21)  |  Case (102)  |  Coming (114)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Drop (77)  |  Ease (40)  |  Event (222)  |  Fall (243)  |  Fear (212)  |  Hot (63)  |  Invest (20)  |  Loss (117)  |  Lump (5)  |  Money (178)  |  Nobel Prize (42)  |  Potato (11)  |  Rise (169)  |  Save (126)  |  Share (82)  |  Soul (235)  |  Sum (103)  |  War (233)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wish (216)  |  World (1850)  |  World War II (9)

When I study philosophical works I feel I am swallowing something which I don’t have in my mouth.
In A Dictionary of Scientific Quotations by Alan L. Mackay (1991).
Science quotes on:  |  Feel (371)  |  Mouth (54)  |  Study (701)  |  Work (1402)

When I was a small boy [my father] used to sit me on his lap and read to me from the [Encyclopaedia] Britannica … say, about … the Tyrannosaurus rex, and it would say something like, “This dinosaur is twenty-five feet high and its head is six feet across.” My father would stop reading and say, “Now, let’s see what that means. That would mean that if he stood in our front yard, he would be tall enough to put his head through our window up here.” (We were on the second floor.) “But his head would be too wide to fit in the window.” Everything he read to me he would translate as best he could into some reality. …
In 'The Making of a Scientist', What Do You Care What Other People Think?": Further Adventures of a Curious Character (2001), 12-13. I learned from my father to translate: everything I read I try to figure out what it really means, what it’s really saying.
Science quotes on:  |  Best (467)  |  Boy (100)  |  Dinosaur (26)  |  Enough (341)  |  Everything (489)  |  Father (113)  |  Fit (139)  |  Head (87)  |  Height (33)  |  High (370)  |  Lap (9)  |  Mean (810)  |  Meaning (244)  |  Means (587)  |  Read (308)  |  Reading (136)  |  Reality (274)  |  Say (989)  |  See (1094)  |  Small (489)  |  Through (846)  |  Translate (21)  |  Tyrannosaurus Rex (2)  |  Wide (97)  |  Width (5)  |  Window (59)

When one begins to speak of something it sounds plausible, but when we reflect on it we find it false. The initial impression a thing makes on my mind is very important. Taking an overall view of a thing the mind sees every side of it obscurely, which is often of more value than a clear idea of only one side of it.
Aphorism 47 in Notebook D (1773-1775), as translated by R.J. Hollingdale in Aphorisms (1990). Reprinted as The Waste Books (2000), 50-51.
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Clarity (49)  |  Find (1014)  |  Idea (881)  |  Importance (299)  |  Impression (118)  |  Initial (17)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Obscurity (28)  |  Overall (10)  |  Plausibility (7)  |  Plausible (24)  |  Reflection (93)  |  See (1094)  |  Side (236)  |  Sound (187)  |  Speak (240)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Value (393)  |  View (496)

When someone says “I am thinking, therefore I am, or I exist,” he does not deduce existence from thought by means of a syllogism, but recognises it as something self-evident by a simple intuition of the mind. This is clear from the fact that if he were deducing it by means of a syllogism, he would have to have had previous knowledge of the major premiss 'Everything which thinks is, or exists'; yet in fact he learns it from experiencing in his own case that it is impossible that he should think without existing. It is in the nature of our mind to construct general propositions on the basis of our knowledge of particular ones.
Author's Replies to the Second set of Objections to Meditations on the First Philosophy (1641), in The Philosophical Writings of Descartes (1985), trans. J. Cottingham, R. Stoothoff and D. Murdoch, Vol. 2, 100.
Science quotes on:  |  Basis (180)  |  Construct (129)  |  Everything (489)  |  Evident (92)  |  Exist (458)  |  Existence (481)  |  Fact (1257)  |  General (521)  |  Impossible (263)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Learn (672)  |  Major (88)  |  Mean (810)  |  Means (587)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Proposition (126)  |  Say (989)  |  Self (268)  |  Self-Evident (22)  |  Simple (426)  |  Syllogism (8)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)

When something comes along and is really important to your career and important to science, important enough so that lots of other people are working on it, you have got to do it in a short time. You have got to get in there and run experiments quickly and get published. That is the killer instinct. I do not think women have that part of it. Part of it comes from sports. It's like scoring a goal.
Quoted in The Door in the Dream: Conversations with Eminent Women in Science by Elga Wasserman, National Academy Press/John Henry Press (2000), p. 182
Science quotes on:  |  Career (86)  |  Do (1905)  |  Enough (341)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Goal (155)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Killer (4)  |  Lot (151)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1031)  |  Publication (102)  |  Run (158)  |  Short (200)  |  Sport (23)  |  Think (1122)  |  Time (1911)

When the logician has resolved each demonstration into a host of elementary operations, all of them correct, he will not yet be in possession of the whole reality, that indefinable something that constitutes the unity ... Now pure logic cannot give us this view of the whole; it is to intuition that we must look for it.
Science and Method (1914 edition, reprint 2003), 126.
Science quotes on:  |  Constitute (99)  |  Correct (95)  |  Demonstration (120)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Indefinable (5)  |  Intuition (82)  |  Logic (311)  |  Logician (18)  |  Look (584)  |  Must (1525)  |  Operation (221)  |  Operations (107)  |  Possession (68)  |  Pure (299)  |  Reality (274)  |  Resolve (43)  |  Unity (81)  |  View (496)  |  Whole (756)  |  Will (2350)

When there is publicity about [UFO] sightings that turn out to be explainable, the percentage of unexplained sightings goes up, suggesting that these, too, are caused by something in people’s psychology rather than by something that is actually out there. The UFO evidence forms no coherent residue; it never gets better.
(1984).
Science quotes on:  |  Actual (118)  |  Better (493)  |  Cause (561)  |  Coherent (14)  |  Evidence (267)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Form (976)  |  Never (1089)  |  People (1031)  |  Percentage (9)  |  Psychology (166)  |  Publicity (7)  |  Residue (9)  |  Turn (454)  |  UFO (4)  |  Unexplained (8)

When was the last time you did something for the first time?
…...
Science quotes on:  |  First (1302)  |  First Time (14)  |  Last (425)  |  Time (1911)

When we no longer look at an organic being as a savage looks at a ship, as something wholly beyond his comprehension; when we regard every production of nature as one which has had a long history; when we contemplate every complex structure and instinct as the summing up of many contrivances, each useful to the possessor, in the same way as any great mechanical invention is the summing up of the labour, the experience, the reason, and even the blunders of numerous workmen; when we thus view each organic being, how far more interesting, I speak from experience, does the study of natural history become!
From the Conclusion of Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (3rd. ed., 1861), 521.
Science quotes on:  |  Become (821)  |  Being (1276)  |  Beyond (316)  |  Blunder (21)  |  Complex (202)  |  Comprehension (69)  |  Contemplate (29)  |  Contrivance (12)  |  Experience (494)  |  Great (1610)  |  History (716)  |  Instinct (91)  |  Interesting (153)  |  Invention (400)  |  Labor (200)  |  Long (778)  |  Look (584)  |  Mechanical (145)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  More (2558)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural History (77)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Numerous (70)  |  Organic (161)  |  Organism (231)  |  Production (190)  |  Reason (766)  |  Regard (312)  |  Savage (33)  |  Ship (69)  |  Speak (240)  |  Speaking (118)  |  Structure (365)  |  Study (701)  |  Summation (3)  |  Useful (260)  |  Usefulness (92)  |  View (496)  |  Way (1214)  |  Wholly (88)  |  Workman (13)

When you do something, you should burn yourself completely, like a good bonfire, leaving no trace of yourself.
Quoted in Kim Lim (ed.), 1,001 Pearls of Spiritual Wisdom: Words to Enrich, Inspire, and Guide Your Life (2014), 180
Science quotes on:  |  Bonfire (2)  |  Burn (99)  |  Completely (137)  |  Do (1905)  |  Good (906)  |  Leave (138)  |  Trace (109)

When you recover or discover something that nourishes your soul and brings joy, care enough about yourself to make room for it in your life.
Quoted in Kim Lim (ed.), 1,001 Pearls of Spiritual Wisdom: Words to Enrich, Inspire, and Guide Your Life (2014), 253
Science quotes on:  |  Bring (95)  |  Care (203)  |  Discover (571)  |  Enough (341)  |  Joy (117)  |  Life (1870)  |  Nourish (18)  |  Recover (14)  |  Room (42)  |  Soul (235)

When you repeat an old pattern in a new location, you sometimes make something new.
In The God Problem: How a Godless Cosmos Creates (2012), 24.
Science quotes on:  |  Location (15)  |  New (1273)  |  Old (499)  |  Pattern (116)  |  Repeat (44)  |  Sometimes (46)

When you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success. That is the way it was with the atomic bomb.
From USAEC Transcript of Hearing Before Personnel Security Board (1954). Reproduced in Richard Polenberg (ed.), In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer: The Security Clearance Hearing (2002), 46-47.
Science quotes on:  |  Atomic Bomb (115)  |  Do (1905)  |  See (1094)  |  Success (327)  |  Sweet (40)  |  Way (1214)

When you start in science, you are brainwashed into believing how careful you must be, and how difficult it is to discover things. There’s something that might be called the “graduate student syndrome”; graduate students hardly believe they can make a discovery.
Quotation supplied by Professor Francis Crick.
Science quotes on:  |  Call (781)  |  Difficult (263)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Graduate (32)  |  Graduate Student (13)  |  Must (1525)  |  Start (237)  |  Student (317)  |  Thing (1914)

Whenever we pride ourselves upon finding a newer, stricter way of thought or exposition; whenever we start insisting too hard upon “operationalism” or symbolic logic or any other of these very essential systems of tramlines, we lose something of the ability to think new thoughts. And equally, of course, whenever we rebel against the sterile rigidity of formal thought and exposition and let our ideas run wild, we likewise lose. As I see it, the advances in scientific thought come from a combination of loose and strict thinking, and this combination is the most precious tool of science.
In 'Culture Contact and Schismogenesis' (1935), in Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology (1972).
Science quotes on:  |  Ability (162)  |  Advance (298)  |  Against (332)  |  Combination (150)  |  Course (413)  |  Equally (129)  |  Essential (210)  |  Hard (246)  |  Idea (881)  |  Logic (311)  |  Lose (165)  |  Most (1728)  |  New (1273)  |  Other (2233)  |  Ourselves (247)  |  Precious (43)  |  Pride (84)  |  Rebel (7)  |  Rigidity (5)  |  Run (158)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Thought (17)  |  See (1094)  |  Start (237)  |  Sterile (24)  |  System (545)  |  Think (1122)  |  Thinking (425)  |  Thought (995)  |  Tool (129)  |  Way (1214)  |  Whenever (81)  |  Wild (96)

While it is true that scientific results are entirely independent from religious and moral considerations, those individuals to whom we owe the great creative achievements of science were all of them imbued with the truly religious conviction that this universe of ours is something perfect and susceptible to the rational striving for knowledge. If this conviction had not been a strongly emotional one and if those searching for knowledge had not been inspired by Spinoza's Amor Dei Intellectualis, they would hardly have been capable of that untiring devotion which alone enables man to attain his greatest achievements.
In response to a greeting sent by the Liberal Ministers’ Club of New York City, published in 'Religion and Science: Irreconcilable?' The Christian Register (Jun 1948). Collected in Ideas and Options (1954), 52.
Science quotes on:  |  Achievement (187)  |  Alone (324)  |  Attain (126)  |  Capable (174)  |  Consideration (143)  |  Conviction (100)  |  Creative (144)  |  Devotion (37)  |  Enable (122)  |  Enquiry (89)  |  Great (1610)  |  Greatest (330)  |  Individual (420)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Man (2252)  |  Moral (203)  |  Owe (71)  |  Perfect (223)  |  Rational (95)  |  Religion (369)  |  Religious (134)  |  Result (700)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Spinoza (11)  |  Truly (118)  |  Universe (900)

While the dogmatist is harmful, the sceptic is useless …; one is certain of knowing, the other of not knowing. What philosophy should dissipate is certainty, whether of knowledge or of ignorance. Knowledge is not so precise a concept as is commonly thought. Instead of saying ‘I know this’, we ought to say ‘I more or less know something more or less like this’. … Knowledge in practical affairs has not the certainty or the precision of arithmetic.
From 'Philosophy For Laymen', collected in Unpopular Essays (1950, 1996), 38-39.
Science quotes on:  |  Arithmetic (144)  |  Certain (557)  |  Certainty (180)  |  Concept (242)  |  Dissipate (8)  |  Dogmatism (15)  |  Harmful (13)  |  Ignorance (254)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowing (137)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  More (2558)  |  More Or Less (71)  |  Other (2233)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Practical (225)  |  Precise (71)  |  Precision (72)  |  Say (989)  |  Sceptic (5)  |  Thought (995)  |  Useless (38)

While we keep an open mind on this question of vitalism, or while we lean, as so many of us now do, or even cling with a great yearning, to the belief that something other than the physical forces animates the dust of which we are made, it is rather the business of the philosopher than of the biologist, or of the biologist only when he has served his humble and severe apprenticeship to philosophy, to deal with the ultimate problem. It is the plain bounden duty of the biologist to pursue his course unprejudiced by vitalistic hypotheses, along the road of observation and experiment, according to the accepted discipline of the natural and physical sciences. … It is an elementary scientific duty, it is a rule that Kant himself laid down, that we should explain, just as far as we possibly can, all that is capable of such explanation, in the light of the properties of matter and of the forms of energy with which we are already acquainted.
From Presidential Address to Zoological Section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. As quoted in H.V. Neal, 'The Basis of Individuality in Organisms: A Defense of Vitalism', Science (21 Jul 1916), 44 N.S., No. 1125, 82.
Science quotes on:  |  Accept (198)  |  According (236)  |  Already (226)  |  Apprenticeship (4)  |  Belief (615)  |  Biologist (70)  |  Business (156)  |  Capable (174)  |  Course (413)  |  Deal (192)  |  Discipline (85)  |  Do (1905)  |  Down (455)  |  Dust (68)  |  Duty (71)  |  Elementary (98)  |  Energy (373)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Explain (334)  |  Explanation (246)  |  Force (497)  |  Form (976)  |  Great (1610)  |  Himself (461)  |  Humble (54)  |  Hypothesis (314)  |  Immanuel Kant (50)  |  Light (635)  |  Matter (821)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Natural (810)  |  Observation (593)  |  Open (277)  |  Other (2233)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Philosophy (409)  |  Physical (518)  |  Physical Science (104)  |  Possibly (111)  |  Problem (731)  |  Properties Of Matter (7)  |  Property (177)  |  Pursue (63)  |  Question (649)  |  Rule (307)  |  Scientific (955)  |  Scientific Method (200)  |  Ultimate (152)  |  Vitalism (5)  |  Yearning (13)

While working with staphylococcus variants a number of culture-plates were set aside on the laboratory bench and examined from time to time. In the examinations these plates were necessarily exposed to the air and they became contaminated with various micro-organisms. It was noticed that around a large colony of a contaminating mould the staphylococcus colonies became transparent and were obviously undergoing lysis. Subcultures of this mould were made and experiments conducted with a view to ascertaining something of the properties of the bacteriolytic substance which had evidently been formed in the mould culture and which had diffused into the surrounding medium. It was found that broth in which the mould had been grown at room temperature for one or two weeks had acquired marked inhibitory, bacteriocidal and bacteriolytic properties to many of the more common pathogenic bacteria.
'On the Antibacterial Action of Cultures of a Penicillium, with Special Reference to their Use in the Isolation of B. Influenzae', British Journal of Experimental Pathology, 1929, 10, 226.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquired (77)  |  Air (366)  |  Bacteria (50)  |  Bacteriology (5)  |  Bench (8)  |  Common (447)  |  Conduct (70)  |  Culture (157)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Evidently (26)  |  Examination (102)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Exposed (33)  |  Form (976)  |  Laboratory (214)  |  Large (398)  |  Lysis (4)  |  Marked (55)  |  Micro-Organism (3)  |  More (2558)  |  Necessarily (137)  |  Number (710)  |  Organism (231)  |  Penicillin (18)  |  Set (400)  |  Staphylococcus (2)  |  Substance (253)  |  Temperature (82)  |  Time (1911)  |  Transparent (16)  |  Two (936)  |  Variant (9)  |  Various (205)  |  View (496)  |  Week (73)

Who ever saw a doctor use the prescription of his colleague without cutting out or adding something?
The Complete Essays of Montaigne, trans. Donald M. Frame (1958), 584.
Science quotes on:  |  Colleague (51)  |  Doctor (191)  |  Physician (284)  |  Prescription (18)  |  Saw (160)  |  Use (771)

Why do scientists call it research when looking for something new?
Anonymous
Science quotes on:  |  Call (781)  |  Do (1905)  |  Joke (90)  |  Looking (191)  |  New (1273)  |  Nomenclature (159)  |  Research (753)  |  Scientist (881)  |  Why (491)

Why does the universe, as Hawking has recently phrased it, go to all the bother of existing? Why is there something rather than nothing? Things would be so much simpler if nothing, absolutely nothing, existed, not even a God.
In Introduction, The Night Is Large: Collected Essays 1938-1995 (1996), xvii.
Science quotes on:  |  Absolutely (41)  |  Bother (8)  |  Exist (458)  |  God (776)  |  Stephen W. Hawking (62)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Simpler (8)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Universe (900)  |  Why (491)

Why then does science work? The answer is that nobody knows. It is a complete mystery—perhaps the complete mystery&mdashwhy the human mind should be able to understand anything at all about the wider universe. ... Perhaps it is because our brains evolved through the working of natural law that they somehow resonate with natural law. ... But the mystery, really, is not that we are at one with the universe, but that we are so to some degree at odds with it, different from it, and yet can understand something about it. Why is this so?
Coming of Age in the Milky Way (1988), 385. In Vinoth Ramachandra, Subverting Global Myths: Theology and the Public Issues Shaping our World (2008), 185.
Science quotes on:  |  Answer (389)  |  Brain (281)  |  Complete (209)  |  Degree (277)  |  Different (595)  |  Evolution (635)  |  Human (1512)  |  Human Mind (133)  |  Know (1538)  |  Law (913)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Natural (810)  |  Natural Law (46)  |  Nobody (103)  |  Odds (6)  |  Really (77)  |  Resonate (2)  |  Somehow (48)  |  Through (846)  |  Understand (648)  |  Universe (900)  |  Why (491)  |  Wide (97)  |  Work (1402)

Why, then, are we surprised that comets, such a rare spectacle in the universe, are not known, when their return is at vast intervals?. … The time will come when diligent research over long periods will bring to light things which now lie hidden. A single lifetime, even though entirely devoted to the sky, would not be enough for the investigation of so vast a subject … And so this knowledge will be unfolded only through long successive ages. There will come a time when our descendants will be amazed that we did not know things that are so plain to them …. Many discoveries are reserved for ages still to come, when memory of us will have been effaced. Our universe is a sorry little affair unless it has in it something for every age to investigate … Nature does not reveal her mysteries once and for all. Someday there will be a man who will show in what regions comets have their orbit, why they travel so remote from other celestial bodies, how large they are and what sort they are.
Natural Questions, Book 7. As translated by Thomas H. Corcoran in Seneca in Ten Volumes: Naturales Quaestiones II (1972), 279 and 293.
Science quotes on:  |  Affair (29)  |  Age (509)  |  Amaze (5)  |  Celestial (53)  |  Comet (65)  |  Descendant (18)  |  Devoted (59)  |  Diligent (19)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Efface (6)  |  Enough (341)  |  Entirely (36)  |  Hidden (43)  |  Investigate (106)  |  Investigation (250)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Known (453)  |  Large (398)  |  Lie (370)  |  Lifetime (40)  |  Light (635)  |  Little (717)  |  Long (778)  |  Man (2252)  |  Memory (144)  |  Mystery (188)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Orbit (85)  |  Other (2233)  |  Period (200)  |  Plain (34)  |  Rare (94)  |  Remote (86)  |  Research (753)  |  Reserve (26)  |  Return (133)  |  Reveal (152)  |  Show (353)  |  Single (365)  |  Sky (174)  |  Someday (15)  |  Sorry (31)  |  Spectacle (35)  |  Still (614)  |  Subject (543)  |  Successive (73)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Through (846)  |  Time (1911)  |  Travel (125)  |  Unfold (15)  |  Universe (900)  |  Vast (188)  |  Why (491)  |  Will (2350)

Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something.
Anonymous
Often seen attributed to Plato. Please contact Webmaster, who has so far found none, if you know a primary source from Plato's writing. Seen without citation in Tryon Edwards (ed.), A Dictionary of Thoughts: Being a Cyclopedia of Laconic Quotations (1891), 560.
Science quotes on:  |  Fool (121)  |  Say (989)  |  Something To Say (4)  |  Talk (108)  |  Wise (143)

Without the slightest doubt there is something through which material and spiritual energy hold togehter and are complementary. In the last analysis, somehow or other, there must be a single energy operating in the world. And the first idea that occurs to us is that the 'soul' must be as it were the focal point of transformation at which, from all the points of nature, the forces of bodies converge, to become interiorised and sublimated in beauty and truth.
In Teilhard de Chardin and Bernard Wall (trans.), The Phenomenon of Man (1959, 2008), 63. Originally published in French as Le Phénomene Humain (1955).
Science quotes on:  |  Analysis (244)  |  Beauty (313)  |  Become (821)  |  Body (557)  |  Complementary (15)  |  Converge (10)  |  Doubt (314)  |  Energy (373)  |  First (1302)  |  Force (497)  |  Hold (96)  |  Idea (881)  |  Last (425)  |  Material (366)  |  Must (1525)  |  Nature (2017)  |  Occur (151)  |  Operating (4)  |  Other (2233)  |  Point (584)  |  Single (365)  |  Slightest (2)  |  Somehow (48)  |  Soul (235)  |  Spiritual (94)  |  Through (846)  |  Together (392)  |  Transformation (72)  |  Truth (1109)  |  World (1850)

Write a paper promising salvation, make it a ‘structured’ something or a ‘virtual’ something, or ‘abstract’, ‘distributed’ or ‘higher-order’ or ‘applicative’ and you can almost be certain of having started a new cult.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Abstract (141)  |  Certain (557)  |  Cult (5)  |  Distribute (16)  |  New (1273)  |  Order (638)  |  Paper (192)  |  Promise (72)  |  Salvation (13)  |  Start (237)  |  Structure (365)  |  Virtual (5)  |  Write (250)

You do not know what you will find, you may set out to find one thing and end up by discovering something entirely different.
About “pure fundamental research.” From Dedication Address opening the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation, Fleming stressed training “to look for significance in scientific ‘accidents,’” and “the importance of serendipity in science,” as well as a “free atmosphere which will allow genius full play.” In 'Penicillin Discoverer Calls For Free Path for Research', New York Times (4 Jul 1949), 1.
Science quotes on:  |  Begin (275)  |  Different (595)  |  Discover (571)  |  Do (1905)  |  End (603)  |  Find (1014)  |  Know (1538)  |  Research (753)  |  Set (400)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Will (2350)

You geneticists may know something about the hereditary mechanisms that distinguish a red-eyed from a white-eyed fruit fly but you haven’t the slightest inkling about the hereditary mechanism that distinguishes fruit flies from elephants.
1925, in Corn, Its Origin, Evolution and Improvement by P. C. Mangelsdorf (1974).
Science quotes on:  |  Distinguish (168)  |  Elephant (35)  |  Fly (153)  |  Fruit (108)  |  Fruit Fly (6)  |  Geneticist (16)  |  Know (1538)  |  Mechanism (102)  |  White (132)

You know something I could really do without? The Space Shuttle. … It’s irresponsible. The last thing we should be doing is sending our grotesquely distorted DNA out into space.
Brain Droppings (1998), 128.
Science quotes on:  |  Distort (22)  |  Distortion (13)  |  DNA (81)  |  Do (1905)  |  Doing (277)  |  Grotesque (6)  |  Irresponsibility (5)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Last Thing (3)  |  Space (523)  |  Space Shuttle (12)  |  Thing (1914)

You know we’re constantly taking. We don’t make most of the food we eat, we don’t grow it, anyway. We wear clothes other people make, we speak a language other people developed, we use a mathematics other people evolved and spent their lives building. I mean we’re constantly taking things. It’s a wonderful ecstatic feeling to create something and put it into the pool of human experience and knowledge.
Expressing the driving force behind his passion. Interview with Rolling Stone writer, Steven Levy (late Nov 1983). As quoted in Nick Bilton, 'The 30-Year-Old Macintosh and a Lost Conversation With Steve Jobs' (24 Jan 2014), on New York Times blog web page. Levy appended a transcript of the interview to an updated Kindle version of his book, Insanely Great: The Life and Times of Macintosh, the Computer that Changed Everything.
Science quotes on:  |  Building (158)  |  Clothes (11)  |  Constantly (27)  |  Create (245)  |  Creating (7)  |  Develop (278)  |  Eat (108)  |  Ecstatic (3)  |  Experience (494)  |  Feeling (259)  |  Food (213)  |  Grow (247)  |  Growing (99)  |  Human (1512)  |  Know (1538)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Language (308)  |  Live (650)  |  Mathematics (1395)  |  Mean (810)  |  Most (1728)  |  Other (2233)  |  People (1031)  |  Pool (16)  |  Speak (240)  |  Spent (85)  |  Taking (9)  |  Thing (1914)  |  Use (771)  |  Wearing (2)  |  Wonder (251)  |  Wonderful (155)

You know, all is development. The principle is perpetually going on. First, there was nothing, then there was something; then—I forget the next—I think there were shells, then fishes; then we came—let me see—did we come next? Never mind that; we came at last. And at the next change there will be something very superior to us—something with wings. Ah! That's it: we were fishes, and I believe we shall be crows.
Tancred: or, The New Crusade (1847), 124.
Science quotes on:  |  Change (639)  |  Development (441)  |  Evolution (635)  |  First (1302)  |  Forget (125)  |  Know (1538)  |  Last (425)  |  Mind (1377)  |  Never (1089)  |  Next (238)  |  Nothing (1000)  |  Perpetually (20)  |  Principle (530)  |  See (1094)  |  Shell (69)  |  Superior (88)  |  Think (1122)  |  Will (2350)  |  Wing (79)

You look at science (or at least talk of it) as some sort of demoralising invention of man, something apart from real life, and which must be cautiously guarded and kept separate from everyday existence. But science and everyday life cannot and should not be separated.
Letter to her father, Ellis Franklin (undated, summer 1940? while she was an undergraduate at Cambridge). Excerpted in Brenda Maddox, The Dark Lady of DNA (2002), 60-61.
Science quotes on:  |  Apart (7)  |  Caution (24)  |  Everyday (32)  |  Everyday Life (15)  |  Existence (481)  |  Experience (494)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Guard (19)  |  Invention (400)  |  Life (1870)  |  Look (584)  |  Man (2252)  |  Must (1525)  |  Real (159)  |  Separate (151)

You make experiments and I make theories. Do you know the difference? A theory is something nobody believes, except the person who made it. An experiment is something everybody believes, except the person who made it.
Remark to Hermann F. Mark.
As related by Herman F. Mark to the author. Quoted in Gerald Holton, The Advancement of Science, and Its Burdens, (1986), 13.
Science quotes on:  |  Difference (355)  |  Do (1905)  |  Everybody (72)  |  Experiment (736)  |  Know (1538)  |  Nobody (103)  |  Person (366)  |  Theory (1015)

You may perceive something of the distinction which I think necessary to keep in view between art and science, between the artist and the man of knowledge, or the philosopher. The man of knowledge, the philosopher, is he who studies and acquires knowledge in order to improve his own mind; and with a desire of extending the department of knowledge to which he turns his attention, or to render it useful to the world, by discoveries, or by inventions, which may be the foundation of new arts, or of improvements in those already established. Excited by one or more of these motives, the philosopher employs himself in acquiring knowledge and in communicating it. The artist only executes and practises what the philosopher or man of invention has discovered or contrived, while the business of the trader is to retail the productions of the artist, exchange some of them for others, and transport them to distant places for that purpose.
From the first of a series of lectures on chemistry, collected in John Robison (ed.), Lectures on the Elements of Chemistry: Delivered in the University of Edinburgh (1807), Vol. 1, 3.
Science quotes on:  |  Acquire (46)  |  Already (226)  |  Art (680)  |  Artist (97)  |  Attention (196)  |  Business (156)  |  Communicate (39)  |  Contrive (10)  |  Definition (238)  |  Department (93)  |  Desire (212)  |  Discover (571)  |  Discovery (837)  |  Distant (33)  |  Distinction (72)  |  Employ (115)  |  Establish (63)  |  Exchange (38)  |  Excite (17)  |  Execute (7)  |  Extend (129)  |  Foundation (177)  |  Himself (461)  |  Improve (64)  |  Improvement (117)  |  Invention (400)  |  Knowledge (1647)  |  Man (2252)  |  Mind (1377)  |  More (2558)  |  Motive (62)  |  Necessary (370)  |  New (1273)  |  Order (638)  |  Other (2233)  |  Philosopher (269)  |  Place (192)  |  Practise (7)  |  Production (190)  |  Purpose (336)  |  Render (96)  |  Retail (2)  |  Science And Art (195)  |  Study (701)  |  Think (1122)  |  Transport (31)  |  Turn (454)  |  Useful (260)  |  View (496)  |  World (1850)

You’ve climbed the highest mountain in the world. What’s left? It’s all downhill from there. You’ve got to set your sights on something higher than Everest.
…...
Science quotes on:  |  Climb (39)  |  Downhill (3)  |  Everest (10)  |  High (370)  |  Leave (138)  |  Mountain (202)  |  Set (400)  |  Sight (135)  |  World (1850)

Your true inventor has a yen to invent, just as a painter or musician is impelled to create something in his art. I began wanting to invent when I was in short pants. At the age of eight—and that was forty years ago—I invented a rock-thrower. Later I found that the Romans had done a much better job some two thousand years before me.
Anonymous
Attributed to an unnamed “holder of many patents,” as quoted by Stacy V. Jones, in You Ought to Patent That (1962), 21.
Science quotes on:  |  Age (509)  |  Art (680)  |  Better (493)  |  Create (245)  |  Creation (350)  |  Impelled (2)  |  Inventor (79)  |  Job (86)  |  Musician (23)  |  Painter (30)  |  Rock (176)  |  Roman (39)  |  Short (200)  |  Thousand (340)  |  Throwing (17)  |  Two (936)  |  Year (963)


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.