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Home > Category Index for Science Quotations > Category Index W > Category: Witch

Witch Quotes (4 quotes)

How many famous men be there in this our age, which make scruple to condemne these old witches, thinking it to bee nothing but a melancholike humour which corrupteth thei imagination, and filleth them with all these vaines toyes. I will not cast my selfe any further into the depth of this question, the matter craveth a man of more leisure.
Describing melancholy as the innocent affliction of those regarded as witches instead of Satanic influence, while distancing himself from the controversy.
Discours de la conservation de la veue; des maladies mélancholiques, des catarrhes, et de la vieillese (1594). In Richard Surphlet (trans.) A Discourse of the Preservation of the Sight: of Melancholike Diseases; of Rheumes, and of Old Age (1599), 98-9. Quoted in Michael Heyd, Be sober and Reasonable (), 58.
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It is one of the signs of the times that modern chemists hold themselves bound and consider themselves in a position to give an explanation for everything, and when their knowledge fails them to make sure of supernatural explanations. Such a treatment of scientific subjects, not many degrees removed from a belief in witches and spirit-rapping, even Wislicenus considers permissible.
In H. Kolbe, 'Sign of the Times', Journal für Praktische Chemie (1877), 15, 473. Trans. W. H. Brock.
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Science affects the average man and woman in two ways already. He or she benefits by its application driving a motor-car or omnibus instead of a horse-drawn vehicle, being treated for disease by a doctor or surgeon rather than a witch, and being killed with an automatic pistol or shell in place of a dagger or a battle-axe.
'The Scientific Point of View' In R.C. Prasad (ed.), Modern Essays: Studying Language Through Literature (1987), 26.
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That the Anatomy of the Nerves yields more pleasant and profitable Speculations, than the Theory of any parts besides in the animated Body: for from hence the true and genuine Reasons are drawn of very many Actions and Passions that are wont to happen in our Body, which otherwise seem most difficult and unexplicable; and no less from this Fountain the hidden Causes of Diseases and their Symptoms, which commonly are ascribed to the Incantations of Witches, may be found out and clearly laid open. But as to our observations about the Nerves, from our following Discourse it will plainly appear, that I have not trod the paths or footsteps of others, nor repeated what hath been before told.
In Anatomy of the Brain and Nerves (1664), trans. Samuel Pordage (1681), reprinted in William Peindel (ed.), Thomas Willis: Anatomy of the Brain and Nerves (1965), Vol. 2, 125.
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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
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- 90 -
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- 70 -
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- 50 -
Stephen Hawking
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Max Planck
Henry Adams
Richard Dawkins
Werner Heisenberg
Alfred Wegener
John Dalton
- 40 -
Pierre Fermat
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Johannes Kepler
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Giordano Bruno
JJ Thomson
Thomas Kuhn
Leonardo DaVinci
Archimedes
David Hume
- 30 -
Andreas Vesalius
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Richard Feynman
James Hutton
Alexander Fleming
Emile Durkheim
Benjamin Franklin
Robert Oppenheimer
Robert Hooke
Charles Kettering
- 20 -
Carl Sagan
James Maxwell
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Francis Crick
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- 10 -
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