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Josiah Dwight Whitney
(23 Nov 1819 - 19 Aug 1896)
American geologist and chemist known for his topographical mapping and studies of the regional geology of California. He served as a commissioner of Yosemite Park.
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Science Quotes by Josiah Dwight Whitney (2 quotes)
I suppose I should be run after for a professorship if I had studied at Giessen, as it seems to be a settled point that no young man can be expected to know anything of chemistry unless he has studied with Liebig; while the truth is, that any one who goes there and does not afterwards correct the bad habits acquired there, in some other laboratory, is almost unfitted for doing things in Chemistry. No doubt Liebig is a remarkable man, who has done much for organic Chemistry, not to speak of his having quarreled with all the Chemists in Europe...
— Josiah Dwight Whitney
Letter to his brother, William Dwight Whitney (25 Apr 1846). In Edwin Tenney Brewster and Josiah Dwight Whitney, Life and Letters of Josiah Dwight Whitney (1909), 79-80.
What astronomy has done for space, geology has done for time; the one gives us the idea of infinite distance and magnitude in the starry heavens—the other, of almost infinite duration of time in the immense cycles of changes which our own planet has undergone.
— Josiah Dwight Whitney
In The Geological Survey of California: An Address Delivered Before the Legislature of California … March 12th, 1861 by J.D. Whitney (1861), 8.
See also:
- 23 Nov - short biography, births, deaths and events on date of Whitney's birth.
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) -- 
