Science Quotes - Page 212

Science starts with preconception, with the common culture, and with common sense. It moves on to observation, is marked by the discovery of paradox, and is then concerned with the correction of preconception. It moves then to use these corrections for the designing of further observation and for more refined experiment. And as it moves along this course the nature of the evidence and experience that nourish it becomes more and more unfamiliar; it is not just the language that is strange [to common culture].

I was just sitting on the train, just staring out the window at some cows. It was not the most inspiring subject. When all of a sudden the idea of Harry just appeared in my mind's eye.

Whether we like it or not, quantification in history is here to stay for reasons which the quantifiers themselves might not actively approve. We are becoming a numerate society: almost instinctively there seems now to be a greater degree of truth in evidence expressed numerically than in any literary evidence, no matter how shaky the statistical evidence, or acute the observing eye.

The Doctrine of Evolution states the fact that the present is the child of the past and the parent of the future.

... The approach of von Neumann and Connes to the use of non-commutative algebra in physics is naive, the situation is much more complicated.

We would be glad to have your friend come here to study, but tell him that we teach Chemistry here and not Agricultural Chemistry, nor any other special kind of chemistry. ... We teach Chemistry.

The universal and lasting establishment of peace constitutes not merely a part, but the whole final purpose and end of the science of right as viewed within the limits of reason.

All revolutionary advances in science may consist less of sudden and dramatic revelations than a series of transformations, of which the revolutionary significance may not be seen (except afterwards, by historians) until the last great step. In many cases the full potentiality and force of a most radical step in such a sequence of transformations may not even be manifest to its author.

Which is the best religion? [...] The religion that brings you closest to God.

Education is only second to nature.

Induction makes you feel guilty for getting something out of nothing, and it is artificial, but it is one of the greatest ideas of civilization.

Mathematics may humbly help in the market-place, but it also reaches to the stars.

The usefulness of mathematics in furthering the sciences is commonly acknowledged: but outside the ranks of the experts there is little inquiry into its nature and purpose as a deliberate human activity. Doubtless this is due to the inevitable drawback that mathematical study is saturated with technicalities from beginning to end.

During human progress, every science is evolved out of its corresponding art.

Intelligence increases mere physical ability one half. The use of the head abridges the labor of the hands.

Torrent of light and river of air, Along whose bed the glimmering stars are seen, Like gold and silver sands in some ravine Where mountain streams have left their channels bare!

The secret of science is to ask the right question, and it is the choice of problem more than anything else that marks the man of genius in the scientific world.

It is the peculiar beauty of this method, gentlemen, and one which endears it to the really scientific mind, that under no circumstance can it be of the smallest possible utility.

Science progresses not because scientists as a whole are passionately open-minded but because different scientists are passionately closed-minded about different things.

Mr Edison gave America just what was needed at that moment in history. They say that when people think of me, they think of my assembly line. Mr. Edison, you built an assembly line which brought together the genius of invention, science and industry.

Conscience - the only incorruptible thing about us.

I am perhaps more proud of having helped to redeem the character of the cave-man than of any other single achievement of mine in the field of anthropology.

That henceforth the absurd game of chemical noughts and crosses be tabu within the Society's precincts and that, following the practice of the Press in ending a correspondence, it be an instruction to the officers to give notice "That no further contributions to the mysteries of Polarity will be received, considered or printed by the Society." His challenge was not accepted.

The fact is the physical chemists never use their eyes and are most lamentably lacking in chemical culture. It is essential to cast out from our midst, root and branch, this physical element and return to our laboratories.

Hypotheses like professors, when they are seen not to work any longer in the laboratory, should disappear.