Science Quotes - Page 33

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.

Even when all is known, the care of a man is not yet complete, because eating alone will not keep a man well; he must also take exercise. For food and exercise, while possessing opposite qualities, yet work together to produce health.

Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all - the apathy of human beings.

Moving in space, the atoms originally were individual units, but inevitable they began to collide with each other, and in cases where their shapes were such as to permit them to interlock, they began to form clusters. Water, air, fire, and earth, these are simply different clusters of the changeless atoms.

Looking closer can make something beautiful

On Saturday, I was a surgeon in South Africa, very little known. On Monday, I was world renowned.

The truth knocks on the door and you say, go away, I'm looking for the truth, and it goes away. Puzzling.

In the end, science as we know it has two basic types of practitioners. One is the educated man who still has a controlled sense of wonder before the universal mystery, whether it hides in a snail's eye or within the light that impinges on that delicate organ. The second kind of observer is the extreme reductionist who is so busy stripping things apart that the tremendous mystery has been reduced to a trifle, to intangibles not worth troubling one's head about.

To understand is to invent.

Increasingly, our leaders must deal with dangers that threaten the entire world, where an understanding of those dangers and the possible solutions depends on a good grasp of science. The ozone layer, the greenhouse effect, acid rain, questions of diet and heredity. All require scientific literacy. Can Americans choose the proper leaders and support the proper programs if they themselves are scientifically illiterate? The whole premise of democracy is that it is safe to leave important questions to the court of public opinion - but is it safe to leave them to the court of public ignorance?

Nature never appeals to intelligence until habit and instinct are useless. There is no intelligence where there is no need of change.

A physicist is an atom's way of knowing about atoms.

We satisfy our endless needs and justify our bloody deeds in the name of destiny and in the name of God.

Biologically speaking, if something bites you it's more likely to be female.

To explain new phenomena, that is my task; and how happy is the scientist when he finds what he so diligently sought, a pleasure that gladdens the heart.

Nature's economy shall be the base for our own, for it is immutable, but ours is secondary. An economist without knowledge of nature is therefore like a physicist without knowledge of mathematics.

He who sees things grow from the beginning will have the best view of them.

Science is simply common sense at its best.

The strongest arguments prove nothing so long as the conclusions are not verified by experience. Experimental science is the queen of sciences and the goal of all speculation.

And first, it seems not at all probable, That if the Omniscient Author of Nature knew that the study of his Works did really tend to make Men disbelieve his Being or Attributes, he would have given Men so many Invitations, and almost Necessities, to study and contemplate the Nature of his Creatures: Of these Invitations divers have been mention'd already, and more might be added to them, if we thought it requisite.

The research worker, in his efforts to express the fundamental laws of Nature in mathematical form, should strive mainly for mathematical beauty. He should take simplicity into consideration in a subordinate way to beauty ... It often happens that the requirements of simplicity and beauty are the same, but where they clash, the latter must take precedence.

Truth is not by nature free - nor error servile - but that its production is thoroughly imbued with relations of power.

Computer is not a device anymore. It is an extension of your mind and your gateway to other people.

It is not his possession of knowledge, of irrefutable truth, that makes the man of science, but his persistent and recklessly critical quest for truth.

O telescope, instrument of much knowledge, more precious than any sceptre!