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Science Quotes

Asimov, Jacob Bronowski, Einstein, Arthur Eddington and Carl Sagan lead the page. The most-sourced writer is Henri Poincaré, with several passages from Science and Hypothesis (1901) and The Value of Science (1905), including the one about doubting everything and believing everything being two equally convenient ways to avoid thinking.

Two entries are flagged. “Etymology is a science in which vowels signify nothing at all, and consonants very little” is credited to Voltaire as disputed, and the notes cite two scholarly articles on where the saying comes from. “Mathematics is the key and door to the sciences” is credited to Galileo and flagged misattributed.

Random quote on Science

Most quoted on science:

Science has an important part to play in our everyday existence, and there is far too much neglect of science; but its intention is to supplement not to supplant the familiar outlook.

Arthur Eddington Science and the Unseen World (1929)

If the author is so interested in Science, why doesn't she take a course in it?

Peg Bracken I Didn't Come Here to Argue (1969)

Pouter, tumbler and fantail are from the same source;
The racer and hack may be traced to one horse;
So men were developed from monkeys of course,
Which nobody can deny.

Charles Neaves Originally published in The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin (1872)

That’s the trouble with science. It’s never done. Always upending itself. Ruining perfect systems for the little inconvenience of them being wrong.

Brandon Sanderson Rhythm of War (2020)

The most essential example of the theory of self-organisation in chemistry is the theory of non-linear, non-equilibrium thermodynamics of chemical reactions presented by Prigogine and his co-workers.

Rein Vihalemm

The unprecedented development of science and technology [has been] so rapid that it is said that 90 per cent of the scientists which this country has ever produced are still living today.

Robert Platt, Baron Platt

Science does not aim to cover exhaustively the whole of reality, but to construct systems and concepts which will perhaps — and it is a big perhaps — allow man to act on the world.

Alain Robbe-Grillet

As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise, human science is at a loss.

Noam Chomsky

The assertion...that there is no knowledge outside science – extra scientiam nulla salus – is nothing but another and most convenient fairy-tale.

Paul Karl Feyerabend Against Method (1975)

Man’s responsibility increases as that of the gods decreases.

André Gide

Science intensifies religious truth by cleansing it of ignorance and superstition.

Charles Lindbergh

One science only will one genius fit,
So vast is art, so narrow human wit.

Alexander Pope An Essay on Criticism (1709)

God does not justify man on the ground of human learning; attainments in chemistry, anatomy, geology, botany, astronomy, or skill in sculpture and painting, — these do not prepare a man to die.

Albert Barnes

In human life, you will find players of religion until the knowledge and proficiency in religion will be cleansed from all superstitions, and will be purified and perfected by the enlightenment of real science.

Mustafa Kemal Atatürk

Evolution doesn’t happen without pain or loss. A lot of fish died, in order for a few to stand. The price may be worthwhile…

David Brin Kiln People (2002)

I love science, and it pains me to think that so many are terrified of the subject or feel that choosing science means that you cannot also choose compassion, or the arts, or be awed by nature. Science is not meant to cure us of mystery, but to reinvent and reinvigorate it.

Robert Sapolsky

One thing about a science: it works.
If an engineer knows his business, his bridge does not fall down.

Chad Oliver

There are three stages in scientific discovery. First, people deny that it is true, then they deny that it is important; finally they credit the wrong person.

Bill Bryson A Short History of Nearly Everything (2003)

The great power of science is its ability, through brutal objectivity, to reveal to us truth we did not anticipate. In this it continues to be invaluable, and one of the greatest of human creations.

Robert B. Laughlin

What is the question now placed before society with the glib assurance the most astounding? That question is this—Is man an ape or an angel? My lord, I am on the side of the angels.

Benjamin Disraeli

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