Scientific literature

Explore 115 quotes from the following genre: Scientific literature

Whence is it that Nature does nothing in vain: and whence arises all that Order and Beauty which we see in the World?... does it not appear from Phenomena that there is a Being incorporeal, living, intelligent, omnipresent, who in infinite Space, as it were in his Sensory, sees the things themselves intimately, and throughly perceives them, and comprehends them wholly.

Isaac Newton

Opticks: or, A Treatise of the Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions and Colours of Light

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Topic

God and nature Nature

Author

Isaac Newton

Source

Opticks: or, A Treatise of the Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions and Colours of Light

Medium

Treatise

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1704 1700s 18th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Newton, Isaac. Opticks: or, A Treatise of the Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions and Colours of Light. London: Samuel Smith and Benjamin Walford, 1704, bk. 3, pt. 1, question 28.

Current Citation

Newton, Isaac. Opticks. Dover Publications, 2012, bk. 3, pt. 1, question 28.

We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it is forever.

Carl Sagan

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Topic

Ephemeral nature of life Nature of time

Author

Carl Sagan

Source

Cosmos

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1980 1980s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Sagan, Carl. Cosmos. Random House, 1980, ch. 2.

What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe?...Why does the universe go to all the bother of existing?

Stephen Hawking

A Brief History of Time

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Topic

Laws of physics Existence of the universe Origin of the universe The universe

Author

Stephen Hawking

Source

A Brief History of Time

Genre

Scientific literature

Statement Type

Question

Language

English

Time

1988 1980s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Hawking, Steven. A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes. Bantam Dell Publishing Group, 1988, conclusion.

Wonder... And not any expectation of advantage from its discoveries, is the first principle which prompts mankind to the study of Philosophy, of that science which pretends to lay open the concealed connections that unite the various appearances of nature.

Adam Smith

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Topic

Wonder Curiosity Philosophy

Author

Adam Smith

Source

The History of Astronomy Essays on Philosophical Subjects

Medium

Essay

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1790 1790s 18th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Smith, Adam. "The History of Astronomy." Essays on Philosophical Subjects. London: T. Cadell Jun. and W. Davies/Edinburgh: W. Creech, 1795, sect. 3, para. 3.

Current Citation

Smith, Adam. "The History of Astronomy." Essays on Philosophical Subjects, edited by W. P. D. Wightman. Liberty Fund, 1982, sect. 3, para. 3.

A man does not attain the status of Galileo merely because he is persecuted; he must also be right.

Stephen Jay Gould

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Topic

Persecution Science

Author

Stephen Jay Gould

Source

Ever Since Darwin

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1975 1970s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Gould, Stephen Jay. "Velikovsky In Collision." Natural History, Mar. 1975.

Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure Science.

Edwin Hubble

The Exploration of Space

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Topic

Man and the universe Science

Author

Edwin Hubble

Source

The Exploration of Space Harper’s Magazine

Medium

Magazine

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1929 1920s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Hubble, Edwin. “The Exploration of Space.” Harper’s Magazine, May 1929.

Not in innocence, and not in Asia, was mankind born.

Robert Ardrey

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Topic

Human origins Evolution Science and religion

Author

Robert Ardrey

Source

African Genesis

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1961 1960s 20th century

Authentication Score 2

Citation

Ardrey, Robert. African Genesis: A Personal Investigation into the Animal Origins and Nature of Man. Atheneum, 1961.

The sea lies all about us. The commerce of all lands must cross it. The very winds that move over the lands have been cradled on its broad expanse and seek ever to return to it. The continents themselves dissolve and pass to the sea, in grain after grain of eroded land. So the rains that rose from it return again in rivers. In its mysterious past it encompasses all the dim origins of life and receives in the end, after, it may be, many transmutations, the dead husks of that same life. For all at least return to the sea—to Oceanus, the ocean river, like the everflowing stream of time, the beginning and the end.

Rachel Carson

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Topic

Ocean and sea

Author

Rachel Carson

Source

The Sea Around Us

Genre

Nature writing Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1951 1950s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Carson, Rachel. The Sea Around Us. Oxford University Press, 1951, pt. 3.

Consciousness... Is the phenomenon whereby the universe's very existence is made known.

Roger Penrose

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Topic

Consciousness

Author

Roger Penrose

Source

The Emperor's New Mind

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1989 1980s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Penrose, Roger. The Emperor's New Mind: Concerning Computers, Minds and The Laws of Physics. Oxford University Press, 1989, ch. 10.

The edge of the sea is a strange and beautiful place. All through the long history of Earth it has been an area of unrest where waves have broken heavily against the land, where the tides have pressed forward over the continents, receded, and then returned. For no two successive days is the shore line precisely the same.

Rachel Carson

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Topic

The beach Ocean and sea

Author

Rachel Carson

Source

The Edge of the Sea

Genre

Nature writing Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1955 1950s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Carson, Rachel. The Edge of the Sea. Houghton Mifflin, 1955, ch. 1.

Natural selection, the blind, unconscious, automatic process which Darwin discovered, and which we now know is the explanation for the existence and apparently purposeful form of all life, has no purpose in mind. It has no mind and no mind's eye. It does not plan for the future. It has no vision, no foresight, no sight at all. If it can be said to play the role of watchmaker in nature, it is the blind watchmaker.

Richard Dawkins

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Topic

Natural selection Origin of life Evolution

Author

Richard Dawkins

Source

The Blind Watchmaker

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1986 1980s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Dawkins, Richard. The Blind Watchmaker. Norton & Company, 1986, ch. 1.

In science, "fact" can only mean "confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent."

Stephen Jay Gould

Evolution as Fact and Theory

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Topic

Science

Author

Stephen Jay Gould

Source

Evolution as Fact and Theory

Medium

Essay

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1983 1980s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Gould, Stephen Jay. "Evolution as Fact and Theory." Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes. W. W. Norton & Company, 1983, ch. 19.

The natural man has only two primal passions, to get and beget.

William Osler

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Topic

Sex Greed Nature of men

Author

William Osler

Source

Science and Immortality

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1904 1900s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Osler, William. Science and Immortality. Houghton, Mifflin & Company, 1904, ch. 2.

In the discovery of secret things and in the investigation of hidden causes, stronger reasons are obtained from sure experiments and demonstrated arguments than from probable conjectures and the opinions of philosophical speculators of the common sort.

William Gilbert

De Magnete

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Topic

Scientific method

Author

William Gilbert

Source

De Magnete

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

Latin

Time

1600 1600s 16th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Gilbert, William. De Magnete, Magneticisque Corporibus, et de Magno Magnete Tellure [On the Magnet and Magnetic Bodies, and on That Great Magnet the Earth]. London: Peter Short, 1600, preface.

Current Citation

Gilbert, William. De Magnete, translated by P. Fleury Mottelay. Dover Publications, 1991.

But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.

Carl Sagan

Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science

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Topic

Genius

Author

Carl Sagan

Source

Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1979 1970s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Sagan, Carl. Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science. Random House, 1979, pt. 2, ch. 5.

If an army of monkeys were strumming on typewriters they might write all the books in the British Museum.

Arthur Eddington

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Topic

Man and animals Probability Randomness

Author

Arthur Eddington

Source

The Nature of the Physical World

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1928 1920s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Eddington, Arthur. "The Nature Of The Physical World." Gifford lecture. January – March 1927, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland.

In so far as a scientific statement speaks about reality, it must be falsifiable: and in so far as it is not falsifiable, it does not speak about reality.

Karl Popper

The Logic of Scientific Discovery

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Topic

Scientific theory Nature of science

Author

Karl Popper

Source

The Logic of Scientific Discovery

Genre

Scientific literature

Statement Type

Precepts and axioms

Language

German

Time

1959 1950s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Popper, Karl. Logik der Forschung [The Logic of Research]. Julius Springer, 1934, pt. 1, ch. 1.

Current Citation

Popper, Karl. The Logic of Scientific Discovery. Routledge, 2002, pt. 1, ch. 1.

One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It's simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we've been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back. So the old bamboozles tend to persist as the new ones rise.

Carl Sagan

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Topic

Con artists and charlatans

Author

Carl Sagan

Source

The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark

Genre

Scientific literature Philosophical literature

Language

English

Time

1995 1990s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Sagan, Carl and Ann Druyan. The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark. Random House, 1995, ch. 13.

There are reverent minds who ceaselessly scan the fields of Nature and the books of Science in search for gaps-gaps which they will fill up with God. As if God lived in gaps?

Henry Drummond

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Topic

God of the gaps Science and religion Science Religion God

Author

Henry Drummond

Source

The Ascent of Man

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1894 1890s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Drummond, Henry. The Ascent of Man. New York City: James Pott & Co., 1894, ch. 10.

From the intrinsic evidence of his creation, the Great Architect of the Universe now begins to appear as a pure mathematician.

James Jeans

More information about this quote

Topic

God Origin of the universe The universe

Author

James Jeans

Source

The Mysterious Universe

Genre

Scientific literature

Language

English

Time

1930 1930s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Jeans, James. The Mysterious Universe. Cambridge University Press/Macmillan, 1930, ch. 5.