Increasing Knowledge Quotes

• The desire of knowledge, like the thirst of riches, increases ever with the acquisition of it.

  Laurence Sterne

  Motivational, Education, Business

  Laurence Sterne (1849). “The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman”, p.65

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• It is that of increasing knowledge of empirical fact, intimately combined with changing interpretations of this body of fact - hence changing general statements about it - and, not least, a changing a structure of the theoretical system.

  Talcott Parsons

  Body, Facts, Structure

  Talcott Parsons (1968). “The structure of social action: a study in social theory with special reference to a group of recent European writers”

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• In vertebrate paleontology, increasing knowledge leads to triumphant loss of clarity.

  Alfred Romer

  Knowledge, Loss, Science

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• Our ignorance can be divided into problems and mysteries. When we face a problem, we may not know its solution, but we have insight, increasing knowledge, and an inkling of what we are looking for. When we face a mystery, however, we can only stare in wonder and bewilderment, not knowing what an explanation would even look like.

  Noam Chomsky

  Ignorance, Knowing, Looks

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• Increasing knowledge lessens the sphere of the supernatural.

  Edward Westermarck

  Knowledge, Science, Spheres

  Edward Westermarck (1908). “The Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas”

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• I do believe in this evolution of consciousness as the only thing which we can embark on, or in fact, willy-nilly, are embarked on; and along with that will go the spiritual discoveries and, I feel, the inexhaustible wonder that one feels, that opens more and more the more you know. It's simply that this increasing knowledge constantly enlarges your kingdom and the capacity for admiring and loving the universe.

  Conrad Aiken

  Spiritual, Believe, Discovery

  "Conrad Aiken, The Art of Poetry No. 9". Interview with Robert Hunter Wilbur in September 1963, "The Paris Review", www.theparisreview.org. Winter - Spring 1968.

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• There is but one bond of peace that is both permanent and enriching: The increasing knowledge of the world in which experiment occurs.

  Walter Lippmann

  Peace, World, Experiments

  Walter Lippmann (1995). “Liberty and the News”, p.60, Transaction Publishers

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• A … difference between most system-building in the social sciences and systems of thought and classification of the natural sciences is to be seen in their evolution. In the natural sciences both theories and descriptive systems grow by adaptation to the increasing knowledge and experience of the scientists. In the social sciences, systems often issue fully formed from the mind of one man. Then they may be much discussed if they attract attention, but progressive adaptive modification as a result of the concerted efforts of great numbers of men is rare.

  Lawrence Joseph Henderson

  Knowledge, Men, Differences

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• It is, indeed, perhaps the greatest prospect of humanistic studies to contribute through an increasing knowledge of the history of cultural development to that gradual removal of prejudices which is the common aim of all science.

  Niels Bohr

  Prejudice, Development, Common

  Niels Bohr (2010). “Atomic Physics and Human Knowledge”, p.31, Courier Dover Publications

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• One of the greatest gifts science has brought to the world is continuing elimination of the supernatural, and it was a lesson that my father passed on to me, that knowledge liberates mankind from superstition. We can live our lives without the constant fear that we have offended this or that deity who must be placated by incantation or sacrifice, or that we are at the mercy of devils or the Fates. With increasing knowledge, the intellectual darkness that surrounds us is illuminated and we learn more of the beauty and wonder of the natural world.

  James D. Watson

  Father, Sacrifice, Fate

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• A person with increasing knowledge and sensory education may derive infinite enjoyment from wine.

  Ernest Hemingway

  Wine, May, Infinite

  Ernest Hemingway (2002). “Death in the Afternoon”, p.18, Simon and Schuster

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