Engineering Quotes - Page 5

• Engineering without imagination sinks to a trade.

  Herbert Hoover

  Science, Imagination, Imagine

  Herbert Hoover (1952). “Memoirs: Years of adventure, 1874-1920”

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• Ah, bien je prétends que les courbes des quatre areêtes du monument, telles que le calcul les a fournies, donneront une grand impression de force et de beauté.
  Well, I think the curves of the four pillars of the monument, as the calculations have provided them, give it a great sense of force and beauty.

  Gustave Eiffel

  Thinking, Curves, Giving

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• Any impatient student of mathematics or science or engineering who is irked by having algebraic symbolism thrust upon him should try to get along without it for a week.

  Eric Temple Bell

  Symbolism, Trying, Statistics

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• With genetic engineering, we will be able to increase the complexity of our DNA, and improve the human race. But it will be a slow process, because one will have to wait about 18 years to see the effect of changes to the genetic code.

  Stephen Hawking

  Race, Dna, Years

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• Today's water institutions-the policies and laws, government agencies and planning and engineering practices that shape patterns of water use-are steeped in a supply-side management philosophy no longer appropriate to solving today's water problems.

  Sandra Postel

  Philosophy, Science, Agency

  Sandra Postel (1985). “Conserving water: the untapped alternative”, Worldwatch Inst

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• It seems to be saying perpetually; 'I am the end of the nineteenth century; I am glad they built me of iron; let me rust.' ... It is like a passing fool in a crowd of the University, a buffoon in the hall; for all the things in Paris has made, it alone has neither wits nor soul.

  Hilaire Belloc

  Iron, Paris, Soul

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• If you ask ... the man in the street ... the human significance of mathematics, the answer of the world will be, that mathematics has given mankind a metrical and computatory art essential to the effective conduct of daily life, that mathematics admits of countless applications in engineering and the natural sciences, and finally that mathematics is a most excellent instrumentality for giving mental discipline... [A mathematician will add] that mathematics is the exact science, the science of exact thought or of rigorous thinking.

  Cassius Jackson Keyser

  Art, Science, Thinking

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• It so happens that the work which is likely to be our most durable monument, and to convey some knowledge of us to the most remote posterity, is a work of bare utility; not a shrine, not a fortress, not a palace, but a bridge.

  Montgomery Schuyler

  Bridges, Shrines, Palaces

  Montgomery Schuyler (1892). “American Architecture”

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• The day when the scientist, no matter how devoted, may make significant progress alone and without material help is past. This fact is most self-evident in our work. Instead of an attic with a few test tubes, bits of wire and odds and ends, the attack on the atomic nucleus has required the development and construction of great instruments on an engineering scale.

  Ernest Lawrence

  Science, Past, Odds

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• The sand should be neither coarse nor fine but of a middling quality or about the size of the common pop(p)y seed. If the sand is too coarse the mortar will be short or brittle . . . If the sand is too fine the cement will shrink and crack after it has been used.

  Canvass White

  Quality, Cracks, Size

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• This cement can be used in any situation and for any purpose to which any other mortar or hydraulic cement can be applied. It does not become perfectly hard within one or two months.

  Canvass White

  Two, Doe, Purpose

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• Software is a great combination between artistry and engineering. When you finally get done and get to appreciate what you have done it is like a part of yourself that you've put together. I think a lot of the people here feel that way.

  Bill Gates

  Thinking, People, Appreciate

  "MS-DOS Turns 30: PCMag's Original Interview With Bill Gates". Interview with David Bunnel, in.pcmag.com. February 1, 1982.

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• The trick to having good ideas is not to sit around in glorious isolation and try to think big thoughts. The trick is to get more parts on the table.

  Steven Johnson

  Thinking, Ideas, Trying

  Steven Johnson (2010). “Where Good Ideas Come From”, p.32, Penguin

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• There has been a substitution of ideology for fact and scientific and engineering data in this administration.

  Vinton Cerf

  Data, Administration, Facts

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• The great liability of the engineer compared to men of other professions is that his works are out in the open where all can see them. His acts, step by step, are in hard substance. He cannot bury his mistakes in the grave like the doctors. He cannot argue them into thin air or blame the judge like the lawyers. He cannot, like the architects, cover his failures with trees and vines. He cannot, like the politicians, screen his shortcomings by blaming his opponents and hope the people will forget. The engineer simply cannot deny he did it. If his works do not work, he is damned.

  Herbert Hoover

  Mistake, Men, Doctors

  Herbert Hoover (1952). “Memoirs: Years of adventure, 1874-1920”

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• Engineering is not merely knowing and being knowledgeable, like a walking encyclopedia; engineering is not merely analysis; engineering is not merely the possession of the capacity to get elegant solutions to non-existent engineering problems; engineering is practicing the art of the organizing forces of technological change ... Engineers operate at the interface between science and society.

  Gordon S. Brown

  Art, Knowledge, Science

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• The human foot is a masterpiece of engineering and a work of art.

  Leonardo da Vinci

  Art, Work, Feet

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• Engineering, medicine, business, architecture and painting are concerned not with the necessary but with the contingent - not with how things are but with how they might be - in short, with design.

  Herbert Simon

  Medicine, Design, Might

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• The story of civilization is, in a sense, the story of engineering-that long and arduous struggle to make the forces of nature work for man's good.

  L. Sprague de Camp

  Struggle, Men, Civilization

  L. Sprague de Camp (1963). “The Ancient Engineers”

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• For decades engineers have stood accused that their buildings do not have any cultural value. We have attempted to liberate engineering of this accusation.

  Fritz Todt

  Building, Accusation, Accused

  "Deutsche Technik", p. 270, June, 1935.

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• Engineering is the professional and systematic application of science to the efficient utilization of natural resources to produce wealth.

  Theodore J. Hoover

  Science, Definitions, Systematic

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• Business is not just doing deals; business is having great products, doing great engineering, and providing tremendous service to customers. Finally, business is a cobweb of human relationships.

  Ross Perot

  Leadership, Business, Self Improvement

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• To define it rudely but not inaptly, engineering is the art of doing that well with one dollar which any bungler can do with two after a fashion.

  Arthur M. Wellington

  Fashion, Art, Science

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• Take the best that exists and make it better.

  Henry Royce

  Rolls Royce, Civil Engineer, Engineers

  "Transforming the Organization". P. 85. Book by Francis J. Gouillart, 1996.

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• You can be creative in anything - in math, science, engineering, philosophy - as much as you can in music or in painting or in dance.

  Ken Robinson

  Philosophy, Math, Creative

  "TED and Reddit asked Sir Ken Robinson anything — and he answered". blog.ted.com. August 12, 2009.

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