Inquiry Quotes - Page 12

• The inquiry into Nature having thus been pursued nearly two thousand years theologically, we find by the middle of the sixteenth century some promising beginnings of a different method the method of inquiry into Nature scientifically the method which seeks not plausibilities but facts.

  Andrew Dickson White

  Years, Two, Different

  Andrew Dickson White (2012). “A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom: From Creation to the Victory of Scientific and Literary Methods”, p.40, Transaction Publishers

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• To Dogmatism the Spirit of Inquiry is the same as the Spirit of Evil.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Evil, Spirit, Dogmatism

  Ambrose Bierce (2013). “Epigrams by Ambrose Bierce”, p.2, e-artnow

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• It takes a long time to write a book. I'm not going to spend that much time trying to deliver a message. The reason I do it is because I want to understand something myself. It's not a delivery device, it's an inquiry device. Didactic fiction to my mind never works. It backfires.

  Ruth Ozeki

  Book, Writing, Long

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• The spirit of philosophy is one of free inquiry. It suspects all authority. Its function is to trace the uncritical assumptions of human thought to their hiding places, and in this pursuit it may finally end in denial or a frank admission of the incapacity of pure reason to reach the ultimate reality.

  Muhammad Iqbal

  Philosophy, Reality, Denial

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• Inquiry is human; blind obedience brutal. Truth never loses by the one but often suffers by the other.

  William Penn

  Suffering, Blind, Obedience

  William Penn (1726). “A Collection of the Works of William Penn: To which is Prefixed a Journal of His Life, with Many Original Letters and Papers Not Before Published”, p.828

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• True myths may serve for thousands of years as an inexhaustible source of intellectual speculation, religious joy, ethical inquiry, and artistic renewal. The real mystery is not destroyed by reason. The fake one is. You look at it and it vanishes. You look at the Blonde Hero-really look-and he turns into a gerbil. But you look at Apollo, and he looks back at you. The poet Rilke looked at a statue of Apollo about fifty years ago, and Apollo spoke to him. "You must change your life," he said. When the true myth rises into consciousness, that is always its message. You must change your life.

  Ursula K. Le Guin

  Life, Religious, Real

  Ursula K. Le Guin, Susan Wood (1980). “The Language of the Night: Essays on Fantasy and Science Fiction”, p.77, Ultramarine Publishing

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• There must be no barriers to freedom of inquiry... There is no place for dogma in science. The scientist is free, and must be free to ask any question, to doubt any assertion, to seek for any evidence, to correct any errors. Our political life is also predicated on openness. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it and that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire. And we know that as long as men are free to ask what they must, free to say what they think, free to think what they will, freedom can never be lost, and science can never regress.

  J. Robert Oppenheimer

  Freedom, Science, Men

  "J. Robert Oppenheimer" by L. Barnett in Life Magazine, Volume 7, No. 9, International Edition (p. 58), October 24, 1949.

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• The merit of painting lies in the exactness of reproduction. Painting is a science and all sciences are based on mathematics. No human inquiry can be a science unless it pursues its path through mathematical exposition and demonstration.

  Leonardo da Vinci

  Lying, Math, Path

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• Curiosity is, in great and generous minds, the first passion and the last; and perhaps always predominates in proportion to the strength of the contemplative faculties. He who easily comprehends all that is before him, and soon exhausts any single subject, is always eager for new inquiries; and in proportion as the intellectual eye takes in a wider prospect, it must be gratified with variety, by more rapid flights and bolder excursions.

  Samuel Johnson

  Passion, Eye, Intellectual

  Samuel Johnson, Arthur Murphy (1825). “The works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.: with Murphy's essay”, p.135

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• By the inquiry 'Who am I?'.
  The thought 'who am I?' will destroy all other thoughts,
  and like the stick used for stirring the burning pyre, it will itself in the end get destroyed. Then, there will arise Self-realization.

  Ramana Maharshi

  Self, Burning, Realization

  Ramana Maharshi (2004). “The Spiritual Teaching of Ramana Maharshi”, p.22, Shambhala Publications

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• The time to go into a new business is when it’s badly run by others.

  Richard Branson

  Running, Powerful, Innovation

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• The thought: A logical inquiry

  Gottlob Frege

  Logical

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• Single-minded devotion engenders deep thought, which expresses itself in action. The Lord's Light descends on the devotee, His power awakens in him and, as a result, profound inner inquiry blossoms forth.

  Anandamayi Ma

  Light, Profound, Deep Thought

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• Science is not the affirmation of a set of beliefs but a process of inquiry aimed at building a testable body of knowledge constantly open to rejection or confirmation. In science, knowledge is fluid and certainty fleeting. That is at the heart of its limitations. It is also its greatest strength.

  Michael Shermer

  Heart, Science, Thinking

  Michael Shermer (2002). “Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of Our Time”, p.124, Macmillan

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• I have already transmitted to Congress the report of the naval court of inquiry on the destruction of the battleship Maine in the harbor of Havana during the night of the fifteenth of February. The destruction of that noble vessel has filled the national heart with inexpressible horror. Two hundred and fifty-eight brave sailors and marines and two officers of our Navy, reposing in the fancied security of a friendly harbor, have been hurled to death, grief and want brought to their homes and sorrow to the nation.

  William McKinley

  Grief, Home, Heart

  Harry Joseph Sievers, William McKinley (1970). “William McKinley, 1843-1901: Chronology, Documents, Bibliographical Aids”, Oceana Publications

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• True poetry is born of scrutiny,
  Scrutiny, the son of meditation,
  Meditation, the son of lore,
  Lore, the son of inquiry,
  Inquiry, the son of investigation,
  Investigation, the son of knowledge,
  Knowledge, the son of understanding,
  Understanding, the son of wisdom,
  Wisdom, the son of surrender to the Divine Will
  Thus it is with the poet himself: his art is powerful, protecting, elevating, and his judgement straight and strong

  Stephen R. Lawhead

  Art, Strong, Powerful

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• Injection of environmental and political perspectives in midstream of the science discussion cannot help the process of inquiry. I believe that persons with relevant scientific expertise should concentrate, with pride, on cool objective analysis, providing information to the public and decision-makers when it is found, but leaving the moral implications for later common consideration, or at most for summary inferential discussion.

  James Hansen

  Believe, Pride, Perspective

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• See that you are not what you believe yourself to be. Fight with all the strength at your disposal against the idea that you are nameable and describable. You are not. Refuse to think of this or that. There is no other way out of misery, which you have created for yourself through blind acceptance without investigation. Suffering is a call for inquiry, all pain needs investigation. Don't be lazy to think.

  Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

  Pain, Believe, Fighting

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• Repeated reflection and inquiry have led me to the somewhat novel opinion, that value depends entirely upon utility.

  William Stanley Jevons

  Reflection, Opinion, Novel

  William Stanley Jevons (1970). “The Theory of Political Economy”, Penguin (Non-Classics)

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• Temperate, sincere, and intelligent inquiry and discussion are only to be dreaded by the advocates of error. The truth need not fear them.

  Benjamin Rush

  Intelligent, Errors, Needs

  "Provisions of the Last Will and Testament of Dr. James Rush". 1869.

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• In a world where concepts are so often deployed in an ad hoc fashion, half explored before being displaced by others, it is immensely refreshing to encounter such serious and sustained attention to the building blocks of inquiry—and to the responsibilities thereby incurred. Designs on the Contemporary is a work of profound importance to the philosophy of anthropology. In conjunction with Rabinow’s other works, it creates a nonpareil, a configuration of thought with no equal.

  Marilyn Strathern

  Fashion, Block, Philosophy

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• It was morality that burned the books of the ancient sages, and morality that halted the free inquiry of the Golden Age and substituted for it the credulous imbecility of the Age of Faith. It was a fixed moral code and a fixed theology which robbed the human race of a thousand years by wasting them upon alchemy, heretic-burning , witchcraft and sacerdotalism.

  H. L. Mencken

  Book, Race, Years

  H. L. Mencken (2003). “The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche”, p.57, See Sharp Press

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• I always assumed scientists were free to ask any question, pursue any line of inquiry without fear or reprisal.

  Ben Stein

  Lines, Scientist, Pursue

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• We have an education and business culture that tends to reward quick factual answers over imaginative inquiry. Questioning isn’t encouraged - it is barely tolerated.

  Warren Berger

  Culture, Answers, Rewards

  "The Surprising Power of Beautiful Questions". Interview with Scott Goodson, www.huffingtonpost.com. March 5, 2014.

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• It can scarcely be denied that the fundamental phenomena which first led mankind into chemical inquiries are those of combustion.

  William Crookes

  Fundamentals, Firsts, Chemicals

  Society for Psychical Research (Great Britain), Society for Psychical Research (London, England), Henry Sidgwick, Balfour Stewart, Arthur James Balfour Balfour (Earl of) (1912). “Presidential Addresses to the Society for Psychical Research, 1882-1911”

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