Scientist Quotes - Page 6

• A discussion between Haldane and a friend began to take a predictable turn. The friend said with a sigh, 'It's no use going on. I know what you will say next, and I know what you will do next.' The distinguished scientist promptly sat down on the floor, turned two back somersaults, and returned to his seat. 'There,' he said with a smile. 'That's to prove that you're not always right.'

  John B. S. Haldane

  Science, Two, Use

  7 Copy quote

• Common sense is not something rigid and stationary, but is in continuous transformation, becoming enriched with scientific notions and philosophical opinions that have entered into common circulation. 'Common sense' is the folklore of philosophy and always stands midway between folklore proper (folklore as it is normally understood) and the philosophy, science, and economics of the scientists. Common sense creates the folklore of the future, a relatively rigidified phase of popular knowledge in a given time and place.

  Antonio Gramsci

  Philosophy, Philosophical, Common Sense

  104 Copy quote

• A system such as classical mechanics may be 'scientific' to any degree you like; but those who uphold it dogmatically - believing, perhaps, that it is their business to defend such a successful system against criticism as long as it is not conclusively disproved - are adopting the very reverse of that critical attitude which in my view is the proper one for the scientist.

  Karl Popper

  Attitude, Believe, Successful

  Karl Popper (2005). “The Logic of Scientific Discovery”, p.28, Routledge

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• A hundred years ago, Auguste Compte, ... a great philosopher, said that humans will never be able to visit the stars, that we will never know what stars are made out of, that that's the one thing that science will never ever understand, because they're so far away. And then, just a few years later, scientists took starlight, ran it through a prism, looked at the rainbow coming from the starlight, and said: "Hydrogen!" Just a few years after this very rational, very reasonable, very scientific prediction was made, that we'll never know what stars are made of.

  Michio Kaku

  Stars, Science, Years

  11 Copy quote

• [When questioned on his longevity] First of all, I selected my ancestors very wisely. ... They were long-lived, healthy people. Then, as a chemist, I know how to eat, how to exercise, keep my blood circulating. ... I don't worry. I don't get angry at people. I don't worry about things I can't help. I do what I can to make the world a better place to live, but I don't complain if things aren't right. As a scientist I take the world as I find it.

  Joel Henry Hildebrand

  Wisdom, Exercise, Science

  52 Copy quote

• After reading a paper by a young theoretical scientist, Pauli, shaking his head sadly, commented:
  That is not even wrong.

  Wolfgang Pauli

  Reading, Science, Paper

  7 Copy quote

• A man who says that men are machines may be a great scientist. A man who says he is a machine is 'depersonalized' in psychiatric jargon.

  R. D. Laing

  Men, Machines, Body

  4 Copy quote

• As a scientist, I can not help feeling that all religions are on a tottering foundation. None is perfect or inspired.The idea that a good God would send people to a burning hell is utterly damnable to me. I don't want to have anything to do with such a God.

  Luther Burbank

  Ideas, People, Perfect

  7 Copy quote

• Are science and religion converging? No. There are modern scientists whose words sound religious but whose beliefs, on close examination, turn out to be identical to those of other scientists who straightforwardly call themselves atheists.

  Richard Dawkins

  Religious, Atheist, Atheism

  Richard Dawkins (2004). “A Devil's Chaplain: Reflections on Hope, Lies, Science, and Love”, p.146, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

  7 Copy quote

  Show source
• 

  Science is the engine of prosperity. But you'd never know it, listening to some of the politicians. They're lawyers and businessmen, not scientists. Lawyers and businessmen massage wealth; they don't create it.

  Michio Kaku

  Listening, Massage, Lawyer

  Interview with Jason Heller, www.avclub.com. April 9, 2009.

  94 Copy quote

  Show source

• We are pantheists as natural scientists, polytheists as poets, and monotheists as moral beings.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Moral, Poet, Natural

  6 Copy quote

• That there is an evolution of one sort or another is now common ground among scientists. Whether or not that evolution is directed is another question.

  Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

  Science, Common, Evolution

  26 Copy quote

• Don't be a writer. Writing is an escape from something. You be a scientist.

  Sinclair Lewis

  Writing

  4 Copy quote

• When it comes to scientific matters the ready talkers simply run riot. There are a lot of pseudo-scientists who with a little technical jargon to spatter through their talk are always getting in the limelight... The less they know the surer they are about it.

  Charles Proteus Steinmetz

  Running, Jargon, Littles

  "ELECTRICITY WILL KEEP THE WORLD FROM FREEZING UP; Noted Expert, Dr. C.P. Steinmetz, Talks of the Future Wonders of Scientific Discovery and Ridicules Many Prophecies". The New York Times Interview, www.nytimes.com. November 12, 1911.

  12 Copy quote

  Show source

• Dissent is the mark of freedom, as originality is the mark of independence of mind. … No one can be a scientist … if he does not have independence of observation and of thought.

  Jacob Bronowski

  Independence, Mind, Doe

  4 Copy quote

• Scientists are skeptics. It's unfortunate that the word 'skeptic' has taken on other connotations in the culture involving nihilism and cynicism. Really, in its pure and original meaning, it's just thoughtful inquiry.

  Unknown

  Taken, Thoughtful, Nihilism

  5 Copy quote

• Science is but an image of the truth.

  Francis Bacon

  Truth, Science

  10 Copy quote

• My point is that perceptual bias can affect nut jobs and scientists alike. If we hold too rigidly to what we think we know, we ignore or avoid evidence of anything that might change our mind.

  Martha Beck

  Jobs, Thinking, Nuts

  "Secret to finding unexpected miracles" by Martha Beck, www.cnn.com. November 30, 2010.

  13 Copy quote

  Show source

• Dissent is the native activity of the scientist, and it has got him into a good deal of trouble in the last years. But if that is cut off, what is left will not be a scientist. And I doubt whether it will be a man.

  Jacob Bronowski

  Cutting, Science, Men

  1953 'The Sense of Human Dignity', lecture at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 19 Mar.

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• There's absolutely no reason at all that physicians, scientists, shouldn't be involved in things that affect all of us.

  Benjamin Carson

  Physicians, Reason, Involved

  4 Copy quote

• There are sadistic scientists who hurry to hunt down errors instead of establishing the truth.

  Marie Curie

  Truth, Science, Hunting

  "The Commodity Trader's Almanac 2007". Book by Scott W. Barrie and Jeffrey A. Hirsch, November 6, 2006.

  32 Copy quote

  Show source

• We're highly social animals - I'm told by scientists that what makes us different from other animals is an acute social awareness, which is what has made us so successful.

  Alan Alda

  Successful, Animal, Different

  "In Love With Marie" by Alan Alda, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 31, 2011.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Life with a scientist who is often changing jobs and is frequently away at meetings and on lecture tours is not easy. Without a secure home base, I could not have made much progress.

  John Pople

  Jobs, Home, Progress

  7 Copy quote

• I had changed from being a mathematician to a practicing scientist. I was increasingly embarassed that I could no longer follow some of the more modern branches of pure mathematics.

  John Pople

  Branches, Modern, Mathematics

  7 Copy quote

• A scientist describes what is. An engineer creates what never was.

  Theodore von Karman

  Engineers

  21 Copy quote