Theory Quotes - Page 26

• The most dangerous tendency of the modern world is the way in which bogus theories are given the force of dogma.

  Jean Danielou

  Science, World, Way

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• The theory of probabilities is basically only common sense reduced to a calculus. It makes one estimate accurately what right-minded people feel by a sort of instinct, often without being able to give a reason for it.

  Pierre-Simon Laplace

  Science, People, Common Sense

  Pierre-Simon Laplace (2012). “Pierre-Simon Laplace Philosophical Essay on Probabilities: Translated from the fifth French edition of 1825 With Notes by the Translator”, p.124, Springer Science & Business Media

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• There is no such thing as absolute truth and absolute falsehood. The scientific mind should never recognise the perfect truth or the perfect falsehood of any supposed theory or observation. It should carefully weigh the chances of truth and error and grade each in its proper position along the line joining absolute truth and absolute error.

  Henry Augustus Rowland

  Science, Errors, Perfect

  Henry Augustus Rowland (1902). “The physical papers of Henry Augustus Rowland ...: John Hopkins University, 1876-1901”

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• This incomparable Author having at length been prevailed upon to appear in public, has in this Treatise given a most notable instance of the extent of the powers of the Mind; and has at once shown what are the Principles of Natural Philosophy, and so far derived from them their consequences, that he seems to have exhausted his Argument, and left little to be done by those that shall succeed him.a

  Edmond Halley

  Philosophy, Science, Mind

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• This theory [the oxygen theory] is not as I have heard it described, that of the French chemists, it is mine (elle est la mienne); it is a property which I claim from my contemporaries and from posterity.

  Antoine Lavoisier

  Science, Oxygen, Biographies

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• Traditional dinosaur theory is full of short circuits. Like the antiquated wiring in an old house, the details sputter and burn out when specific parts are tested.

  Robert T. Bakker

  Science, House, Details

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• Twenty years ago many chemists would have defended the theory of bond arms as a satisfactory explanation because they had become accustomed to thinking of it as unique and as ultimate.

  Henry Margenau

  Science, Unique, Thinking

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• Until now, physical theories have been regarded as merely models with approximately describe the reality of nature. As the models improve, so the fit between theory and reality gets closer. Some physicists are now claiming that supergravity is the reality, that the model and the real world are in mathematically perfect accord.

  Paul Davies

  Nature, Real, Science

  Paul Davies (1985). “Superforce”, p.149, Simon and Schuster

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• Who ... is not familiar with Maxwell's memoirs on his dynamical theory of gases? ... from one side enter the equations of state; from the other side, the equations of motion in a central field. Ever higher soars the chaos of formulae. Suddenly we hear, as from kettle drums, the four beats 'put n=5.' The evil spirit v vanishes; and ... that which had seemed insuperable has been overcome as if by a stroke of magic ... One result after another follows in quick succession till at last ... we arrive at the conditions for thermal equilibrium together with expressions for the transport coefficients.

  Ludwig Boltzmann

  Science, Expression, Evil

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• Wallace's sales agent, back in London, heard mutterings from some naturalists that young Mr. Wallace ought to quit theorizing and stick to gathering facts. Besides expressing their condescension toward him in particular, that criticism also reflected a common attitude that fact-gathering, not theory, was the proper business of all naturalists.

  David Quammen

  Attitude, Criticism, Gathering

  David Quammen (1996). “The Song of the Dodo: Island Biogeography in an Age of Extinctions”, Vintage

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• [The infinitely small] neither have nor can have theory; it is a dangerous instrument in the hands of beginners [ ... ] anticipating, for my part, the judgement of posterity, I would dare predict that this method will be accused one day, and rightly, of having retarded the progress of the mathematical sciences.

  Francois-Joseph Servois

  Science, Hands, Judgement

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• [Theory is] an explanation that has been confirmed to such a degree, by observation and experiment, that knowledgeable experts accept it as fact. That's what scientists mean when they talk about a theory: not a dreamy and unreliable speculation, but an explanatory statement that fits the evidence. They embrace such an explanation confidently but provisionally - taking it as their best available view of reality, at least unil some severely conflicting data or some better explanation might come along.

  David Quammen

  Mean, Reality, Views

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• A mere inference or theory must give way to a truth revealed; but a scientific truth must be maintained, however contradictory it may appear to the most cherished doctrines of religion.

  David Brewster

  Truth, Giving, Doctrine

  David Brewster (1854). “More Worlds Than One: The Creed of the Philosopher and the Hope of the Christian”, p.138

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• It is clear, then, that the idea of a fixed method, or of a fixed theory of rationality, rests on too naive a view of man and his social surroundings. To those who look at the rich material provided by history, and who are not intent on impoverishing it in order to please their lower instincts, their craving for intellectual security in the form of clarity, precision, "objectivity," "truth," it will become clear that there is only one principle that can be defended under all circumstances and in all stages of human development. It is the principle: anything goes.

  Paul Feyerabend

  Truth, Science, Men

  "Against Method". Book by Paul Feyerabend, 1975.

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• Science gains from it [the pendulum] more than one can expect. With its huge dimensions, the apparatus presents qualities that one would try in vain to communicate by constructing it on a small [scale], no matter how carefully. Already the regularity of its motion promises the most conclusive results. One collects numbers that, compared with the predictions of theory, permit one to appreciate how far the true pendulum approximates or differs from the abstract system called 'the simple pendulum'.

  Leon Foucault

  Science, Simple, Numbers

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• This success permits us to hope that after thirty or forty years of observation on the new Planet [Neptune], we may employ it, in its turn, for the discovery of the one following it in its order of distances from the Sun. Thus, at least, we should unhappily soon fall among bodies invisible by reason of their immense distance, but whose orbits might yet be traced in a succession of ages, with the greatest exactness, by the theory of Secular Inequalities.

  Urbain Le Verrier

  Distance, Fall, Science

  "The Planet Neptune: An Exposition and History". Book by John Pringle Nichol, 1848.

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• An announcement of [Christopher] Zeeman's lecture at Northwestern University in the spring of 1977 contains a quote describing catastrophe theory as the most important development in mathematics since the invention of calculus 300 years ago.

  Stephen Smale

  Spring, Science, Years

  Stephen Smale, Roderick Wong (2000). “The Collected Papers of Stephen Smale”, p.814, World Scientific

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• Christ is indispensable to any scientific theory, even if its practitioners do not have a clue about him.

  William A. Dembski

  Religion, Atheism, Clue

  "Intelligent Design: The Bridge Between Science & Theology". Book by William A. Dembski, 2002.

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• You cannot coherently affirm the Christian-truth claim and the dominant model of evolutionary theory at the same time.

  Albert Mohler

  Christian, Religion, Atheism

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• The theory of natural selection is the centerpiece of The Origin of Species and of evolutionary theory. It is this theory that accounts for the adaptations of organisms, those innumerable features that so wonderfully equip them for survival and reproduction; it is this theory that accounts for the divergence of species from common ancestors and thus for the endless diversity of life. Natural selection is a simple concept, but it is perhaps the most important idea in biology.

  Douglas J. Futuyma

  Simple, Ideas, Diversity

  Douglas J. Futuyma (2009). “Evolution”, Sinauer Associates Incorporated

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• I think the fault is more with historicists who have stubbornly failed to develop a good theory of historicity. By simply resting on the feeble laurels of prima facie plausibility ('Jesus existed because everyone said so') and subjective notions of absurdity ('I can't believe Jesus didn't exist!'), the existence of Jesus has largely been taken for granted, even by competent historians who explicitly try to argue for it.

  Earl Doherty

  Jesus, Believe, Taken

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• As soon as we notice that certain types of events 'like' to cluster together at certain times, we begin to understand the Chinese, whose theories of medicine, philosophy, and even building are based on a 'science' of meaningful coincidences.

  Marie-Louise von Franz

  Meaningful, Philosophy, Destiny

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• To look for a single general theory of how to decide the right thing to do is like looking for a single theory of how to decide what to believe.

  Thomas Nagel

  Believe, Psychology, Looks

  Thomas Nagel (1991). “Mortal Questions : Canto”, p.135, Cambridge University Press

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• A theory of motivation is defective if it renders intelligible behaviour which is not intelligible.

  Thomas Nagel

  Motivation, Psychology, Behaviour

  Thomas Nagel (2016). “The Possibility of Altruism”, p.34, Princeton University Press

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• Only a tiny fraction of corpses fossilize, and we are lucky to have as many intermediate fossils as we do. We could easily have had no fossils at all, and still the evidence for evolution from other sources, such as molecular genetics and geographical distribution, would be overwhelmingly strong. On the other hand, evolution makes the strong prediction that if a single fossil turned up in the wrong geological stratum, the theory would be blown out of the water.

  Richard Dawkins

  Strong, Hands, Water

  Richard Dawkins (2008). “The God Delusion”, p.154, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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