There is not much that even the most socially responsible scientists can do as individuals, or even as a group, about the social consequences of their activities.
—Eric Hobsbawm (1917–2012) British Historian
Science can only determine what is, but not what shall be, and beyond its realm, value judgements remain indispensable. Religion, on the other hand, is concerned only with evaluating human thought and actions; it is not qualified to speak of real facts and the relationships between them.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist
The whole history of science has been the gradual realization that events do not happen in an arbitrary manner, but that they reflect a certain underlying order, which may or may not be divinely inspired.
—Stephen Hawking (1942–2018) English Theoretical Physicist, Cosmologist, Academic
Thus will the fondest dream of Phallic science be realized: a pristine new planet populated entirely by little boy clones of great scientific entrepreneurs free to smash atoms, accelerate particles, or, if they are so moved, build pyramids—without any social relevance or human responsibility at all.
—Barbara Ehrenreich (1941–2022) American Social Critic, Essayist
Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure Science.
—Edwin Hubble (1889–1953) American Astronomer
Science is always wrong. It never solves a problem without creating ten more.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
Science is the only truth and it is the great lie. It knows nothing, and people think it knows everything. It is misrepresented. People think that science is electricity, automobilism, and dirigible balloons. It is something very different. It is life devouring itself. It is the sensibility transformed into intelligence. It is the need to know stifling the need to live. It is the genius of knowledge vivisecting the vital genius.
—Remy de Gourmont (1858–1915) French Critic, Novelist
Surely it must be plain that an ingenious man could speculate without end on both sides, and find analogies for all his dreams. Nor does it help me to tell me that the aspirations of mankind
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95) English Biologist
Every great advance in science has issued from a new audacity of imagination.
—John Dewey (1859–1952) American Philosopher, Psychologist, Educator
If anybody says he can think about quantum physics without getting giddy, that only shows he has not understood the first thing about them.
—Niels Bohr (1885–1962) Danish Physicist
Thomas Edison reads not for entertainment but to increase his store of knowledge. He sucks in information as eagerly as the bee sucks honey from flowers. The whole world, so to speak, pours its wisdom into his mind. He regards it as a criminal waste of time to go through the slow and painful ordeal of ascertaining things for one’s self if these same things have already been ascertained and made available by others. In Edison’s mind knowledge is power.
—B. C. Forbes (1880–1954) Scottish-born American Journalist, Publisher
Learning is the dictionary, but sense the grammar of science.
—Laurence Sterne (1713–68) Irish Anglican Novelist, Clergyman
Science is what you know, philosophy what you don’t know.
—Bertrand A. Russell (1872–1970) British Philosopher, Mathematician, Social Critic
Familiar things happen, and mankind does not bother about them. It requires a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious.
—Alfred North Whitehead (1861–1947) English Mathematician, Philosopher
Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one’s living at it.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist
Mathematicians are like Frenchman: whatever you say to them they translate Into their own language, and forthwith it is something entirely different.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
Although it is difficult to pinpoint the physical base or location of awareness, it is perhaps the most precious thing concealed within our brains. And it is something that the individual alone can feel and experience. Each of us cherishes it highly, yet it is private
—The 14th Dalai Lama (b.1935) Tibetan Buddhist Religious Leader, Civil Rights Leader, Philosopher, Author
Science is simply common sense at its best—that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic.
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95) English Biologist
Science has not solved problems, only shifted the points of problems.
—Charles Henry Parkhurst (1842–1933) American Clergyman, Civic Reformer
Observatory: A place where astronomers conjecture away the guesses of their predecessors.
—Ambrose Bierce (1842–1913) American Short-story Writer, Journalist
Religions die when they are proved to be true. Science is the record of dead religions.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
I am acutely aware of the fact that the marriage between mathematics and physics which was so enormously fruitful in past centuries, has recently ended in divorce.
—Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) American Theoretical Physicist, Author
The religion that is afraid of science dishonors God and commits suicide.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
I claim that in losing the spinning wheel we lost our left lung. We are, therefore, suffering from galloping consumption. The restoration of the wheel arrests the progress of the fell disease.
—Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869–1948) Indian Hindu Political leader
Human science is an uncertain guess.
—Matthew Prior (1664–1721) English Poet, Diplomat
Nothing tends so much to the corruption of science as to suffer it to stagnate; these waters must be troubled before they can exert their virtues.
—Edmund Burke (1729–97) British Philosopher, Statesman
Science is what you know. Philosophy is what you don’t know.
—Bertrand A. Russell (1872–1970) British Philosopher, Mathematician, Social Critic
An architect should live as little in cities as a painter. Send him to our hills, and let him study there what nature understands by a buttress, and what by a dome.
—John Ruskin (1819–1900) English Writer, Art Critic
The pace of science forces the pace of technique. Theoretical physics forces atomic energy on us; the successful production of the fission bomb forces upon us the manufacture of the hydrogen bomb. We do not choose our problems, we do not choose our products; we are pushed, we are forced—by what? By a system which has no purpose and goal transcending it, and which makes man its appendix.
—Erich Fromm (1900–80) German-American Psychoanalyst, Social Philosopher
It has been said that science is opposed to, and in conflict with revelation. But the history of the former shows that the greater its progress, and the more accurate its investigations and results, the more plainly it is seen not only not to clash with the latter, but in all things to confirm it. The very sciences from which objections have been brought against religion have, by their own progress, removed those objections, and in the end furnished full confirmation of the inspired Word of God.
—Tryon Edwards American Theologian