Quotes
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There is not a child in the world, I don’t think, who doesn’t begin as a scientist.
Carl Sagan, Astronomer
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Adopt a critical mind. By itself, it can neither encourage ideas nor stimulate anything great. But without it, everything is useless. It always has the last word.
Louis Pasteur, French microbiologist and chemist
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Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.
Carl Sagan, Astronomer
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Developing safer and more effective drugs is really a matter of when and not if.
Hilary Evans, CEO of Alzheimer’s Research UK
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We are all worms. But I believe that I am a glow-worm.
Winston Churchill, British leader
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…man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but usually manages to pick himself up, walk over or around it, and carry on.
Winston Churchill, British leader
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My own religion has been to do all the good I could to my fellow men, and as little harm as possible.
William Worrall Mayo, M.D.
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The hypotheses we accept ought to explain phenomena which we have observed. But they ought to do more than this: our hypotheses ought to foretell phenomena which have not yet been observed.
William Whewell, British mathematician and philosopher
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Medical science aims at the truth and nothing but the truth.
William J. Mayo, American physician
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It is for the younger people to meet the conditions of their generation in the way that appears to them to be wise and best.
William J. Mayo, American physician
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The ills of today must not cloud the horizons of tomorrow
William J. Mayo, American physician
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… science knows no country.
William J. Mayo, American physician
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Science is the desire to know causes.
William Hazlitt, English essayist
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Whenever truth stands in the mind unaccompanied by the evidence upon which it depends, it cannot properly be said to be apprehended at all.
William Godwin, English political philosopher
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The U.S. is safest when Congress is in recess.
Will Rogers, American cowboy, humorist
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Basic research is what I am doing when I don’t know what I am doing.
Werner Von Braun, German rocket engineer
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A spectacular failure is more important than a mediocre success.
Wayne Quinton, Bioengineering pioneer & entrepreneur
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No effect that requires more than 10 percent accuracy in measurement is worth investigating.
Walther Nernst, German physicist and chemist (Nobel Laureate, 1920)
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Happy is he who gets to know the reasons for things.
Virgil, Roman poet
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There is nothing so powerful, not all the armies in the world, as an idea whose time has come.
Victor Hugo, French poet and novelist (Les Miserables)
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Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the grander view?
Victor Hugo, French poet and novelist (Les Miserables)
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It is foolish to be convinced without evidence, but it is equally foolish to refuse to be convinced by real evidence.
Upton Sinclair, American writer
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It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.
Upton Sinclair, American writer
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I aimed at the public’s heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach.
Upton Sinclair, American writer
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To follow the path that ends AIDS, the world needs to let communities lead.
UNAIDS Executive Director Winnie Byanyima
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In order to make a dent in a public health sense, we must prevent cancer.
Timothy Rebbeck, Harvard Professor
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Botany is the school for patience, and it’s amateurs learn resignation from daily disappointments.
Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President
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Embrace those sciences which give to retired life usefulness, ornament or amusement.
Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President
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Every son of science feels a strong & disinterested desire of promoting it in every part of the earth.
Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President
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The main objects of all science, the freedom and happiness of man. . . . [are] the sole objects of all legitimate government.
Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President
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The ocean – like the air, is the common birth -right of mankind.
Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President
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The more ignorant we become the less value we set on science, and the less inclination we shall have to seek it.
Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President
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Freedom, the first-born of science.
Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President
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I was bold in the pursuit of knowledge, never fearing to follow truth and reason to whatever results they led.
Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President
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Reason and free inquiry are the only effectual agents against error.
Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President
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Science is the knowledge of consequences, and dependence of one fact upon another.
Thomas Hobbes, English philosopher and author
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The great tragedy of Science – the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.
Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist
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Every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority.
Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist
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Science commits suicide when it adopts a creed.
Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist
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Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one’s living at it.
Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist
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Great scientific discoveries have been made by men seeking to verify quite erroneous theories about the nature of things.
Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist
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The man of science has learned to believe in justification, not by faith, but by verification.
Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist
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Science is nothing but trained and organized common sense…
Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist
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Science is simply common sense at its best that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic.
Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist
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The great tragedy of Science – the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.
Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist
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Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.
Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist
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This world, after all our science and sciences, is still a miracle; wonderful, inscrutable, magical and more, to whosoever will think of it.
Thomas Carlyle, Scottish historian
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Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.
Thomas Alva Edison, U. S. inventor
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There ain’t no rules around here! We’re trying to accomplish something!
Thomas Alva Edison, U. S. inventor
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In Science the credit goes to the man who convinces the world, not to the man to whom the idea first occurred.
Sir William Osler, Canadian physician
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The important thing in science is not so much to obtain new facts as to discover new ways of thinking about them.
Sir William Bragg (Nobel Laureate 1915)
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If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants.
Sir Isaac Newton, English physicist and mathematician
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I do not know what I may appear to the world; but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.
Sir Isaac Newton, English physicist and mathematician
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In science credit goes to the man who convinces the world, not the man to whom the idea first occurs.
Sir Francis Galton, Statistician
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Science is an imaginative adventure of the mind seeking truth in a world of mystery.
Sir Cyril Herman Hinshelwood, English chemist (Nobel Laureate 1956)
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Innocence about Science is the worst crime today.
Sir Charles Percy Snow, English novelist and scientist
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Not only is the universe stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine.
Sir Arthur Eddington, English astronomer
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It is impossible to trap modern physics into predicting anything with perfect determinism because it deals with probabilities from the outset.
Sir Arthur Eddington, English astronomer
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Science is one thing, wisdom is another. Science is an edged tool, with which men play like children, and cut their own fingers.
Sir Arthur Eddington, English astronomer
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It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories instead of theories to suit facts.
Sherlock Holmes, fictional creation of Arthur Conan Doyle, British physician and novelist
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Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind.
Rudyard Kipling, English novelist and journalist
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The strongest arguments prove nothing so long as the conclusions are not verified by experience. Experimental science is the queen of sciences and the goal of all speculation.
Roger Bacon, English philosopher and scientist
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Most institutions demand unqualified faith; but the institution of science makes skepticism a virtue.
Robert K. Merton, Social Theorist
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It’s not enough what I did in the past – there is also the future.
Rita Levi-Montalcini (Nobel Laureate, 1986)
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I tell young people: Do not think of yourself, think of others. Think of the future that awaits you, think about what you can do and do not fear anything.
Rita Levi-Montalcini (Nobel Laureate, 1986)
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Above all, don’t fear difficult moments. The best comes from them.
Rita Levi-Montalcini (Nobel Laureate, 1986)
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Religion is a culture of faith; science is a culture of doubt.
Richard Feynman, Physicist
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The wonderful thing about science is that it’s alive.
Richard Feynman, Physicist
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What I cannot create, I do not understand.
Richard Feynman, Physicist
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Natural selection is anything but random.
Richard Dawkins
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Science is practical philosophy.
Ren� Descartes, French philosopher and mathematician
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Everything in nature contains all the power of nature. Everything is made of one hidden stuff.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Philosopher
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The religion that is afraid of science dishonors God and commits suicide.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Philosopher
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Men love to wonder, and that is the seed of science.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Philosopher
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Science is a series of judgements, revised without ceasing.
Pierre Emile Duclaux, French biochemist and bacteriologist
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The beginning of wisdom is found in doubting; by doubting we come to the question, and by seeking we may come upon the truth.
Pierre Abelard, French philosopher and theologian
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… the scientist would maintain that knowledge in of itself is wholly good, and that there should be and are methods of dealing with misuses of knowledge by the ruffian or the bully other than by suppressing the knowledge.
Percy Williams Bridgman, U.S. physicist (Nobel Laureate,1946)
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There is no adequate defense, except stupidity, against the impact of a new idea.
Percy Williams Bridgman, U.S. physicist (Nobel Laureate,1946)
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Science is the record of dead religions.
Oscar Wilde, Irish writer
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A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.
Oscar Wilde, Irish writer
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Science is piecemeal revelation.
Oliver Wendell Holmes I, U.S. poet, essayist and physician
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Shall I refuse my dinner because I do not fully understand the process of digestion?
Oliver Heaviside, English physicist
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As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise, human science is at a loss.
Noam Chomsky, Professor of linguistics, University of Arizona
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Those who are not shocked when they first come across quantum mechanics cannot possibly have understood it.
Niels Henrik David Bohr, Danish physicist
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All we know of the truth is that the absolute truth, such as it is, is beyond our reach.
Nicholas of Cusa, German cardinal, mathematician and philosopher
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Science is not a boy’s game, it’s not a girl’s game. It’s everyone’s game. It’s about where we are and where we’re going.
Nichelle Nichols, former NASA Ambassador and actress
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Could one person really make a difference?
Nancy Brinker, sister of Susan G. Komen, and founder of the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation
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One thing that makes the adventure of working in our field particularly rewarding, especially in attempting to improve the theory, is that… a chief criterion for the selection of a correct hypothesis… seems to be the criterion of beauty, simplicity, or elegance.
Murray Gell-Mann, U.S. Physicist (Nobel Prize, 1969)
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True science teaches, above all, to doubt and be ignorant.
Miguel de Unamuno, Spanish philosopher
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It is only certain that there is nothing certain, and that nothing is more miserable or more proud than man.
Michel de Montaigne, French philosopher
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A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.
Max Planck, German physicist (Nobel Laureate, 1918)
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An experiment is a question which science poses to Nature, and a measurement is the recording of Nature’s answer.
Max Planck, German physicist (Nobel Laureate, 1918)
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It is not the possession of truth, but the success which attends the seeking after it, that enriches the seeker and brings happiness to him.
Max Planck, German physicist (Nobel Laureate, 1918)
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Technology is the knack of so arranging the world that we do not experience it.
Max Frisch, German novelist
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I believe there is no philosophical high-road in science, with epistemological signposts. No, we are in a jungle and find our way by trial and error, building our road behind us as we proceed.
Max Born, German Physicist (Nobel Laureate, 1954)
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Goddamnit, science has to produce something useful. That’s the payback to society for support of the enterprise.
Maurice Hilleman, American microbiologist
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We are extraordinarily fortunate to be living in this era of exciting discoveries and rapid scientific advancements in human genetics. There has not been a more exciting time to be involved in the genetics field since Gregor Mendel counted smooth and wrinkled peas and Charles Darwin tended finches.
Mary-Claire King, Ph.D., American geneticist
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Hain’t we got all the fools in town on our side? And hain’t that a big enough majority in any town?
Mark Twain, American writer
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The man who doesn’t read good books has no advantage over the man who can’t read them.
Mark Twain, American writer
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It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.
Mark Twain, American writer
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It is better to deserve honors and not have them than to have them and not to deserve them.
Mark Twain, American writer
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Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please.
Mark Twain, American writer
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Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities. Truth isn’t.
Mark Twain, American writer
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Facts are stubborn things, but statistics are more pliable.
Mark Twain, American writer
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Education: that which reveals to the wise, and conceals from the stupid, the vast limits of their knowledge.
Mark Twain, American writer
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Don’t part with your illusions. When they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.
Mark Twain, American writer
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Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear – not absence of fear.
Mark Twain, American writer
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Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint.
Mark Twain, American writer
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Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest.
Mark Twain, American writer
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You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.
Mark Twain, American writer
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There are sadistic scientists who hurry to hunt down errors instead of establishing the truth.
Marie Curie, French chemist and physicist
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Some of the most fun people I know are scientists.
Mae C. Jemison, NASA
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I know if the vaccines being tested give us positive results, I will consider myself, other participants, and scientists as the heroes of this century.
Luwano Geofrey, clinical trial participant in Masaka, Uganda
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Chance favors the prepared mind.
Louis Pasteur, French microbiologist and chemist
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Science knows no country, because knowledge belongs to humanity, and is the torch which illuminates the world. Science is the highest personification of the nation because that nation will remain the first which carries the furthest the works of thought and intelligence.
Louis Pasteur, French microbiologist and chemist
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There are no such things as applied sciences, only applications of science.
Louis Pasteur, French microbiologist and chemist
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Only in America could the son of an uneducated carpenter receive the Nobel Prize in Medicine.
Louis J. Ignarro, American pharmacologist
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Science is the search for truth, that is the effort to understand the world: it involves the rejection of bias, of dogma, of revelation, but not the rejection of morality.
Linus Pauling (Nobel Laureate, 1954 & 1962)
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Every aspect of the world today – even politics and international relations – is affected by chemistry.
Linus Pauling (Nobel Laureate, 1954 & 1962)
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Optimum nutrition is the medicine of tomorrow.
Linus Pauling (Nobel Laureate, 1954 & 1962)
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The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas.
Linus Pauling (Nobel Laureate, 1954 & 1962)
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Life is a relationship among molecules and not a property of any molecule.
Linus Pauling (Nobel Laureate, 1954 & 1962)
![The main objects of all science, the freedom and happiness of man. . . . [are] the sole objects of all legitimate government.](https://lifesciencehistory.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/jefferson_thomas_portrait_thomas_sully-768x768.jpg)
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"We know nothing in reality; for truth lies in an abyss."
~ Democritus, Greek philosopher
(c. 420 BCE)