Clouds are not spheres, mountains are not cones, coastlines are not circles, and bark is not smooth, nor does lightning travel in a straight line.
Interpretation
This quote highlights the complexity and irregularity of natural forms contrary to simplistic geometric shapes.
Benoit Mandelbrot emphasizes the idea that the natural world is far more intricate than the simplistic geometric forms we often attribute to it. Instead of being perfectly smooth and uniform, nature exhibits a diverse range of irregularities and complexities that are crucial to its beauty and function, which is captured in the study of fractals.
In practice
In a presentation on environmental science, one might quote this to emphasize the complexity of ecosystems.
The existence of these patterns [fractals] challenges us to study forms that Euclid leaves aside as being formless, to investigate the morphology of the amorphous. Mathematicians have disdained this challenge, however, and have increasingly chosen to flee from nature by devising theories unrelated to anything we can see or feel.
Fractal geometry is not just a chapter of mathematics, but one that helps Everyman to see the same world differently.
Why is geometry often described as cold and dry? One reason lies in its inability to describe the shape of a cloud, a mountain, a coastline or a tree.
I don't think that science is complete at all. We don't understand everything, and one can see, within science itself, there are many inconsistencies. We just have to accept that we don't understand.
When results are shared freely amongst the biological community, as has been done for the worm and the Human Genome Projects, specialist scientists can move much more rapidly towards their goals.
If a sect does officially insist that its structure of belief demands that evolution be false, then no compromise is possible. An honest and competent biology teacher can only conclude that the sect's beliefs are wrong and that its religion is a false one.
Windmills installed around the world converting their direct current into alternating current and feeding the electric energy into the world network can harvest the planet Earth's prime daily energy income source-the wind--and adequately supply all the world's energy needs
Perhaps one day I will go into space.
In these days when science is clearly in the saddle and when our knowledge of disease is advancing at a breathless pace, we are apt to forget that not all can ride and that he also serves who waits and who applies what the horseman discovers.
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