Isolated facts and experiments have in themselves no value, however great their number may be. They only become valuable in a theoretical or practical point of view when they make us acquainted with the law of a series of uniformly recurring phenomena, or, it may be, only give a negative result showing an incompleteness in our knowledge of such a law, till then held to be perfect.
Interpretation
Facts and experiments gain value only when they reveal consistent patterns or highlight gaps in our understanding.
This quote by Hermann Von Helmholtz emphasizes the importance of synthesizing individual facts and experiments into a broader understanding of the underlying laws of nature. Merely accumulating data without context does not advance knowledge; rather, it is the connection of these facts into a coherent theory that gives them significance, whether by demonstrating consistent phenomena or revealing our ignorance of existing laws.
In practice
In a science class discussing the importance of applying theory to experiments.
The total quantity of all the forces capable of work in the whole universe remains eternal and unchanged throughout all their changes. All change in nature amounts to this, that force can change its form and locality, without its quantity being changed. The universe possesses, once for all, a store of force which is not altered by any change of phenomena, can neither be increased nor diminished, and which maintains any change which takes place on it.
Black is real sensation, even if it is produced by entire absence of light. The sensation of black is distinctly different from the lack of all sensations.
Whoever, in the pursuit of science, seeks after immediate practical utility, may generally rest assured that he will seek in vain.
Just as computer technology and the Internet created whole new industries and extraordinary benefits for people that extend into almost every realm of human endeavor from education to transportation to medicine, genetics will undoubtedly benefit people everywhere in ways we can't even imagine but know will surely occur.
Science fiction frees you to go anyplace and examine anything.
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.
When you look at the calculation, it's amazing that every time you try to prove or disprove time travel, you've pushed Einstein's theory to the very limits where quantum effects must dominate. That's telling us that you really need a theory of everything to resolve this question. And the only candidate is string theory.
Now, a living organism is nothing but a wonderful machine endowed with the most marvellous properties and set going by means of the most complex and delicate mechanism.
People make their own fates, and if enough of us make our fate to be space explorers, perhaps we can actually get some space exploration done.
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