QuoteProject
It is a fraud of the Christian system to call the sciences human invention; it is only the application of them that is human.
Thomas Paine
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Paine argues that science is a natural discovery, while its application is a human endeavor.

In this quote, Thomas Paine emphasizes that the principles of science are inherent in nature and not mere human creations. He suggests that while humans apply scientific knowledge in various contexts, the fundamental truths of science are universal and exist independently of human interpretation or invention.

Themes

ScienceHuman InventionApplicationTruthKnowledge

In practice

Example use cases

In a debate about the role of science in society, one could use this quote to highlight the distinction between the discovery of scientific facts and human application.

More from Thomas Paine

A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.
Thomas PaineRead
That God cannot lie, is no advantage to your argument, because it is no proof that priests can not, or that the Bible does not.
Thomas PaineRead
I consider the war of America against Britain as the country's war, the public's war, or the war of the people in their own behalf, for the security of their natural rights, and the protection of their own property.
Thomas PaineRead
Had the news of salvation by Jesus Christ been inscribed on the face of the sun and the moon, in characters that all nations would have understood, the whole earth had known it in twenty-four hours, and all nations would have believed it; whereas, though it is now almost two thousand years since, as they tell us, Christ came upon earth, not a twentieth part of the people of the earth know anything of it, and among those who do, the wiser part do not believe it.
Thomas PaineRead
The end of all political associations is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man; and these rights are liberty, property, security, and resistance of oppression.
Thomas PaineRead
To reason with goverments, as they have existed for ages, is to argue with brutes. It is only from the nations themselves that reforms can be expected
Thomas PaineRead

Similar quotes

I am a child of God. I always carry that with me.
Maya AngelouRead
Who knows whether, if I had given up smoking, I should really have become the strong perfect man I imagined? Perhaps it was this very doubt that bound me to my vice, because life is so much pleasanter if one is able to believe in one's own latent greatness
Italo SvevoRead
Closure is a greasy little word which, moreover, describes a nonexistent condition. The truth, Venus, is that nobody gets over anything.
Martin AmisRead
The nonconformist here may be "beat down" by life but still has a beauty in his or her longing for freedom and for an awakening of the mind.
William S. BurroughsRead
There is a beautiful transparency to honest disciples who never wear a false face and do not pretend to be anything but who they are.
Brennan ManningRead
I had neither kith nor kin in England, and was therefore as free as air -- or as free as an income of eleven shillings and sixpence a day will permit a man to be. Under such circumstances, I naturally gravitated to London, that great cesspool into which all the loungers and idlers of the Empire are irresistibly drained.
Arthur Conan DoyleRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.