Everything in nature is the result of fixed laws.
Charles DarwinRead
We cannot fathom the marvelous complexity of an organic being; but on the hypothesis here advanced this complexity is much increased. Each living creature must be looked at as a microcosm--a little universe, formed of a host of self-propagating organisms, inconceivably minute and as numerous as the stars in heaven.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the intricate complexity of living organisms, likening them to a universe made up of countless tiny, self-replicating entities.
Charles Darwin reflects on the extraordinary complexity inherent in living creatures, suggesting that each organism can be seen as a small universe, or 'microcosm', populated by an incredible number of microscopic organisms. This perspective highlights the interconnectedness and richness of life at a microbial level, underscoring the idea that every living being is composed of numerous smaller entities working together in harmony.
In practice
In a science class discussing the intricacies of biology.
Everything in nature is the result of fixed laws.
The highest possible stage in moral culture is when we recognize that we ought to control our thoughts.
I am quite conscious that my speculations run beyond the bounds of true science....It is a mere rag of an hypothesis with as many flaw[s] & holes as sound parts.
I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of Natural Selection.
we are always slow in admitting any great change of which we do not see the intermediate steps
I am not the least afraid to die
For many parts of Nature can neither be invented with sufficient subtlety, nor demonstrated with sufficient perspicuity, nor accommodated unto use with sufficient dexterity, without the aid and intervening of the mathematics, of which sort are perspective, music, astronomy, cosmography, architecture, engineery, and divers others.
All the mathematical sciences are founded on relations between physical laws and laws of numbers, so that the aim of exact science is to reduce the problems of nature to the determination of quantities by operations with numbers.
Mathematics is the language with which God has written the universe.
Here I am at the turn of the millennium and I'm still the last man to have walked on the moon, somewhat disappointing. It says more about what we have not done than about what we have done.
If the fate of the universe was decided in a single moment at the instant of the Big Bang , that was the most creative moment of all.
Good science is done by being curious in general, by asking questions all around, by acknowledging the likelihood of being wrong and taking this in good humor for granted, by having a deep fondness for nature, and by being made jumpy and nervous by ignorance.
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