I can measure the motion of bodies but I cannot measure human folly.
Interpretation
Newton acknowledges the limits of scientific measurement in understanding human behavior.
In this quote, Isaac Newton reflects on the distinction between the measurable elements of the physical world and the complexities of human behavior. While he is confident in his ability to quantify the laws of motion, he acknowledges a fundamental limitation in trying to quantify the irrational and unpredictable aspects of human nature, suggesting that folly cannot be accurately measured or categorized like physical laws.
In practice
During a lecture on the limitations of science, one might quote Newton to illustrate the unpredictability of human decisions.
The best and safest way of philosophising seems to be, first to enquire diligently into the properties of things, and to establish those properties by experiences [experiments] and then to proceed slowly to hypotheses for the explanation of them. For hypotheses should be employed only in explaining the properties of things, but not assumed in determining them; unless so far as they may furnish experiments.
Plato is my friend, Aristotle is my friend, but my greatest friend is truth.
His epitaph: Who, by vigor of mind almost divine, the motions and figures of the planets, the paths of comets, and the tides of the seas first demonstrated.
And from true lordship it follows that the true God is living, intelligent, and powerful; from the other perfections, that he is supreme, or supremely perfect. He is eternal and infinite, omnipotent and omniscient; that is, he endures from eternity to eternity; and he is present from infinity to infinity; he rules all things, and he knows all things that happen or can happen.
My Design in this Book is not to explain the Properties of Light by Hypotheses, but to propose and prove them by Reason and Experiments: In order to which, I shall premise the following Definitions and Axioms.
It is the weight, not numbers of experiments that is to be regarded.
Individual liberty depends upon keeping government under control.
The only unbearable thing is that nothing is unbearable.
So the unwanting soul sees what's hidden, and the ever-wanting soul sees only what it wants.
We cannot go back in time and change the past, but we can repent. The Savior can wipe away our tears of regret and remove the burden of our sins. His Atonement allows us to leave the past behind and move forward with clean hands, a pure heart, and a determination to do better and especially to become better.
The best way to make every one poor is to insist on equality of wealth.
Commune with your own heart upon your bed, and be still.
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