To test a perfect theory with imperfect instruments did not impress the Greek philosophers as a valid way to gain knowledge.
Interpretation
The pursuit of knowledge should be done with the right tools, or the results may be flawed.
Isaac Asimov highlights the fundamental issue of relying on inadequate methods or instruments when attempting to validate a theory. The Greek philosophers valued precision in their quest for knowledge, suggesting that to derive accurate understanding, one must employ appropriate and effective means of investigation.
In practice
This quote can be used in a lecture about scientific methods in research.
Democracy cannot survive overpopulation. Human dignity cannot survive it. Convenience and decency cannot survive it. As you put more and more people into the world, the value of life not only declines, but it disappears. It doesn't matter if someone dies.
Science does not promise absolute truth, nor does it consider that such a thing necessarily exists. Science does not even promise that everything in the Universe is amenable to the scientific process.
Democracy cannot survive overpopulation.
Although the time of death is approaching me, I am not afraid of dying and going to Hell or (what would be considerably worse) going to the popularized version of Heaven. I expect death to be nothingness and, for removing me from all possible fears of death, I am thankful to atheism.
A subtle thought that is in error may yet give rise to fruitful inquiry that can establish truths of great value.
During the century after Newton, it was still possible for a man of unusual attainments to master all fields of scientific knowledge. But by 1800, this had become entirely impracticable.
Proposition one: time is a man, space is a woman.
Jesus is much more concerned about shaking your foundations, giving you an utterly alternative self image, world image, and God image, and thus reframing your entire reality. Mere inspiration can never do this.
It is one of the consolations of philosophy that the benefit of showing how to dispense with a concept does not hinge on dispensing with it.
My future is in my past and my past is my present. I must now make the present my future.
A belief is only a thought you continue to think. A belief is nothing more than a chronic pattern of thought, and you have the ability - if you try even a little bit - to begin a new pattern, to tell a new story, to achieve a different vibration, to change your point of attraction.
Christ calls us to carry the Cross; churches call us to have fun in His name.
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