Quotes on Philosophy Of Science

If you are only skeptical, then no new ideas make it through to you.

The universe is not only queerer than we suppose; it is queerer than we can suppose

There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.

I know that most men, including those at ease with problems of the greatest complexity, can seldom accept even the simplest and most obvious truth if it be such as would oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions which they have delighted in explaining to colleagues, which they have proudly taught to others, and which they have woven, thread by thread, into the fabric of their lives.

The philosophies of one age have become the absurdities of the next, and the foolishness of yesterday has become the wisdom of tomorrow.

I often say that when you can measure what you are speaking about, and express it in numbers, you know something about it; but when you cannot measure it, when you cannot express it in numbers, your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind.

Zero is powerful because it is infinity’s twin. They are equal and opposite, yin and_x000D_ yang. They are equally paradoxical and troubling. The biggest questions in science_x000D_ and religion are about nothingness and eternity, the void and the infinite, zero and_x000D_ infinity. The clashes over zero were the battles that shook the foundations of philosophy,_x000D_ of science, of mathematics, and of religion. Underneath every revolution lay a_x000D_ zero – and an infinity.

In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.

Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language.

Science is the great antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition.

Philosophy of science without history of science is empty; history of science without philosophy of science is blind.

Philosophy is true mother of the arts [of science].

The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd; indeed in view of the silliness of the majority of mankind, a widely spread belief is more likely to be foolish than sensible.

Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds.