When asked what kind of grad student Lynn Marulis takes: ‘I never take a straight A student. A real scientist tends to be critical, and somewhere along the line, they had to rebel against their...

I have learned to have more trust in the scientist than he does in himself.

The scientist is a lover of truth for the very love of truth itself, wherever it may lead.

This theory [the oxygen theory] is not as I have heard it described, that of the French chemists, it is mine (elle est la mienne); it is a property which I claim from my contemporaries...

Evolution on the large scale unfolds, like much of human history, as a succession of dynasties.

I should like to preface my remarks with a personal statement in order that my later remarks will not be misunderstood. I consider myself an atheist.

The alchemists of past centuries tried hard to make the elixir of life: … Those efforts were in vain; it is not in our power to obtain the experiences and the views of the future...

Mathematics is much more than a language for dealing with the physical world. It is a source of models and abstractions which will enable us to obtain amazing new insights into the way in which...

If a problem is clearly stated, it has no further interest to the physicist.

Professor [John] Tyndall once said the finest inspiration he ever received was from an old man who could scarcely read. This man acted as his servant. Each morning the old man would knock on the...

The scientific man does not aim at an immediate result. He does not expect that his advanced ideas will be readily taken up. His work is like that of the planter—for the future. His duty...

The genius of a great magician is as impressive as the genius of a great scientist.

You make experiments and I make theories. Do you know the difference? A theory is something nobody believes, except the person who made it. An experiment is something everybody believes, except the person who made...

Consistent with the liberal views of the Enlightenment, Leibniz was an optimist with respect to human reasoning and scientific progress. Although he was a great reader and admirer of Spinoza, Leibniz, being a confirmed deist,...

Every scientist is a descendant of Humboldt. We are all his family.

What makes me different as a scientist is that I’m kind of imaginative. The ideas just happen.

He [Alexander von Humboldt] was to science what Shakespeare was to the drama.

A common fallacy in much of the adverse criticism to which science is subjected today is that it claims certainty, infallibility and complete emotional objectivity. It would be more nearly true to say that it...

In Italy the artist is a god. Now if the artist is a god, the scientist is likewise a god.

Be brave. Be free from philosophies, prophets and holy lies. Go deep into your feelings and explore the mystery of your body, mind and soul. You will find the truth.

It is a matter for considerable regret that Fermat, who cultivated the theory of numbers with so much success, did not leave us with the proofs of the theorems he discovered. In truth, Messrs Euler...

And when statesmen or others worry him [the scientist] too much, then he should leave with his possessions. With a firm and steadfast mind one should hold under all conditions, that everywhere the earth is...

As science is more and more subject to grave misuse as well as to use for human benefit it has also become the scientist’s responsibility to become aware of the social relations and applications of...

Science makes people reach selflessly for truth and objectivity; it teaches people to accept reality, with wonder and admiration, not to mention the deep awe and joy that the natural order of things brings to...

I consider him [Alexander von Humboldt] the most important scientist whom I have met.

Le savant doit ordonner ; on fait la science avec des faits comme une maison avec des pierres ; mais une accumulation de faits n’est pas plus une science qu’un tas de pierres n’est une...

[On Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz]The answer is unknowable, but it may not be unreasonable to see him, at least in theological terms, as essentially a deist. He is a determinist: there are no miracles (the events...

The scientist believes in proof without certainty, the bigot in certainty without proof.

A body of work such as Pasteur’s is inconceivable in our time: no man would be given a chance to create a whole science. Nowadays a path is scarcely opened up when the crowd begins...

I believe it to be of particular importance that the scientist have an articulate and adequate social philosophy, even more important than the average man should have a philosophy. For there are certain aspects of...

Conor, I could search the world for another swashbuckling scientist, but I doubt if I would find one like you.

A scientist doesn’t know all the answers. Nobody does, not even teachers. But a scientist keeps on trying to find the answers.

Theories cannot claim to be indestructible. They are only the plough which the ploughman uses to draw his furrow and which he has every right to discard for another one, of improved design, after the...

I notice that, in the lecture … which Prof. Lowry gave recently, in Paris … he brought forward certain freak formulae for tartaric acid, in which hydrogen figures as bigamist … I may say, he...

I cannot give any scientist of any age better advice than this: the intensity of the conviction that a hypothesis is true has no bearing on whether it is true or not.

The creatures I seek do not want to be seen.

On tue un homme, on est un assassin. On tue des millions d’hommes, on est un conquérant. On les tue tous, on est un dieu.Kill a man, and you are a murderer. Kill millions of...

I wanted to be a scientist. I did a thesis on lions. But I realised photography can show things writing can’t. Lions were my professor of photography.

He who thinks half-heartedly will not believe in God; but he who really thinks has to believe in God.

In 1902, Marcellin P. Berthelot, often called the founder of modern organic chemistry, was one of France’s most celebrated scientists—if not the world’s. He was permanent secretary of the French Academy, having succeeded the giant...

The perfect being, huh? There is no such thing as perfect in this world. That may sound cliché, but it’s the truth. The average person admires perfection and seeks to obtain it. But, what’s the...

This man [Alexander von Humboldt] is as knowledgeable as a whole academy.

I often asked Laplace what he thought of God. He owned that he was an atheist.

Not only in antiquity but in our own times also laws have been passed…to secure good conditions for workers; so it is right that the art of medicine should contribute its portion for the benefit...

The theist and the scientist are rival interpreters of nature, the one retreats as the other advances.

Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy laws my services are bound…{His second motto, from King Lear by Shakespeare}

It is well known that geometry presupposes not only the concept of space but also the first fundamental notions for constructions in space as given in advance. It only gives nominal definitions for them, while...

There is no branch of mathematics, however abstract, which may not some day be applied to phenomena of the real world.

The mind likes a strange idea as little as the body likes a strange protein and resists it with similar energy. It would not perhaps be too fanciful to say that a new idea is...

In the last four days I have got the (results) given by Tantalum, Chromium, Manganese, Iron , Nickel, Cobalt and Copper … The chief result is that … the result for any metal (is) quite...