Quotes about the Philosophy of Science
No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.
A scientist must (...) be absolutely like a child. If he sees a thing, he must say that he sees it, whether it was what he thought he was going to see or not. See first, think later, then test. But always see first. Otherwise you will only see what you were expecting.
I hope no one reading this book thinks that "The exception proves the rule" means that if you have an exception, it means the rule is true. That`s just bugnutty. I had it explained to me as "The exception tests the rule." Also not true. The exception does not test the rule - it disproves the rule.
Scientific inquiry shouldn`t stop just because a reasonable explanation has apparently been found.
In the history of science, ever since the famous trial of Galileo, it has repeatedly been claimed that scientific truth cannot be reconciled with the religious interpretation of the world. Although I an now convinced that scientific truth is unassailable in its own field, I have never found it possible to dismiss the content of religious thinking as simply part of an outmoded phase in the consciousness of mankind, a part we shall have to give up from now on, Thus in the course of my life I have repeatedly been compelled to ponder on the relationship of these two regions of though, for I have never been able to doubt the reality of that to which they point.
Abstract thought can anticipate by centuries hypotheses that find a use - or confirmation - in scientific inquiry.
The ability to understand something before it`s observed is at the heart of scientific thinking.
The best grammar for thinking about the world is that of change, not of permanence. Not of being, but of becoming.
The language of experiment is more authoritative than any reasoning: facts can destroy our ratiocination - not vice versa.