science

"Whether in the intellectual pursuits of science or in the mystical pursuits of the spirit, the light beckons ahead, and the purpose surging in our nature responds."

"The important thing is to not stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existence. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery each day.—"Old Man's Advice to Youth: 'Never Lose a Holy Curiosity.'"LIFE Magazine (2 May 1955) p. 64"

"WATNEY: Look! A pair of boobs! -> (.Y.)."

"Everyone has a hidden agenda. Except me!"

"I would remind you to notice where the claim of consensus is invoked. Consensus is invoked only in situations where the science is not solid enough. Nobody says the consensus of scientists agrees that E=mc2. Nobody says the consensus is that the sun is 93 million miles away. It would never occur to anyone to speak that way."

"I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail."

"Before it is science and career, before it is livelihood, before even it is family or love, freedom is sound sleep and safety to notice the play of morning sun."

"Gravity disappears again, and we rise up off the floor like spooks from a grave. It's like the Rapture in here every thirty seconds."

"His work seems to confirm my old axiom: it is useless to try to keep the whole body alive."

"Maybe our favorite quotations say more about us than about the stories and people we're quoting."

"A person who has been punished is not thereby simply less inclined to behave in a given way; at best, he learns how to avoid punishment."

"We have artists with no scientific knowledge and scientists with noartistic knowledge and both with no spiritual sense of gravity at all,and the result is not just bad, it is ghastly."

"En un mot, pour tirer la loi de l'expérience, if faut généraliser; c'est une nécessité qui s'impose à l'observateur le plus circonspect.In one word, to draw the rule from experience, one must generalize; this is a necessity that imposes itself on the most circumspect observer."

"Flowers always make people better, happier, and more helpful; they are sunshine, food and medicine to the mind."

"Those distinct substances, which concretes generally either afford, or are made up of, may, without very much inconvenience, be called the elements or principles of them."

"Pluto will always be a planet in my book. That’s because my book was published before Pluto was blacklisted by planetary scientists."

"To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk."

"[E]xceptional claims demand exceptional evidence."

"It's almost as if each instant is our last and first. We are always dying, and always reborn. And that is living."

"At the end of the universe you’ll find a door labeled “Do Not Enter.” No great mysteries are hidden there—it’s just a supplies closet."