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“If the world were to end tomorrow and we could choose to save only one thing as the explanation and memorial to who we were, then we couldn't do better than the Natural History Museum, although it wouldn't contain a single human. The systematic Linnean order, the vast inquisitiveness and range of collated knowledge and beauty would tell all that is the best of us.”
Source : A.A. Gill (2008). “Previous Convictions: Assignments from Here and There”, p.80, Simon and Schuster
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“I value science--none can prize it more, It gives ten thousand motives to adore: Be it religious, as it ought to be, The heart it humbles, and it bows the knee.”
Source : Abraham Coles (1866). “The Microcosm: A Poem, Read Before the Medical Society of New Jersey at Its Centenary Anniversary: with the Address Delivered as President, Jan. 24, 1866”, p.22
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“A people of scholars, if they are physically degenerate, weak-willed and cowardly pacifists, will not storm the heavens, indeed, they will not be able to safeguard their existence on this earth.”
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“Our national policies will not be revoked or modified, even for scientists. If the dismissal of Jewish scientists means the annihilation of contemporary German science, then we shall do without science for a few years.”
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“There are more microbes per person than the entire population of the world. Imagine that. Per person. This means that if the time scale is diminished in proportion to that of space it would be quite possible for the whole story of Greece and Rome to be played out between farts.”
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“Somewhere in my head, a private conviction exists that 'Search is the Process' and 'Discovery the Art Form.”
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“It is essential for me to become involved in another search, and 'search' is the proper word to use because it promises discovery along with the risk.”
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“And of all illumination which human reason can give, none is comparable to the discovery of what we are, our nature, our obligations, what happiness we are capable of, and what are the means of attaining it.”
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“Serendipity is the way to make discoveries, by accident but also by sagacity, of things one is not in quest of. Based on experience, knowledge, it is the creative exploitation of the unforeseen.”
Source : "Constructal Theory of Social Dynamics". Book by Adrian Bejan and Gilbert W. Merkx, 2007.
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“A poem generated by its own laws may be unrealized and bad in terms of so-called objective principles of taste, judgement, deduction.”
Source : A. R. Ammons (1996). “Set in motion: essays, interviews, and dialogues”, Univ of Michigan Pr
