Site uses cookies to provide basic functionality.

OK
1 2 3 4 5 6 ▲ ▼
Link Quote Stars Tags Author
da20778 Ordinary experience, from waking second to second, is in fact highly synthetic (in the sense of combinative or constructive), and made of a complexity of strands, past memories and present perceptions, times and places, private and public history, hopelessly beyond science's powers to analyse. It is quintessentially 'wild' ... unphilosophical, irrational uncontrollable, incalculable. phenomenology science John Fowles
508c997 When the neglect is severe, the patient may behave almost as if one half of the universe had abruptly ceased to exist in any meaningful form.... Patients with unilateral neglect behave not only as if nothing were actually happening in the left hemispace, but also as if nothing of any importance could be expected to occur there. nonfiction science Oliver Sacks
1d3a763 "To measure market needs, I would watch carefully what customers do, not simply listen to what they say. Watching how customers actually use a product provides much more reliable information than can be gleaned from a verbal interview or a focus group. Thus, observations indicate that auto users today require a minimum cruising range (that is, the distance that can be driven without refueling) of about 125 to 150 miles; most electric vehicles only offer a minimum cruising range of 50 to 80 miles. Similarly, drivers seem to require cars that accelerate from 0 to 60 miles per hour in less than 10 seconds (necessary primarily to merge safely into highspeed traffic from freeway entrance ramps); most electric vehicles take nearly 20 seconds to get there. And, finally, buyers in the mainstream market demand a wide array of options, but it would be impossible for electric vehicle manufacturers to offer a similar variety within the small initial unit volumes that will characterize that business. According to almost any definition of functionality used for the vertical axis of our proposed chart, the electric vehicle will be deficient compared to a gasolinepowered car. This information is not sufficient to characterize electric vehicles as disruptive, however. They will only be disruptive if we find that they are also on a trajectory of improvement that might someday make them competitive in parts of the mainstream market. innovation science technology Clayton M Christensen
a05db45 Der wesentliche Punkt ist hier, dass Menschen mit szientistischem Gedankengut wie Atkins oder Dawkins nicht unterscheiden zwischen Mechanismus und Urheberschaft. creation creationism dawkins religion science scientism John C. Lennox
dcc65e5 "Robin, he chided her. He wanted to tell her all this would happen to her, too, that her luck would turn as well. But he had no good arguments for this, and she had no reason to believe him. Such luck as his was far too rare. "I hope it all works out," she said, looking up, and then, as if afraid to sound too stingy, she added, "I'm sure it will." He bent down to kiss her, but she turned away slightly, and his lips brushed her ear as he whispered, "Please be happy for me." love luck science suffering Allegra Goodman
19d1265 Weightlessness is like heroin, or how I imagine heroin must be. You try it once, and when it's over, all you can think about is how much you want to do it again. But apparently the thrill wears off. funny humor mary-roach sci-fi science space Mary Roach
e17c362 [photography]... wanted to understand, to master for myself, all the processes involved, and to manipulate them in my own way. childhood photography science Oliver Sacks
e275412 "Tatal meu mi-a povestit odata de un tovaras de detentie emaciat, din lagarul de concentrare de la Buchenwald, care era de formatie matematician. Poti spune unele lucruri despre oameni dupa ceea ce le vine in minte cand aud cuvantul "pi". Pentru un "matematician", "pi" reprezinta raportul dintre circumferinta si diametrul unui cerc. Daca l-as fi intrebat pe tatal meu, care avea doar sapte clase, ar fi spus ca "pi" este o placinta rotunda, cu mere. Intr-o zi, in pofida discrepantei dintre ei, detinutul matematician i-a dat tatalui meu sa rezolve o enigma matematica. Tatal meu s-a gandit la ea timp de cateva zile, dar nu a reusit sa-i dea de capat. Cand s-a intalnit din nou cu matematicianul, i-a cerut solutia. Omul nu a vrut sa i-o dea, zicandu-i ca trebuie s-o gaseasca el insusi. Dupa catva timp, tatal meu l-a rugat din nou, dar omul tinea la secretul sau ca la ochii din cap. Tatal meu a incercat sa-si ignore curiozitatea, dar nu a putut. Inconjurat de duhoare si moarte, el a facut o obsesie pentru cunoasterea raspunsului. Pana la urma, celalalt detinut i-a propus un targ - el ii va dezvalui solutia enigmei in schimbul coltului lui de paine. Nu stiu ce greutate avea tatal meu atunci, dar cand trupele americane au eliberat lagarul, el cantarea 38 de kilograme. Cu toate acestea, dorinta lui de a sti a fost atat de puternica, incat a renuntat la paine in schimbul raspunsului. Aveam aproapre douazeci de ani cand tatal meu mi-a povestit episodul acesta, care a avut un impact enorm asupra mea. Familia tatalui meu pierise, bunurile ii fusesera confiscate, el insusi era infometat, emaciat si batut. Nazistii il despuiasera de tot ce era palpabil, si totusi imboldul lui de a gandi, de a rationa si de a cunoaste supravietuise. Desi era intemnitat, mintea ii era libera sa cutreiere, si asa a si facut. Am inteles atunci ca a cauta cunoasterea este cea mai omeneasca dintre toate dorintele si ca, oricat de diferite ar fi circumstantele noastre, pasiunea mea de a intelege lumea a fost stimulata de acelasi instinct ca si a tatalui meu." human-evolution science Leonard Mlodinow
02a9162 ... Para que estes ahora aqui, tuvieron que agruparse de algun modo, de una forma compleja y extranamente servicial, trillones de atomos errantes. Es una disposicion tan especializada y tan particular que nunca se ha intentado antes y que solo existira esta vez. Durante los proximos muchos anos -tenemos esa esperanza-, estas pequenas particulas participaran sin queja en todos los miles de millones de habilidosas tareas cooperativas necesarias para mantenerte intacto y permitir que experimentes ese estado tan agradable, pero tan a menudo infravalorado, que se llama existencia. Por que se tomaron esta molestia los atomos es todo un enigma. Ser tu no es una experiencia gratificante a nivel atomico. Pese a toda su devota atencion, tus atomos no se preocupan en realidad por ti, de hecho ni siquiera saben que estas ahi. Ni siquiera saben que ellos estan ahi. Son, despues de todo, particulas ciegas, que ademas no estan vivas. (Resulta un tanto fascinante pensar que si tu mismo te fueses deshaciendo con unas pinzas, atomo por atomo, lo que producirias seria un monton de fino polvo atomico, nada del cual habria estado nunca vivo pero todo el habria sido en otro tiempo tu.) Sin embargo, por la razon que sea, durante el periodo de tu experiencia, tus atomos responderan a un unico impulso riguroso: que tu sigas siendo tu. science Bill Bryson
1825384 Human beings, Lucretius thought, must not drink in the poisonous belief that their souls are only part of the world temporarily and they are heading somewhere else. That belief will only spawn in them a destructive relation to the environment in which they live the only lives they have. philosophy science Stephen Greenblatt
e48eef9 I gazed at these marvels in profound silence. Words were utterly wanting to indicate the sensations of wonder I experienced. I seemed, as I stood upon that mysterious shore, as if I were some wandering inhabitant of a distant planet, present for the first time at the spectacle of some terrestrial phenomena belonging to another existence. To give body and existence to such new sensations would have required the coinage of new words - and here my feeble brain found itself wholly at fault. I looked on, I thought, I reflected, I admired, in a state of stupefaction not altogether unmingled with fear! discovery science science-fiction Jules Verne
9bf72f8 "As the ninth-century legal scholar Malik ibn Anas, founder of the Maliki school of law, once quipped, "This religion is a science, so pay close attention to those from whom you learn it." islam religion science Reza Aslan
7faf2bf The second or third time I watched Stamets show a video of a Cordyceps doing its diabolical thing to an ant--commandeering its body, making it do its bidding, and then exploding a mushroom from its brain in order to disseminate its genes--it occurred to me that Stamets and that poor ant had rather a lot in common. Fungi haven't killed him, it's true, and he probably knows enough about their wiles to head off that fate. But it's also true that this man's life--his brain!--has been utterly taken over by fungi; he has dedicated himself to their cause, speaking for the mushrooms in the same way that Dr. Seuss's Lorax speaks for the trees. He disseminates fungal spores far and wide, helping them, whether by mail order or sheer dint of his enthusiasm, to vastly expand their range and spread their message. brain cordyceps fungus science stamets Michael Pollan
ff93de4 "There's the claim that the only progress made is in posing problems that scientists can answer. That philosophy never has the means to answer problems--it's just biding its time till the scientists arrive on the scene. You hear this quite often. There is, among some scientists, a real anti-philosophical bias. The sense that philosophy will eventually disappear. But there's a lot of philosophical progress, it's just a progress that's very hard to see. It's very hard to see because we see animal-rights bigotry human-rights philosophy prejudice progress science thinking thought Rebecca Newberger Goldstein
103304a The dangers that we face are part of the process, now well underway, of the unification of the planet--in language, culture, science, and commerce. They are both driven by the identical technological advances--this critical and delicate time coincides with the widespread availability of nuclear weapons. At the present rate of change, it seems likely that in the period between now and 2061, the turning point for the human species will have been reached. If we survive until then, our passage to the next apparition of Halley's Comet should be comparatively easy. That perihelion passage will be in March 2134, when the comet will make an unusually close encounter with the Earth. It will come as close as 0.09AU or 14 million kilometers, less than half the distance of the 1910 encounter. It will then be brighter than the brightest star. If there are those to do the commemorating, the years 2061 and 2134 should be celebrated for the courage, intelligence, and common purpose of a species forced by urgent necessity to come to its senses. comet human-species humanity inspirationalal science survival Carl Sagan Ann Druyan
65c36d0 Of course, I reject atheism because I believe Christianity to be true. But I also reject it because I am a scientist. How could I be impressed with a worldview that undermines the very rationality we need to do science? Science and God mix very well. It is science and atheism that do not mix. christianity science John C. Lennox
ee6619c Tech made all things possible, and therefore mandatory. Not to mention the fact that carrying around all this smartphone in your purse or pocket had become such a fantastic drag. Cranial implant was so much easier. Now they could be in touch with the hive 24/7 and have their hands free for whatever. Their cars drove them everywhere, too. Also left them free to, you know, do whatever. modern-life sarcasm science science-fiction-comedy snarky-humor technology Stanley Bing
8d560a7 A lot of who you were in middle age was determined before you had a chance to manipulate, control, or eve understand the things around you. It was no mystery, he thought, why some old people's minds returned to their youth; the wonder of those years, the discoveries, the first experience with the dirty secret of death, and the first stirrings of lust and love were indelible, drawn in luminous colors on clean canvas. Indeed, the first sex act was so mind-boggling that most people could still remember it clearly twenty, thirty, sixty years later. humor inspirational life love lust old romance science sex wisdom Nelson DeMille
0ae0554 As the historian Edward Grant explained, 'It is indisputable that modern science emerged in the seventeenth century in Western Europe and nowhere else'. ... The crucial question is: Why? My answer to this question is as brief as it is unoriginal: Christianity depicted God as a rational, responsive, dependable, and omnipotent being and the universe as his personal creation, thus having a rational, lawful, stable structure, awaiting human comprehension. science world-history Rodney Stark
74bd325 "Half the ideas in this book are probably wrong. The history of human science is not encouraging. Galton's eugenics, Freud's unconscious, Durkheim's sociology, Mead's culture-driven anthropology, Skinner's behaviorism, Piaget's early learning, and Wilson's sociobiology all appear in retrospect to be riddled with errors and false perspectives. No doubt the Red Queen's approach is just another chapter in this marred tale. No doubt its politicization and the vested interests ranged against it will do as much damage as was done to previous attempts to understand human nature. The Western cultural revolution that calls itself political correctness will no doubt stifle inquiries it does not like, such as those into the mental differences between men and women. I sometimes feel that we are fated never to understand ourselves because part of our nature is to turn every inquiry into an expression of our own nature: ambitious, illogical, manipulative, and religious. "Never literary attempt was more unfortunate than my Treatise of Human Nature. It fell dead-born from the Press," said David Hume. But then I remember how much progress we have made since Hume and how much nearer to the goal of a complete understanding of human nature we are than ever before. We will never quite reach that goal, and it would perhaps be better if we never did. But as long as we can keep asking why, we have a noble purpose." science sex-differences Matt Ridley
687955a The Prohibition era had been a great source of material for building an excellent science of alcohol intoxication irony prohibition science Deborah Blum
6a4b42c After a few years of breeding a type of lily, Burbank found a single specimen that met his standards. A rabbit ate it. science Carl Zimmer
8a63001 "Human life must be cheap to the one who can place the dollar above it" -John Ruston" poison science Deborah Blum
089156f The real point is this: We don't know where to go because we don't know what we are. Do you want to go back to living in a sewer-pipe? And eating other people's garbage? Because that's what rats do. But the fact is, we aren't rats anymore. We are something Dr. Schultz has made. Something new. jenner rats science Robert C. O'Brien
086c0ba Cars with flames painted on the hood might get more speeding tickets. Are the flames making the car go fast? No. Certain things just go together. And when they do, they are correlated. It is the darling of all human errors to assume, without proper testing, that one is the cause of the other. correlation entomology monarch-butterflies science Barbara Kingsolver
f705f2a Figurines of Apkallus were buried in boxes in the foundation deposits in Mesopotamian buildings in order to avert evil ... The term , Watchers, is used of these sets. Likewise the Apkallus were said to have taught antediluvian sciences to humanity and so, too, were the Watchers. As one scholar concludes, however: 'The Jewish authors often inverted the Mesopotamian intellectual traditions with the intention of showing the superiority of their own cultural foundations. [Thus] ... the antediluvian sages, the Mesopotamian Apkallus, were demonised as the 'sons of God' and ... appear as the Watchers ... illegitimate teachers of humankind before the flood. apkallu deluge judaism mesopotamia sages science watchers Graham Hancock
85589a6 I've brought scientific thinking to literature. There's been very little gratitude for this. science Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
77f4af6 It takes a special energy, over and above one's creative potential, a special audacity or subversiveness, to strike out in a new direction once one is settled. It is a gamble as all creative projects must be, for the new direction may not turn out to be productive at all. creativity science Oliver Sacks
0463d30 When the farmer bores the tap hole into the trunk, the tree sends sap to heal the wound. Sure enough, by the next spring, only an extremely observant and knowledgeable person can find the old tap scars. When the wind blows, the tree senses that a branch might break. A broken branch is a much more serious wound than a little clean tap hole in the trunk. Therefore, the tree withholds the sap from the tap hole in case it needs to rush a bunch of sap to a broken limb somewhere. Once the wind subsides, the sap starts flowing again through the little tap hole. Sentient beings, anyone? You bet. Fearfully and wonderfully made. plant-life science Joel Salatin
3acb88e I said that I had heard curiosity could be harmful, in particular to cats i-laughed science Michael Chabon
3ab57d6 You know, the aspirants believe this is the only true existence. That everything outside is an illusion, a shadow play created by the ancestor gods to cradle us until we can build our own tailored reality and Upload into it. That's comforting, isn't it. science singularity theology transhumanism Richard K. Morgan
be22379 When an experiment was to begin, all women were excluded for fear their irrational natures would influence the result, and an air of fervent concentration descended. science women Iain Pears
be58650 I was on the shy side at school (one school report called me 'diffident') and Braefield had added a special timidity, but when I had a natural wonder... I lost all my diffidence, and freely approached others, all my fear forgotten. curiosity science shyness Oliver Sacks
36f1e20 "The man is mollified. The systematic juices leave off bubbling, the fires sink, the coals are scattered. But the anger is still there, apart. Energy is never lost; a primal law. -"Mad House" insanity science Richard Matheson
3b0fc24 At a deeper level what this whole exchange revealed to me was something disturbing about the way science works. I hadn't quite grasped the role of before. But I could see it in action everywhere here: fear of being 'noticed and monitored by colleagues,' fear of unwanted negative celebrity, fear of indignity, fear of loss of reputation, fear of loss of career--and not for committing some terrible crime but simply for exploring unorthodox possibilities and undertaking 'somewhat controversial research' into what everyone agrees were extraordinary events 12,800 years ago. Worse still, this pervasive state of fear has somehow ingrained itself so deeply into the fabric of science that those who have embraced unorthodox possibilities themselves are often among the least willing to consider unorthodox possibilities embraced by others--lest by doing so they 'contaminate' their own preferred unorthodoxy. How will it ever be possible to discover the truth about the past when so much fear gets in the way? controversy establishment exploring fear science shills truth unorthodoxy Graham Hancock
c139406 A union of literary and scientific cultures - there was not the dissociation of sensibility that was so soon to come ... Davy himself was writing (and sometimes publishing) a good deal of poetry at the time; his notebooks mix details of chemical experiments, poems, and philosophical reflections all together; and these did not seem to exist in separate compartments in his mind. childhood literature science science-and-arts Oliver Sacks
b985de4 "So perhaps spiritual experience is simply what happens in the space that opens up in the mind when "all mean egotism vanishes." Wonders (and terrors) we're ordinarily defended against flow into our awareness; the far ends of the sensory spectrum, which are normally invisible to us, our senses can suddenly admit. While the ego sleeps, the mind plays, proposing unexpected patterns of thought and new rays of relation. The gulf between self and world, that no-man's-land which in ordinary hours the ego so vigilantly patrols, closes down, allowing us to feel less separate and more connected, "part and particle" of some larger entity. Whether we call that entity Nature, the Mind at Large, or God hardly matters. But it seems to be in the crucible of that merging that death loses some of its sting." psychology science spiritual Michael Pollan
c333b9b Proof of the beginning of time probably ranks as the most theologically significant theorem. This great significance arises from the theorem establishing that the universe must be caused by some Entity capable of creating the universe entirely independent of space and time. Such an entity matches the attributes of the God of the Bible but is contradicted by the gods of the eastern (and indeed all other) religions who create within space and time. astrophysics big-bang god religion science Hugh Ross
6ecb9f8 Statistically it was not greatly different than it had been for previous generations, but anecdotally it had become so prominent that every problem was noticed and remarked. The cognitive error called ease of representation thrust them into a space where every problem they witnessed convinced them they were in an unprecedented colapse. They were getting depressed. pessimism science science-fiction society Kim Stanley Robinson
1 2 3 4 5 6 ▲ ▼