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Quote by William John Macquorn Rankine

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William John Macquorn Rankine
William John Macquorn Rankine

William John Macquorn Rankine was a Scottish civil engineer known for his contributions to thermodynamics and steam engine design. He was born on July 5, 1820, and died on December 24, 1872. more

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“The progress of science has always been the result of a close interplay between our concepts of the universe and our observations on nature. The former can only evolve out of the latter and yet the latter is also conditioned greatly by the former. Thus in our exploration of nature, the interplay between our concepts and our observations may sometimes lead to totally unexpected aspects among already familiar phenomena.”

MaySometimesScienceUniverseNatureNaturalResultsProgressConceptsAspectAccountsFamiliarObservationFormerEvolveUnexpectedLatterExploration
Author:Tsung-Dao Lee
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“The sense that the meaning of the universe had evaporated was what seemed to escape those who welcomed Darwin as a benefactor of mankind. Nietzsche considered that evolution presented a correct picture of the world, but that it was a disastrous picture. His philosophy was an attempt to produce a new world-picture which took Darwinism into account but was not nullified by it.”

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Book:Nietzsche: The Man and His Philosophy
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“The total quantity of all the forces capable of work in the whole universe remains eternal and unchanged throughout all their changes. All change in nature amounts to this, that force can change its form and locality, without its quantity being changed. The universe possesses, once for all, a store of force which is not altered by any change of phenomena, can neither be increased nor diminished, and which maintains any change which takes place on it.”

WholeFormScienceUniverseForceChangedAmountEternalCapableRemainsStoresQuantityAlteredLocality
Book:Popular Lectures on Scientific Subjects
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“We have found that where science has progressed the farthest, the mind has but regained from nature that which the mind has put into nature. We have found a strange foot-print on the shores of the unknown. We have devised profound theories, one after another, to account for its origin. At last, we have succeeded in reconstructing the creature that made the foot-print. And Lo! it is our own.”

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Author:Arthur Eddington
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“What a glorious title, Nature, a veritable stroke of genius to have hit upon. It is more than a cosmos, more than a universe. It includes the seen as well as the unseen, the possible as well as the actual, Nature and Nature's God, mind and matter. I am lost in admiration of the effulgent blaze of ideas it calls forth.”

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Author:James Joseph Sylvester
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“Wheeler hopes that we can discover, within the context of physics, a principle that will enable the universe to come into existence "of its own accord." In his search for such a theory, he remarks: "No guiding principle would seem more powerful than the requirement that it should provide the universe with a way to come into being." Wheeler likened this 'self-causing' universe to a self-excited circuit in electronics.”

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Author:Paul Davies
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