Isaac Newton Quotes

Science is the refusal to believe on the basis of hope.

The wonderful thing about science is that in science, faith is shakable.

Agnosticism, in fact, is not a creed, but a method, the essence of which lies in the rigorous application of a single principle. ... Positively the principle may be expressed: In matters of the intellect, follow your reason as far as it will take you, without regard to any other consideration. And negatively: In matters of the intellect, do not pretend that conclusions are certain which are not demonstrated or demonstrable.

I would proclaim that the vast majority of what [say, Scientific American] is true-yet my ability to defend such a claim is weaker than I would like. And most likely the readers, authors, and editors of that magazine would be equally hard pressed to come up with cogent, non-technical arguments convincing a skeptic of this point, especially if pitted against a clever lawyer arguing the contrary. How come Truth is such a slippery beast?

I can feel this heart inside me and I conclude it exists. I can touch this world and I also conclude that it exists. All my knowledge ends at this point. The rest is hypothesis.

Science has nothing to do with any dogma. Science ceases to exist when there is a dogma.

I feign no hypotheses.

There is not a single truth of science upon which we ought to bet more than about a million of millions to one.

As a scientist, I don't believe anything. Science shouldn't use the word belief. There are things more likely and less likely. Science can say nothing with absolute certainty.

Science ... warns me to be careful how I adopt a view which jumps with my preconceptions, and to require stronger evidence for such belief than for one to which I was previously hostile. My business is to teach my aspirations to conform themselves to fact, not to try and make facts harmonize with my aspirations.

The alternative to doubt is authority, against which science had fought for centuries.

Everything that people say is testable.

Science means simply the aggregate of all the recipes that are always successful. All the rest is literature.

Science consists exactly of those forms of knowledge that can be verified and duplicated by anybody.

Science should always be in the business of attempting to disprove itself.

I love science. I hate supposition, superstition, exaggeration and falsified data. Show me the research, show me the results, show me the conclusions - and then show me some qualified peer reviews of all that.

The ultimate court of appeal is observation and experiment... not authority.

The insidiousness of science lies in its claim to be not a subject, but a method.

The work of science is to substitute facts for appearances, and demonstrations for impressions.

Scientists are always skeptics.

Experience seems to most of us to lead to conclusions, but empiricism has sworn never to draw them.

I take what I see work. I'm a strict believer in the scientific principle of believing nothing, only taking the best evidence available at the present time, interpreting it as best you can, and leaving your mind open to the fact that new evidence will appear tomorrow.

Philosophy would render us entirely Pyrrhonian, were not nature too strong for it.

I am not here concerned with intent, but with scientific standards, especially the ability to tell the difference between a fact, an opinion, a hypothesis, and a hole in the ground.

True science teaches, above all, to doubt