Josiah Royce Quotes

A man may imagine things that are false, but he can only understand things that are true, for if the things be false, the apprehension of them is not understanding.

To try to write a grand cosmical drama leads necessarily to myth. To try to let knowledge substitute ignorance in increasingly larger regions of space and time is science.

A concept is stronger than a fact.

While I'm a big fan of science fiction, especially as rendered in expensive Hollywood blockbusters, it's the real universe that calls to me.

The main reason why people should care about research in fundamental physics is the same reason they care about astronomy and cosmology. People, children, want to know what we're made out of, how it works, and why the universe is the way it is.

The universe is a great mystery.

How can you look at the galaxy and not feel insignificant?

One of the things I do know is we know very little about our universe. Even though we think we know a lot, and we do know a lot more than we used to, we have a lot to learn about our universe.

That in the beginning when the world was young there were a great many thoughts but no such thing as truth. Man made the truths himself and each truth was a composite of a great many vague thoughts. All about in the world were truths and they were all beautiful.

It is fun to try figure out the things that really are real and the things that aren't.

If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences.

It's a difficult business, finding out what's true about the world, the universe.

There is no doubt whatsoever that the universe is the merest illusion.

The natural phenomenon of the universe is so mind-blowing, but you have to know about it. You have to be curious. You've got to find it on your own. If you're lucky, you do.

Here we were, the only seven humans in space, repairing a telescope whose only purpose is to enrich the minds of people on planet Earth and increase our understanding of the workings of the universe. I can think of no better peaceful use of space for all humankind.

I got into astronomy through an interest in religion.

Hubble isn't just a satellite; it's about humanity's quest for knowledge.

Rocks are space, and space is illusion.

It is good to know our universe. What is new is only new to us.

Belief is nearly the whole of the universe whether based on truth or not.

No doubt the world is entirely an imaginary world, but it is only once removed from the true world.

The book Forest Dark wants to provoke questions about what is reality and why are we so given to believe that reality is firm and unbendable. There's a whole host of questions that the book is asking about that. Why do we believe that the world is only one way and as we see it? Why are we not open to the ways in which it might be otherwise.

I began to wonder whether anything truly existed, whether reality wasn't an unformed and gelatinous substance only half-captured by my senses....If that were true, each of us was living in absolute isolation. The thought terrified me. I was consoled by the idea that I could take that gelatin and mold it to create anything I wanted...At times I felt that the universe fabricated from the power of the imagination had stronger and more lasting contours than the blurred realm of the flesh-and-blood creatures around me.

Everything that we know is within our universe, and everything within our universe is moulded by the conditions of space, time, and causation.

The reasons for which 'this' world has been characterized as 'apparent' are the very reasons which indicate its reality; any other kind of reality is absolutely indemonstrable.