Peter Medawar Quotes

There are lots of things that science will enable us to do that we shouldn’t do.

There's no question that as science, knowledge and technology advance, that we will attempt to do more significant things. And there's no question that we will always have to temper those things with ethics.

Science has made us gods even before we are worthy of being men.

We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.

There is an ever-widening gap between what science allows and what we should actually do. There are many doors science can open that should be kept closed, on prudential or ethical grounds.

It is not a Pandora's box that science opens; it is, rather, a treasure chest. We, humanity, can choose whether or not to take out the discoveries and use them, and for what purpose.

Back in my days as a chemistry student, I used to be quite a technocrat. I was firmly convinced that scientists would have cornered God and photographed Him in color by 1951.

Please don't make the mistake of thinking that 'Oryx and Crake' is anti-science. Science is a way of knowing, and a tool. Like all ways of knowing and tools, it can be turned to bad uses. And it can be bought and sold, and it often is. But it is not in itself bad. Like electricity, it's neutral.

We've arranged a civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology.

With so much power, science will inevitably receive strong criticism. It comes with success. It’s entirely appropriate. Take it as a complement. And get over it.

When I contemplate the immense advances in sciences and discoveries in the arts which have been made within the period of my life, I look forward with confidence to equal advances by the present generation, and have no doubt they will consequently be as much wiser than we have been as we than our fathers were, and they than the burners of witches

The ... progress of improvement and discovery ought not to be overlooked. ... Philosophy already directs her finger at sources of inexhaustible power. ... We are on the eve of mechanical discoveries still greater than any which have yet appeared.

In holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that could itself become the captive of a scientific technological elite.

The United States needs to be a leader in scientific research.

The spending in science and technology need to be to increased.

If we choose to ignore science and refuse to fund important scientific research, we voluntarily cede our place as a world leader in innovation.

Without science, there would be no such hope.

Science is the future of mankind.

The future belongs to science and those who make friends with science.

Science is not inherently good.

Scientists are not these guys in lab coats deep in the inner bowels of universities and hospitals with their Bunsen burners. They're the people molding the culture that we live in, the future of our culture, and the technology we rely on every day.

I'm very pro-science and pro-technology; I believe that these have been key drivers of progress in the world in the last centuries.

The march of invention has clothed mankind with powers of which a century ago the boldest imagination could not have dreamt.

If we continue to develop our technology without wisdom or prudence, our servant may prove to be our executioner.

Innovations in science and technology are the engines of the 21st-century economy; if you care about the wealth and health of your nation tomorrow, then you'd better rethink how you allocate taxes to fund science. The federal budget needs to recognize this.