Gregory Bateson Quotes

Science does not give us absolute and final certainty. It only gives us assurance within the limits of our mental abilities and the prevailing state of scientific thought.

The final test of a work of art is not whether it has beauty, but whether it has power.

The final test of truth is ridicule. Very few dogmas have ever faced it and survived.

All life is a test one way or the other.

A philosopher once said, 'It is necessary for the very existence of science that the same conditions always produce the same results.' Well, they don't!

Whoever makes it a rule to test action by thought, thought by action, cannot falter, and if he does, will soon find his way back to the right road.

There's no way to know what's going to happen.

I feel that I've often pointed out that there are countless aspects of life and nature that scientists and scientific thinkers cannot explain. Why the universe is accelerating in its expansion and what came before the Big Bang serve as compelling examples. The process of science provides a way to seek answers to those questions.

There's nobody between you and the print. Nobody. It's you and the subject and the final print. And if you get it published that way, you've said it.

Science says the first word on everything, and the last word on nothing.

Any way, death is so final, isn't it? "Is it?" asked Richard. "Sometimes," said the marquis de Carabas. And they went down.

In real science a hypothesis can never be proved true...A science which confines itself to correlating phenomena can never learn anything about the reality underlying the phenomena, while a science which goes further than this and introduces hypotheses about reality, can never acquire certain knowledge of a positive kind about reality; in whatever way we proceed, this is forever denied us.

Don't let the actions of a few determine the way you feel about an entire group. Remember, not all German's were Nazis.

You believe by doubting and you doubt by believing; yet this state too is not the final one.

Our Lord told His disciples that love and obedience were organically united. The final test of love is obedience.

There are two kinds of truth; The truth that lights the way and the truth that warms the heart. The fist of these is science and the second is art.

One thing I learned from meteorology is that being an actual science was no guarantee of exactness.

The final test of fame is to have a crazy person imagine he is you.

Sources say the Obama administration is in the 'final stages' of planning the closing of Guantanamo Bay. The way it's gonna work is, they're going to put a Radio Shack sign out front and let nature take its course.

Our aim as scientists is objective truth; more truth, more interesting truth, more intelligible truth. We cannot reasonably aim at certainty. Once we realize that human knowledge is fallible, we realize also that we can never be completely certain that we have not made a mistake.

An effective way to test code is to exercise it at its natural boundaries

Confidence applied properly is the path of genius. You must always be in a state of confidence. And the way you sustain a state of confidence is by testing yourself. Difficult quagmires that may occur; there's always a test. You have to seek them out. You constantly have to test yourself to prepare for these quagmires. That's why I always put myself to the test.

Modern economics is a set of formal models and equations purporting to fully determine human behaviour, at least in the economic realm. And there is no way that uncertainty can be compressed into determinate mathematical models.

You know how I get angry sometimes? That's because it's the only way I can still feel. And I need to test myself, to make sure I'm really here.

Experimental evidence is the final arbiter of right and wrong.