James Bryant Conant Quotes

It takes years to realize the multiple benefits of science; without adequate, sustained funding for research, the careers of many bright, young scientists may come to a screeching halt.

Scientists tend to be unappreciated in the world at large, but you can hardly overstate the importance of the work they do.

Science grows like a weed every year.

As you know, in most areas of science, there are long periods of beginning before we really make progress.

For science must breathe the oxygen of freedom.

The most obvious characteristic of science is its application: the fact that, as a consequence of science, one has a power to do things. And the effect this power has had need hardly be mentioned. The whole industrial revolution would almost have been impossible without the development of science.

Is science of any value? I think a power to do something is of value. Whether the result is a good thing or a bad thing depends on how it is used, but the power is a value.

Personally, I attach great importance to research in fundamental sciences because I believe that no applied or developmental research can do without basic research as the wellspring and driving force. But, in this world of ours, often because of material gains and immediate interests, it is easy to neglect basic research. This should be avoided.

In the history of science, we often find that the study of some natural phenomenon has been the starting point in the development of a new branch of knowledge.

Understanding science and pushing the boundaries of science is what makes me immensely satisfied.

It was the late Dr. Mahendra Lal Sircar who, by founding the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science, made it possible for the scientific aspirations of my early years to continue burning brightly.

So now, if we don't fund the physical sciences, where will the Next Big Thing come from?

Fundamental science that may not achieve results must be supported at the state level.

We must face up to a difficult paradox: The U.S. can maintain a leading position in science only by giving up its desire to be number one.

The most important thing is to recognize that research is our seed corn. It's a national security priority. It's not just a way to have enough going on that graduate students can do their Ph.D.s and scientists can publish. We have to do research, or we'll fall behind the rest of the world.

We are all enormously indebted to the National Science Foundation of the United States and the American public for steady support over close to 50 years.

Again there is another great and powerful cause why the sciences have made but little progress; which is this. It is not possible to run a course aright when the goal itself has not been rightly placed.

Man armed with science is like a baby with a box of matches.

You will be able to appreciate the influence of such an Engine on the future progress of science. I live in a country which is incapable of estimating it.

The science hangs like a gathering fog in a valley, a fog which begins nowhere and goes nowhere, an incidental, unmeaning inconvenience to passers-by.

vivisection is not the same thing as scientific progress. There is such a thing as scientific progress. But this wholesale dedication of scientists to vivisection, which is the easy and cheap way, actually prevents them from scientific progress, for true progress is difficult and requires genius and imagination in its devoted workers.

Most man only care for science so far as they get a living by it, and that they worship even error when it affords them a subsistence.

Progress in science is often built on wrong theories that are later corrected. It is better to be wrong than to be vague.

It is my earnest desire that some of you should carry on this scientific work and keep for your ambition the determination to make a permanent contribution to science.