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If I had to define life in a single phrase, I should clearly express my thought of throwing into relief one characteristic which, in my opinion, sharply differentiates biological science. I should say: life is creation.

Claude Bernard

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Claude Bernard
Age: 64 †
Born: 1813
Born: July 12
Died: 1878
Died: February 10
Physician Writer
Physiologist
Politician
Professor
Psychologist
Creation
Phrase
Single
Phrases
Opinion
Throwing
Science
Characteristics
Differentiates
Thought
Define
Sharply
Life
Relief
Differentiate
Clearly
Characteristic
Express
Biological

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In the philosophic sense, observation shows and experiment teaches.
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A discovery is generally an unforeseen relation not included in theory.
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We must alter theory to adapt it to nature, but not nature to adapt it to theory.
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A contemporary poet has characterized this sense of the personality of art and of the impersonality of science in these words,-'Art is myself science is ourselves. '
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Obervation is a passive science, experimentation is an active science.
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Effects vary with the conditions which bring them to pass, but laws do not vary. Physiological and pathological states are ruled by the same forces they differ only because of the special conditions under which the vital laws manifest themselves.
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We achieve more than we know. We know more than we understand. We understand more than we can explain.
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The experimenter who does not know what he is looking for will not understand what he finds.
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Now, a living organism is nothing but a wonderful machine endowed with the most marvellous properties and set going by means of the most complex and delicate mechanism.
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Well-observed facts, though brought to light by passing theories, will never die they are the material on which alone the house of science will at last be built.
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Priestley [said] that each discovery we make shows us many others that should be made.
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Hatred is the most clear- sighted, next to genius.
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The doubter is a true man of science: he doubts only himself and his interpretations, but he believes in science.
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Theories are like a stairway by climbing, science widens its horizon more and more, because theories embody and necessarily include proportionately more facts as they advance.
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Science admits no exceptions otherwise there would be no determinism in science, or rather, there would be no science.
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Our ideas are only intellectual instruments which we use to break into phenomena we must change them when they have served their purpose, as we change a blunt lancet that we have used long enough.
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The science of life is a superb and dazzlingly lighted hall which may be reached only by passing through a long and ghastly kitchen.
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Science does not permit exceptions.
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The terrain is everything the germ is nothing.
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Progress is achieved by exchanging our theories for new ones which go further than the old, until we find one based on a larger number of facts. ... Theories are only hypotheses, verified by more or less numerous facts. Those verified by the most facts are the best, but even then they are never final, never to be absolutely believed.
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