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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.

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
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More quotes by Claude Bernard

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The terrain is everything the germ is nothing.
Claude Bernard
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Science does not permit exceptions.
Claude Bernard
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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.
Claude Bernard
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Those who do not know the torment of the unknown cannot have the joy of discovery.
Claude Bernard
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All the vital mechanisms, varied as they are, have only one object, that of preserving constant the conditions of life in the internal environment.
Claude Bernard
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Men who believe too firmly in their theories, do not believe enough in the theories of others. So ... these despisers of their fellows ... make experiments only to destroy a theory, instead of to seek the truth.
Claude Bernard
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A great discovery is a fact whose appearance in science gives rise to shining ideas, whose light dispels many obscurities and shows us new paths.
Claude Bernard
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Proof that a given condition always precedes or accompanies a phenomenon does not warrant concluding with certainty that a given condition is the immediate cause of that phenomenon. It must still be established that when this condition is removed, the phenomen will no longer appear.
Claude Bernard
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The goal of scientific physicians in their own science ... is to reduce the indeterminate. Statistics therefore apply only to cases in which the cause of the facts observed is still indeterminate.
Claude Bernard
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Mediocre men often have the most acquired knowledge. It is in the darker. It is in the darker regions of science that great men are recognized they are marked by ideas which light up phenomena hitherto obscure and carry science forward.
Claude Bernard
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True science teaches us to doubt and, in ignorance, to refrain.
Claude Bernard
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Science rejects the indeterminate.
Claude Bernard
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Il ne fallait jamais faire des expériences pour confirmer ses idées, mais simplement pour les contrôler. We must never make experiments to confirm our ideas, but simply to control them.
Claude Bernard
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The fact that knowledge endlessly recedes as the investigator is about to grasp it is what constitutes at the same time his torment and happiness.
Claude Bernard
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The stability of the internal medium is a primary condition for the freedom and independence of certain living bodies in relation to the environment surrounding them.
Claude Bernard
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Science increases our power in proportion as it lowers our pride.
Claude Bernard
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The mental never influences the physical. It is always the physical that modifies the mental, and when we think that the mind is diseased, it is always an illusion.
Claude Bernard
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The joy of discovery is certainly the liveliest that the mind of man can ever feel.
Claude Bernard
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A discovery is generally an unforeseen relation not included in theory.
Claude Bernard
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Hatred is the most clear- sighted, next to genius.
Claude Bernard