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Philosophy is written in that great book which ever lies before our eyes — I mean the universe — but we cannot understand it if we do not first learn the language and grasp the symbols, in which it is written.

Galileo Galilei

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Galileo Galilei
Age: 77 †
Born: 1564
Born: February 15
Died: 1642
Died: January 8
Astrologer
Astronomer
Engineer
Inventor
Mathematician
Philosopher
Physicist
Polymath
Scientist
University Teacher
Galileo
G. Galilei
Understand
Philosophy
Cannot
Written
Ever
Eyes
Firsts
Lying
Book
Eye
Triangles
First
Universe
Grasp
Mean
Learn
Symbols
Great
Language
Lies

More quotes by Galileo Galilei

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Mathematics is the language with which God has written the universe.
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I do not know what to say in a case so surprising, so unlooked for and so novel.
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Holy Scripture could never lie or err...its decrees are of absolute and inviolable truth.
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To be humane, we must ever be ready to pronounce that wise, ingenious and modest statement 'I do not know'.
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In time you may discover everything that can be discovered, and still your progress will only be progress away from humanity. The distance between you and them can one day become so great that your joyous cry over some new gain could be answered by an universal shriek of horror.
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It is necessary for the Bible, in order to be accommodated to the understanding of every man, to speak many things which appear to differ from the absolute truth so far as the bare meaning of the words is concerned.
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The vain presumption of understanding everything can have no other basis than never having understood anything. For anyone who had ever experienced just once the perfect understanding of one single thing, and had truly tasted how knowledge is accomplished, would recognize that of the infinity of other truths he understands nothing.
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But some, besides allegiance to their original error, possess I know not what fanciful interest in remaining hostile not so much toward the things in question as toward their discoverer.
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The Milky Way is nothing else but a mass of innumerable stars planted together in clusters.
Galileo Galilei
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Surely, God could have caused birds to fly with their bones made of solid gold, with their veins full of quicksilver, with their flesh heavier than lead, and with their wings exceedingly small. He did not, and that ought to show something. It is only in order to shield your ignorance that you put the Lord at every turn to the refuge of a miracle.
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There are those who reason well, but they are greatly outnumbered by those who reason badly.
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If experiments are performed thousands of times at all seasons and in every place without once producing the effects mentioned by your philosophers, poets, and historians, this will mean nothing and we must believe their words rather than our own eyes?
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By denying scientific principles, one may maintain any paradox.
Galileo Galilei
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Who would dare assert that we know all there is to be known?
Galileo Galilei
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I would beg the wise and learned fathers [of the church] to consider with all diligence the difference which exists between matters of mere opinion and matters of demonstration.
Galileo Galilei
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The greatest wisdom is to get to know oneself.
Galileo Galilei
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[Copernicus] did not ignore the Bible, but he knew very well that if his doctrine were proved, then it could not contradict the Scriptures when they were rightly understood.
Galileo Galilei
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Nothing physical which sense-experience sets before our eyes, or which necessary demonstrations prove to us, ought to be called in question (much less condemned) upon the testimony of biblical passages...
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To excite in us tastes, odors, and sounds I believe that nothing is required in external bodies except shapes, numbers, and slow or rapid movements. ... if ears, tongues, and noses were removed, shapes and numbers and motions would remain, but not odors or tastes or sounds.
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Science proceeds more by what it has learned to ignore than what it takes into account.
Galileo Galilei