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It is a popular delusion that the scientific enquirer is under an obligation not to go beyond generalisation of observed facts...but anyone who is practically acquainted with scientific work is aware that those who refuse to go beyond the facts, rarely get as far.

Thomas Huxley

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Thomas Huxley
Age: 70 †
Born: 1825
Born: May 4
Died: 1895
Died: June 29
Anatomist
Anthropologist
Biologist
Carcinologist
Ichthyologist
Linguist
Naturalist
Paleontologist
Philosopher
Photographer
Physiologist
Lexington
Kentucky
T. H. Huxley
Huxley
Work
Scientific
Enquirer
Popular
Generalisation
Refuse
Acquainted
Aware
Practically
Beyond
Observed
Anyone
Delusion
Science
Rarely
Facts
Obligation

More quotes by Thomas Huxley

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There is no greater mistake than the hasty conclusion that opinions are worthless because they are badly argued.
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Science is simply common sense at its best.
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In matters of the intellect, do not pretend that conclusions are certain which are not demonstrated or demonstrable. That I take to be the agnostic faith, which if a man keep whole and undefiled, he shall not be ashamed to look the universe in the face, whatever the future may have in store for him.
Thomas Huxley
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The scientific imagination always restrains itself within the limits of probability.
Thomas Huxley
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Ecclesiasticism in science is only unfaithfulness to truth
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If a man cannot do brain work without stimulants of any kind, he had better turn to hand work it is an indication on Nature's part that she did not mean him to be a head worker.
Thomas Huxley
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History warns us that it is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and to end as superstitions.
Thomas Huxley
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The great tragedy of science - the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact.
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It is far better for a man to go wrong in freedom than to go right in chains.
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That which lies before the human race is a constant struggle to maintain and improve, in opposition to State of Nature, the State of Art of an organized polity in which, and by which, man may develop a worthy civilization
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I do not say think as I think, but think in my way. Fear no shadows, least of all in that great spectre of personal unhappiness which binds half the world to orthodoxy.
Thomas Huxley
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Fact I know and Law I know but what is this Necessity, save an empty shadow of my own mind's throwing?
Thomas Huxley
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My business is to teach my aspirations to confirm themselves to fact, not to try and make facts harmonize with my aspirations.
Thomas Huxley
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Genius as an explosive power beats gunpowder hollow and if knowledge, which should give that power guidance, is wanting, the chances are not small that the rocket will simply run amuck among friends and foes.
Thomas Huxley
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The dogma of the infallibility of the Bible is no more self-evident than is that of the infallibility of the popes.
Thomas Huxley
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The only medicine for suffering, crime, and all other woes of mankind, is wisdom. Teach a man to read and write, and you have put into his hands the great keys of the wisdom box. But it is quite another thing to open the box.
Thomas Huxley
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What would become of the garden if the gardener treated all the weeds and slugs and birds and trespassers as he would like to be treated, if he were in their place?
Thomas Huxley
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If a man cannot see a church, it is preposterous to take his opinion about its altar-piece or painted window.
Thomas Huxley
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The results of political changes are hardly ever those which their friends hope or their foes fear.
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The foundation of all morality is to have done, once and for all, with lying to give up pretending to believe that for which there is no evidence, and repeating unintelligible propositions about things beyond the possibilities of knowledge.
Thomas Huxley