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Man is the interpreter of nature, science the right interpretation.

William Whewell

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William Whewell
Age: 71 †
Born: 1794
Born: May 24
Died: 1866
Died: March 6
Economist
Geologist
Historian
Mathematician
Philosopher
Physicist
Polymath
Theologian
University Teacher
Writer
Reverend William Whewell
Science
Nature
Right
Men
Interpreter
Interpretation

More quotes by William Whewell

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The person who did most to give to analysis the generality and symmetry which are now its pride, was also the person who made mechanics analytical I mean Euler.
William Whewell
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Astronomy is ... the only progressive Science which the ancient world produced.
William Whewell
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...the question undoubtedly is, or soon will be, not whether or no we shall employ notation in chemistry, but whether we shall use a bad and incongruous, or a consistent and regular notation.
William Whewell
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There is a mask of theory over the whole face of nature.
William Whewell
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Every failure is a step to success.
William Whewell
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Our assent to the hypothesis implies that it is held to be true of all particular instances. That these cases belong to past or to future times, that they have or have not already occurred, makes no difference in the applicability of the rule to them. Because the rule prevails, it includes all cases.
William Whewell
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The system becomes more coherent as it is further extended. The elements which we require for explaining a new class of facts are already contained in our system. In false theories, the contrary is the case.
William Whewell
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The catastrophist constructs theories, the uniformitarian demolishes them.
William Whewell
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Every man has obligations which belong to his station. Duties extend beyond obligations, and direct the affections, desires, and intentions, as well as the actions.
William Whewell
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The present generation finds itself the heir of a vast patrimony of science and it must needs concern us to know the steps by which these possessions were acquired, and the documents by which they are secured to us and our heirs for ever.
William Whewell
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Hence no force, however great, can stretch a cord, however fine, into a horizontal line which is accurately straight: there will always be a bending downwards.
William Whewell
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The main object of the work was to present such a survey of the advances already made in physical knowledge, and of the mode in which they have been made, as might serve as a real and firm basis for our speculations concerning the progress of human knowledge, and the processes by which sciences are formed.
William Whewell
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In order that the facts obtained by observation and experiment may be capable of being used in furtherance of our exact and solid knowledge, they must be apprehended and analysed according to some Conceptions which, applied for this purpose, give distinct and definite results, such as can be steadily taken hold of and reasoned from.
William Whewell
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In art, truth is a means to an end in science, it is the only end.
William Whewell
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The earlier truths are not expelled but absorbed, not contradicted but extended and the history of each science, which may thus appear like a succession of revolutions, is, in reality, a series of developements.
William Whewell
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A man really and practically looking onwards to an immortal life, on whatever grounds, exhibits to us the human soul in an enobled attitude.
William Whewell
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Nobody since Newton has been able to use geometrical methods to the same extent for the like purposes and as we read the Principia we feel as when we are in an ancient armoury where the weapons are of gigantic size and as we look at them we marvel what manner of man he was who could use as a weapon what we can scarcely lift as a burden.
William Whewell
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Conscience is the reason employed about questions of right and wrong.
William Whewell
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Geometry in every proposition speaks a language which experience never dares to utter and indeed of which she but halfway comprehends the meaning.
William Whewell
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Fundamental ideas are not a consequence of experience, but a result of the particular constitution and activity of the mind, which is independent of all experience in its origin, though constantly combined with experience in its exercise.
William Whewell