Applied Science Quotes (11)

Il n'existe pas de sciences appliquées, mais seulement des applications de la science.
There are no such things as applied sciences, only applications of science.
Address (11 Sep 1872). In Comptes Rendus des Travaux du Congrès viticole et séricole de Lyon, 9-14 Septembre 1872, 49.
See also:  |  Application (16)  |  Science (463)

But, contrary to the lady's prejudices about the engineering profession, the fact is that quite some time ago the tables were turned between theory and applications in the physical sciences. Since World War II the discoveries that have changed the world are not made so much in lofty halls of theoretical physics as in the less-noticed labs of engineering and experimental physics. The roles of pure and applied science have been reversed; they are no longer what they were in the golden age of physics, in the age of Einstein, Schrödinger, Fermi and Dirac.
'The Age of Computing: a Personal Memoir', Daedalus (1992), 121, 120.
See also:  |  Application (16)  |  Paul A. M. Dirac (31)  |  Discovery (178)  |  Albert Einstein (109)  |  Engineer (17)  |  Fact (146)  |  Enrico Fermi (9)  |  Laboratory (37)  |  Physical Science (14)  |  Physics (70)  |  Prejudice (12)  |  Profession (6)  |  Pure Science (4)  |  Reverse (3)  |  Role (5)  |  Erwin Schrödinger (7)  |  Theoretical Physics (6)  |  Theory (192)

Geology does better in reclothing dry bones and revealing lost creations, than in tracing veins of lead and beds of iron; astronomy better in opening to us the houses of heaven than in teaching navigation; surgery better in investigating organiation than in setting limbs; only it is ordained that, for our encouragement, every step we make in science adds something to its practical applicabilities.
Modern Painters (1852), Part 3, 8-9.
See also:  |  Astronomy (68)  |  Geology (114)  |  Surgery (21)

Good applied science in medicine, as in physics, requires a high degree of certainty about the basic facts at hand, and especially about their meaning, and we have not yet reached this point for most of medicine.

The Medusa and the Snail (1979), 143.
See also:  |  Fact (146)  |  Medicine (127)  |  Physics (70)

The aims of pure basic science, unlike those of applied science, are neither fast-flowing nor pragmatic. The quick harvest of applied science is the useable process, the medicine, the machine. The shy fruit of pure science is understanding.
Life, 9 January 1950.
See also:  |  Pure Science (4)  |  Science (463)

The fact that the regions of nature actually covered by known laws are few and fragmentary is concealed by the natural tendency to crowd our experience into those particular regions and to leave the others to themselves. We seek out those parts that are known and familiar and avoid those that are unknown and unfamiliar. This is simply what is called 'Applied Science.'
Scientific Method: An Inquiry into the Character and Validy of Natural Law (1923), 201.
See also:  |  Law (145)  |  Research (221)

The step between practical and theoretic science, is the step between the miner and the geologist, the apocathecary and the chemist.
Modern Painters (1852), Part 3, 8.
See also:  |  Apothecary (2)  |  Chemist (24)  |  Geologist (13)

This example illustrates the differences in the effects which may be produced by research in pure or applied science. A research on the lines of applied science would doubtless have led to improvement and development of the older methods—the research in pure science has given us an entirely new and much more powerful method. In fact, research in applied science leads to reforms, research in pure science leads to revolutions, and revolutions, whether political or industrial, are exceedingly profitable things if you are on the winning side.
In Lord Rayleigh, The Life of Sir J. J. Thomson (1943), 199
See also:  |  Development (27)  |  Difference (30)  |  Effect (22)  |  Improvement (9)  |  Method (14)  |  Profit (7)  |  Pure Science (4)  |  Reform (5)  |  Research (221)  |  Revolution (10)

Unless we choose to decentralize and to use applied science, not as the end to which human beings are to be made the means, but as the means to producing a race of free individuals, we have only two alternatives to choose from: either a number of national
Brave New World (1932, 1998), Preface, xvii.
See also:  |  Techonology (3)  |  Utopia (3)  |  War (51)

We must not forget that when radium was discovered no one knew that it would prove useful in hospitals. The work was one of pure science. And this is a proof that scientific work must not be considered from the point of view of the direct usefulness of it. It must be done for itself, for the beauty of science, and then there is always the chance that a scientific discovery may become like the radium a benefit for humanity.
Lecture at Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York (14 May 1921). In Cambridge Editorial Partnership, Speeches that Changed the World, 53.
See also:  |  Discovery (178)  |  Hospital (16)  |  Radium (8)  |  Research (221)

Why does this magnificent applied science which saves work and makes life easier bring us so little happiness? ... The simple answer runs: Because we have not yet learned to make sensible use of it.'
Address to students of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California (16 Feb 1931). In New York Times (17 Feb 1931), p. 6.
See also:  |  Happiness (26)  |  Sensible (3)  |  Use (8)  |  Work (48)

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