Quip Quotes (38)

A man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a minute. He sits on a hot stove for a minute, it's longer than any hour. That is relativity.
Explanation given to his secretary, Helen Dukas, to relay to reporters and laypersons.
James B. Simpson, Best Quotes of '54, '55, '56 (1957), in Fred R. Shapiro and Joseph Epstein, The Yale Book of Quotations (2006), 230.
See also:  |  Relativity (16)

A neurotic is a man who builds a castle in the air. A pyschotic is the man who lives in it. A psychiatrist is the man who collects the rent.
Collected Papers
See also:  |  Neurotic (2)  |  Psychiatrist (6)

A psychiatrist is a man who goes to the Folies-Bergère and looks at the audience.
In Robert Andrews, The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations (1993), 747.
See also:  |  Psychiatrist (6)

An epidemiologist is a doctor broken down by age and sex.
Anonymous

Archaeology is the science that proves you can't keep a good man down.
Anonymous
In Bob Phillips, Phillips' Book of Great Thoughts & Funny Sayings (1993), 24.
See also:  |  Archaeology (9)

ARCHIMEDES. On hearing his name, shout 'Eureka!' Or else: 'Give me a fulcrum and I will move the world' There is also Archimedes' screw, but you are not expected to know what that is.
The Dictionary of Accepted Ideas (1881), trans. Jaques Barzun (1968), 15.
See also:  |  Archimedes (6)

Behaviorism is the art of pulling habits out of rats.
Anonymous
In Jon Fripp, Michael Fripp and Deborah Fripp, Speaking of Science (2000), 23.

COLD. Healthier than heat.
The Dictionary of Accepted Ideas (1881), trans. Jaques Barzun (1968), 25.
See also:  |  Cold (4)  |  Heat (10)

DOCTOR. Always preceded by 'The good'. Among men, in familiar conversation, 'Oh! balls, doctor!' Is a wizard when he enjoys your confidence, a jack-ass when you're no longer on terms. All are materialists: 'you can't probe for faith with a scalpel.'
The Dictionary of Accepted Ideas (1881), trans. Jaques Barzun (1968), 30.
See also:  |  Doctor (17)

Every science thinks it is the science.
Anonymous
In Leonard and Thelma Spinrad, Speaker's Lifetime Library (1979), 220.
See also:  |  Science (253)

Exploratory operation: a remunerative reconnaissance.
Anonymous
See also:  |  Operation (7)

Great science is an art.
Anonymous
In Leonard and Thelma Spinrad, Speaker's Lifetime Library (1979), 220.
See also:  |  Science (253)

I don't quite hear what you say, but I beg to differ entirely with you.

I'd lay down my life for two brothers or eight cousins.
Quipped in a pub conversation. 'Accidental Career', New Scientist, 8 Aug 1974, 325.
See also:  |  Genetics (39)

LITTRÉ. Snicker on hearing his name: 'the gentleman who thinks we are descended from the apes.'
The Dictionary of Accepted Ideas (1881), trans. Jaques Barzun (1968), 59.
See also:  |  Evolution (142)

Newton said, "If I have seen further than others, it is because I've stood on the shoulders of giants." These days we stand on each other's feet! (You and Your Research)
You and Your Research', Bell Communications Research Colloquium Seminar, 7 Mar 1986.

No man of science wants merely to know. He acquires knowledge to appease his passion for discovery. He does not discover in order to know, he knows in order to discover.
The Aims of Education and Other Essays (1967), 48.
See also:  |  Discovery (85)  |  Knowledge (190)  |  Men Of Science (60)

Nothing you can't spell will ever work.
In Geoff Tibballs, The Mammoth Book of Humor (2000), 365.
See also:  |  Technology (22)

Psychiatrist: A man who asks you a lot of expensive questions your wife asks you for nothing.
Attributed.
See also:  |  Psychiatrist (6)

Science has always been too dignified to invent a good back-scratcher.
In Edward Anthony, O Rare Don Marquis (1962), 354.
See also:  |  Invention (49)  |  Science (253)

Science is a first-rate piece of furniture for a man's upper chamber, if he has common sense on the ground floor. But if a man hasn't got plenty of good common sense, the more science he has the worse for his patient.
'The Poet at the Breakfast-Table', Chapter 5. The Atlantic Monthly (May 1872), 29, 607.
See also:  |  Common Sense (10)  |  Science (253)

Science is forever rewriting itself.
Anonymous
In Leonard and Thelma Spinrad, Speaker's Lifetime Library (1979), 220.
See also:  |  Science (253)

Science is the ascertainment of facts and the refusal to regard facts as permanent.
Anonymous
In Leonard and Thelma Spinrad, Speaker's Lifetime Library (1979), 220.
See also:  |  Fact (83)  |  Science (253)

Science is wonderful: for years uranium cost only a few dollars a ton until scientists discovered you could kill people with it.
Anonymous
In Evan Esar, 20,000 Quips and Quotes, 703.
See also:  |  Science (253)  |  Uranium (2)  |  War (33)

Show me an archaeologist, and I'll show you a man who practices skull drugery.
Anonymous
In Bob Phillips, Phillips' Book of Great Thoughts & Funny Sayings (1993), 24.
See also:  |  Archaeology (9)

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
Attributed.

Television is chewing gum for the eyes.
In Geoff Tibballs, The Mammoth Book of Humor (2000), 365.
See also:  |  Television (2)

The banker asks, 'how much?' The scientist asks, 'how come?'
Anonymous
In Leonard and Thelma Spinrad, Speaker's Lifetime Library (1979), 220.
See also:  |  Science (253)

The brain is a wonderful organ. It starts working the moment you get up in the morning and does not stop until you get into the office.
Attributed. In Peter McDonald Slop, Oxford Dictionary of Medical Quotations (2004), 37.
See also:  |  Brain (33)

The brain is an island in an osmotically homogeneous sea.
From a lecture. Quoted in 'The Best Hope of All', Time (3 May 1963)
See also:  |  Brain (33)

The scientific theory I like best is that the rings of Saturn are composed entirely of lost airline luggage
In Eileen Mason, Great Book of Funny Quotes: Witty Words for Every Day of the Year (1993). Quoted in Lilly Walters, What to Say When … You're Dying on the Platform (1995), 173.
See also:  |  Saturn (5)

The space scientist is a most remarkable man: he has his feet on the ground and his head in the clouds.
Anonymous
In Evan Esar, 20,000 Quips and Quotes, 703.

The spine is a series of bones running down your back. You sit on one end of it and your head sits on the other.
Anonymous
See also:  |  Bone (2)

The ways of science are unpredicatable: it can get men up to the moon, but it cannot get pigeons down from public buildings.
Anonymous
In Evan Esar, 20,000 Quips and Quotes, 703.
See also:  |  Science (253)

There are two kinds of sleep. The sleep of the just and the sleep of the just after.
Anonymous
See also:  |  Sleep (2)

Tis better than riches
To scratch when it itches
Anonymous
See also:  |  Itch (2)

When someone abuses me I can defend myself, but against praise I am defenceless.
Attributed.

Yesterday's dreams are today's science
Anonymous
In Leonard and Thelma Spinrad, Speaker's Lifetime Library (1979), 220.
See also:  |  Science (253)

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Original words on great scientific discoveries.
Darwin considers pros and cons of marriage.
James Clerk Maxwell's electric but poetic Valentine.
I have little patience with scientists who take a board of wood, look for its thinnest part and drill a great number of holes where drilling is easy. --Albert Einstein
I try to identify myself with the atoms...I ask what I would do if I were a carbon atom or a sodium atom. --Linus Pauling




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