Substitute Quotes (4)
Furious activity is no substitute for analytical thought.
Quoted in New Scientist (1972), 55, 429.
Furious activity is no substitute for understanding.
In Michael Fripp, Speaking of Science: Notable Quotes on Science, Engineering, and the Environment‎ (2000), 203. Widely seen, but without further biographical information or source citation. Webmaster has not yet found a print source prior to 2000. Please contact Webmaster if you have more details. (For a similar quote in 1972, see Alastair Pilkington.)
The difference between myth and science is the difference between divine inspiration of 'unaided reason' (as Bertrand Russell put it) on the one hand and theories developed in observational contact with the real world on the other. It is the difference between the belief in prophets and critical thinking, between Credo quia absurdum (I believe because it is absurd–Tertullian) and De omnibus est dubitandum (Everything should be questioned–Descartes). To try to write a grand cosmical drama leads necessarily to myth. To try to let knowledge substitute ignorance in increasingly large regions of space and time is science.
In 'Cosmology: Myth or Science?'. Journal of Astrophysics and Astronomy (1984), 5, 79-98.
See also: | Belief (45) | Contact (3) | Cosmology (6) | René Descartes (27) | Difference (30) | Divine (2) | Drama (2) | Ignorance (63) | Inspiration (11) | Knowledge (341) | Myth (15) | Observation (147) | Question (52) | Real (5) | Reason (71) | Bertrand Russell (56) | Science (463) | Theory (192) | Thinking (58) | World (49) | Write (12)
There is no substitute for mother's milk.
