Quote of the day, April 26

Alfred North Whitehead, from The Concept of Nature

“The guiding motto in the life of every natural philosopher should be, Seek simplicity and distrust it.”

Quote of the day, Jan. 17

Jacob Bronowski, from The Ascent of Man

“For us, the cave paintings re-create the hunter’s way of life as a glimpse of history; we look through them into the past. But for the hunter, I suggest, they were a peep-hole into the future; he looked ahead. In either direction, the cave paintings act as a kind of telescope tube of imagination: they direct the mind from what is seen to what can be inferred or conjectured. Indeed, this is so in the very action of painting; for all its superb observation, the flat picture only means something to the eye because the mind fills it out with roundness and movement, a reality by inference, which is not actually seen but imagined.”

Quote of the day, Dec. 14

Pythagoras, on man’s soul

“The soul of man is divided into three parts, intelligence, reason, and passion. Intelligence and passion are possessed by other animals, but reason by man alone.”