“Scientists dealt with this paradox in the handiest possible way. They ...” — Bill Bryson Quote

“Scientists dealt with this paradox in the handiest possible way. They ignored it.”

“As we parted at the Natural History Museum in London, I asked Richard Fortey how science ensures that when one person goes there's someone ready to take his place.”

“Coming back to your native land after an absence of many years is a surprisingly unsettling business, a little like waking from a long coma. Time, you discover, has wrought changes that leave you feeling mildly foolish and out of touch.”

“The basic challenge of any book is you know you're going to be working on it for three or four years or more. So you want to have a subject that will keep you engaged.”

“Because they are so long-lived, atoms really get around. Every atom you possess has almost certainly passed through several stars and been part of millions of organisms on its way to becoming you. We are each so atomically numerous and so vigorously recycled at death that a significant number of our atoms—up to a billion for each of us, it has been suggested—probably once belonged to Shakespeare. A billion more each came from Buddha and Genghis Khan and Beethoven, and any other historical figure you care to name. (The personages have to be historical, apparently, as it takes the atoms some decades to become thoroughly redistributed; however much you may wish it, you are not yet one with Elvis Presley.) So we are all reincarnations—though short-lived ones. When we die our atoms will disassemble and move off to find new uses elsewhere—as part of a leaf or other human being or drop of dew. Atoms, however, go on practically forever.”

“I ended your experiment. Because you're not a scientist. You're a monster. I'm not leaving any of them at your mercy.”

“Therefore, the good of man must be the end of the science of politics.”

“من أوجب الواجبات على الدولة أن تترك العلماء أحراراً في حكمهم على الأمور، أن تشعرهم باستقلالهم، لأنهم قادة الفكر، كما أن على العلماء أن يتمسكوا بهذا الاستقلال. فاستقلال العلم والعلماء شرط لابد منه لحياة العلم والفضيلة على حد سواء. وإذا ضاع استقلال العلم ضاع العلم وضاعت الفضيلة، بل وضاعت الأمة. وقد بقيت أوروبا ألف عام في ظلمات العصور الوسطى، لأن أمورهم كانت في أيدي قوم لا يؤمنون بالحق، ولا يؤمنون باستقلال العلم، فاضطهدوا العلماء، وحاربوا حرية الفكر، واتغمسوا في الجهالة محتمين وراء الجدل اللفظي الأجوف، فعم الظلم والضلال.”

“When things get too complicated, it sometimes makes sense to stop and wonder: Have I asked the right question?”

“We tend to hear much more about the splendors returned than the ships that brought them or the shipwrights. It has always been that way. Even those history books enamored of the voyages of Christopher Columbus do not tell much about the builders of the Nina the Pinta and the Santa Maria or about the principle of the caravel. These spacecraft their designers builders navigators and controllers are examples of what science and engineering set free for well-defined peaceful purposes can accomplish. Those scientists and engineers should be role models for an America seeking excellence and international competitiveness. They should be on our stamps.”