Quotes by William Kingdon Clifford - Page 1

An atom must be at least as complex as a grand piano.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Science
Atoms
Piano
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To know all about anything is to know how to deal with it under all circumstances.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Circumstances
Deals
Know How
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It is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Insufficient
Everywhere
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There is one thing in the world more wicked than the desire to command, and that is the will to obey.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Desire
Thinking
Wicked
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If a belief is not realized immediately in open deeds, it is stored up for the guidance of the future.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Belief
Deeds
Guidance
Immediately
Realized
Stored
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Nor is it that truly a belief at all which has not some influence upon the actions of him who holds it.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Belief
Actions
Holds
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To sum up: it is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Insufficient
Everywhere
Anyone
Wrong
Sum
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All our liberties are due to men who, when their conscience has compelled them, have broken the laws of the land.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Men
Land
Law
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No simplicity of mind, no obscurity of station, can escape the universal duty of questioning all that we believe.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Believe
Mind
Obscurity
Questioning
Simplicity
Escape
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We may always depend on it that algebra, which cannot be translated into good English and sound common sense, is bad algebra.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Algebra
Common Sense
May
Sound
English
Good May Always
Depend
Good Bad Always
Translated
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Our lives our guided by that general conception of the course of things which has been created by society for social purposes.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Conception
Courses
Our Lives
Purpose
Social
General
Course
Guided
Purposes
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The scientific discovery appears first as the hypothesis of an analogy; and science tends to become independent of the hypothesis.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Science
Discovery
Independent
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When an action is once done, it is right or wrong for ever; no accidental failure of its good or evil fruits can possibly alter that.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Failure
Action
Done
Evil
Fruit
Accidental
Alter
Wrong
Fruits
Possibly
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Thought is powerless, except it make something outside of itself: the thought which conquers the world is not contemplative but active.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Atheism
Conquer The World
Contemplative
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He who truly believes that which prompts him to an action has looked upon the action to lust after it, he has committed it already in his heart.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Believe
Committed
Heart
Lust
Believes
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The harm which is done by credulity in a man is not confined to the fostering of a credulous character in others, and consequent support of false beliefs.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Men
Character
Confined
Credulity
Fostering
Harm
Support
Beliefs
Consequent
False
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A little reflection will show us that every belief, even the simplest and most fundamental, goes beyond experience when regarded as a guide to our actions.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Experience
Belief
Believe
Fundamentals
Reflection
Simplest
Actions
Beyond
Show
Fundamental
Goes
Guide
Regarded
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Every rustic who delivers in the village alehouse his slow, infrequent sentences, may help to kill or keep alive the fatal superstitions which clog his race.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Alive
Race
Rustic
Sentences
Superstitions
Village
Clog
Fatal
Slow
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This sense of power is the highest and best of pleasures when the belief on which it is founded is a true belief, and has been fairly earned by investigation.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Belief
Believe
Investigation
Pleasure
Fairly
Earned
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We feel much happier and more secure when we think we know precisely what to do, no matter what happens, then when we have lost our way and do not know where to turn.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Matter
Secure
Thinking
Way
Happier
Precisely
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An atmosphere of beliefs and conceptions has been formed by the labours and struggles of our forefathers, which enables us to breathe amid the various and complex circumstances of our life.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Atmosphere
Belief
Breathe
Circumstances
Forefathers
Struggle
Beliefs
Complex
Enables
Formed
Labours
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The rule which should guide us in such cases is simple and obvious enough: that the aggregate testimony of our neighbours is subject to the same conditions as the testimony of any one of them.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Cases
Conditions
Obvious
Testimony
Aggregate
Guide
Neighbours
Rule
Subject
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To consider only one other such witness: the followers of the Buddha have at least as much right to appeal to individual and social experience in support of the authority of the Eastern saviour.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Authority
Eastern
Followers
Saviour
Witness
Appeal
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Into this, for good or ill, is woven every belief of every man who has speech of his fellows. A awful privilege, and an awful responsibility, that we should help to create the world in which posterity will live.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Belief
Every Man
Fellows
Ill
Posterity
Privilege
Responsibility
Woven
Good Man World
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In like manner, if I let myself believe anything on insufficient evidence, there may be no great harm done by the mere belief; it may be true after all, or I may never have occasion to exhibit it in outward acts.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Belief
Evidence
Harm
Insufficient
Mere
Acts
Great Myself Believe
Be True
Exhibit
Manner
Occasion
Outward
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Namely, we have no right to believe a thing true because everybody says so unless there are good grounds for believing that some one person at least has the means of knowing what is true, and is speaking the truth so far as he knows it.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Believe
Knowing
Mean
Truth Good Believe
Believing
Grounds
Namely
Speaking
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scientific thought does not mean thought about scientific subjects with long names. There are no scientific subjects. The subject of science is the human universe; that is to say, everything that is, or has been, or may be related to man.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Men
Mean
Names
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There is no scientific discoverer, no poet, no painter, no musician, who will not tell you that he found ready made his discovery or poem or picture - that it came to him from outside, and that he did not consciously create it from within.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Musician
Painter
Discoverer
Poem
Scientific
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There is no scientific discoverer, no poet, no painter, no musician, who will not tell you that he found ready made his discovery or poem or picture — that it came to him from outside, and that he did not consciously create it from within.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Discovery
Musician
Poet
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The danger to society is not merely that it should believe wrong things, though that is great enough; but that it should become credulous, and lose the habit of testing things and inquiring into them; for then it must sink back into savagery.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Great
Society
Believe
Danger
Enough
Habit
Inquiring
Savagery
Should
Testing
Wrong Things
Things
Then
Back
Credulous
Wrong
Must
Lose
Merely
Sink
Though
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If I steal money from any person, there may be no harm done from the mere transfer of possession; he may not feel the loss, or it may prevent him from using the money badly. But I cannot help doing this great wrong towards Man, that I make myself dishonest.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Men
Done
Harm
Loss
Mere
Possession
Badly
Dishonest
Towards
Prevent
Steal
Transfer
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Remember that [scientific thought] is the guide of action; that the truth which it arrives at is not that which we can ideally contemplate without error, but that which we may act upon without fear; and you cannot fail to see that scientific thought is not an accompaniment or condition of human progress, but human progress itself.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Science
Truth
Errors
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If a man, holding a belief which he was taught in childhood or persuaded of afterwards, keeps down and pushes away any doubts which arise about it in his mind, purposely avoids the reading of books and the company of men that call in question or discuss it, and regards as impious those questions which cannot easily be asked without disturbing it - the life of that man is one long sin against mankind.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Men
Book
Reading
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The aim of scientific thought, then, is to apply past experience to new circumstances; the instrument is an observed uniformity in the course of events. By the use of this instrument it gives us information transcending our experience, it enables us to infer things that we have not seen from things that we have seen; and the evidence for the truth of that information depends on our supposing that the uniformity holds good beyond our experience.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Giving
Past
Supposing That
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It cannot be doubted that theistic belief is a comfort and a solace to those who hold it, and that the loss of it is a very painful loss. It cannot be doubted, at least, by many of us in this generation, who either profess it now, or received it in our childhood and have parted from it since with such searching trouble as only cradle-faiths can cause. We have seen the spring sun shine out of an empty heaven, to light up a soulless earth; we have felt with utter loneliness that the Great Companion is dead.
William Kingdon Clifford / Mathematician
Loneliness
Loss
Spring
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William Kingdon Clifford Quotes - Page 1

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