Famous quote:
Archimedes
Aristotle
(384-322 B.C.)
“Give me a lever long enough
and a fulcrum on which to
place it, and I shall move the
world.”
Eureka! Supposedly, it was in
the bath tub that this person
figured out the solution to the
problem posed to him by the
king of Syracuse: was a crown
(or wreath) supposedly made
of pure gold in fact entirely
gold? He measured the
amount of water displaced by
the crown and by an equal
weight of gold, and found that
the crown displaced more
water. Its specific gravity* was
thus less than that of gold,
and therefore it had been
adulterated with another
metal.
"Wit is educated insolence."
Initiated fields of Hydrostatics,
static mechanics, pycnometry
(the measurement of the
volume or density of an
object). He is called the "father
of integral calculus."
(287 BC – 211 BC)
“For the things we have to
learn before we can do them,
we learn by doing them.”
Famous quotes:
Famous Quote:
Isaac Asimov
“The saddest aspect of life
right now is that science
gathers knowledge faster than
society gathers wisdom.”
"Life is pleasant. Death is
peaceful. It's the transition
that's troublesome."
Although most of his books
and articles are non-fiction, he
is most well known for his
science fiction books and
stories, such as the
Foundation Trilogy.
“The most exciting phrase to
hear in science, the one that
heralds new discoveries, is
not 'Eureka!' (I found it!) but
'That's funny ...'
(1920 – 1992)
Famous quotes:
“We all agree that your theory
is crazy, but is it crazy
enough?”
Famous Quotes:
Niels Bohr
“If quantum mechanics hasn't
profoundly shocked you, you
haven't understood it yet.”
“Prediction is very difficult,
especially about the future.”
In Manchester this physicist
worked with Rutherford's
group on the structure of the
atom. Using quantum ideas
due to Planck and Einstein,
Bohr conjectured that an atom
could exist only in a discrete
set of stable energy states.
“An expert is a person who
has made all the mistakes that
can be made in a very narrow
field.”
“Humanity will be confronted
with dangers of
unprecedented character
unless, in due time, measures
can be taken to forestall a
disastrous competition in such
formidable armaments and to
establish an international
control of the manufacture and
use of powerful materials.”
(1885 – 1962)
Robert Boyle
“Under conditions of constant
temperature and quantity,
there is an inverse relationship
between the volume and
pressure for an ideal gas.”
P1V1 = P2V2
(1627 – 1691)
George Washington Carver
Former Slave, Educator,
Scientist, Businessperson,
Service Industry Employee,
Agriculturist, Medical Worker,
Artist, Author, Lecturer,
Domestic, Reformer,
Performing Artist.
His work with agricultural
products developed industrial
applications from farm
products, called chemurgy in
technical literature in the early
1900s. His research
developed 325 products from
peanuts, 108 applications for
sweet potatoes, and 75
products derived from pecans.
(1865 – 1943)
Famous Quote:
Famous Quote:
Nicolaus Copernicus
Let no one expect anything of
certainty from astronomy, lest
if anyone take as true that
which has been constructed
for another use, he go away ...
a bigger fool than when he
came to it.”
This Polish astronomer is said
to be the founder of modern
astronomy.
“Finally we shall place the Sun
himself at the center of the
Universe. All this is
suggested by the systematic
procession of events and the
harmony of the whole
Universe, if only we face the
facts, as they say, 'with both
eyes open'.”
(1473 - 1543)
Famous quote:
Seymour Cray
"I just bought a Mac to help
me design the next Cray."
when was informed that Apple
Inc. had recently bought a
Cray supercomputer to help
them design the next Mac.”
This electrical engineer was a
pioneer in supercomputing.
His innovations include vector
register technology, cooling
technologies, and magnetic
amplifiers
(1925 – 1996)
Marie Curie
This chemist invented the
word “radioactivity.”
This Polish-French chemist is
best known as the discoverer
of the radioactive elements
polonium and radium and as
the first person to win two
Nobel prizes.
Leonardo da Vinci
(1452 - 1519)
(1867 - 1934)
That mental discourse that originates in first principles is termed science.
Nothing can be found in nature that is not part of science, like continuous
quantity, that is to say, geometry, which, commencing with the surfaces of
bodies, is found to have its origins in lines, the boundary of these surfaces. Yet
we do not remain satisfied with this, in that we know that line has its conclusion
in a point, and nothing can be smaller than that which is a point. Therefore the
point is the first principle of geometry, and no other thing can be found either in
nature or in the human mind that can give rise to the point.... No human
investigation may claim to be a true science if it has not passed through
mathematical demonstrations... The principle of the science of painting is the
point; second is the line; third is the surface; fourth is the body which is
enclosed by these surfaces. And that is just what is to be represented...since in
truth the scope of painting does not extend beyond the representation of the
solid body or the shape of all the things that are visible.
He had a keen eye and quick
mind that led him to make
important scientific
discoveries, yet he never
published his ideas.
Leonardo da Vinci
He was a gentle vegetarian
who loved animals and
despised war, yet he worked
as a military engineer to
invent advanced and deadly
weapons.
He was one of the greatest
painters of the Italian
Renaissance, yet he left only
a handful of completed
paintings.
The “flying machine”
(1452 - 1519)
Famous quote:
Famous Quote:
Charles Darwin
“To suppose that the eye with
all its inimitable contrivances
for adjusting the focus to
different distances, for
admitting different amounts of
light, and for the correction of
spherical and chromatic
aberration, could have been
formed by natural selection,
seems, I confess, absurd in
the highest degree.”
“In the survival of favoured
individuals and races, during
the constantly-recurring
struggle for existence, we see
a powerful and ever-acting
form of selection.”
Books:
The Voyage of the Beagle
The Origin of Species
Famous quote:
The Descent of Man
"An abominable mystery" is
how this nineteenth-century
naturalist referred to the origin
of flowering plants.
(1809 – 1882)
James B. Eads
(1820 – 1887)
This engineer is known for the
a triple-arch steel bridge over
the Mississippi River (bearing
his name) that connects East
St. Louis, Illinois to St.. Louis,
Missouri. He also worked to
create a channel into New
Orleans from the Gulf of
Mexico that would be
navigable year round by
means of jetties.
Famous quote:
Famous quote:
Thomas Alva Edison
“I have not failed. I've just
found 10,000 ways that won't
work.”
"Genius is one per cent
inspiration and ninety-nine per
cent perspiration. As a result,
“To invent, you need a good
a genius is often a talented
imagination and a pile of junk.”
person who has simply done
all of his homework."
Famous quote:
(1847 – 1931)
Albert Einstein
Famous quote:
Famous quotes:
“Put your hand on a hot stove
for a minute, and it seems like
an hour. Sit with a pretty girl
for an hour, and it seems like
a minute. That's relativity.”
“I shall never believe that God
plays dice with the world.”
“Science without religion is
lame, religion without science
is blind.”
E = mc2
(1879 – 1955)
Michael Faraday
This English physicist/chemist
is known for his pioneering
experiments in electricity and
magnetism. Many consider
him the greatest
experimentalist who ever
lived. Several concepts that
he derived directly from
experiments, such as lines of
magnetic force, have become
common ideas in modern
physics.
Famous quote:
I do not feel that I possess
anything extraordinary. If I do
have the pleasure of a special
talent, it must certainly be
perseverance.”
(1791 - 1867)
Framous quote:
Richard Feynman
“The fact that I beat a drum
has nothing to do with the fact
that I do theoretical physics.”
The Jimmi Hendrix of physics.
Famous quote:
This physicist won the Nobel
“I find that teaching and the
Prize in Physics, 1965, for
students keep life going, and I fundamental work in quantum
would never accept any
electrodynamics, with deepposition in which somebody
ploughing consequences for
has invented a happy situation the physics of elementary
particles.
for me where I don't have to
teach. Never.”
(1918 – 1988)
Famous quotes:
Benjamin Franklin
He invented bifocals and the
iron furnace stove.
"The definition of insanity is
doing the same thing over and
over and expecting different
results."
"The only things of certainty
are Death and Taxes.”
(1706 – 1790)
Famous Quote:
Sigmund Freud
Famous Quote:
“A man should not strive to
eliminate his complexes but to
“Sometimes a cigar is just a
get into accord with them: they
cigar.”
are legitimately what directs
his conduct in the world.”
Famous for The Interpretation
of Dreams, published in 1900.
(1856-1939)
R. Buckminster Fuller
“Everything you've learned in
school as "obvious" becomes
“Humanity is acquiring all the
less and less obvious as you
right technology for all the
begin to study the universe.
wrong reasons. “
For example, there are no
solids in the universe. There's
“Sometimes I think we're
not even a suggestion of a
alone. Sometimes I think we're
solid. There are no absolute
not. In either case, the thought
continuums. There are no
is staggering.”
surfaces. There are no
straight lines.”
Galileo Galilei
This Italian mathematician’s
support for the heliocentric
theory (Copernicus’ suncentered theory that the Earth
revolves around the sun) got
him into trouble with the
Roman Catholic Church. In
1633 the Inquisition convicted
him of heresy and forced him
to recant (publicly withdraw)
his support of Copernicus.
They sentenced him to life
imprisonment, but because of
his advanced age allowed him
serve his term under house
arrest at his villa outside of
Florence, Italy.
Famous Quote:
Bill Gates
"640K ought to be enough for
anybody."
Famous Quote:
Italian mathematician,
astronomer, physicist,
philosopher.
"I do not feel obliged to
believe that the same God
who has endowed us with
sense, reason, and intellect
has intended us to forgo their
use."
(1564–1642)
This software developer never
graduated from college, but
authored Business @ the
Speed of Thought and The
Road Ahead.
(1955 - )
Jane Goodall
This conservationist is the
world's foremost authority on
chimpanzees, having closely
observed their behavior for the
past quarter century in the
jungles of the Gombe Game
Reserve in Africa, living in the
chimps' environment and
gaining their confidence.
“It can be exhausting climbing high, far and fast. Around 3 pm
you feel very weary because of spending a lot of the day on
your tummy, crawling, with vines catching your hair. Living
under the skies, the forest is for me a temple, a cathedral made
of tree canopies and dancing light, especially when it's raining
and quiet. That's heaven on earth for me. I can't imagine going
through life without being tuned into the mystical side of nature.
People are too busy nowadays.”
(1934 – )
Stephen Hawking
Werner Karl Heisenberg
Famous quote:
“Even if there is only one
possible unified theory, it is
just a set of rules and
equations. What is it that
breathes fire into the
equations and makes a
universe for them to describe?
The usual approach of
science of constructing a
mathematical model cannot
answer the questions of why
there should be a universe for
the model to describe. Why
does the universe go to all the
bother of existing?”
Even for the physicist the
Famous quote:
“God not only plays dice. He
also sometimes throws the
dice where they cannot be
seen. “
English physicist, educator,
author
(1942 – )
German physicist
(1901 - 1976)
description in plain language
will be a criterion of the
degree of understanding that
has been reached.
Famous quote:
Hippocrates
“There are in fact two things,
science and opinion; the
former begets knowledge, the
latter ignorance. “
This early mathematician
showed that a cube can be
doubled if two mean
proportionals can be
determined between a number
and its double. This had a
major influence on attempts to
duplicate the cube, all efforts
after this being directed
towards the mean
proportionals problem.
His book included geometrical
solutions to quadratic
equations and included early
methods of integration.
(460 BC - 377 BC)
Grace Hopper
She was the first woman to
receive the National Medal of
Technology (1991). The
award recognises her as a
computer pioneer, who spent
a half century helping keep
America on the leading edge
of high technology.
In 1951 this early computer
scientist discovered the first
computer "bug." It was a real
moth, and was pasted into the
UNIVAC I logbook.
In 1952 she had an
operational compiler. "Nobody
believed that," she said. "I had
a running compiler and
nobody would touch it. They
told me computers could only
do arithmetic."
(1906 – 1992)
Mary Leakey
Richard: It has taken
biologists some 230 years to
identify and describe three
quarters of a million insects; if
there are indeed at least thirty
million, as Erwin (Terry Erwin,
the Smithsonian Institute)
estimates, then, working as
they have in the past, insect
taxonomists have ten
thousand years of
employment ahead of them.
Ghilean Prance, director of the
Botanical Gardens in Kew,
estimates that a complete list
of plants in the Americas
would occupy taxonomists for
four centuries, again working
at historical rates.
It was this anthropologist’s
1959 discovery of the
Zinjanthropus cranium at
Olduvai that captured
worldwide attention and made
this family a household name.
Building on this find, the
husband and wife team
attracted a multidisciplinary
team of specialists to work at
Olduvai and launched the
modern science of
paleoanthropology, the study
of human origins.
This anthropologist discovered
three trails of fossilised
hominid footprints 3.6 million
years old at Laetoli in
Tanzania in 1978. These
showed that man's ancestors
were already walking upright
at a much earlier period than
most anthropologists had
believed.
(1913 – 1996)
Famous quote:
Margaret Mead
“Anthropology demands the
open-mindedness with which
one must look and listen,
record in astonishment and
wonder that which one would
not have been able to guess.”
Most famous for The Coming
of Age in Somoa, first
published in 1928.
(1901 – 1987)
Gregor Mendel
Best known for his research
on heredity, using pea plants.
This biologist’s work became
the foundation for modern
genetics.
(1823 – 1884)
Famous quote:
Sir Isaac Newton
“If I have seen further [than
certain other men], it is by
standing upon the shoulders
of giants.”
Every object in a state of
uniform motion tends to
remain in that state of motion
unless an external force is
applied to it.
F = ma
This physicist/mathematician’s
greatest achievement was his
work in physics and celestial
mechanics, which culminated
in the theory of universal
gravitation.
For every action there is an
equal and opposite reaction.
(1642 – 1727)
Alfred Nobel
This industrialist was very
interested in social and peacerelated issues and held what
were considered radical views
in his era. He had a great
interest in literature and wrote
his own poetry and dramatic
works.
This person invented
dynamite and endowed a $9
million fund in his will. The
interest on this endowment
was to be used as awards for
people whose work most
benefited humanity.
(1833-1896)
J. Robert Oppenheimer
This physicist’s name has
become almost synonymous
with the atomic bomb, and
also with the dilemma facing
scientists when the interests
of the nation and their own
conscience collide.
He established the Manhattan
Project in 1941.
(1904 – 1967)
Blaise Pascal
This future mathematician’s
father decided that he was not
to study mathematics before
the age of 15 and all
mathematics texts were
removed from their house.
However, his curiosity raised
by this, the son started to work
on geometry himself at the
age of 12. He discovered that
the sum of the angles of a
triangle are two right angles
and, when his father found
out, he relented and allowed
him a copy of Euclid.
Famous Quote:
“Nature is an infinite sphere of
which the center is
everywhere and the
circumference nowhere.”
(1623 – 1662)
Jean Piaget
His researches in
developmental psychology
and genetic epistemology had
one unique goal: how does
knowledge grow? His answer
is that the growth of
knowledge is a progressive
construction of logically
embedded structures
superseding one another by a
process of inclusion of lower
less powerful logical means
into higher and more powerful
ones up to adulthood.
sensorimotor,
preoperations,
concrete operations, and
formal operations
(1896-1980)
“I never said it. Honest. Oh I
said there are maybe 100
billion galaxies and 10 billion
trillion stars. It’s hard to talk
about the Cosmos without
using big numbers. I said
“billion” many times on the
Cosmos television series,
which was seen by a great
many people. But I never said
“billions and billions.”
Famous quotes:
Carl Sagan
"If you want to make an apple
pie from scratch, you must
first create the universe."
"We make our world
significant by the courage of
our questions and by the
depth of our answers".
He published Cosmos in
1980, the novel Contact in
1985, and Billions and Billions
: Thoughts on Life and Death
at the Brink of the Millennium
in 1997.
(1934 – 1996)
Jonas Salk
Famous Quote:
“When I worked on the polio
vaccine, I had a theory. I
guided each [experiment] by
imagining myself in the
phenomenon in which I was
interested. The intuitive realm
... the realm of the imagination
guides my thinking.”
US microbiologist
(1914 - 1995)
Erwin Schrödinger
“To each function of the
position- and momentumcoordinates in wave
mechanics there may be
related a matrix in such a way
that these matrices, in every
case satisfy the formal
calculation rules of Born and
Heisenberg. ... The solution of
the natural boundary value
problem of this differential
equation in wave mechanics is
completely equivalent to the
solution of Heisenberg's
algebraic problem.”
"One can even set up quite ridiculous cases. A cat is penned
up in a steel chamber, along with the following diabolical device
(which must be secured against direct interference by the cat):
in a Geiger counter there is a tiny bit of radioactive substance,
so small that perhaps in the course of one hour one of the
atoms decays, but also, with equal probability, perhaps none; if
it happens, the counter tube discharges and through a relay
releases a hammer which shatters a small flask of hydrocyanic
acid.
If one has left this entire system to itself for an hour, one would
say that the cat still lives if meanwhile no atom has decayed.
The first atomic decay would have poisoned it. The Psi function
for the entire system would express this by having in it the
living and the dead cat (pardon the expression) mixed or
smeared out in equal parts."
(1887 – 1961)
Famous quotes:
B. F. Skinner
“Education is what survives
when what has been learned
has been forgotten.”
“The real problem is not
whether machines think but
whether men do.”
“A behavior followed by a
reinforcing stimulus results in
an increased probability of
that behavior occurring in the
future.
A behavior no longer followed
by the reinforcing stimulus
results in a decreased
probability of that behavior
occurring in the future. “
(1904 – 1990)
Famous quote:
Alan Turing
Founder of computer science,
mathematician, philosopher,
codebreaker, strange
visionary and a gay man
before his time.
This early computer scientist
developed a test designed to
answer the question ‘Can
machines think?’. In the test
an interrogator attempts to
distinguish between machine
and human responses.
I propose to consider the
question "Can machines
think?" This should begin with
definitions of the meaning of
the terms "machine" and
"think."
(1912 – 1954)
Famous Quotes:
Famous quotes:
Wernher von Braun
“Basic research is what I am
doing when I don't know what
I am doing.”
“I have learned to use the
word 'impossible' with the
greatest caution. “
This man was one of the
world's first and foremost
“We can lick gravity, but
rocket engineers and a
sometimes the paperwork is
leading authority on space
overwhelming.”
travel. His will to expand
man's knowledge through the
“There is just one thing I can
exploration of space led to the
promise you about the outerdevelopment of the Explorer
space program: your dollar will satellites, the Jupiter and
go further.”
Jupiter-C rockets, Pershing,
the Redstone rocket, Saturn
“Man is the best computer we rockets, and Skylab, the
can put aboard a spacecraft... world's first space station.
and the only one that can be
Additionally, his determination
mass produced with unskilled to "go where no man has gone
labor.”
before" led to mankind setting
foot on the moon.
James D. Watson
(1928 - ____)
One could not be a successful
scientist without realizing that,
a goodly number of scientists
are not only narrow-minded
and dull, but also just stupid.
US biochemist
(1912 – 1977)
Famous quote:
Thomas J. Watson
“I think there's a world market
for about five computers.”
This business executive
adopted for IBM the slogan,
"World peace through world
trade," and made it
internationally known. He said
he advocated "the exchange
not only of goods and services
but of men and methods,
ideas and ideals."
(1874 – 1956)
James Watt
(1736 – 1819)
Inventor of the steam engine.
“Steam Governor”
Euclid
Ernest Rutherford
Neil Armstrong
Thomas Huxley
(1825 – 1895)
Aldous Huxley
(1894– 1963)
“There is no "royal road" to
geometry.” (to King Ptolemy I)
All science is either physics or
stamp collecting.
"That's one small step for
man, one giant leap for
mankind."
The great tragedy of Science the slaying of a beautiful
hypothesis by an ugly fact.
"Maybe this world is another
planet's Hell."