Stephen Jay Gould Quotes About Vision

Quotes about: Vision

• Good scholars struggle to understand the world in an integral way (pedants bite off tiny bits and worry them to death). These visions of reality [...] demand our respect, for they are an intellectual's only birthright. They are often entirely wrong and always flawed in serious ways, but they must be understood honorably and not subjected to mayhem by the excision of patches.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Struggle, Reality, Worry

  Stephen Jay Gould (1993). “Eight little piggies: reflections in natural history”, Vintage

• Before Kuhn, most scientists followed the place-a-stone-in-the-bright-temple-of-knowledge tradition, and would have told you that they hoped, above all, to lay many of the bricks, perhaps even the keystone, of truth's temple. Now most scientists of vision hope to foment revolution. We are, therefore, awash in revolutions, most self-proclaimed.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Self, Vision, Bricks

  "An Urchin in the Storm". Book by Stephen Jay Gould. "Cardboard Darwinism", p. 27, 1987.

• Hyper-selectionism has been with us for a long time in various guises; for it represents the late nineteenth century's scientific version of the myth of natural harmony all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds (all structures well designed for a definite purpose in this case). It is, indeed, the vision of foolish Dr. Pangloss, so vividly satirized by Voltaire in Candide the world is not necessarily good, but it is the best we could possibly have.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Long, Vision, Drs

  Stephen Jay Gould (2010). “The Panda's Thumb: More Reflections in Natural History”, p.57, W. W. Norton & Company

• Great theories are expansive; failures mire us in dogmatism and tunnel vision.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Tunnels, Vision, Dogmatism

  Stephen Jay Gould (1993). “Eight little piggies: reflections in natural history”, Vintage

• Nature is objective, and nature is knowable, but we can only view her through a glass darkly and many clouds upon our vision are of our own making: social and cultural biases, psychological preferences, and mental limitations (in universal modes of thought, not just individualized stupidity).

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Clouds, Glasses, Views

  Stephen Jay Gould (2011). “Full House”, p.8, Harvard University Press

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