aphorisms

=aphorisms=

toc Read here a motley collection of aphorisms that relate to matters of scale

=On Contrasting Scales=

"We shall not cease from exploration And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive where we started And know the place for the first time." -- Little Gidding, (No. 4 of 'Four Quartets'), #5, T.S. Eliot

John Bonner:
 * "It is only natural that we should measure everything in the world around us in terms of our own size." p.7 Size matters
 * "Size Matters" – title of his book
 * "There is no corner of human endeavor and human thought that escapes the tentacles of size." p.151

"There is a lot of room down there." – Richard Feynman, referring to the nano-scale

"(Hindu god) Hanuman is present in every human being as a molecule!"

=On Perception= "Humankind lingers unregenerately in Plato's cave, still reveling, its age-old habit, in mere images of the truth." - Susan Sontag, on photography

"Fallor ergo sum" -- "I err therefore I am." – St. Augustine

=Miscellaneous=

‘I can call spirits from the vasty deep’, said Owen Glendower. ‘Why so can I, or so can any man,’ answered Hotspur, ‘but will they come when you do call for them?’ – Henry IV

"In the world of human thought generally, and in physical science particularly, the most important and most fruitful concepts are those to which it is impossible to attach a well-established meaning." - H. A. Kramers, statement at the Princeton Bicentennial Conference on the Future of Nuclear Energy, 1946, in K. K. Darrow Ed., Physical Science and Human Values, Princeton: Princeont University Press, 1947, p.196; quoted by Jammer "Mass" p.3

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