I'd wipe the machines off the face of the earth again, and end the industrial epoch absolutely, like a black read more

I'd wipe the machines off the face of the earth again, and end the industrial epoch absolutely, like a black mistake.

Form follows function. - "Lippincott's Magazine", March, 1896.

Form follows function. - "Lippincott's Magazine", March, 1896.

We have a habit in writing articles published in scientific journals to make the work as finished as possible, to read more

We have a habit in writing articles published in scientific journals to make the work as finished as possible, to cover up all the tracks, to not worry about the blind alleys or describe how you had the wrong idea at first, and so on. So there isn't any place to publish, in a dignified manner, what you actually did in order to get to do the work.

If you put garbage in a computer nothing comes out but garbage. But this garbage, having passed through a very read more

If you put garbage in a computer nothing comes out but garbage. But this garbage, having passed through a very expensive machine, is somehow ennobled and none dare criticize it.

People will accept your ideas much more readily if you tell them Benjamin Franklin said it first.

People will accept your ideas much more readily if you tell them Benjamin Franklin said it first.

What goes up must come down. Ask any system administrator.

What goes up must come down. Ask any system administrator.

As the births of living creatures, at first, are ill-shapen: so are all Innovations, which are the births of time.

As the births of living creatures, at first, are ill-shapen: so are all Innovations, which are the births of time.

Science is simply common sense at its best, that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic.

Science is simply common sense at its best, that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic.

In a manner which matches the fortuity, if not the consequence, of Archimedes' bath and Newton's apple, the 3.6 million read more

In a manner which matches the fortuity, if not the consequence, of Archimedes' bath and Newton's apple, the 3.6 million year old fossil footprints were eventually noticed one evening in September 1976 by the paleontologist Andrew Hill, who fell while avoiding a ball of elephant dung hurled at him by the ecologist David Western.