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Single Idea 22363

[from 'works' by Lord Kelvin (Wm Thomson), in 14. Science / B. Scientific Theories / 1. Scientific Theory ]

Full Idea

When you cannot express it in numbers, your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind; it may be the beginning of knowledge, but you have scarcely, in your thoughts, advanced to the stage of science, whatever the matter may be.

Gist of Idea

You have only begun to do real science when you can express it in numbers

Source

Lord Kelvin (Wm Thomson) (works [1881]), quoted by Reiss,J/Spreger,J - Scientific Objectivity 4.1

Book Reference

'Stanford Online Encyclopaedia of Philosophy', ed/tr. Stanford University [plato.stanford.edu], p.16


A Reaction

[Popular Lectures 1 p.73] Clearly the writer is a physicist! Astronomers discover objects, geologists discover structures, biologists reveal mechanisms.