Words&Dirt

“He could see Bonzo’s anger growing hot.  Hot anger was bad.  Ender’s anger was cold, and he could use it.  Bonzo’s was hot, and so it used him.”

––Ender’s Game, by Orson Scott Card, pg. 87

“The tentativeness of scientific conclusions is a source of continuous inspiration to scientists, but also of perennial frustration and misunderstandings for policymakers and the general public, all of whom would much rather be told ‘the Truth’ by scientists and be done with it––especially after paying millions of dollars to finance scientific research.  And yet there is a profound lesson in humility to bring home here.  It is rather ironic that science is often portrayed as the ultimate refuge of the arrogant, but that scientists themselves keep trying to explain to us the limits inherent in the human quest for knowledge about the world.”

––Answers for Aristotle, by Massimo Pigliucci, pg. 11