Matthew Mason

Favorite Quotes

5 min read

A collection of quotes that resonate with me.

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

The unexamined life is not worth living.

For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

  • Sir Isaac Newton, Newton’s Third Law; mathematician, physicist, astronomer, alchemist, theologian, and author (1642-1726)

You are the universe experiencing itself.

All models are wrong, but some are useful.

Science progresses one funeral at a time.

  • Max Planck, German theoretical physicist (1858–1947)

In anything at all, perfection is finally attained not when there's no longer anything to add, but when there is no longer anything to take away.

Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.

All our science, measured against reality, is primitive and childlike-and yet it is the most precious thing we have.

It is morally as bad not to care whether a thing is true or not, so long as it makes you feel good, as it is not to care how you got your money as long as you have got it.

  • Edwin Way Teale, Circles of the Seasons, American naturalist, photographer & writer (1899-1980)

The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself.

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.

  • Carl Sagan, American scientist and science communicator (1934–1996)

I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness.

We cannot have science in bits and pieces, applying it where we feel safe and ignoring where we feel threatened.

  • Carl Sagan, The Demon Haunted World, American scientist and science communicator (1934–1996)

If we crave some cosmic purpose, then let us find ourselves a worthy goal.

The visions we offer our children shape the future. It matters what those visions are. Often they become self-fulfilling prophecies. Dreams are maps.

  • Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot, American scientist and science communicator (1934–1996)

Saying you don't care about data privacy because you've got nothing to hide is like saying you don't care about freedom of speech because you've got nothing to say today.

  • Edward Snowden, American whistleblower and NSA contractor (1983-Living)

There are no rules here—we are trying to accomplish something.

Quote

First they came for the Communists And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Communist

Then they came for the Socialists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Socialist

Then they came for the trade unionists
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a trade unionist

Then they came for the Jews
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a Jew

Then they came for me
And there was no one left
To speak out for me.

The greatest obstacle to knowledge is not ignorance—it is the illusion of knowledge.

There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.

If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.

My battery is low and it’s getting dark.

  • Opportunity Rover, A poetic translation of the mars rovers last transmission. (2004-2018)

Allowing our Faith to dictate our history betrays both.

We are the only animals cursed with awareness.

You only see what you know.

When fascism comes to America, it will come wrapped in the flag and waving the cross.

  • Sinclair Lewis, American novelist and short story writer (1885-1951)

The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.

Nothing in biology makes sense, except in the light of evolution.

Consistency is the playground of dull minds.

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