I think that in the discussion of natural problems we ought to begin not with the Scriptures, but with experiments, and demonstrations.
Interpretation
Galileo emphasizes the importance of empirical evidence over religious or scriptural beliefs in understanding nature.
In this quote, Galileo Galilei advocates for a scientific approach to understanding the natural world, suggesting that discussions about natural phenomena should start with direct observation and experimentation rather than relying on religious texts. This reflects the foundational principles of the scientific method, where evidence and experimentation lead to knowledge and understanding, challenging the dominant views of previously established authority.
In practice
In a lecture about the scientific method, you might say, 'As Galileo once stated, we must begin our discussions about nature with observations before any scripture.'
It has always seemed to me extreme presumptuousness on the part of those who want to make human ability the measure of what nature can and knows how to do, since, when one comes down to it, there is not one effect in nature, no matter how small, that even the most speculative minds can fully understand.
We must say that there are as many squares as there are numbers.
Science proceeds more by what it has learned to ignore than what it takes into account.
The sun, with all those planets revolving around it and dependent on it, can still ripen a bunch of grapes as if it had nothing else in the universe to do.
Philosophy is written in this grand book, the universe, which stands continually open to our gaze. But the book cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and read the letters in which it is composed.
That sculpture is more admirable than painting for the reason that it contains relief and painting does not is completely false. ... Rather, how much more admirable the painting must be considered, if having no relief at all, it appears to have as much as sculpture!
Mathematics deals exclusively with the relations of concepts to each other without consideration of their relation to experience.
We could call order by the name of God, but it would be an impersonal God. There's not much personal about the laws of physics.
The faster you go, the shorter you are.
Species evolve exactly as if they were adapting as best they could to a changing world, and not at all as if they were moving toward a set goal.
We know so much about planets and the universe and small particles and we do not know anything about the inner state of our own bodies, we do not know about this microcosm we have inside our skin.
...A one-pound box of prewashed lettuce contains 80 calories of food energy. According to Cornell ecologist David Pimentel, growing, chilling, washing, packaging, and transporting that box of organic salad to a plate on the East Coast takes more than 4,600 calories of fossil fuel energy, or 57 calories of fossil fuel for every calorie of food.
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