It is hard to look at the tumor and not come away with the feeling that one has encountered a powerful monster in its infancy
Siddhartha MukherjeeRead
The history is important because science is a discipline deeply immersed in history. In other words, every time you perform an experiment in science or in medicine, what you're actually doing is you're answering someone, answering a question raised by someone in the past.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Science builds upon historical knowledge and past inquiries.
Siddhartha Mukherjee emphasizes the significance of history in scientific endeavors. He argues that every scientific experiment is not just a standalone effort but a response to historical questions and challenges posed by previous thinkers, showcasing the continuity of knowledge and the importance of understanding the past in advancing current scientific practices.
Themes
ScienceHistoryExperimentationKnowledgePast
In practice
Example use cases
In a lecture on the history of science, you could introduce this quote to highlight how historical context shapes modern research.
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It felt—nearly twenty-five hundred years after Hippocrates had naively coined the overarching term karkinos—that modern oncology was hardly any more sophisticated in its taxonomy of cancer.
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