Remember that [scientific thought] is the guide of action; that the truth which it arrives at is not that which we can ideally contemplate without error, but that which we may act upon without fear; and you cannot fail to see that scientific thought is not an accompaniment or condition of human progress, but human progress itself.
Interpretation
Scientific thought provides a reliable framework for making decisions that drive human progress.
This quote emphasizes the vital role of scientific thought as a guiding principle for human action. It suggests that the truths derived from scientific inquiry are not only theoretical but are fundamental in enabling us to make decisions without fear, thereby underscoring that scientific thought is integral to true human progress rather than merely a supplementary aspect of it.
In practice
In a speech about the importance of research and innovation, I could use this quote to highlight how scientific thinking advances society.
The aim of scientific thought, then, is to apply past experience to new circumstances; the instrument is an observed uniformity in the course of events. By the use of this instrument it gives us information transcending our experience, it enables us to infer things that we have not seen from things that we have seen; and the evidence for the truth of that information depends on our supposing that the uniformity holds good beyond our experience.
Into this, for good or ill, is woven every belief of every man who has speech of his fellows. A awful privilege, and an awful responsibility, that we should help to create the world in which posterity will live.
This sense of power is the highest and best of pleasures when the belief on which it is founded is a true belief, and has been fairly earned by investigation.
We may always depend on it that algebra, which cannot be translated into good English and sound common sense, is bad algebra.
It is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.
In the good old days physicists repeated each other's experiments, just to be sure. Today they stick to FORTRAN, so that they can share each other's programs, bugs included.
Confronting climate change is, in the long run, one of the greatest challenges that we face, and you can see this duty or responsibility laid down in scriptures, clearly.
There are many who would much prefer that the word 'climate' never be mentioned and that the issue be eliminated from our national conversation.
We are all agreed that your theory is crazy. The question which divides us is whether it is crazy enough to have a chance of being correct. My own feeling is that it is not crazy enough.
Either CS (coordinate system) could be used with equal justification. The two sentences: the sun is at rest and the earth moves, or the sun moves and the earth is at rest, would simply mean two different conventions concerning two different CS
So far as physics is concerned, time's arrow is a property of entropy alone.
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