At quite uncertain times and places, James Clerk Maxwell More Quotes by James Clerk Maxwell More Quotes From James Clerk Maxwell In Science, it is when we take some interest in the great discoverers and their lives that it becomes endurable, and only when we begin to trace the development of ideas that it becomes fascinating. James Clerk Maxwell discoveryscienceideas I have looked into most philosophical systems and I have seen that none will work without God. James Clerk Maxwell most-philosophicalphilosophicalfound The true Logic for this world is the Calculus of Probabilities, which takes account of the magnitude of the probability. James Clerk Maxwell logicscienceworld Thoroughly conscious ignorance is the prelude to every real advance in science. James Clerk Maxwell consciousignorancereal I think men of science as well as other men need to learn from Christ, and I think Christians whose minds are scientific are bound to study science that their view of the glory of God may be as extensive as their being is capable. But I think that the results which each man arrives at in his attempts to harmonize his science with his Christianity ought not to be regarded as having any significance except to the man himself, and to him only for a time, and should not receive the stamp of a society. James Clerk Maxwell christianmenthinking The only laws of matter are those that our minds must fabricate and the only laws of mind are fabricated for it by matter. James Clerk Maxwell matterlawmind In every branch of knowledge the progress is proportional to the amount of facts on which to build, and therefore to the facility of obtaining data. James Clerk Maxwell progressdatabranches The student who uses home made apparatus, which is always going wrong, often learns more than one who has the use of carefully adjusted instruments, to which he is apt to trust and which he dares not take to pieces. James Clerk Maxwell piecesusehome Faraday is, and must always remain, the father of that enlarged science of electromagnetism. James Clerk Maxwell electromagnetismfather All the mathematical sciences are founded on relations between physical laws and laws of numbers. James Clerk Maxwell educationmathnumbers Science is incompetent to reason upon the creation of matter itself out of nothing. We have reached the utmost limit of our thinking faculties when we have admitted that because matter cannot be eternal and self-existent it must have been created. James Clerk Maxwell atheismselfthinking We can scarcely avoid the inference that light consists in the transverse undulations of the same medium which is the cause of electric and magnetic phenomena. James Clerk Maxwell causeslightscience Mathematicians may flatter themselves that they possess new ideas which mere human language is as yet unable to express. James Clerk Maxwell languagemayideas It is of great advantage to the student of any subject to read the original memoirs on that subject, for science is always most completely assimilated when it is in the nascent state. James Clerk Maxwell physicsstudentsscience In speaking of the Energy of the field, however, I wish to be understood literally. All energy is the same as mechanical energy, whether it exists in the form of motion or in that of elasticity, or in any other form. The energy in electromagnetic phenomena is mechanical energy. James Clerk Maxwell words-of-wisdomenergywish The chief philosophical value of physics is that it gives the mind something distinct to lay hold of, which, if you don't, Nature at once tells you you are wrong. James Clerk Maxwell philosophicalmindgiving An Experiment, like every other event which takes place, is a natural phenomenon; but in a Scientific Experiment the circumstances are so arranged that the relations between a particular set of phenomena may be studied to the best advantage. James Clerk Maxwell eventsmayscience Gin a body meet a body James Clerk Maxwell bodyairscience I have the capacity of being more wicked than any example that man could set me. James Clerk Maxwell wickedexamplemen The popularisation of scientific doctrines is producing as great an alteration in the mental state of society as the material applications of science are effecting in its outward life. Such indeed is the respect paid to science, that the most absurd opinions may become current, provided they are expressed in language, the sound of which recals [sic] some well-known scientific phrase. James Clerk Maxwell soundmindscience
