Great Throughts Treasury

This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.

Related Quotes

Stephen Hawking

If we do discover a complete [unified] theory [of the universe], it should be in time be understandable in broad principle by everyone, not just a few scientists. Then we shall all, philosophers, scientists, and just ordinary people, be able to take part in the discussion of the question of why it is that we and the universe exist. If we find the answer to that, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason – for then we should know the mind of God.

Discussion | God | Mind | People | Question | Reason | Time | Universe |

Albert Eustace Haydon

Faith in God is synonymous with the brave hope that the universe is friendly to the ideals of man.

Faith | God | Hope | Ideals | Man | Universe | God |

Stephen Hawking

Today scientists describe the universe in terms of two basic partial theories – the general theory of relativity and quantum mechanics. They are the great intellectual achievements of this century. The general theory of relativity describes the force of gravity and the large-scale structure of the universe (that is the structure on scales from only a few miles to as large as a million million million million miles – the size of the observable universe). Quantum mechanics, on the other hand, deals with phenomena on extremely small scales, such as a millionth of a millionth of an inch. Unfortunately, however, these two theories are known to be inconsistent with each other – they cannot both be correct.

Force | Phenomena | Size | Theories | Universe |

Stephen Hawking

The behavior of the universe on a very large scale seems to be simple and not chaotic.

Behavior | Universe |

John Hick, fully John Harwood Hick

The meaning for us of our human life depends upon what we believe to be the nature of the universe in which we find ourselves

Life | Life | Meaning | Nature | Universe |

William Ralph Inge

If the universe is running down like a clock, the clock must have been wound up at a date which we could name if we knew it. The world, if it is to have an end in time, must have had a beginning in time

Beginning | Time | Universe | World |

Jāmī, fully DJāmī, Mawlanā Nūr al-Dīn 'Abd al-Rahmān or Abd-Al-Rahmān Nur-Al-Din Muhammad Dashti NULL

The universe is the outward visible expression of the Real, and the Real is the inner unseen reality of the Universe.

Reality | Universe |

David Hockey

Life learns how to exploit and control its environment by perceiving, investigating, understanding, then utilizing the relationships that exist between objects and events. This is possible because the universe is causally constructed.

Control | Events | Exploit | Life | Life | Understanding | Universe |

Julian Huxley, fully Sir Julian Sorell Huxley

Any conflict which prevents the personality from attaining wholeness is a hindrance: all taboos against considering any part of the universe in relation to man and his destiny are hindrances; so, too, are all restrictions upon the free use of reason, or the free appeal of conscience. In other words, any religion which is not an affirmation of the ultimate value of truth and knowledge, beauty and its expression, and goodness and moral action, which ever sets itself up against these, is in that respect a false, low and incomplete religion.

Action | Beauty | Conscience | Destiny | Knowledge | Man | Personality | Reason | Religion | Respect | Truth | Universe | Wholeness | Words | Respect | Beauty | Value |

Lao Tzu, ne Li Urh, also Laotse, Lao Tse, Lao Tse, Lao Zi, Laozi, Lao Zi, La-tsze

Everything in the universe is created from something, which in turn is created from nothing.

Nothing | Universe |

John Koster

Darwin’s and Huxley’s picture of man’s place in the universe prepared the way for the Holocaust… Darwin the scientist directly inspired Nietzsche’s superman theory and the Nazi corollary that some people were subhuman… People have to learn to stop thinking of other people as machines and learn to think of them as men and women possessed of souls… History doesn’t need another one hundred million deaths to prove that scientific atheism is a form of mental illness.

Atheism | History | Machines | Man | Men | Need | People | Thinking | Universe | Learn | Think |

Bibhuti Mazumder

The body is mortal but the changeless Spirit within is immortal. It pervades the universe and is indestructible. No one has the power to change the changeless.

Body | Change | Mortal | Power | Spirit | Universe |