Michael Crichton on thinking

Professor Johnston often said that if you didn’t know history, you didn’t know anything. You were a leaf that didn’t know it was part of a tree.

The romantic view of the natural world as a blissful Eden is only held by people who have no actual experience of nature.

Science is nothing more than a method of inquiry. The method says an assertion is valid — and merits universal acceptance — only if it can be independently verified.

Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.

Eleanor Roosevelt1884–1962

• Ideas

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

Aristotle384–322 BC

• Education
• Ideas

He who learns but does not think, is lost! He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.

Confucius551–479 BC

• Education