The end of science is not to prove a theory, but to improve mankind.
When I first went to college, I went into physics, and my goal was to help perfect nuclear fusion so I could solve the energy crisis and global warming. I probably would have done it, too, if I'd stuck to it.
Universal peace as a result of cumulative effort through centuries past might come into existence quickly - not unlike a crystal that suddenly forms in a solution which has been slowly prepared. Science is but a perversion of itself unless it has as its ultimate goal the betterment of humanity.
All science has one aim, namely, to find a theory of nature.
I think that we scientists are seeking an understanding of the natural world. We come in various types - chemists and physicists and biologists and such - and we all have the same goal. We are making progress.
The aim of science is always to reduce complexity to simplicity.
The central task of science is to arrive, stage by stage, at a clearer comprehension of nature, but this does not at all mean, as it is sometimes claimed to mean, a search for mastery over nature.
In art, truth is a means to an end; in science, it is the only end.
Science never makes things that do not have to do with what we feel, by which I mean what we want and what we fear.
I want to make a difference in the world because I believe that's what science is for.
