Help finding a quote?
Posted on: May 21, 2009 - 10:49pm
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Help finding a quote?
I've tried all combinations of keywords, but can't find the quote I'm looking for. It goes something like: "When we look into space, we see a world of the infinitely large, but when we look into a microscope, we see another world of the infinitely small..." and so on.
My Brand New Blog - Jesu Ad Nauseum.
God of the Gaps: As knowledge approaches infinity, God approaches zero. It's introductory calculus.
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I can't find it either...
Where the telescope ends, the microscope begins. Which of the two has the grander view? - Victor Hugo
Is this it?
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, | As I foretold you, were all spirits, and | Are melted into air, into thin air; | And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, | The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, | The solemn temples, the great globe itself, - Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, | And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, | Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff | As dreams are made on, and our little life | Is rounded with a sleep. - Shakespeare
Well, your words strongly suggest Carl Sagan. They also suggest the short movie “Powers of Ten”.
Try this Sagan quote which is quite close:
“Suppose that I cut a piece of this apple pie, crumbly but good. And now suppose that we cut this piece in half, more or less. And then cut this piece in half and keep going. How many cuts before we get down to an individual atom? The answer is about ninety successive cuts. Of course this knife is not sharp enough, the pie is to crumbly and an atom is too small to see in any case but there is a way to do it.”
(here I am skipping some of his wool gathering about the nature of matter)
“When we consider cutting this apple pie down beyond a single atom, we confront an infinity of the very small. And when we look up at the night sky, we confront an infinity of the very large. These infinites are among the most awesome of human ideas. They represent an unending regress that goes on, not just very far but forever.”
That was from episode 9 of Cosmos, “The live of the stars”.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=402246698468988536&ei=UuEXSvKQD4nKqgKZnOjBDA&q=cosmos&hl=en&emb=1
Also, if you have not seen it, here is “Powers of Ten”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2cmlhfdxuY
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I think that is it.