Atlas Shrugged Science Quotes Page 1
Citations follow this format: (Volume.Chapter.Section.Page). We used the 50th Anniversary Edition published by Signet Books in 2007.
| Quote #1 She felt, at the same time, a growing respect for the adversary, for a science that was so clean, so strict, so luminously rational. Studying mathematics, she felt, quite simply and at once, "How great that men have done this." (1.3.2.4) |
Dagny's love of math crops up often in the book; it represents her worldview, which favors reason over emotion. The language used to describe mathematics here is interesting: adversary, clean, strict, rational. These are terms that apply both to Dagny herself and to things she admires (like a good challenge).
| Quote #2 "Let's find out" was the motive he gave to Dagny and Eddie for anything he undertook, or "Let's make it." These were his only forms of enjoyment. (1.5.2.34) |
Francisco is the embodiment of an engineer here, taking joy in discovering, making, and doing. Engineers are celebrated throughout the novel, and it's no accident that Dagny herself studied engineering.
| Quote #3 They spoke of the [Rearden] metal and of the possibilities which they could not exhaust. It was as if they were standing on a mountain top, seeing a limitless plain below and roads open in all directions. But they merely spoke of mathematical figures, of weights, of pressures, resistances, costs. (1.4.8.95) |
Rearden Metal symbolizes the achievements of people who share Galt's values. It also serves as a sort of symbolic "victim" in the struggle with the looters, who continually try to steal and misuse it. Rearden Metal also adds to the book's alternate universe/science fiction-y feel. The "merely" is used somewhat ironically here, since, in this book's value system, things like science and math and money are considered very worthy topics of conversation.
